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+This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements,
+metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be
+in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES.
+
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+Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for
+eBook #52069 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/52069)
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-The Project Gutenberg EBook of Lives of Boulton and Watt, by Samuel Smiles
-
-This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most
-other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
-whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of
-the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at
-www.gutenberg.org.  If you are not located in the United States, you'll have
-to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook.
-
-Title: Lives of Boulton and Watt
-       Principally from the Original Soho Mss.
-
-Author: Samuel Smiles
-
-Release Date: May 15, 2016 [EBook #52069]
-
-Language: English
-
-Character set encoding: UTF-8
-
-*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LIVES OF BOULTON AND WATT ***
-
-
-
-
-Produced by Chris Curnow, Rosanna Murphy, and the Online
-Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
-file was produced from images generously made available
-by The Internet Archive)
-
-
-
-
-
-Transcriber’s Note: Italic text is denoted by _underscores_,
-and superscripted text is preceded by a caret (^).
-
-
-
-
-                                   LIVES
-
-                                    OF
-
-                             BOULTON AND WATT.
-
-
-
-
-BY THE SAME AUTHOR.
-
-
-  LIVES OF BRITISH ENGINEERS, from the Earliest Times to the Death
-      of Robert Stephenson; with an Account of their Principal Works,
-      and a HISTORY OF INLAND COMMUNICATION IN BRITAIN. With Portraits
-      and 270 Woodcuts. 3 Vols. 8vo. 63_s._
-
-  SELF-HELP; WITH ILLUSTRATIONS OF CHARACTER AND CONDUCT. Post 8vo.
-      6_s._
-
-  ‘SELF-HELP,’ OU CARACTÈRE, CONDUITE ET PERSÉVÉRANCE, Illustrés à
-      l’aide de Biographie. Traduit de l’Anglais par ALFRED TALANDIER
-      sur le texte revu et corrigé par l’Auteur. Post 8vo. 5_s._
-
-  INDUSTRIAL BIOGRAPHY: IRON-WORKERS AND TOOL-MAKERS. A Companion
-      Volume to ‘Self-Help.’ Post 8vo. 6_s._
-
-  JAMES BRINDLEY AND THE EARLY ENGINEERS. [Abridged from ‘Lives of
-      the Engineers.’] With Illustrations. Post 8vo. 6_s._
-
-  STORY OF THE LIFE OF GEORGE STEPHENSON INCLUDING A MEMOIR OF HIS
-      SON ROBERT STEPHENSON. [Abridged from ‘Lives of the Engineers.’]
-      With Illustrations. Post 8vo. 6_s._
-
-  WORKMEN’S EARNINGS,--SAVINGS,--AND STRIKES: Reprinted from the
-      ‘Quarterly Review.’ Post 8vo. 1_s._ 6_d._
-
-                      JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET.
-
-
-
-
-[Illustration: _James Watt F.R.S._
-
-_Engraved by W. Holl, after the portrait by Sir W. Beechy, R.A._
-
-_Published by John Murray, Albemarle Street, 1865._]
-
-
-
-
-                                   LIVES
-
-                                    OF
-
-                             BOULTON AND WATT.
-
-
-                  PRINCIPALLY FROM THE ORIGINAL SOHO MSS.
-
-
-                              COMPRISING ALSO
-
-                A HISTORY OF THE INVENTION AND INTRODUCTION
-                           OF THE STEAM-ENGINE.
-
-
-
-
-                             BY SAMUEL SMILES,
-
-                  AUTHOR OF ‘INDUSTRIAL BIOGRAPHY,’ ETC.
-
-
-
-
-                                  LONDON:
-
-                      JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET.
-
-                                   1865.
-
-
-                  _The right of Translation is reserved._
-
-
-
-
-       LONDON: PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, STAMFORD STREET,
-                            AND CHARING CROSS.
-
-
-
-
-PREFACE.
-
-
-The present volume concludes the author’s ‘Lives of the Engineers.’ Its
-preparation was begun many years since. The favourable reception given to
-the ‘Life of George Stephenson,’ the principal improver and introducer
-of the locomotive engine, encouraged the author to follow it by a Life
-of James Watt, the principal inventor and introducer of the condensing
-engine. On making inquiries, however, he found that the subject had
-already been taken in hand by J. P. Muirhead, Esq., the literary executor
-of the late Mr. Watt, of Aston Hall, near Birmingham. As Mr. Muirhead was
-in all respects entitled to precedence, and was, moreover, in possession
-of the best sources of information, the author’s contemplated Life of Watt
-was abandoned, and he satisfied himself with embodying the substance of
-the materials he had collected in a review of Mr. Muirhead’s work, which
-appeared in the ‘Quarterly Review’ for July, 1858.
-
-Having recently, however, through the kindness of M. P. W. Boulton, Esq.,
-of Tew Park, Oxon, been enabled to examine the extensive collection of
-documents brought from Soho, including the original correspondence between
-Watt and Small, between Watt and Boulton, and between the latter and his
-numerous intimate friends and business correspondents, it has appeared
-to the author that, notwithstanding the valuable publications of Mr.
-Muirhead, the story of the life of Watt is one that will well bear to be
-told again, in connexion with the life and labours of Matthew Boulton of
-Soho. The two men were so intimately related during the most important
-period of their lives, and their biographies so closely intermingle, that
-it is almost impossible to separate them. They are therefore treated
-conjointly in the present volume, under the title of ‘Boulton and
-Watt,’ the name of the old Soho firm which so long enjoyed a world-wide
-reputation. But though the name of Boulton takes priority in the title,
-that of Watt will be found in many respects the most prominent in the
-narrative.
-
-The MS. papers which have been consulted for the purposes of the present
-volume are of an unusually complete and varied character. They consist
-of several thousand documents selected from the tons of business books
-and correspondence which had accumulated at Soho. The most important
-were selected and arranged by the late M. Robinson Boulton, Esq., who
-entertained the highest regard for his father's memory; and, from the
-character of the collection, the author inclines to the opinion that
-it must have been made with a view to the preparation and publication
-of a Life of Matthew Boulton,--which has not, however, until now been
-undertaken. Thus, among sundry papers endorsed “M. Boulton--Biographical
-Memoirs,” is found a MS. memoir in the handwriting of James Watt, entitled
-“Memorandum concerning Mr. Boulton, commencing with my first acquaintance
-with him,” and another of a similar character, by Mr. James Keir,--both
-written shortly after Mr. Boulton’s death. Another collection, endorsed
-“Familiarum Epistolæ et Selectæ, 1755 to 1808,” contains letters received
-from various distinguished personages in the course of Mr. Boulton’s
-long and interesting career. The number of original documents is indeed
-so large, that, but for a rigid exclusion of non-essential matter, these
-Lives must have expanded into several volumes, instead of being compressed
-into one. But the author believes labour to be well bestowed in practising
-the art of condensation, and that the interest of biography gains much by
-judicious rejection. What Watt said to Murdock as to the production of
-a machine, holds equally true as to the production of a book,--“It is a
-great thing,” said Watt, “to know what to do without.”
-
-Besides the memoirs of Boulton and Watt, which occupy the principal places
-in the following volume, it will also be found to contain memoirs of the
-other inventors who have at various times laboured at the invention and
-application of the steam-engine,--of the Marquis of Worcester, Dionysius
-Papin, Thomas Savery, and Thomas Newcomen. The author has also been
-enabled to gather from the Boulton papers a memoir of William Murdock,
-which probably contains all that is likely to be collected respecting that
-excellent and most ingenious mechanic.
-
-In addition to the essential assistance received from M. P. W. Boulton,
-Esq., in preparing the present book, without which it would not have been
-undertaken, the author desires to record his acknowledgments to J. W.
-Gibson Watt, Esq., for information relative to James Watt;--to Charles
-Savery, Esq., Clifton, J. T. Savery, Esq., Modbury, Lieutenant-Colonel
-Yolland, R.E., and Quartermaster Connolly, R.E., for various facts as
-to the family history and professional career of Thomas Savery, inventor
-of the “Fire Engine;”--and to Thomas Pemberton, Esq., Heathfield; W. C.
-Aitkin, Esq., Coventry; George Williamson, Esq., Greenock; the late J.
-Murdock, Esq., Handsworth; and the late Mr. William Buckle, of the Royal
-Mint, formerly of Soho,--for various information as to the lives and
-labours of Boulton and Watt.
-
-In his treatment of the subject, it will be observed that the author has
-endeavoured, as much as possible, to avoid introducing technical details
-relating to the steam-engine. Those who desire further information
-on such points, are referred to the works of Farey, Tredgold, Bourne,
-Scott Russell, Muirhead (‘Mechanical Inventions of James Watt’), and
-other technical treatises on the subject, where they will find detailed
-particulars of the various inventions which are only incidentally referred
-to in the following pages.
-
-    _London, October, 1865._
-
-
-
-
-CONTENTS.
-
-
-                                CHAPTER I.
-
-  Anecdote of Matthew Boulton and George III.--Roger Bacon on steam
-    power--Early inventors, their steam machines and apparatus--Hero
-    of Alexandria, Branca, De Caus--The Marquis of Worcester--His
-    water-works--His imprisonment--His difficulties--The
-    water-commanding engine--His “Century of Inventions”--Obscurity
-    of descriptions of his steam-engine--Persevering struggles--His
-    later years and death                                     Page 1–26
-
-
-                                CHAPTER II.
-
-  Zeal of the Marchioness of Worcester--Sir Samuel Morland--His
-    pumps and fire-engines--His privations and death--Dr.
-    Dionysius Papin--His digester--Experiments on the power of
-    steam--His steam-engine--Proposed steamboat--Early schemes
-    of paddle-boats--Blasco Garay--Papin’s model engine and
-    boat--Destroyed by boatmen--Papin’s death                     27–38
-
-
-                               CHAPTER III.
-
-  Thomas Savery--The Savery family--Savery’s mechanical experiments
-    and contrivances--His paddle-boat--Treatise on ‘Navigation
-    Improved’--Cornish mines and the early pumping machinery--Savery’s
-    “Fire-engine”--Exhibition of his model--Explanations in the
-    ‘Miner’s Friend’--The engine tried in Cornwall--Its failure at
-    Broadwaters, Staffordshire--Savery’s later years--His death and
-    testament                                                     39–58
-
-
-                                CHAPTER IV.
-
-  Slow progress in invention of the steam-engine--Thomas Newcomen
-    of Dartmouth--His study of steam-power--Correspondence with Dr.
-    Hooke of the Royal Society--Newcomen’s experiments--Assisted
-    by John Calley--Newcomen’s atmospheric engine--Newcomen and
-    Calley erect their first engine--Humphrey Potter the turn-cock
-    boy’s contrivance--Engines erected at Newcastle-on-Tyne, Leeds,
-    and Cornwall--Wheal Fortune engine--Mr. William Lemon--Joseph
-    Hornblower--Jonathan Hulls and steam propulsion of ships--His
-    steamboat--Extended use of the Newcomen engines in Cornwall and
-    northern mining counties--Payne, Brindley, and Smeaton, improvers
-    of the steam-engine                                           59–76
-
-
-                                CHAPTER V.
-
-  James Watt, his birthplace and lineage--His grandfather the
-    mathematician--Cartsdyke and Greenock in the last century--James
-    Watt’s father--His multifarious occupations--His mother--Watt’s
-    early years--His fragile constitution--Sent to school--His first
-    visit to Glasgow--His indulgence in storytelling--His boyish
-    ingenuity--His home education--The Stuart rebellion--Watt’s love
-    of scientific pursuits--Sent to Glasgow to learn the trade of
-    mathematical-instrument maker                                 77–95
-
-
-                                CHAPTER VI.
-
-  Glasgow in 1754--The Glasgow tobacco lords--The early clubs,
-    and social habits of the merchants--Watt’s master--Leaves
-    Glasgow, and proceeds to London on horseback--Is placed with
-    a mathematical-instrument maker--His progress in learning the
-    trade--Frugal living in London--Danger from pressgangs--His
-    infirm health--Returns to Scotland--Refused permission to begin
-    business in Glasgow--Gains asylum in the College--His workshop
-    there--Makes musical instruments--His various reading and
-    studies--Intercourse with the professors--Intimate relations of
-    Watt with Robison--Robison’s estimate of Watt                96–116
-
-
-                               CHAPTER VII.
-
-  Robison and Watt’s conferences on the power of steam--Dr. Black
-    and latent heat--Watt’s experiments on steam--His apparatus--The
-    college model of the Newcomen engine arrives from London--Watt’s
-    experiments upon it--His difficulties and perseverance--His
-    instrument-making business improves--Takes a partner and opens
-    a shop in the Salt Market--His marriage--Continued experiments
-    on steam--His Sunday walk on Glasgow Green, and his first idea
-    of the condensing engine--His experiments with the model, and
-    successive difficulties--Anecdote of Watt and Robison and the
-    new apparatus--The model engine--Removes to a cellar and erects
-    a working engine--Mechanical and financial difficulties     118–137
-
-
-                               CHAPTER VIII.
-
-  Watt’s introduction to Dr. Roebuck--Begins business as
-    surveyor--Surveys canals--Partnership with Roebuck in the
-    engine--Difficulties in constructing the engine--Watt’s visit to
-    Kinneil--A patent determined on--Watt’s despondency--Continues
-    his improvements--Learns German--Correspondence with Dr.
