Rational Horse Shoeing and Wagon Making
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with rules, tables, recipes, etc., useful to
manufactures, blacksmiths, machinists,
well-drillers, engineers, liverymen,
horse-shoers, farmers, wagon-makers,
mechanics, amateurs and all others who have
occasion to perform the work for which this
book is primarily intended.
successful nor respected as before is his intemperance. The
danger for the smith becoming a drunkard is greater than for
any other mechanic. It is often the case that when a customer
pays a bill the smith is requested to treat. This is a bad habit
and quite a tax on the smith. Just think of it-fifteen cents a day
spent for liquor, will, in twenty-five years, amount to $9,000.
Then add to this fifteen cents a day for cigars, which will, in
twenty-five years, amount to $9,000 at ten per cent compound
interest. If these two items would be saved, it will give a man
a farm worth $18,000 in twenty-five years. How many smiths
are there who ever think of this? I would advise every one to
put aside just as much as he spends for liquor and tobacco;
that is, when you buy cigars or tobacco for twenty-five cents
put aside as much. When you buy liquor for one dollar put
aside one dollar. Try this for one year and it will stimulate to
continual effort in that direction. The best thing to do is to
"swear off" at once, and if you must have it, take it out of
with another, and the opportunity comes too often. When you have finished some difficult work you are to be treated
j when you trust you are to be treated; when you accommodate one before another you are to be treated; when
you order the stock from the traveling man you are to be treated. Some smiths keep a bottle in a corner to draw
customers by; others tap a keg of beer every Saturday for the same purpose. No smith will ever gain anything by this
bad practice. He will only get undesirable customers, and strictly temperance people will shun him for it. What he
gains on one side he will lose on another. Besides this he will in the long run ruin himself physically and financially.
Let the old smith quit and the apprentice never begin this dangerous habit. A smith that is drunk or half drunk cannot
do his duty to his customers, and they know it, and prefer to patronize a sober smith.