Technology & Engineering Books

CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTION. Our distance from the old world, and the favorable circumstances in which we have been placed with respect to the other nations of the new world, have made it so easy for our government to adhere to a pacific policy, that, in the sixty-two years that have elapsed since the acknowledgment of our national independence, we have enjoyed more than fifty-eight of general peace; our... more...

CHAPTER 2.   Infantry Drill Regulations. The greatest lesson of the present war is that the keynote of success is discipline. In trenches the direct control of the men is even less than in extended order in open warfare, and only thoroughly disciplined troops with a trusted leader can hope to succeed. The successful officer will show anger or irritation only in rare cases, and then by design: he will... more...

THE ART OF WARFARE "The Art of War, like every other art, possesses its theory, its principles; otherwise, it would not be an art."—MARSHAL FOCH. The Art of War, like any other art, is based upon certain fixed principles, and there is no short cut which hurries the student to his goal. The long and laborious line of study is the only safe way, and there are many pitfalls to be avoided on the... more...

INTRODUCTION Since the earliest communities of human beings first struggled for supremacy and protection, the principles of warfare have remained unchanged. New methods have been evolved and adopted with the progress of science, but no discovery, save perhaps that of gunpowder, has done so much in so short a time to revolutionize the conduct of war as aviation, the youngest, yet destined perhaps to be... more...

INTRODUCTORY It was at Mons in the third week of the Great War. The grey-green German hordes had overwhelmed the greater part of Belgium and were sweeping down into France whose people and military establishment were all unprepared for attack from that quarter. For days the little British army of perhaps 100,000 men, that forlorn hope which the Germans scornfully called "contemptible," but... more...

CHAPTER I IT IS an old saying that "any fool can farm," and this was almost the truth when farming consisted chiefly in reducing the fertility of new, rich land secured at practically no cost from a generous Government. But to restore depleted soils to high productive power in economic systems is no fool's job, for it requires mental as well as muscular energy; and no apologies should be... more...

I COMMUNICATION AMONG THE ANCIENTS     Signaling the Fall of Troy—Marine Signaling among the    Argonauts—Couriers of the Greeks, Romans, and    Aztecs—Sound-signaling—Stentorophonic Tube—The Shouting    Sentinels—The Clepsydra—Signal Columns—Indian Fire and Smoke    Signals. It was very early in the history of the world that man began to feel the urgent need of... more...

Depth of Soil for Fruit. Would four feet of good loose soil be enough for lemons? Four feet of good soil, providing the underlying strata are not charged with alkali, would give you a good growth of lemon trees if moisture was regularly present in about the right quantity, neither too much nor too little, and the temperature conditions were favorable to the success of this tree, which will not stand as... more...

THEORIES OF TUITION Only eight years ago, in 1908, it was declared impossible for one man to teach another to fly. Those few men who had risen from the ground in aeroplanes, notably the Wright brothers, were held to be endowed by nature in some very peculiar way; to be men who possessed some remarkable and hitherto unexplained sense of equilibrium. That these men would be able to take other... more...

First Dream. "Any fool can get into a hole."—Old Chinese proverb. "If left to you, for defence make spades."—Bridge Maxim. I felt lonely, and not a little sad, as I stood on the bank of the river near Duffer's Drift and watched the red dust haze, raised by the southward departing column in the distance, turn slowly into gold as it hung in the afternoon sunlight. It was just... more...