-    Small--Specification of patent lodged--Watt erects a trial
-    engine--The washhouse behind Kinneil--The engine completed--Its
-    defects--Roebuck’s embarrassments--Watt accepts engagement to
-    superintend canal works--Employed in various surveys--Designs
-    Hamilton Bridge--Supplies plans for dock and pier at Port Glasgow
-    and harbour at Ayr--Illness and death of Mrs. Watt--Dr. Roebuck’s
-    ruin--Turning point in Watt’s fortunes                      138–158
-
-
-                                CHAPTER IX.
-
-  Birmingham in early times--Its industry--Roads--William Hutton--The
-    Boulton family--Matthew Boulton begins business--His trade
-    correspondence--His marriage--His love of business--Snow-hill
-    and Soho--Partnership with Fothergill--Aims at excellence
-    in his productions--Emulates Wedgwood--Surpasses French
-    art-manufacturers--His royal and noble patrons--Employs the
-    best artists--Visits of foreigners at Soho--Extension of
-    business--Promotes canals--His vast business--Commercial
-    panic--Boulton’s scientific pursuits                        161–181
-
-
-                                CHAPTER X.
-
-  Water- and horse-power at Soho--Boulton’s correspondence
-    with Benjamin Franklin concerning fire-engine--Boulton’s
-    model--Correspondence with Dr. Darwin and Dr. Roebuck--Watt
-    visits Soho--First meeting of Boulton and Watt--Correspondence
-    of Boulton and Watt, and of Dr. Small and Watt--Dr. Roebuck
-    visits Boulton--Watt’s anxiety for Boulton to join him--Watt’s
-    discouragements--His continued experiments and their failure--Watt
-    engineer for the Monkland Canal--Commercial panic--Watt loses
-    employment as canal engineer--Roebuck’s failure--Terms of proposed
-    partnership between Watt, Small, and Boulton--Roebuck’s share in
-    Watt’s engine transferred to Boulton--Watt’s arrival at
-    Birmingham                                                  182–198
-
-
-                                CHAPTER XI.
-
-  Characteristics of Matthew Boulton--Contrast between him and
-    Watt--Boulton’s friends--Watt’s engine at Soho--Boulton’s
-    views of engine business--The Kinneil engine re-erected
-    at Soho--Works successfully--Inquiries for pumping-engines
-    from the mining districts--Proposed extension of patent by
-    an Act--Watt in London--Death of Dr. Small--Watt invited to
-    Russia--Application to Parliament for extension of engine
-    patent--Application opposed--Watt’s arguments--Act obtained--Watt
-    returns to Birmingham--The manufacture of engines begun--The
-    Wilkinsons--First iron vessel                               199–213
-
-
-                               CHAPTER XII.
-
-  Watt’s house, Harper’s Hill--First order for engines--Boulton’s
-    activity--The London engineers prophesy the failure of Watt’s
-    engine--Watt revisits Glasgow--His second marriage--Terms of
-    partnership between Boulton and Watt--Orders from Scotland for
-    engines--Boulton pressed with work and anxiety--Watt returns
-    to Soho with his wife--Order for engine for Tingtang and
-    Chacewater mines, Cornwall--Watt and the Shadwell Waterworks
-    Committee--Stratford-le-Bow engine--Difficulties with workmen at
-    Soho, and with unskilled enginemen--Expansive working       214–229
-
-
-                               CHAPTER XIII.
-
-  Inefficiency of the Newcomen pumping-engines--More orders from
-    Cornwall--Watt in Cornwall--United Mines district--Mines
-    drowned--Watt and Jonathan Hornblower--Mrs. Watt’s
-    account of Cornwall--Chacewater engine finished--Its
-    successful working--Watt’s embarrassments and financial
-    difficulties--Boulton’s courage and perseverance, and
-    Fothergill’s despondency--Fire at Soho--Engine royalty on
-    savings of fuel--Altercations with adventurers--Watt’s frequent
-    calls for Boulton’s help--Boulton’s harassments--Proceeds to
-    Cornwall--Watt’s return to Birmingham--His despondency--Boulton
-    sustains the firm--Orders for engines from abroad--William
-    Murdock, his excellencies of character and ability--First
-    interview with Boulton and engagement--Sent to Cornwall--His
-    mode of dealing with the captains--Watt’s altercations with the
-    Cornishmen--His reliance on Boulton--Altercation with
-    Trevithick                                                  230–260
-
-
-                               CHAPTER XIV.
-
-  Lieutenant Henderson in Cornwall--Boulton’s financial embarrassments
-    increase--Boulton and Fothergill--The “Soho pictures”--Watt’s
-    letter-copying machine--Boulton pushes the machine--Demand for
-    copying-presses--More financial difficulties--Watt’s sufferings
-    and melancholy--More Cornish engines wanted--Engine-dues--Boulton
-    cheers Watt--Mining adventurers’ meetings--Boulton and
-    Watt take shares--The mines--Boulton organises the mining
-    business--Boulton’s house at Cosgarne, Cornwall--Mrs. Watt
-    describes her husband’s miseries and weakness--The engine
-    patent threatened by the Cornish men--Watt on patent right--The
-    Birmingham Copper Company--Boulton improves engine-boilers by
-    introducing tubes--His MSS. and drawings concerning mechanical
-    and scientific experiments--His indefatigable industry      261–284
-
-
-                                CHAPTER XV.
-
-  Watt again visits Cornwall--Rotary motion--The crank-engine at
-    Soho--Theft of the invention--Matthew Washborough--Smeaton
-    and steam-power--Rotary-motion engine--Boulton and Watt’s
-    cares--Evasions of the engine patent--The Hornblowers’
-    engine--Watt’s new inventions--Boulton’s confidence in the
-    engine--Air-engine--Watt’s fears for the patent--The rotary engine
-    invented--New improvements introduced--The equalising beam--Watt’s
-    ill health and humour--Various expedients for producing circular
-    motion--Murdock’s sun-and-planet motion--Patent taken for the
-    reciprocating expansive engine--Troubles with workmen--Murdock’s
-    efficiency and popularity--Watt’s despondency--The firm’s London
-    agent’s house burnt--Gloomy prospects of the mining trade   285–316
-
-
-                               CHAPTER XVI.
-
-  Financial position of the firm--Rotary engines for mills--Boulton’s
-    battles with the Cornish adventurers--His life in
-    Cornwall--Murdock and the miners--The Hornblowers’ engine at
-    Radstoke--Watt at Bristol--Major Tucker--Steam mills--Rotary
-    motion applied--The first rotative engines--Pumping-engines for
-    the Fens--Boulton’s health fails--He visits Scotland, Carron
-    ironworks, Lord Dundonald--His extensive correspondence--Grumbling
-    in Cornwall--Concessions to the miners--Press of work
-    at Soho--Watt’s invention of the parallel motion and the
-    governor--Murdock’s model locomotive--Boulton’s praise of
-    Murdock--More pumping-engines wanted--Boulton’s affection for his
-    children--Letter to his son--His scientific recreations--Domestic
-    enjoyment at Cosgarne                                       317–341
-
-
-                               CHAPTER XVII.
-
-  Boulton’s action in commercial politics--His interview with
-    Pitt--Agitation against Pitt’s commercial policy--The “Irish
-    resolutions”--Watt on free commerce--Is opposed to political
-    agitation--Combination against patents--Fluctuations in the
-    business at Soho--Engine orders from various quarters--The
-    Cornish copper-miners--The Copper Company formed, and Boulton’s
-    part in it--Riots in Cornwall--Boulton’s life threatened--The
-    esteem in which he was held in Cornwall--His intimacy with
-    the Quakers--The Albion Mill scheme--The double-acting
-    engines for the mill--Ill-success of the undertaking--Albion
-    Mill burnt down--Demand for rotative engines--Want of
-    skill and misconduct of workmen--Wedgwood’s advice to
-    Watt--Speculativeness of Boulton--His embarrassments--Watt’s
-    caution in investing--Boulton’s health fails--His depressed
-    spirits--Generosity to Watt                                 342–366
-
-
-                              CHAPTER XVIII.
-
-  Friends of Boulton and Watt--The Lunar Society--Provincial
-    scientific societies--Distinguished associates of the
-    Lunar Society--Dr. Darwin--Dr. Priestley, his gifts and
-    accomplishments--Josiah Wedgwood--Meetings and discussions
-    of the Lunar Society--Dr. Priestley’s speculations and
-    experiments--Composition of water, Watt and Cavendish--Bleaching
-    by chlorine--Sun-pictures--Saint-Fond at Birmingham, his
-    descriptions of Watt and Priestley--Decline of the Lunar
-    Society                                                     367–385
-
-
-                               CHAPTER XIX.
-
-  Increasing debasement of the coinage--Punishments for
-    counterfeiting--Birmingham coiners--Boulton refuses orders
-    for base money--Executes a contract for coin for the East
-    India Company--Applies the steam-engine to coining--Improves
-    the coining apparatus--Political action in relation to
-    base coin--Strikes model coins for inspection of the Privy
-    Council--Opposed by the Mint authorities--Presents model coins to
-    the king--Executes coinage orders for foreign governments--His
-    success--Medalling--Description of the Soho mint--Large
-    consumption of copper in coining--Threatened attack on Soho
-    by a mob--Boulton executes the new copper coinage for Great
-    Britain--Erects the new Government Mint on Tower Hill, and mints
-    for foreign countries--Watt’s estimate of Boulton’s improvements
-    in coining                                                  386–399
-
-
-                                CHAPTER XX.
-
-  Prosperity of Soho--Relaxed strain upon Boulton and Watt--Watt’s
-    pleasure tours--His interview with the king at Windsor--Matthew
-    Robinson Boulton, and James Watt, jun., join their fathers
-    in the business--Their character and attainments--Boulton
-    and young Watt--Young Boulton’s return from Paris--The
-    French revolution--The Birmingham riots--Priestley’s house
-    destroyed--Unpopularity of the “Philosophers”--Young Watt and
-    the Jacobins--Watt’s flight from Paris--Denounced by Burke--Mr.
-    Watt’s fear for his son’s safety--The sons join their fathers in
-    partnership--Important services of the young partners--Evasion of
-    engine-dues, resistance of the Cornish mining companies--Legal
-    proceedings and favourable judgments--Progress of the engine
-    business--William Murdock--His valuable services--His engine
-    improvements--Return to Soho--Invents gas-lighting--Winsor’s
-    wonderful schemes--Murdock’s various inventions--Substitute
-    for isinglass, his idea of power wasted in streets, atmospheric
-    railway, &c.--His death                                     400–433
-
-
-                               CHAPTER XXI.
-
-  First attempts to construct steamboats--All attempts fail until
-    Watt’s condensing engine invented--The locomotive of Watt and
-    Murdock--William Symington--His model locomotive--Symington
-    at Edinburgh--Steam-engine for canal-boats proposed by
-    Symington--Miller’s paddle-boats--Symington, Miller, and
-    Taylor co-operate to produce a steamboat--Sir John Dalrymple’s
-    inquiries of Boulton on the same subject--Boulton’s
-    reply--Symington’s engine finished and fitted in Miller’s
-    boat--Successful experiment--Symington makes another engine,
-    further experiments--Miller applies to Boulton and Watt to join
-    speculation--Watt’s reply--Symington’s engine for the ‘Charlotte
-    Dundas’--Symington’s success frustrated--Fulton and Bell inspect
-    the ‘Charlotte Dundas’--Fulton’s steamboat on the Seine--His
-    ‘Nautilus’--His application to James Watt, jun.--Boulton’s
-    caution, his letter to Lord Hawkesbury--Fulton orders an engine
-    from Soho for the ‘Clermont’--Its success--Henry Bell’s steamboat
-    ‘Comet’--Development of steam-navigation--First rendered
-    practicable through Watt’s inventions                       434–455
-
-
-                               CHAPTER XXII.
-
-  Watt withdraws from Soho--Boulton continues his interest in
-    business--His patent for raising water--The burglary at
-    Soho--Sir Walter Scott and Boulton--Watt in retirement--Search
-    for investments--Purchases land--Makes a foreign tour--Death of
-    Mrs. Keir--Painful bereavements--Death of Dr. Black--Deaths of
-    members of the Lunar Society--Watt’s family bereavements--Watt’s
-    studies on the inhalation of gas--Gregory Watt, his brilliant
-    talents--His friendship with Humphry Davy--His excursions and
-    tours--His scientific pursuits--His illness and death--Davy on
-    Gregory’s death--Death of Professor Robison--Watt’s estimate
-    of Robison--Boulton’s last days, his death and funeral--His
-    character--Opinions of his contemporaries, Boswell and others,
-    concerning him--Attachment of the workmen--His Mutual Assurance
-    Society for the workmen--His powers of organisation--His business
-    qualities--His strength, courage, and perseverance in fighting the
-    battle of the steam-engine--Watt’s estimate of Boulton--Boulton’s
-    generosity                                                  456–487
-
-
-                              CHAPTER XXIII.
-
-  Watt’s closing years--His pursuits--His machine for copying
-    statuary--Medallions of his friends--His garret workshop--Mrs.
