t
Folio Shakespeares, and command prices equal to those of other American
first editions. The little book is the only known incursion of its
author into literature, if we except the brief articles he has written
for technical papers and for the magazines. It contained what was at
once a full, elaborate, and terse explanation of a complete isolated
plant, with diagrams of various methods of connection and operation, and
a carefully detailed description of every individual part, its functions
and its characteristics. The remarkable success of those early years was
indeed only achieved by following up with Chinese exactness the minute
and intimate methods insisted upon by Edison as to the use of the
apparatus and devices employed. It was a curious example of establishing
standard practice while changing with kaleidoscopic rapidity all the
elements involved. He was true to an ideal as to the pole-star, but was
incessantly making improvements in every direction. With an iconoclasm
that has often seemed ruthless and brutal he did not hesitate to
sacrifice older devices the moment a new one came in sight that embodied
a real advance in securing effective results. The process is heroic but
costly. Nobody ever had a bigger scrap-heap than Edison; but who dare
proclaim the process intrinsically wasteful if the losses occur in the
initial stages, and the economies in all the later ones?

With Edison in this introduction of his lighting system the method
was ruthless, but not reckless. At an early stage of the commercial
development a standardizing committee was formed, consisting of the
heads of all the departments, and to this body was intrusted the task of
testing and criticising all existing and proposed devices, as well as of
considering the suggestions and complaints of workmen offered from
time to time. This procedure was fruitful in two principal results--the
education of the whole executive force in the technical details of
the system; and a constant improvement in the quality of the Edison
installations; both contributing to the rapid growth of the industry.

For many years Goerck Street played an important part in Edison's
affairs, being the centre of all his manufacture of heavy machinery. But
it was not in a desirable neighborhood, and owing to the rapid growth of
the business soon became disadvantageous for other reasons. Edison tells
of his frequent visits to the shops at night, with the escort of "Jim"
Russell, a w