Excerpt from Locomotive Appliances: This Volume Describes Important Attachments Used on Locomotives and the Rules and Regulations for Their Care and Operation; Forming One of the Series of Volumes Comprised in the Revised and Enlarged Edition of "Kirkman's Science of Railways" In the case of many mechanical inventions, it has often happened that the machine left the hands of its inventor in its most complicated and cumbrous form, and it remained for the practical man and operator afterward to simplify it, without reducing the advan tages of the mechanism as a whole, but rather increasing its efficiency. Thus, in the process of time, the machine, once complex and confusing In its many parts, became shorn of its excrescences, and simplicity rather than complexity characterized its construction. Such, however, has not been the case with the locomotive; early types were entirely lacking in the many appliances that now play so important a part in its operation, and which form the subject of this volume. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.