-    Watt’s rule over her husband--Tenacious retention of his
-    faculties--Is consulted by the Glasgow Waterworks Company--His
-    visits to Cheltenham and other places--Growth and improvement
-    of Glasgow--Watt’s interview with the brothers Hart--His
-    conversational powers--Sir Walter Scott’s panegyric on
-    Watt--His extensive and varied knowledge--His anecdotal
-    powers--Fondness for novels--Description of him by visitors
-    at Heathfield--His last improvements in the sculpture-copying
-    machine--His last illness and peaceful death--Monumental
-    honours--Lord Brougham’s inscription--His qualities and
-    genius--His modesty--His close observation--Facts and
-    theory--Watt and Smeaton compared--Universal application of
-    the steam-engine--Conclusion                                488–514
-
-
-  INDEX                                                             515
-
-
-
-
-LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
-
-
-  PORTRAIT OF JAMES WATT                         _to face Title-page_
-       „      MATTHEW BOULTON                      _to face page_ 159
-                                                                 PAGE
-  Edward, second Marquis of Worcester                               2
-  Ancient Greek Æolipile                                            3
-  Branca’s Machine                                                  7
-  De Caus’s Steam Apparatus                                         9
-  Ruins of Raglan Castle                                           26
-  Dionysius Papin                                                  31
-  Ancient Paddle-Boat                                              36
-  Thomas Savery                                                    41
-  Section of Savery’s Paddle-Boat                                  43
-  Savery’s Fire-Engine                                             52
-  Huel Vor                                                         55
-  Newcomen’s House, Dartmouth                                      60
-  Newcomen’s Atmospheric Engine                                    67
-  Ruins of Wheal Fortune                                           70
-  Polgooth                                                         71
-  Jonathan Hull’s Steam-Boat                                       73
-  Dartmouth from the Harbour                                       76
-  Greenock and the Clyde, 1865                                     78
-  Greenock Harbour, 1768                                           79
-  Crawfordsburn House, Greenock                                    80
-  James Watt Tavern, Greenock                                      87
-  Trongate, Glasgow                                                97
-  Inner Quadrangle, Glasgow College                               107
-  Isometric View of Glasgow College, 1693                         108
-  The Broomielaw in 1760                                          116
-  Professor Robison                                               117
-  Papin’s Digester                                                120
-  The Newcomen Model                                              121
-  Watt’s House, Delftfield Lane                                   126
-  Watt’s first Improved Apparatus                                 130
-  Dr. Joseph Black                                                132
-  Kinneil House                                                   142
-  Outhouse behind Kinneil                                         148
-  Hamilton Bridge                                                 156
-  Port Glasgow                                                    158
-  Birmingham                                                      160
-  Soho Manufactory                                                169
-  Soho House                                                      177
-  Watt’s House, Harper’s Hill                                     214
-  Map of United Mines District                                    231
-  Watt’s Pumping-Engine for Mines                                 236
-  Redruth, High Street                                            238
-  Cardozos Pumping-Engine                                         260
-  United Mines District and St. Day                               261
-  Cosgarne House                                                  275
-  Entrance to ditto                                               284
-  The “Waggon and Horses,” Handsworth                             285
-  The Crank as applied in the Foot-Lathe                          287
-  Interior of the “Waggon and Horses”                             288
-  Old Engine-House, Dalcoath                                      306
-  Sun-and-Planet Motion                                           309
-  “Old Bess” Engine                                               326
-  The parallel Motion                                             334
-  The Governor                                                    335
-  Polgooth Engine-House                                           339
-  Double Acting Engine, Albion Mill                               355
-  Dr. Priestley                                                   370
-  Site of Soho Mint                                               399
-  Burning of Dr. Priestley’s House                                411
-  William Murdock                                                 422
-  Murdock’s House, Handsworth                                     433
-  Miller’s Triple Vessel                                          437
-  Symington’s first Steamboat-Engine                              441
-  Miller’s Experimental Steamboat                                 442
-  Machinery of the ‘Charlotte Dundas’                             447
-  The “Comet” passing Dumbarton                                   453
-  Watt’s House, Heathfield                                        456
-  Boulton’s Monument in Handsworth Church                         478
-  The Garret at Heathfield                                        494
-  Water-Pipe in the Bed of the Clyde                              497
-  Watt’s Chapel and Monument, Handsworth Church                   508
-  Handsworth Church                                               514
-
-
-
-
-BEGINNINGS OF THE STEAM-ENGINE:
-
-THE EARLY INVENTORS.
-
-[Illustration: EDWARD, SECOND MARQUIS OF WORCESTER.
-
-[By T. D. Scott after Vandyck.]]
-
-
-
-
-[Illustration: ANCIENT GREEK ÆOLIPILE.]
-
-BEGINNINGS OF THE STEAM-ENGINE:
-
-THE EARLY INVENTORS.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER I.
-
-DAWNINGS OF STEAM POWER--THE MARQUIS OF WORCESTER.
-
-
-When Matthew Boulton entered into partnership with James Watt, he gave
-up the ormolu business in which he had before been principally engaged.
-He had been accustomed to supply George III. with articles of this
-manufacture, but ceased to wait upon the King for orders after embarking
-in his new enterprise. Some time after, he appeared at the Royal Levee
-and was at once recognised by the King. “Ha! Boulton,” said he, “it is
-long since we have seen you at Court. Pray, what business are you now
-engaged in?” “I am engaged, your Majesty, in the production of a commodity
-which is the desire of kings.” “And what is that? what is that?” asked
-the King. “POWER, your Majesty,” replied Boulton, who proceeded to give
-a description of the great uses to which the steam-engine was capable of
-being applied.
-
-If the theory of James Mill[1] be true, that government is founded on
-the desire which exists among men to secure and enjoy the products of
-labour, by whatsoever means produced, probably the answer of Boulton
-to George III. was not far from correct. In the infancy of nations this
-desire manifested itself in the enforcement of labour by one class upon
-another, in the various forms of slavery and serfdom. To evade the more
-onerous and exhausting kinds of bodily toil, men were impelled to exercise
-their ingenuity in improving old tools and inventing new ones,--while, to
-increase production, they called the powers of nature to their aid. They
-tamed the horse, and made him their servant; they caught the winds as they
-blew, and the waters as they fell, and applied their powers to the driving
-of mills and machines of various kinds.
-
-But there was a power greater by far than that of horses, wind, or
-water,--a power of which poets and philosophers had long dreamt,--capable
-of being applied alike to the turning of mills, the raising of water, the
-rowing of ships, the driving of wheel-carriages, and the performance of
-labour in its severest forms. As early as the thirteenth century, Roger
-Bacon described this great new power in terms which, interpreted by the
-light of the present day, could only apply to the power of Steam. He
-anticipated that “chariots may be made so as to be moved with incalculable
-force, without any beast drawing them,” and that “engines of navigation
-might be made without oarsmen, so that the greatest river and sea ships,
-with only one man to steer them, may sail swifter than if they were fully
-manned.” But Bacon was a seer rather than an expounder, a philosophic poet
-rather than an inventor; and it was left to men of future times to find
-out the practical methods of applying the wonderful power which he had
-imagined and foretold.
-
-    [1] Article “Government,” in ‘Encyclopædia Britannica.’
-
-The enormous power latent in water exposed to heat had long been known.
-Its discovery must have been almost contemporaneous with that of fire.
-The expansive force of steam would be obvious on setting the first
-partially-closed pipkin upon the fire. If closed, the lid would be blown
-off; and even if the vessel were of iron, it would soon burst with
-appalling force. Was it possible to render so furious and apparently
-unmanageable an agent, docile and tractable? Even in modern times, the
-explosive force of steam could only be compared to that of gunpowder;
-and it is a curious fact, that both De Hautefeuille and Papin proposed to
-employ gunpowder in preference to steam in driving a piston in a cylinder,
-considering it to be the more manageable power of the two.
-
-Although it appears from the writings of the Greek physician, Hero, who
-flourished at Alexandria more than a century before Christ, that steam
-was well known to the ancients, it was employed by them merely as a toy,
-or as a means of exciting the wonder of the credulous. In his treatise on
-Pneumatics, Hero gives descriptions of various methods of employing steam
-or heated air for the purpose of producing apparently magical effects;
-from which we infer that the agency of heat was employed by the heathen
-priests in the performance of their rites. By one of the devices which he
-describes, water was apparently changed into wine; by another, the temple
-doors were opened by fire placed on the sacrificial altar; while by a
-third, the sacrificial vessel was so contrived as to flow only when the
-money of the votary was cast into it. Another ingenious device consisted
-in the method employed to pour out libations. Upon the altar-fire being
-kindled, the air in the interior became expanded and, pressing upon the
-surface of the liquid which it contained, forced it up a connecting-pipe,
-and so out of the sacrificial cup. The libation was made, and the people
-cried, “A miracle!” But Hero knew the trick, and explained the arrangement
-by which it was accomplished: it forms the subject of his eleventh
-theorem.
-
-The most interesting of the other devices described by Hero is the
-whirling Æolipile, or ball of Æolus, which, though but a toy, possessed
-the properties of a true steam-engine, and was most probably the first
-ever invented. As Hero’s book professes to be, for the most part, but
-a collection of the devices handed down by former writers, and as he
-does not lay claim to its invention, it is probable the Æolipile may
-have been known long before his time. The machine consisted of a hollow
-globe of metal, moving on its axis, and communicating with a caldron of
-water placed underneath. The globe was provided with one or more tubes
-projecting from it, closed at the ends, but open on one side. When a fire
-was lit under the caldron, and the steam was raised, it filled the globe,
-and, projecting itself against the air through the openings in the tubes,
-the reactive force thus produced caused the globe to spin round upon its
-axis “as if it were animated from within by a living spirit.”[2]
-
-The mechanical means by which these various objects were accomplished,
-as explained by Hero, show that the ancients were acquainted with the
-ordinary expedients for communicating motion, such as the wheel and
-axle, spur-wheels, toothed pinions and sectors, the lever-beam, and other
-well-known expedients; while they also knew of the cylinder and piston,
-the three-way cock, slide-valves and valve-clacks,[3] and many other
-ingenious mechanical details which have been reinvented in modern times.
-
-
-    [2] The principle of the Æolipile is the same as that embodied
-      in Avery and Ruthven’s engines for the production of rotary
-      motion. “These engines,” says Bourne, “are more expensive in
-      steam than ordinary engines, and travel at an inconvenient
-      speed; but in other respects they are quite as effectual, and
-      their construction is extremely simple and inexpensive.”
-
-[Illustration: BRANCA’S MACHINE.]
-
-Hero’s book lay hidden in manuscript and buried in libraries, until the
-revival of learning in Italy in the sixteenth century, when a translation
-of it appeared at Bologna in 1547. By that time printing had been
-invented; and the multiplication of copies being thereby rendered easy,
-the book was soon brought under the notice of inquiring men throughout
-Europe. The work must, indeed, have excited an extraordinary degree of
-interest; in proof of which it may be mentioned that eight different
-editions, in different languages, were published within a century. The
-minds of the curious and the scientific were thus directed to the subject
-of steam as a motive power. But for a long time they never got beyond
-the idea of Hero’s Æolipile, though they endeavoured to apply the rotary
-motion produced by it in different ways. Thus, a German writer suggested
-that it should be used to turn spits, instead of turnspit dogs; and
-Branca, the Italian architect, used the steam jet projected from a brazen
-head to drive an apparatus contrived by him for pounding drugs. The jet
-forced round the vanes of a wheel, so as to produce a rotary motion, and
-this, being communicated to other wheels, set in motion a rod and stamper,
-after the manner shown in the preceding cut.
-
-    [3] See Bennet Woodcroft’s ‘Pneumatics of Hero of Alexandria,’
-      from the original Greek. London, 1851.
-
-Solomon de Caus was another of the speculative inquirers whose attention
-was drawn to the subject of steam by the publication of Hero’s book. De
-Caus was a native of Normandy, and for some time studied the profession
-of an architect in Italy; from whence he returned to France early in the
-seventeenth century. Religious persecution was then raging, and, being
-a Protestant, he was glad to take refuge from it in England. He entered
-the service of the Prince of Wales, by whom he was for a time employed
-in designing grottoes, fountains, and hydraulic ornaments for the Palace
-Gardens at Richmond. While occupied in that capacity he gave lessons
-in design to the Princess Elizabeth; and on her marriage to the Elector
-Palatine he accompanied her to Heidelberg, to take charge of the Castle
-gardens there. It was while residing at Heidelberg that De Caus wrote
-his well-known book on hydraulics, which was published at Frankfort in
-1615.[4]
-
-    [4] Les Raisons des Forces Mouvantes, avec diverses machines tant
-      utiles que plaisantes, &c., par Solomon de Caus, Ingénieur et
-      Architecte du Roy. Frankfort, 1615.
-
-One of De Caus’s expedients for raising water consisted of an apparatus in
-which he proposed to employ the expansive power of steam for the purpose.
-In Hero’s book it is shown how a column of water may be thrown up by means
-of compressed air; and De Caus merely proposed to employ steam instead of
-air. His apparatus was very simple. It consisted of a spherical vessel
-fitted with two pipes, one of them provided with a cock and funnel; the
-other, which reached down to near the bottom of the vessel, being open at
-the top to the external air. When the vessel was filled with water and
-a fire lit underneath, the water was forced up the open tube in a jet,
-greater or less in proportion to the elasticity of the steam. When both
-tubes were tightly closed, so that neither steam nor water could escape,
-the heat, says De Caus, would shortly cause a compression from within so
-violent that “the ball will burst in pieces, with a noise like a petard.”
-
-[Illustration: DE CAUS’S STEAM APPARATUS.]
-
-It will be observed that there was little mechanical contrivance, and
-no practical use in this apparatus; it merely furnished an illustration
-of the extraordinary force of pent-up steam, and that was all. Though
-De Caus made many experiments with his steam-vessel, he never succeeded
-in making--if, indeed, he ever attempted to make--a working steam-engine
-of any kind. It is not improbable that he was dismayed, as others were,
-by the apparent violence of the imprisoned monster; and it needed a more
-ingenious head than his to contrive a method of rendering him docile, and
-making him go quietly in harness.[5]
-
-    [5] De Caus eventually returned to France, and was appointed
-      engineer to the King. During the later years of his life he
-      was employed in carrying out plans for the better supply of
-      Paris with water. The story so often told of De Caus having
-      been shut up in the Bicêtre turns out to be a fiction. Though
-      a Huguenot, he was not persecuted by Richelieu, but was, on
-      the contrary, employed by him; and in 1624 he dedicated to
-      that prelate his treatise entitled ‘Horologes Solitaires.’ Mr.
