but this process has its limitations also, and the fact remains
that with a gasoline machine it is possible to carry a given load
only so fast, but if the machine moves it all, it will continue to
move on until the load is increased, or the road changes for the
worse.

When the farmer hears of an eight horse-power machine he thinks of
the wonderful things eight good horses can do on the road, and is
surprised when the machine fails to go up hills that teams travel
every day; he does not understand it, and wonders where the power
comes in. He is not enough of a mechanic to reflect that the eight
horse-power is demonstrated in the carrying of a ton over average
roads one hundred and fifty miles in ten hours, something eight
horses could not possibly do.

Just as we were entering the valley of Lebanon, beyond the village
of Brainerd, while going down a slight descent, my Companion
exclaimed,--

"The wheel is coming off." I threw out the clutch, applied the
brake, looked, and saw the left front wheel roll gracefully and
quite deliberately out from under the big metal mud guard; the
carriage settled down at that corner, and the end of the axle
ploughed a furrow in the road for a few feet, when we came to a
stop.

The steering-head had broken short off at the inside of the hub.
We were not going very fast at the time, and the heavy metal mud
guard which caught the wheel, acting as a huge brake, saved us
from a bad smash.