The boys who read this book have the advantage of instructions showing
how to build apparatus that has actually been built and tested. You know
what size of wire to use and will not have to find it out for yourself.
For that reason you ought to be able to give more time to the
construction of such things. The purpose of this conclusion is simply a
plea for better work. The American boy is usually careless in this
regard. He often commences to build something and then, growing tired
before it is finished, lays it aside only to forget it and undertake
something else. _Finish whatever you undertake_. The principle is a good
one. Remember also that care with the little details is what insures
success in the whole.
If in carrying out your work, you get an idea, do not hesitate to try
it. A good idea never refused to be developed. It is not necessary to
stick absolutely to the directions that I have given. They will insure
success if followed, but if you think you can make an improvement, do
so.
Of course, such a book as this cannot, in the nature of things, be
exhaustive, nor is it desirable, in one sense, that it should be.
I have tried to write a book which, considered as a whole, would prove
to be exhaustive only in that it treats of almost every phase of
practical electricity.
The principle in mind has been to produce a work which would stimulate
the inventive faculties in boys, and to guide them until face to face
with those practical emergencies in which no book can be of any
assistance but which must be overcome by common sense and the exercise
of personal ingenuity.
The book is not as free from technical terms or phrases, as it lay in my
power to make it, because certain of those terms have a value and an
every-day use which are a benefit to the young experimenter who
understands them.
Any one subject treated in the various chapters of the "Boy Electrician"
may be developed far beyond that point to which I have taken it. The
railroad system could be fitted with electric signals, drawbridges, and
a number of other devices.
Many new ideas suggest themselves to the ready-witted American boy. I
shall always be pleased to hear from any boy who builds any of the
apparatus I have described, and, if possible, to receive photographs of
the work. I should be glad to be of any assistance to such a lad, but
remember that some of the drawings and text in this book required many
hours even to complete a small portion, and therefore please do not
write to ask how to build other apparatus not described herein. And, as
the future years bring new inventions and discoveries, no one now knows
but that, some day, perhaps I will write another "Boy Electrician."
THE END.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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