-      Charles Read, editor of several interesting memoirs of early
-      French Protestants, has recently brought to light and published
-      in the ‘Gazette des Tribunaux’ the proofs of the patronage of
-      De Caus by Richelieu, and reproduced the original documents,
-      which he discovered slumbering in the dust of the State Records
-      at Paris. In 1621 De Caus is found proposing to Louis XIII. to
-      adopt measures for cleansing Paris and the faubourgs of dirt and
-      uncleanness, by a system of reservoirs established at elevated
-      points, and by fountains at various places which he indicated.
-      The king and his council sent the propositions to the chief
-      magistrate of Paris, and Mr. Read transcribes the deliberation
-      which took place on the subject at the City Council, as handed
-      down in the records deposited in the Imperial Archives. De Caus
-      died at Paris, and was buried in the church of La Trinité in
-      February, 1626.
-
-It is probable that the first contriver of a working steam-engine was
-Edward, second Marquis of Worcester, one of the first and most illustrious
-of a long line of unfortunate inventors. The career of that nobleman--born
-though he was to high rank and great estate--was chequered and sad in no
-ordinary degree. Edward Somerset was the eldest son of Henry Lord Herbert,
-afterwards Earl of Worcester, and consequently heir to that title. He was
-born in London in 1601. His early years were principally spent at Raglan
-Castle, his father’s country seat, where his education was carefully
-attended to. In the course of his pupilage he made occasional visits to
-the continent, accompanied by his tutor, for the purpose of acquiring
-that degree of polish and culture considered necessary for a person of
-his social position. On the accession of his father to the Earldom of
-Worcester, in 1627, Edward became Lord Herbert by courtesy; and in the
-following year he married, and went to reside at Raglan Castle.
-
-From an early period of his life Lord Herbert took especial pleasure in
-mechanical studies, and in the course of his foreign tours he visited and
-examined the famous works of construction abroad; for as yet there were
-none such in England. On settling down at Raglan, he proceeded to set
-up a laboratory, or workshop, wherein to indulge his mechanical tastes,
-and perhaps to while away the tedium of a country life. To assist him in
-his labours, he engaged a clever foreign mechanic, named Caspar Kaltoff,
-who remained in his service for many years, and materially helped him in
-his various contrivances. Among the works executed by Lord Herbert and
-his assistant at Raglan, was the hydraulic apparatus by means of which
-the castle was supplied with water. From an incidental reference to the
-“water-works” by a contemporary writer, we learn that they consisted of a
-series of engines and wheels, by means of which water was raised through
-pipes to a cistern placed on the summit of the central tower.[6] It is
-probable that the planning and construction of these works induced Lord
-Herbert to prosecute the study of hydraulics, and to enter upon that
-series of experiments as to the power of steam which eventually led to
-the contrivance of his “Water-commanding Engine.”
-
-In pursuits and studies such as these, Lord Herbert spent about seven
-years at Raglan Castle. But his wife dying in 1635, the place became
-connected in his mind with too painful associations, and he shortly after
-left it to reside in London. On his arrival there, he proceeded to put to
-the practical test a plan of perpetual motion which he had long studied,
-and now thought he had brought to perfection. He accordingly had his
-self-moving wheel[7] set up in the Tower; but though it moved, its motion
-did not prove perpetual, and it shortly dropped out of sight, to be no
-more heard of.
-
-    [6] Dr. Bayly, in his ‘Apothegms’ (1682), p. 87, describes the
-      fright given to some Puritan visitors on the occasion of their
-      searching Raglan Castle for arms, the Marquis of Worcester
-      being a known Papist. “Having carried them up and down the
-      castle, his lordship at length brought them over a high bridge
-      that arched over the moat between the castle and the great
-      tower, wherein the Lord Herbert had lately contrived certain
-      water-works, which, when the several engines and wheels were set
-      agoing, much quantity of water through the hollow conveyances
-      of the aqueducts was to be let down from the top of an high
-      tower.” When all was ready for the surprise, the water was let
-      in, and it made such a hideous and fearful noise by reason of
-      the hollowness of the tower, and the neighbouring echoes of
-      the castle, that the men stood amazed and terror-struck. At
-      this point up came a man staring and running, who exclaimed,
-      “Look to yourselves, my masters, for the lions are got loose.”
-      Whereupon the Puritans fled down the narrow staircase in such
-      haste that they lost footing and fell, tumbling one over the
-      other, and never halted until they had got the castle out of
-      sight. Mr. Dircks, in his able and exhaustive ‘Life, Times, and
-      Scientific Labours of the Marquis of Worcester,’ London, 1865,
-      says that this hydraulic apparatus “probably depended for its
-      operation on the influence of heat from burning fuel acting on
-      a suitably constructed boiler, and so arranged as to be able
-      to apply the expansive force of steam to the driving of water
-      through vertical pipes to a considerable elevation.” But it does
-      not seem to us that the facts stated are sufficient to warrant
-      this assumption.
-
-    [7] Mr. Dircks says “it was a machine consisting of a wheel 14
-      feet in diameter, carrying forty weights of forty pounds each,
-      and is supposed to have rotated on an axle supported on two
-      pillars or upright frames,” as indicated in the ‘Century of
-      Inventions,’ Art. 56.
-
-After the lapse of four years, Lord Herbert again married, taking to
-wife the Lady Margaret, second daughter of the Earl of Thomond. In the
-year after his second marriage, the celebrated Long Parliament began
-its sittings. Questions of great public import were agitating the minds
-of thinking men, and the nation was gradually becoming divided into two
-hostile parties, soon to be arrayed against each other in deadly strife. A
-Royalist and a Roman Catholic like his father, Lord Herbert at once ranged
-himself on the side of the King. On the outbreak of the Civil War, we find
-both father and son actively employed in mustering forces, and preparing
-to hold the western counties against the Parliament. Raglan Castle was
-strongly garrisoned, and fortifications were thrown up around it, so as
-to render it secure against assault. The Earl, now Marquis of Worcester,
-was appointed Generalissimo of the Western Forces, while his son, Lord
-Herbert, was made General of South Wales. From this office he was shortly
-after called by the King, who, creating him Earl of Glamorgan, despatched
-him on a mission to Ireland, with the object of stirring up the loyalists
-of that kingdom, and inducing them to come to his help. This delicate
-office he is said to have performed with more zeal than discretion.
-Indeed, the studious habits of his early life must in a measure have
-unfitted him for the conduct of so important an affair; and the bungle
-he made of it was such that the King felt himself under the necessity of
-repudiating the acts which the Earl had done in his name.
-
-It is unnecessary that we should follow the fortunes of the house of
-Raglan in the course of the civil war. Suffice it to say that the King’s
-cause was utterly lost; that Raglan Castle was besieged, taken, and
-dismantled; that the Marquis of Worcester, having advanced to the King
-at different times as much as 122,500_l._, had completely impoverished
-himself; and that when the Earl succeeded to his father’s title, and
-became second Marquis of Worcester, in 1646, he inherited an exhausted
-exchequer, a confiscated estate, and a ruined home. The services he
-had rendered to the King were remembered against him; and to escape the
-vengeance of his political enemies he took refuge in France. There he
-lived in poverty and in exile for a period of about five years. At length,
-drawn to England by the powerful attractions of wife and family, and
-probably also commissioned to perform a service for the exiled Charles
-II., the Marquis secretly visited London in 1655, where he was shortly
-after detected, apprehended, and imprisoned in the Tower. He sought
-and found solace, during his confinement, in study and contemplation,
-reverting to his early experiments in mechanics; and he occupied the long
-and weary hours in committing to paper descriptions of his many ingenious
-devices, which he afterwards published in his ‘Century of Inventions.’ The
-Marquis’s old and skilled mechanic, Caspar Kaltoff, continued faithful to
-him in his adversity, and was permitted to hold free communication with
-him; from which we infer that his imprisonment was not of a very rigid
-character.
-
-After lying in the Tower for about two years, the Marquis was liberated
-on bail, in October, 1654, when he proceeded to take steps to erect his
-long-contemplated Water-commanding Engine. Even while a prisoner, we find
-him negotiating with the then owner of Vauxhall for its purchase, with
-a view to the establishment there of a school of skilled industry; thus
-anticipating by nearly two centuries the School of Mines and Manufactures
-at South Kensington. In the month preceding his enlargement we find
-Hartlib writing to the Hon. Robert Boyle,--“The Earl of Worcester is
-buying Fauxhall from Mr. Trenchard, to bestow the use of that house upon
-Caspar Calchoff and his son as long as they shall live, for he intends to
-make it a College of Artizans.”[8] His main difficulty, however, consisted
-in raising the necessary means for carrying his excellent project into
-effect. He was, indeed, so reduced in his circumstances as to be under
-the necessity of petitioning his political enemies for the bare means
-of living; and we find Cromwell, in the course of the year following his
-liberation from prison, issuing a warrant for the payment to him of three
-pounds a week “for his better maintenance.” The Marquis also tried the
-experiment of levying contributions from his friends; but they were, for
-the most part, as poor as himself. He next tried the wealthy men of the
-Parliamentary party, and succeeded in obtaining several advances of money
-from Colonel Copley, who took an active interest in the prosecution of
-various industrial undertakings.[9] The following letter from the Marquis
-to Copley shows the straits to which he was reduced:--
-
-  “DEAR FRIEND,--I knowe not with what face to desire a curtesie
-  from you, since I have not yet payed you the five powndes, and
-  the mayne businesse soe long protracted, whereby my reality and
-  kindnesse should with thankfullnesse appeare; for though the
-  least I intende you is to make up the somme already promised to
-  a thousand powndes yearly, or a share ammounting to four more,
-  which, to nominate before the perfection of the woorke, were but
-  an _individuum vagum_, and, therefore, I deferre it, and upon
-  noe other score. Yet in this interim, my disappointments are soe
-  great, as that I am forced to begge, if you could possible, eyther
-  to helpe me with tenne powndes to this bearer, or to make use of
-  the coache, and to goe to Mr. Clerke, and if he could this day
-  help me to fifty powndes, then to paye your selfe the five powndes
-  I owe you out of them. The Alderman has taken three days’ time
-  to consider of it. Pardon the great trouble I give you, which I
-  doubt not but in time to deserve, by really appearing
-                                 “Your most thankfull friend,
-                                                        “WORCESTER.
-
-  “_28th March, 1656._
-  “To my honoured friend, Collonel CHRISTOPHER COPPLEY, these.”
-
-The original of this letter is endorsed “My Lord of Worcester’s letter
-about my share in his engine,” from which it would appear that the Marquis
-induced his friends to advance him money on the promise of a certain
-proportion of shares in the undertaking. He also pressed his invention
-upon the notice of Government, representing that he was in a position
-to do his Highness the Protector “more service than any one subject of
-his three nations.” But neither the Protector nor his Ministers took any
-further notice of the Marquis or his project. It is probable that they
-regarded him as a bore, and his water-commanding engine as the mere dream
-of a projector.
-
-    [8] ‘Weld’s Royal Society,’ i. 53.
-
-    [9] ‘Industrial Biography,’ p. 57.
-
-The Marquis himself continued to be as confident as ever of the ultimate
-success of his scheme. He believed that it would yet realise him an
-immense fortune. Writing of the engine to the Earl of Lotherdale, he
-described it as “the greatest invention for profit that I ever yet heard
-of vouchsafed to a man, especially so unworthy and ignorant as I am.” But
-the Marquis was not so humble as he affected to be, believing in his heart
-that he had invented, without exception, the most wonderful machine of
-the age. Still it remained a mere project. Without the means of erecting
-an engine, it promised to remain such; and all his efforts to raise the
-necessary funds had thus far proved unavailing.
-
-The Restoration of Charles II., in 1660, revived his hopes. Now that the
-King enjoyed his own again, the Marquis believed that he, too, would come
-into possession of the means for carrying out his project. For thirteen
-years he had lived in exile, in prison, and in poverty: but brighter days
-had dawned at last; and he indulged in the hope that compensation would
-at length be made to him for his sufferings in the cause of the Stuarts,
-and that he would now bask in the sunshine of Royal favour. He made all
-haste to represent his case to the king, and to claim restitution for his
-heavy losses in the late war. But there were thousands of like suppliants
-all over the kingdom, and redress came slowly. The Marquis was, however,
-shortly put in possession of such parts of his estates as had not been
-sold by the Protector; but he found them for the most part cleared of
-their timber, and comparatively valueless. The castle at Raglan was in
-ruins. He himself was heavily burdened with debt, and his creditors were
-becoming increasingly importunate for money. It was thus long before he
-could shake himself clear of his embarrassments, and devote himself to the
-great object of his life, the prosecution of his water-commanding engine.
