THE PRACTICAL MAN.

Thames Star, Volume VI, Issue 1821, 3 November 1874, Page 3

THE PRACTICAL MAN.

Ho .•••a!; beside us in a street-car. Ke looked over ova- shoulder at the neiv copy of the Scientific American, which, fresh from the press, avsis receiving' our final scrutiny, and requested the loan of the paper for a moment when v\ c had finished. He glanced at the first page, skimmed over the middle, and peep d into tho iusicie. '" I suppose that paper interests a great many people," he remarked. We modestly signified our assent. " Wa'li it don't me," he interrupted sharply. "Jt doseu't take no books or papers to learn me my business, you know. Never learned nuthin" from books in my life. Didn't have but a quarter's schoolin', and then I went into the shop. Served my time with old Pete Reynolds of Boston. You knovr.'d him inebbe ; dead now. Was his foreman; now I'm boss of my own works in tho city. I'm a I practical man, I atn. All yor hollergeys and hosserpliys may do well enough to write about: but they ain't no sorter use in the shop. They just pjifc into men's heads and set 'em a thiukin' about other things than their work, and then gifc inventin', and that's the last of 'em. Why, I had a likely young feller, who used to buy that paper and read _ on it, dinner lipur. Sometimes he'd stick it up on his lathe, until I stopped that mighty sudden. Wail, one day I caught him scrubbin' with a piece of chalk on a bit of board ; then I know'd the invention fit had got hold of him, and that he was a goner. A few weeks after he comes in the office, and, says he : " Boss, Ive got a little arrangement here that'll make the old lathe do better work,' 1 and he out with one of them reg'lar printed paytents, and sh6wed me a new attachment for making gearins, and sich.' ' Well,' says I,' you can go make yer masheen and set if up on the-lathe if yerwanter.' ' But the ungreatful villinbegau to say something about royalty and shop rights, and I told the b'ook-keepertopay him right off and let him clear out. Blow me if he didn't go over to Smith's across the street, and rig his affair there ; and the first ihing I know'd Smith Avas turain' out work at half my prices. Then I had to go find that feller, and pay him his blamed royalty and a heap it was too. " JN Tow, there was a good hand just spiled by readin'; if he'd a let that ere papers of yourn' alone he might ha' been a good, stiddy' man, gittin' his three dollars a day comfortable and reg'lar. JSTow they say he's makin' stamps by the thousand, but he's spiled. Won't be worth nuthin' ever for work again. Where'ud I Lave been if I'd pegged away at books and noozepapcrs:— eh t>"

Our practical friend did not wait for an answer ; for while we were cogitating a suitable response he suddenly made a bolt out of the car and rushed down a side street towards a dilapidated looking edifice, which we conjectured, was none other than the " works."

Our acquaintance carried off our paper. He honestly mailed it back to us the other day. "We smiled as we saw the thumb marks oa all the pages, and opposite an engraving there was a pencil note of: "I kno a better plan than this." Perhaps after all a patent idea in his brain has been aroused, or has he taken the invention fit ? Should he see this, he will promptly scout the ;,dea that our humble effort shave awakened him, for "itdosen't take no papers to learn me my business, you know." —Scientific American.