-
-One of his first cares, on the partial recovery of his property,
-was to obtain a legal protection for his inventions; and in the year
-following the Restoration we find him taking out a patent for four of his
-schemes,--a watch or clock, guns or pistols, an engine to give security
-to a coach, and a boat to sail against wind and tide. In the session of
-Parliament, 1662–3, he obtained an Act securing to himself the profits
-of the water-commanding engine. About the same time he gave to the world
-his famous ‘Century,’[10] which contains his own account of his various
-inventions. In the second dedication of the book to the members of both
-Houses of Parliament he states that he had already expended the large sum
-of 10,000_l._ on experiments; but he professed that he esteemed himself
-sufficiently rewarded by the passing of “the Act of the Water-commanding
-Engine,” and, his debts once paid, he intended to devote the rest of
-his life to the service of his King and country. The ‘Century’ is a mere
-summary of things alleged to have been tried and perfected, conveyed in
-vague and mysterious language, and calculated rather to excite wonder
-than to furnish information. The descriptions were unaccompanied by plans
-or drawings, so that we can only surmise the means by which he proposed
-to carry his schemes into effect. It is possible that he purposely left
-the descriptions of his inventions vague, in order that he might not
-be anticipated in their application; for it is certain that at the time
-the book was written the Marquis had not taken out his first patent, nor
-obtained the Act securing to him the profits of his engine.
-
-    [10] ‘A Century of the Names and Scantlings of such Inventions
-      as at present I can call to mind to have tried and perfected,
-      which (my former Notes being lost) I have, at the instance of
-      a powerful Friend, endeavoured now, in the year 1655, to set
-      these down in such a way as may sufficiently instruct me to put
-      any of them in practice.’ London, 1663.
-
-There can, however, be no doubt that, vague and mysterious though the
-‘Scantlings’ be, they indicate a knowledge of mechanical principles
-considerably in advance of the age, as well as a high degree of
-mechanical ingenuity. The hundred Articles into which the book is divided
-contain suggestions, in shorthand descriptions, of things so various
-as ship-destroying machines, telegraphs, combination and escutcheon
-locks,[11] improvements in fire-arms, universal alphabets, seals and
-watches, various kinds of cipher, a boat rowing against wind and tide,
-automata, and mechanical appliances of different kinds, including
-the “stupendious and semi-omnipotent” engine. Some of them read like
-descriptions of conjuring tricks, such as the artificial bird, the hour
-water-ball, the flying man, the brazen head, the dicing-box, and various
-automata. Others are full of prophetic insight, and contain anticipations
-of mechanical marvels, which, however wonderful they may at that time
-have appeared, have since been fully realised. The style in which the
-treatise was written, however, presented so remarkable a contrast to the
-contemporary writings of Newton, Boyle, Pascal, Guericke, and others,
-that it is not improbable it had the effect of prejudicing the minds of
-scientific men against the writer, and led them to regard his schemes
-as those of a wild projector, and hence to treat his propositions with
-neglect, if not with contumely.
-
-    [11] The writer of the elaborate article “Lock,” in the supplement
-      to the ‘Penny Cyclopædia’ (ii. 217), in describing the
-      _combination lock_, says: “The Marquis of Worcester, in whose
-      ‘Century of Inventions’ several different kinds of lock, which
-      lay claim to the most marvellous properties, are enumerated,
-      would appear, from his 72nd article, to have devised an
-      improvement on this apparatus; as he refers to ‘an escutcheon
-      to be placed before any of these locks,’ one of the properties
-      of which he describes as being that ‘the owner, though a woman,
-      may, with her delicate hand, vary the ways of coming to open
-      the lock ten millions of times beyond the knowledge of the
-      smith that made it, or of me who invented it.’ The details
-      of this invention are not given; but in the third volume of
-      the ‘Transactions of the Society of Arts,’ pp. 160–5, is an
-      escutcheon of similar character, invented by Mr. Marshall, and
-      rewarded by the Society in 1784. The details of this ingenious
-      contrivance are fully given in the volume referred to.”
-
-So soon as the Marquis had become possessed of the requisite funds, he
-proceeded to erect an engine at Vauxhall to illustrate the uses of his
-principal invention. He was assisted, as before, by his old workman,
-Caspar Kaltoff. It is probable that the engine was erected by the
-beginning of 1663; for in the course of that year M. Sorbière paid his
-visit to England, and found the Marquis’s “hydraulic machine” at work.
-He describes it as capable of raising, by the strength of one man only,
-within a minute of time, four large buckets of water to a height of forty
-feet, through a pipe eight inches in diameter. He proceeds to compare
-it with another machine at Somerset House, worked by one or two horses,
-which he considers the more effective machine of the two.[12] This account
-of the Marquis’s invention is confirmed by another brief description of
-it, which occurs in the narrative of the travels of Cosmo, Grand Duke
-of Tuscany, in England, some years later. Count Magalotti, the narrator,
-says, “It raises water more than forty geometrical feet, by the power of
-one man only; and in a very short space of time will draw up four vessels
-of water through a tube or channel not more than a span in width, on
-which account it is considered to be of greater service to the public than
-the other machine at Somerset House.” It will thus be observed that the
-Duke’s secretary entertained a different opinion from that expressed by
-M. Sorbière as to the comparative merits of the two engines spoken of.
-
-    [12] His words are these:--“One of the most curious things that
-      I wished to see was an hydraulic machine which the Marquis of
-      Worcester has invented, and of which he is making trial. I went
-      with all speed to Fox-hall, on the other side of the Thames, a
-      little below Lambeth, which is the Palace of the Archbishop of
-      Canterbury, in sight of London. This machine will raise to the
-      height of forty feet, by the strength of one man only, and in a
-      minute of time, four large buckets of water through a pipe of
-      eight inches. But what will be the most powerful help to the
-      wants of the public is the work which is performed by another
-      ingeniously-constructed machine, which can be seen raised on a
-      wooden tower on the top of Somerset House, which supplies that
-      part of the town with water, but with some difficulty, and a
-      smaller quantity than could be desired. It is somewhat like our
-      Samaritane water-work on the Pont Neuf; and on the raising-pump
-      they have added an impulsion which increases the force; but for
-      what we obtain by the power of the Seine, they employ one or two
-      horses, which incessantly turn the machine, as the river changes
-      its course twice a day, and the spring or wheels which are
-      used for the ebbing tide would not do for the flow.”--Sorbière,
-      ‘Relation d’un Voyage en Angleterre.’
-
-It is worthy of remark that the incidental accounts of these two
-foreigners contain almost the only contemporary information we possess
-as to the character of the Marquis’s invention. English writers of the
-time are almost entirely silent about it; and when Dr. Hooke, the learned
-Secretary of the Royal Society, refers to the contrivance, it is in a
-tone of ridicule rather than of praise. Writing to Mr. Boyle, in 1667,
-he characterises the definition or description of the water-commanding
-engine as “so purely romantic that it would serve one rarely to fill up
-half a dozen pages in the ‘History of Fortunatus his Wishing Cap.’” ... “I
-was,” he adds, “since my return to London to see this engine, when I found
-Caltrop [Kaltoff], his chief engineer, to laugh at it; and as far as I was
-able to see it, it seemed one of the perpetual-motion fallacies; of which
-kind Caltrop himself, and two or three others that I know, are labouring
-at this time in vain to make, but after several ways; and nothing but
-costly experience will make them desist.”[13]
-
-    [13] The Works of the Hon. Robert Boyle, v. 532.
-
-It is difficult to gather from the statements of Sorbière and Cosmo de
-Medici what was the precise nature of the Marquis’s hydraulic apparatus.
-There is no mention whatever of steam, either in their accounts or in that
-of Dr. Hooke; but the latter does not seem to have been allowed to examine
-the details of the machine. From the mention by Sorbière of the “four
-large buckets of water,” and by Cosmo’s secretary, of “four vessels of
-water,” it might possibly have been only an improved hydraulic apparatus,
-worked by a man instead of a horse. In order, therefore, to obtain a clue
-to the real nature of the machine we find it necessary to resort to the
-Marquis’s ‘Scantlings’ for his own account of its action, and we find it
-in article No. 68, which runs as follows:--
-
-  “68. An admirable and most forcible way to drive up water by
-  fire, not by drawing or sucking it upwards, for that must be as
-  the Philosopher calleth it, _Intra sphæram activitatis_, which
-  is but at such a distance. But this way hath no Bounder, if the
-  Vessels be strong enough; for I have taken a piece of a whole
-  Cannon, whereof the end was burst, and filled it three-quarters
-  full of water, stopping and scruing up the broken end; as also
-  the Touch-hole; and making a constant fire under it, within
-  twenty-four hours it burst and made a great crack: So that having
-  a way to make my Vessels, so that they are strengthened by the
-  force within them, and the one to fill after the other, I have
-  seen the water run like a constant Fountaine-stream forty foot
-  high; one Vessel of water rarified by fire driveth up forty of
-  cold water. And a man that tends the work is but to turn two
-  Cocks, that one Vessel of water being consumed, another begins to
-  force and refill with cold water, and so successively, the fire
-  being tended and kept constant, which the self-same Person may
-  likewise abundantly perform in the interim between the necessity
-  of turning the said Cocks.”
-
-From this account we gather that the Marquis had contrived a plan for
-raising water by the expansive force of steam, after the manner of De
-Caus, but with important modifications and improvements. It had obviously
-occurred to him, that by generating the steam in a separate vessel,
-and conveying it by means of a suitable pipe to a second closed vessel,
-he could thereby make it expel the water which the latter contained by
-pressing upon its surface, as in De Caus’s apparatus. The admission of
-the steam could easily be regulated by the turning of two cocks; one to
-admit the steam from the boiler, and the other to allow the exit of the
-water. On the expulsion of the water, and the production of a vacuum by
-the condensation of the contained steam, the empty vessel would at once be
-refilled by the action of the atmospheric pressure on the surface of the
-water to be raised. It is probable that this engine was--in the absence of
-a feed-pump, of which there is no mention--provided with two boilers as
-well as with the two cisterns in which the “forcing and refilling” went
-on, so as to maintain the “constant fountain-stream” which the Marquis
-describes. But the precise arrangement of parts by which he accomplished
-this object must ever remain a matter of mere conjecture.
-
-We have other distinct indications of a steam-engine in the Marquis’s
-98th, 99th, and 100th Articles, which ought to be read in connection with
-the 68th Article: they run as follows:--
-
-  “98. An Engine so contrived, that working the _Primum mobile_
-  forward or backward, upward or downward, circularly or cornerwise,
-  to and fro, streight, upright or downright, yet the pretended
-  Operation continueth, and advanceth none of the motions
-  above-mentioned, hindering, much less stopping the other; but
-  unanimously, and with harmony agreeing they all augment and
-  contribute strength unto the intended work and operation: And
-  therefore I call this _A Semi-omnipotent Engine_, and do intend
-  that a Model thereof be buried with me.”
-
-  “99. How to make one pound weight to raise an hundred as high as
-  one pound falleth, and yet the hundred pound descending doth what
-  nothing less than one hundred pound can effect.”
-
-  “100. Upon so potent a help as these two last-mentioned
-  Inventions a Waterwork is by many years experience and labour so
-  advantageously by me contrived, that a Child’s force bringeth
-  up an hundred foot high an incredible quantity of water, even
-  two foot Diameter, so naturally, that the work will not be heard
-  even into the next Room; and with so great ease and Geometrical
-  Symmetry, that though it work day and night from one end of the
-  year to the other, it will not require forty shillings reparation
-  to the whole Engine, nor hinder ones day-work. And I may boldly
-  call it _The most stupendious Work in the whole world_: not
-  onely with little charge to drein all sorts of Mines, and furnish
-  Cities with water, though never so high seated, as well to keep
-  them sweet, running through several streets, and so performing
-  the work of Scavengers, as well as furnishing the Inhabitants
-  with sufficient water for their private occasions; but likewise
-  supplying Rivers with sufficient to maintaine and make them
-  portable from Towne to Towne, and for the bettering of Lands all
-  the way it runs; with many more advantageous, and yet greater
-  effects of Profit, Admiration, and Consequence. So that deservedly
-  I deem this Invention to crown my Labours, to reward my Expences,
-  and make my Thoughts acquiesce in way of further Inventions: This
-  making up the whole Century, and preventing any further trouble to
-  the Reader for the present, meaning to leave to Posterity a Book,
-  wherein under each of these Heads the means to put in execution
-  and visible trial all and every of these Inventions, with the
-  shape and form of all things belonging to them, shall be Printed
-  by Brass-plates.”
-
-The promised book was never written, and we are accordingly left in
-uncertainty as to the precise character of the Marquis’s inventions. That
-he had a full conviction of the great powers of steam, as well as of its
-manageability and extensive practical uses, is sufficiently clear; but
-that he ever erected any engines after the plans thus summarily described
-is matter of considerable doubt. It is remarkable that, notwithstanding
-the number and variety of his suggested inventions, not a single model
-or machine constructed by the Marquis or his skilled workmen has been
-preserved. Mr. Dircks, who has collected and published all that is
-likely to be brought to light relative to the life and works of the
-Marquis, and has laboured at his task with a rare love and enthusiasm
-for his subject, naturally expresses surprise that “none of the many
-cabinets of the curious seem to have possessed any model or work of his
-production; not even the indefatigable Tradescant, although his museum
-was at Lambeth.”[14] But it is probable, as we have already observed,
-that the Marquis’s ‘Scantlings,’ notwithstanding his statement that he
-had “tried and perfected” the inventions of which he speaks, were rather
-the foreshadowings of things to come than the descriptions of things
-that had actually been executed. Thus, no one pretends that the Marquis
-ever constructed a steamboat, and yet his description of a vessel “to
-work itself against wind and tide, yea, both, without the help of man
-or beast,” can apply to nothing else.[15] “This engine,” said he, “is
-applicable to any vessel or boat whatsoever, without being therefore made
-on purpose, and worketh these effects: it roweth, it draweth, it driveth,
-(if need be) to pass London Bridge against the stream at low-water, and a
-boat laying at anchor, the engine may be used for loading or unloading.”
-But it would not be possible for any one to make an engine after the
-description given in the ‘Scantlings;’ and to a generation unacquainted
-with the powers of steam, his suggestions would be altogether without
-meaning.
-
-    [14] Dircks’s ‘Life and Times,’ &c., 356.
-
-The strongest evidence which could be adduced of the ambiguity of the
-Marquis’s ‘Articles’ is to be found in the fact that the various ingenious
-writers who have given plans of his supposed engine have represented it
-in widely different forms. Farey assumes that it worked by the expansive
-force of steam; Bourne, that it worked by condensation and atmospheric
-pressure; Dircks infers that it included such ingenious expedients
-as valves and even a four-way cock, worked by a lever-handle; Stuart,
-that it contained a cylinder and piston, and was, in fact, a complete
-high-pressure lever-engine. Again, the drawings of the various writers
-on engineering who have attempted to reproduce the engine--of Stuart,
-Galloway, Millington, and Dircks--differ in essential respects.
-
-    [15] Mr. Woodcroft is, however, of opinion that the Marquis’s
-      contrivance was but a boat with paddle-wheels, with an axis
-      across it, which axis was turned by the action of the stream
-      on the paddles, and thus wound up a rope and dragged the
-      boat onward to the other end of the rope fixed by an anchor;
-      certainly a more clumsy and less notable contrivance than that
-      of a steamboat.
-
-When Watt was on one occasion asked for his opinion as to the precise
-nature of the Marquis’s contrivance, his answer was, that the descriptions
-given were too obscure to enable any definite opinion to be formed on
-the subject; but he thought that the expansive power of steam was the
-principle on which the engine worked. He added, that no one could possibly
-erect an engine after the Marquis’s ‘Scantlings,’ and that any inventor
-desirous of constructing a steam-engine would have to begin again at the
-beginning. But though the Marquis did not leave the steam-engine in such
-a state as to be taken up and adopted as a practicable working power, he
-at least advanced it several important steps. In this world, it is not
-given to man to finish; to persevere, to improve, and to advance, are all
-that can be hoped for; and these are enough for the real philosopher.
-
-Little remains to be told of the unfortunate Marquis’s history. His
-water-commanding engine proved of no service to him. It only increased
-his embarrassments by involving him in further debts. The Restoration,
-though it gave him back his estates, did not mend his fortunes, and he
-continued to importune his friends for loans. He sought access to the
-King by petition; but it became more and more difficult to approach him.
-On one occasion he tried to accomplish his purpose through the influence
-of his Majesty’s mistress, Lady Castlemaine. Provided she could persuade
-the king to grant his request, he offered to present to her “a thousand
-pieces to buy her a little jewel, which she deserves to wear every day
-of the week. And if it please God I live but two years,” he added, “I
-will, out of the profits of my water-commanding engine, appropriate four
-hundred pounds yearly, for ever, to her Grace’s disposal ... all which, as
-I am a gentleman and a Christian, shall be faithfully and most thankfully
-performed; though the benefit I pretend to by my petition will not amount
-to what my gratitude obliges, yet the satisfaction which it will be to
-my mind, and my credit therein at stake, I value at ten times as much.
-And this will enable me to place my Water-commanding Engine, when I am
-certained of an hundred pounds a day profit, without further troubling
-the king or anybody.”[16]
-
-All his piteous importunity proved of no avail. His friends turned
-aside from his petitionings, and the king would give him no help. He
-came to be regarded as a crack-brained enthusiast, and a wild projector
-of impracticable things. He could not find any one to believe in his
-water-commanding engine, though he himself regarded it as of greater worth
-than either his titles or his estates. It had been his own creation--the
-child of his brain--the product of studies and experiments extending over
-nearly forty years. But what signified all this if no one would make use
-of the invention?
-
-His difficulties and embarrassments grew from day to day; and his projects
-met with increased contumely and even contempt. None valued them, because
-none understood them. It was even proposed to appropriate to other
-purposes the premises at Vauxhall, on which he so much plumed himself, but
-which he had been unable to purchase. To prevent this, he again petitioned
-the king in 1666, representing that he had expended 9000_l._ in building
-the house he occupied there as “an operatory for engineers and artists to
-make public works in,” and “above 50,000_l._ trying conclusions of arts in
-that operatory which may be useful to his Majesty and his kingdom;” and he
-concluded by praying that Vauxhall might be granted to him at a fee-farm
-rent. The Marchioness, his wife, at the same time petitioned the House of
-Lords, representing the state of poverty to which her husband had been
-reduced, and that, in consequence of an execution having been put in at
-Worcester House, through a debt of 6000_l._ which the Marquis had incurred
-in 1642 to pay the garrison of Monmouth, then in a state of mutiny, he
-was actually threatened to be turned out of house and home. It is not
-known what came of this petition; but shortly after its presentation the
-poor Marquis was beyond all worldly help. Broken in health, harassed,
-embarrassed, and disappointed, he died in April, 1667, in the sixty-sixth
-year of his age, and his remains were conveyed to Raglan for interment in
-the family vault.
-
-    [16] Letter to some person unknown, quoted by Mr. Dircks from the
-      Badminton MSS.--Dircks’s ‘Life, Times,’ &c., 276.
-
-It will be remembered that the Marquis concluded the 98th article of his
-‘Century’ with the words, “I call this a semi-omnipotent engine, and do
-intend that a model thereof be buried with me.” A diligent search for the
-model has recently been made in the vault under Raglan church, under the
-direction of Mr. Bennet Woodcroft, whose enthusiasm as a collector of
-primitive engines and machines is so well known; but the search proved
-unsuccessful, and no traces of the Marquis’s model could be found.
-
-[Illustration: RUINS OF RAGLAN CASTLE.
-
-[By Percival Skelton.]]
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER II.
-
-SIR SAMUEL MORLAND--DR. DIONYSIUS PAPIN.
-
-
-After the death of the Marquis of Worcester, the Marchioness, his
-widow, made various efforts to turn his inventions to account. Sceptical
-though the world was as to their utility, she fully believed in them;
-and now that he was gone, it would have been dishonouring to his memory
-to entertain a doubt as to his engine being able to do all that he had
-promised. The Marchioness had not only to maintain the fame of her dear
-husband, but to endeavour, if possible, to pay the debts he had contracted
-in prosecuting his inventions. She accordingly sought to interest persons
-of authority and influence in the water-commanding engine, and seized
-every opportunity of bringing it into notice.
-
-To such an extent did the Marchioness carry her zeal, that her
-friends began to fear lest her mind was becoming disordered; and
-her father-confessor was requested to expostulate with her as to the
-impropriety of her conduct. He accordingly implored her to desist from
-her vain endeavours to get “great sums of money from the King to pay her
-deceased lord’s debts, enriching herself by the great machine, and the
-like.” He added that he feared “the devil, to make his suggestions the
-more prevalent, doth make use of some motives that seem plausible, as of
-paying your lord’s debts, of founding monasteries, and the like;” pointing
-out that the end did not justify the means, and that such undertakings
-were improper for her ladyship, and by no means likely to be attended
-with success. It is not improbable that these representations had their
-effect; the more especially as the Marchioness was no more successful in
-inducing the public to adopt the invention than the Marquis himself had
-been. Accordingly, the water-commanding engine very shortly dropped out
-of sight, and in the course of a few years was almost entirely forgotten.
-
-The steam-engine project, however, did not die; it only slept. It had
-been the fruit thus far of noble effort, of persevering self-denial, and
-unquestionable skill. What was good in it would yet live, and reappear
-perhaps in other forms, to vindicate the sagacity and foresight of its
-inventor. Even during the Marquis’s lifetime other minds besides his were
-diligently pursuing the same subject. Indeed, his enthusiasm was of a
-kind especially calculated to inflame other minds; and the success he had
-achieved with his engine, imperfect though it might be, was of so novel
-and original a character that it could not fail to excite a warm interest
-amongst men of like mechanical genius.
-
-One of the most distinguished of these was Sir Samuel Morland, appointed
-Master of Mechanics to Charles II. immediately after the Restoration. He
-had been for some time previously in the employment of the Protectorate.
-He formed one of the embassy to Sweden, with Whitlocke, in 1653. Some
-years later he took an active part in the relief of the sufferings of
-the persecuted Protestants of Piedmont--whose history he afterwards
-wrote,--having been appointed Commissioner Extraordinary for the
-distribution of the collected moneys. For some time he officiated as
-assistant to Thurloe, Cromwell’s secretary; and it was while acting
-in this capacity that he became cognisant of a plot against the life
-of Charles II., then in exile. Morland divulged the plot to the king’s
-friends, and thereby perhaps saved his life. For this service, Charles,
-on his Restoration, presented him with a medal, as a badge of his signal
-loyalty, and also appointed him Master of Mechanics.
-
-From that time until the close of his life, Morland devoted himself
-entirely to mechanical studies. Among his various inventions may be
-mentioned the speaking-trumpet;[17] two arithmetical machines, of which
-he published an illustrated description; the capstan to heave ships’
-anchors; and various kinds of pumps and water engines. His pumps were of
-a very powerful and effective kind. One of them, worked by eight men,
-forced water from the Thames at Blackmoor Park, near Winkfield, to the
-top of Windsor Castle. He also devoted himself to the improvement of
-the fire-engine, in which he employed a cylinder and piston, as well as
-a stuffing-box. Towards the later years of his life, he applied himself
-more particularly to the study of the powers and uses of steam.[18] In
-1677, we find him taking a lease of Vauxhall, most probably the identical
-house occupied by the Marquis of Worcester, where he conducted a series
-of experiments as to the power requisite to raise water by cylinders of
-different dimensions.[19] It is not, however, known that he ever erected
-a steam-engine. If he did, no account of its performances has been
-preserved.
-
-    [17] We are informed that Morland’s _Tuba Stentorphornica_, or
-      speaking-trumpet, is still to be seen at Trinity College,
-      Cambridge. Butler, in his ‘Hudibras,’ alludes to the
-      invention:--
-
-        “I heard a formidable voice
-        Loud as the stentorphornic noise.”
-
-    [18] His first idea seems to have been to employ gunpowder for
-      the production of motive power, for in the ‘Calendar of State
-      Papers’ (Dom) we find the following entry:--“Decr. 11th,
-      1691.--Warrant for a grant to Sir Samuel Morland of the sole use
-      for 14 years of his invention for raising water out of pits,
-      &c., to a reasonable height, by the force of powder and air
-      conjointly.”--(‘Entry Book,’ V., p. 85.) In vol. XLVI., p. 49,
-      we find this entry under the same date:--“Warrant for a grant
-      to Sir S. Morland of the sole making of an engine invented by
-      him for raising water in mines or pits, draining marshes, or
-      supplying buildings with water.”
-
-    [19] The ‘Harleian Miscellany’ (Brit. Mus.), No. 5771, contains
-      the following brief tract in French, written by Morland in 1682.
-      It is on vellum, and entitled ‘Les Principes de la Nouvelle
-      Force de Feu:’--“L’eau estant evaporée par la force de feu, ces
-      vapeurs demandent incontinant une plus grand’espace [environ
-      deux mille fois] que l’eau n’occupoiet auparavant, et plus tost
-      que d’etre toujours emprisonnés, feroient crever une piece
-      de canon. Mais estant bien gouvernées selon les regles de la
-      statique, et par science reduites a la mesure au poids, et à la
-      balance, alors elles portent paisiblement leurs fardeaux [comme
-      des bons chevaux] et ainsy seroient elles du grand usage au
-      gendre humain, particulièrement pour l’elevation des eaux, selon
-      la table suivante que marque les nombres des livres qui pourrant
-      estre levés 1800 fois par heure, à 6 pouces de levée, par de
-      cylindres à moitie remplies d’eau, ausi bien que les divers
-      diametres et profondeurs des dit cylindres.” Tables are then
-      given, showing the power requisite to raise given quantities of
-      water to certain heights by cylinders of different dimensions.
-
-Morland’s inventions proved of no greater advantage to him than those of
-the Marquis of Worcester had done. His later years were spent in poverty
-and blindness, and he must have perished but for the charitable kindness
-of Archbishop Tenison and a few other friends. Evelyn gives the following
-interesting account of a visit to him in October, 1695, two months before
-his death:--“The Archbishop and myself went to Hammersmith to visit
-Sir Samuel Morland, who was entirely blind; a very mortifying sight. He
-showed me his invention of writing, which was very ingenious; also his
-wooden calendar, which instructed him all by feeling, and other pretty
-and useful inventions of mills, pumps, &c., and the pump he had erected
-that serves water to his garden, and to passengers, with an inscription,
-and brings from a filthy part of the Thames now near it, a most perfect
-and pure water. He had newly buried 200_l._ worth of music books, being,
-as he said, love songs and vanity. He plays himself psalms and religious
-hymns on the theorbo.” The inscription to which Evelyn refers was on a
-stone tablet fixed on the wall of his house, still preserved, which runs
-thus:--“SIR SAMUEL MORLAND’S WELL, the use of which he freely gives to
-all persons: hoping that none who shall come after him, will adventure
-to incur God’s displeasure, by denying a cup of cold water (provided
-at another’s cost and not their own) to either neighbour, stranger,
-passenger, or poor thirsty beggar. July 8, 1695.”
-
-[Illustration: DIONYSIUS PAPIN, M.D., F.R.S.]
-
-The next prominent experimenter on the powers of steam was Dr. Dionysius
-Papin. He was born at Blois about the middle of the seventeenth century,
-and educated to the profession of medicine. After taking his degree
-at Paris, he turned his attention more particularly to the study of
-physics, which soon occupied his whole attention; and under the celebrated
-Huyghens, then resident in that city, he made rapid progress. He would,
-doubtless, have risen to great distinction in his own country, but for
-the circumstance of his being a Protestant. To escape the persecutions
-to which all members of that persuasion were then subject, Papin fled
-from France in 1681, together with thousands of his countrymen, a few
-years before the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes. He took refuge in
-London, where he was welcomed by men of science, and more especially by
-the celebrated Boyle, under whose auspices he was introduced to the Royal
-Society, of which he was appointed Curator at an annual salary.
-
-It formed part of Papin’s duty, in connection with his new office,
-to produce an experiment at each meeting of the Society. He was thus
-induced to prosecute the study of physical science; and in order to
-stimulate the interest of the members, he sought to introduce new subjects
-from time to time to their notice. One of the greatest novelties of
-his “entertainments” was the production of his well-known Digester,
-which excited a considerable degree of interest; and on one occasion
-a philosophical supper, cooked by the Digester, was served up to the
-Fellows, of which Evelyn gives an amusing account in his Diary.
-
-He was led to the invention of the Digester by certain experiments which
-he made for Boyle. He discovered that if the vapour of boiling water could
-be prevented escaping, the temperature of the water would be raised much
-above the boiling point; and it occurred to him to employ this increased
-heat in more effectually extracting nutritious matter from the bones of
-animals, until then thrown away as useless. The great strength required
-for his Digester, and the means he was obliged to adopt for the purpose
-of securely confining the cover, must have early shown him what a powerful
-agent he was experimenting on. To prevent the bursting of the vessel from
-the internal pressure, he was led to the invention of the safety-valve,
-which consisted of a small moveable plate, or cylinder, fitted into an
-opening in the cover of the boiler, and kept shut by a lever loaded with
-a weight, capable of sliding along it in the manner of a steel yard. The
-pressure of the weight upon the valve could thus be regulated at pleasure.
-When the pressure became so great as to endanger the safety of the boiler,
-the valve was forced up, and so permitted the steam to escape. Although
-Papin was thus the inventor of the safety-valve, it is a curious fact that
-he did not apply it to the steam-machine which he subsequently invented,
-but adopted another expedient.
-
-The reputation of Papin having extended to Germany, he was, in 1687,
-invited to fill the office of Professor of Mathematics in the University
-of Marburg, and accepted the appointment. He continued, however, to
-maintain a friendly correspondence with his scientific friends in England,
-and communicated to the Royal Society the results of the experiments
-in physics which he continued to pursue. In the same year in which he
-settled at Marburg, he submitted to the Society an important paper, which
-indicated the direction in which his thoughts were then running. It had
-occurred to him, as it had before done to Hautefeuille, that the explosion
-of gunpowder presented a ready means of producing a power to elevate a
-piston in a tube or cylinder, and that, when so raised, a vacuum could
-be formed under the piston by condensing the vapour, and so ensuring its
-return by the pressure of the atmosphere. He thought that he might thus be
-enabled to secure an efficient moving force. But it was found in practice,
-that the proposed power was too violent as well as uncertain, and it was
-shortly given up as impracticable.
-
-Papin next inquired whether his proposed elastic force and subsequent
-vacuum might not better be produced by means of steam. He accordingly
-entered upon a series of experiments, which gradually led him to the
-important conclusions published in his celebrated paper on “A New Method
-of Obtaining very Great Moving Powers at Small Cost,” which appeared in
-the ‘Acta Eruditorum’ of Leipsic, in 1690. “I felt confident,” he there
-observes, “that machines might be constructed wherein water, by means of
-no very intense heat, and at small cost, might produce that perfect vacuum
-which had failed to be obtained by means of gunpowder.” He accordingly
-contrived a machine to illustrate this idea, but it was very imperfect and
-slow in its action, as may well be imagined from the circumstance that to
-produce the condensation he did not apply cold, but merely took away the
-fire! Still he was successfully working out, step by step, the important
-problem of steam power. He clearly perceived that a piston might be raised
-in a cylinder by the elastic force of steam, and that on the production
-of a vacuum by its condensation, the piston might be driven home again by
-the pressure of the atmosphere. The question was, how was this idea to be
-realised in a practicable working machine? After many experiments, Papin
-had the courage to make the attempt to pump water by atmospheric pressure
-on a large scale. He was employed to erect machines after his principle,
-for the purpose of draining mines in Auvergne and Westphalia; but from
-the difficulty he experienced in procuring and preserving a vacuum, and
-the tediousness of the process, his enterprise proved abortive.
-
-The truth is, that fertile though Papin was in conception, he laboured
-under the greatest possible disadvantage in not being a mechanic. The
-eyes and hands of others are not to be relied on in the execution of new
-and untried machines. Unless eyes and hands be disciplined by experience
-in skilled work, and inspired by intelligence, they are comparatively
-useless. The chances of success are vastly greater when mind, eyes, and
-hands, are combined in one person. Hence the unquestionable fact that
-though the motive power of steam had long been the subject of ingenious
-speculation and elaborate experiment amongst scientific men, it failed
-to be adopted as a practicable working power until it was taken in
-hand by mechanics--by such men as Newcomen, the blacksmith; Potter, the
-engine-driver; Brindley, the millwright; and, above all, by James Watt,
-the mathematical instrument maker.
-
-The sagacious foresight of Papin as to the extensive applicability of
-steam-power as a motive agent, is strikingly shown by the following
-passage in the paper above referred to:--“If any one,” says he, “will
-consider the magnitude of the forces to be obtained in this way (_i. e._,
-by the atmospheric high-pressure engine he was suggesting), and the
-trifling expense at which a sufficient quantity of fuel can be procured,
-he will certainly admit that this very method is far preferable to the use
-of gunpowder above spoken of, especially as in this way a perfect vacuum
-is obtained, and so the inconveniences above recounted are avoided. In
-what manner that power can be applied to draw water or ore from mines,
-to discharge iron bullets to a great distance, to propel ships against
-the wind, and to a multitude of other similar purposes, it would be too
-long here to detail; but each individual, according to the particular
-occasion, must select the construction of machinery appropriate to his
-purpose.” This last was, however, the real difficulty to be overcome.
-Steam, doubtless, contained a power to do all these things; but as for
-the machine that would work quietly, docilely, and effectively, in pumping
-water, discharging bullets, or propelling ships, the mechanic had not yet
-appeared that was able to make one.
-
-Papin was, however, a man of great perseverance; and, strong in his faith
-as to the power of steam to propel ships, he gradually worked his way
-to the contrivance of a model steamboat. When in London, he had seen an
-experiment tried by the Prince Palatine Rupert on the Thames, in which
-a boat fitted with revolving paddles attached to the two ends of an
-axle which received its motion from a trundle working on a wheel turned
-round by horses, went with such rapidity as to leave the king’s barge,
-manned by sixteen rowers, far behind in the race. The idea which occurred
-to Papin was, to apply a steam machine to drive the paddles, and thus
-ensure a ship’s motion independent of wind or tide. For this purpose, it
-was necessary to convert the alternate motion of the piston-rod into a
-continuous rotary one; and this he proposed to effect “by having the rods
-of the pistons fitted with teeth, which would force round small wheels,
-toothed in like manner, fastened to the axis of the paddles.”
-
-[Illustration: ANCIENT PADDLE-BOAT.]
-
-The use of paddle-wheels in propelling boats had long been known.
-The Harleian MSS. contain an Italian book of sketches, attributed to
-the fifteenth century, in which there appears the annexed sketch of a
-paddle-boat. This boat was evidently intended to be worked by two men
-turning the crank by which the paddles were made to revolve. There were
-many other early schemes of paddle-boats, some of which were proposed
-to be worked by horse-power. The name of Blasco Garay has often been
-mentioned as the first who applied the power of steam to the driving
-of paddle-boats; but for this there is not the slightest foundation. M.
-Bergenroth informs us that he has carefully examined all the documents
-relating to the trials of Blasco Garay in the archives at Simancas, but
-has found no reference whatever to steam as the power employed in causing
-the paddles to revolve.[20] The experiments were made at Malaga and
-Barcelona respectively, in the years 1540 and 1543: in one the vessel was
-propelled by a paddle-wheel on each side worked by twenty-five men, and
-in the other by a paddle-wheel worked by forty men.
-
-    [20] M. Bergenroth says the documents at Simancas consist of--1. A
-      holograph letter of Blasco Garay to the Emperor, dated Malaga,
-      10th Sept., 1540, containing his report on the trial trip of
-      one of his paddle-wheel ships; 2. The report of the Captain
-      Antonio Destigarura on the same trial trip; 3. The report of
-      the Provcedores of Malaga concerning the same trip, dated 27th
-      July, 1540; 4. The report of Blasco Garay to the Emperor, dated
-      6th July, 1543, concerning the trial trip of another of his
-      paddle-wheel ships made at Barcelona in June, 1543; 5. A letter
-      of Blasco Garay to Carrs, dated 20th June, 1543. In none of
-      these is there to be found any reference to steam-power; but
-      only to the power of men employed in driving the paddle-wheels.
-      This is confirmed by the independent examination of the same
-      documents by J. Macgregor, Esq., of the Temple, who gives the
-      result in a Letter to Bennet Woodcroft, Esq., inserted as a
-      note to the ‘Abridgments of the Specifications relating to Steam
-      Propulsion,’ pp. 105–7.
-
-It appears probable that although others before Papin had speculated
-as to the possibility of constructing a boat to be driven by the power
-of steam, he was the first to test the theory by actual experiment; the
-first to construct a model steamboat. His first experiments were doubtless
-failures. The engine contrived by himself was found inapplicable to the
-driving of ships, as it had been to the pumping of mines; and it was
-not until he saw the model of Savery’s engine exhibited to the Royal
-Society of London, in 1698, and witnessed the trial of the same inventor
-s paddle-wheel boat on the Thames in the course of the same year that it
-occurred to him to combine the two contrivances in one, and apply Savery’s
-engine to drive Savery’s paddle-wheels. Returning to Marburg, he proceeded
-with his experiments, and informed Liebnitz that he had employed both
-suction and pressure by steam; that he had made a model of a carriage
-propelled by this force, which succeeded; and he hoped that the same
-power would answer for boats. Papin prosecuted his idea with great zeal,
-trying many expedients, encountering many difficulties, and meeting with
-many disappointments. At length, after about fifteen years’ labour, he
-succeeded in constructing a model engine, fitted in a boat--“une petite
-machine d’un vaisseau à roues”--which worked to his satisfaction. His next
-object was to get his model transported to London, to exhibit it on the
-Thames. “It is important,” he writes to Liebnitz (7th July, 1707), “that
-my new construction of vessel should be put to the proof in a seaport like
-London, where there is depth enough to apply the new invention, which,
-by means of fire, will render one or two men capable of producing more
-effect than some hundreds of rowers.” Papin had considerable difficulty
-in obtaining the requisite permission from the authorities to enable his
-model to pass from the Fulda to the Weser; but at length he succeeded,
-and the little vessel reached Münden, when, to Papin’s great grief, it
-was seized by the boatmen of the river, and barbarously destroyed.
-
-The year after this calamity befell Papin’s machine he wrote an urgent
-letter to his old friends of the Royal Society at London, asking them to
-advance him sufficient money to construct another engine “and to fit it so
-that it might be applied for the rowing of ships.” The Society, however,
-did not see their way to assisting Papin in the manner proposed, most
-likely because of the expense as well as uncertainty of the experiment.
-Two years later, worn out by work and anxiety, the illustrious exile died;
-and it was left for other labourers to realise the great ideas he had
-formed as to locomotion by steam-power.
-
-The apparently resultless labours of these men will serve to show what a
-long, anxious, and toilsome process the invention of the steam-engine has
-been. The early inventors had not the gratification of seeing their toils
-rewarded by even the faintest glimmering of practical success. One after
-another, they took up the subject, spent days and nights of study over
-it, and, laying down their lives, there left it. To many the study brought
-nothing but anxiety, toil, distress, and sometimes ruin; while some fairly
-broke their hearts over it. But it was never abandoned. Disregarding
-the fate of their predecessors, one labourer after another resumed
-the investigation, advancing it by further stages, until at length the
-practicable working steam-engine was invented, presenting, perhaps, the
-most remarkable illustration of the power of human skill and perseverance
-to be found in the whole history of civilisation.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER III.
-
-CAPTAIN SAVERY--HIS FIRE-ENGINE.
-
-
-The attempts hitherto made to invent a working steam-engine, it will
-be observed, had not been attended with much success. The most that
-could be said of them was, that, by demonstrating the impracticable,
-they were gradually leading other experimenters in the direction of
-the practicable. Although the progress made seemed but slow, the amount
-of net result was by no means inconsiderable. Men were becoming better
-acquainted with the elastic force of steam. The vacuum produced by its
-condensation in a closed vessel, and the consequent atmospheric pressure,
-had been illustrated by repeated experiments; and many separate and minor
-inventions, which afterwards proved of great value, had been made, such as
-the four-way cock, the safety-valve, and the piston moving in a cylinder.
-The principle of a true steam-engine had not only been demonstrated, but
-most of the separate parts of such an engine had been contrived by various
-inventors. It seemed as if all that was now wanting was a genius of more
-than ordinary power to combine them in a complete and effective whole.
-
-To Thomas Savery is usually accorded the merit of having constructed the
-first actual working steam-engine. Little is known of his early history;
-and various surmises have been formed as to his origin and calling.
-Some writers have described him as the captain of a tin-mine; others as
-a naval captain; while a third says he was an immigrant Frenchman.[21]
-We are, however, enabled to state, from information communicated by his
-descendants, that he was the scion of a well-known Devonshire family.
-John Savery, of Halberton, or Harberton, afterwards of Great Totness,
-was a gentleman of considerable property in the reign of Henry VIII. In
-the sixteenth century the Saverys became connected by marriage with the
-Servingtons of Tavistock, another old county family, one of whom served as
-sheriff in the reign of Edward III. In 1588, Christopher Savery, the head
-of the family, resided in Totness Castle, of which he was the owner; and
-for a period of nearly forty years the town was represented in Parliament
-by members of the Savery family. Sir Charles served as Sheriff of Devon in
-1619. Though the Saverys took the side of the Parliament, in resisting the
-despotic power assumed by Charles I., they nevertheless held a moderate
-course; for we find Colonel Savery, in 1643, attaching his name to the
-famous “round robin” presented to Parliament. Richard Savery, the youngest
-son of the Colonel, was father of Thomas Savery, the inventor of the
-“fire-engine.” Other members of the Savery family, besides Thomas, were
-distinguished for their prosecution of physical science. Thus we find from
-the family MSS., Servington Savery corresponding with Dr. Jurin, Secretary
-to the Royal Society, respecting an improvement which he had made in the
-barometer, and communicating the results of some magnetic experiments of
-a novel kind, which he had recently performed.[22]
-
-    [21] Burn, ‘History of Foreign Protestant Refugees,’ 261.
-
-    [22] In a letter, dated Shilston, August 9th, 1727, he
-      writes:--“The late Mr. Thomas Savery, inventor of the engines
-      for rowing, and raising water by fire, was, I believe, well
-      known to several of the Royal Society, perhaps to the President;
-      but as I am a perfect stranger, do acquaint you that his father
-      was youngest brother to my grandfather. The late Servington
-      Savery, M.D., of Marlborough, was one of my family, viz., a
-      brother to my deceased father.”
-
-[Illustration: THOMAS SAVERY, F.R.S.]
-
-Thomas Savery was born at Shilston, near Modbury, in Devon, about
-the year 1650. Nothing is known of his early life, beyond that he was
-educated to the profession of a military engineer, and in course of time
-duly reached the rank of Trench-master. The corps of engineers was not,
-however, regarded as an essential part of the military force until the
-year 1787, when the officers ranked with those of the Royal Artillery.
-The pursuit of his profession, as well as his natural disposition, led
-Savery to the study of mechanics, and he became well accomplished in the
-physical knowledge of his time. He occupied much of his spare time in
-mechanical experiments, and in projecting and executing contrivances of
-various sorts. One of his early works was a clock, still preserved in the
-family,[23] which until lately kept very good time; and when last repaired
-by a watchmaker of Modbury was pronounced to be a piece of very good work,
-of a peculiar construction, displaying much ingenuity.
-
-Another of Savery’s early contrivances was a machine for polishing
-plate-glass, for which he obtained a patent. He was occupied about the
-same time with an invention for rowing ships in calms by the mechanical
-apparatus subsequently described in his treatise, entitled ‘Navigation
-Improved.’ He there relates how it troubled his thoughts and racked
-his brains to find out this invention, which he accomplished after many
-experiments, conducted “with great charge.” He naturally set much value
-on the product of so much study and labour; and he was proportionately
-vexed on finding that others regarded it with indifference. He professed
-to have had “promises of a great reward from the Court, if the thing would
-answer the end for which he proposed it;” but instead of a reward, Savery
-received only contumely and scorn. He attributed his want of success to
-the ill-humour of the then Surveyor of the Navy, who reported against
-his engine, because, said he, “it’s the nature of some men to decry all
-inventions that are not the product of their own brains.” He only asked
-for a fair trial of his paddle-boat, believing in its efficiency and
-utility; declaring, that it was not his “fondness for his own bratt that
-made him think so,” but the favourable opinions of several very judicious
-persons in town, that encouraged him to urge his invention for public
-adoption.
-
-    [23] It is now in the possession of Capt. Lowe, of the 26th
-      Regiment, whose grand-aunt was a Miss Savery of Shilston.
-
-The invention in question consisted of a boat mounted with two
-paddle-wheels, one on each side, worked by a capstan placed in the centre
-of the vessel. The annexed cut will show the nature of the arrangement,
-which probably did not differ much from the scheme of Blasco Garay, above
-referred to.
-
-[Illustration: SECTION OF SAVERY’S PADDLE-BOAT.]
-
-Savery says he was led to make the invention through the difficulty
-which had been experienced in getting ships in motion so as to place them
-alongside of the enemy in sea-fights, especially during calm weather. He
-thought that if our fighting-ships could be made to move independent of
-the winds, we should thereby possess an advantage of essential consequence
-to the public service. “The gentlemen,” said he, “that were on the Brest
-expedition with my Lord Caermarthen must know how useful this engine would
-have been; for had they had them there on board each ship, they might have
-moved themselves where they had pleased.” He also urged the usefulness of
-the engine for packet-boats, bomb-vessels, and sloops, and especially for
-use in sea-fights, in bringing off disabled ships. When he had completed
-his invention, he took steps to bring it under the notice of Mr. Secretary
-Trenchard. The plan was shown to the King, who thought highly of it, and
-referred Savery to the Admiralty. When he went there he was told that he
-should have gone to the Navy Board. At the Navy Board he was told that
-certain objections to the adoption of his scheme had already been sent to
-the Admiralty.
-
-Savery having ascertained that the Surveyor was himself the author of the
-objections, proceeded to discuss the matter with him. But the Surveyor
-was not a man to be argued out of his views by an inventor; and he shut
-up Savery with the remark: “What have interloping people, that have no
-concern with us, to do to pretend to contrive or invent things for us?”
-Savery was highly indignant at the official snub, and published the
-conversation in his Treatise. “Though one has found out,” said he, “an
-improvement as great to shipping as turning to windward or the Compass,
-unless you can sit round the Green Table in Crutched Friars, your
-invention is damned, of course;” and the testy inventor concluded: “All I
-have now to add is, that whoever is angry with the Truth for appearing in
-mean language may as well be angry with an honest man for his plain habit;
-for, indeed, it is as common for Lyes and Nonsense to be disguised by a
-jingle of words as for a Blockhead to be hid by abundance of Peruke.”[24]
-
-    [24] ‘Navigation Improved; or the Art of Rowing Ships of all rates
-      in calms, with a more easy, swift and steady motion than oars
-      can. Also, a description of the engine that performs it; and the
-      Author’s answer to all Mr. Drummer’s objections that have been
-      made against it. By Tho. Savery, Gent. London, 1698.’
-
-Notwithstanding his rebuff by the Navy Surveyor, Savery proceeded to
-fit up a small yacht with his engine, and tried an experiment with it
-on the Thames, in sight of many thousands of spectators. The experiment
-was, in his opinion, entirely successful. The yacht, manned by eight
-sailors working the capstan, passed a ketch with all its sails spread,
-as well as other vessels. “All people,” said Savery, “seemed to like the
-demonstration of the use of my engine, the public newspapers speaking
-very largely of it, yet all to no purpose.” Savery had already expended
-200_l._ in his experiments on the paddle-wheel boat, and was not disposed
-to go any further, now that Government had decided not to take up the
-invention. Indeed, its practical utility was doubtful. The power of the
-wind was, after all, better than hand-labour for working large ships;
-and it continued to maintain its superiority until the steam-engine was
-brought to perfection.
-
-It is curious that it should not have occurred to Savery, who invented
-both a paddle-wheel boat and a steam-engine, to combine the two in one
-machine; but he was probably sick of the former invention, which had given
-him so much vexation and annoyance, and gave it up in disgust, leaving
-it to Papin, who saw both his inventions at work, to hit upon the grand
-idea of combining the two in a steam-vessel,--the only machine capable
-of effectually and satisfactorily rowing ships in a calm, or against wind
-and tide.
-
-It is probable that Savery was led to enter upon his next and most
-important invention by the circumstance of his having been brought up
-in the neighbourhood of the mining districts, and being well aware
-of the great difficulty experienced by the miners in keeping their
-pits clear of water, to enable them to proceed with their underground
-operations. The early tin-mining of Cornwall was for the most part
-what was called “stream-work,” being confined mainly to washing and
-collecting the diluvial deposits of the ore. Mines usually grew out of
-these stream-works; the ground was laid open at the back of the lodes,
-and the ore was dug out as from a quarry. Some of these old openings,
-called “coffins,” are still to be met with in different parts of Cornwall.
-The miners did not venture much below the surface, for fear of the
-water, by which they were constantly liable to be drowned out. But as
-the upper strata became exhausted, they were tempted to go deeper in
-search of the richer ores. Shafts were sunk to the lodes, and they were
-followed underground. Then it was that the difficulty of water had to be
-encountered and overcome; for unless it could be got rid of, the deeper
-ores of Cornwall were as so much buried treasure. When the mines were of
-no great depth, it was possible to bale out the water by hand-buckets.
-But this expedient was soon exhausted; and the power of horses was then
-employed to draw the buckets. Where the lodes ran along a hill-side, it
-was possible, by driving an adit from a lower point, to let off the water
-by natural drainage. But this was not often found practicable, and in most
-cases it had to be raised directly from the shafts by artificial methods.
-As the quantity increased, a whim or gin moving on a perpendicular axis
-was employed to draw the water.[25] An improvement on this was the rack
-and chain pump, consisting of an endless iron chain mounted with knobs
-of cloth stiffened with leather, inclosed in a wooden pump of from six
-to eight inches bore, the lower part of which rested in the well of the
-mine. The chain was turned round by a wheel two or three feet in diameter,
-usually worked by men, and the knobs with which it was mounted brought up
-a stream of water according to the dimensions of the pump. Another method,
-considered the most effectual of all, was known as “the water-wheel and
-bobs,” consisting of a powerful pump, or series of pumps, worked by
-a water-wheel. But although there is no want of water underground in
-Cornwall, and no want of rain above ground, there are few or no great
-water-courses capable of driving machinery; besides, as the mines are for
-the most part situated on high ground, it will be obvious that water-power
-was available to only a very limited extent for this purpose.
-
-    [25] Mr. Davies Gilbert says even this method was comparatively
-      modern, as he remembered a carpenter who used to boast that
-      he had assisted in making the first whim ever seen westward of
-      Hayle.--Davies, ‘Parochial History of Cornwall,’ London, 1838,
-      ii. 83.
-
-It is also worthy of notice that the early mining of Cornwall was carried
-on by men of small capital, principally by working men, who were unable
-to expend any large amount of money in forming artificial reservoirs,
-or in erecting the powerful pumping machinery necessary for keeping the
-deeper mines clear of water. The Cornish miners, like the Whitstable
-oyster-dredgers, worked upon the principle of co-operation. This doctrine,
-now taught as a modern one, was practised by them almost time out of mind.
-The owner of the land gave the use of his land, the adventurers gave their
-money, and the miners their labour; all sharing in the proceeds according
-to ancient custom. For the use of his land, and for the ore taken from
-the mine, the lord usually took a sixth part; but in consideration of
-draining the mine, and in order to encourage the adventure, he was often
-content with an eighth, or it might be only a tenth part of the produce.
-The miners, on their part, agreed to divide in the proportions in which
-they took part in the work. Their shares of the ore raised were measured
-by barrows, and parcelled into heaps; “and it is surprising,” says
-Borlase, “to see how ready and exact the reckoners are in dividing, though
-oftentimes they can neither write nor read. The parcels being laid forth,
-lots are cast, and then every parcel has a distinct mark laid on it with
-one, two, or three stones, and sometimes a bit of stick or turf stuck up
-in the middle or side of the pile; and when these marks are laid on, the
-parcels may continue there half a year or more unmolested.”[26]
-
-    [26] Borlase, ‘Natural History of Cornwall,’ 175–6.
-
-These were, however, the early and primitive days of mining, when the
-operations were carried on comparatively near the surface, and the capital
-invested in pumping-machinery was comparatively small in amount. As the
-miners went deeper and deeper into the ground, and the richer lodes were
-struck and followed, the character of mining became considerably changed.
-Larger capitals were required to sink the shafts and keep them clear
-of water until the ore was reached; and a new class of men, outside the
-mining districts, was induced to venture their money in the mines as a
-speculation. Yet the system above described, though greatly modified by
-altered circumstances, continues to this day; and the mining of Cornwall
-continues to be carried on mainly upon the co-operative or joint-stock
-system.
-
-When the surface lodes became exhausted, the necessity of employing some
-more efficient method of pumping the water became more and more urgent.
-In one pit after another the miners were being drowned out, and the
-operations of an important branch of national industry were in danger of
-being brought to a complete standstill. It was under these circumstances
-that Captain Savery turned his attention to the contrivance of a more
-powerful engine for the raising of water; and after various experiments,
-he became persuaded that the most effective agency for the purpose was
-the power of steam. It is very probable that he was aware of the attempts
-that had been previously made in the same direction, and he may have
-gathered many useful and suggestive hints from the Marquis of Worcester’s
-‘Century;’ but as that book contained no plans nor precise definitions
-of the methods by which the Marquis had accomplished his objects, it
-could have helped him but little towards the contrivance of a practicable
-working engine.[27]
-
-    [27] The absurd story is told by Dr. Desaguliers (‘Experimental
-      Philosophy,’ ii. 465) that Savery, having read the Marquis’s
-      book, “was the first to put in practice the raising of water by
-      fire, which he proposed for the draining of mines;” and having
-      copied the Marquis’s engine, “the better to conceal the matter,
-      bought up all the Marquis of Worcester’s books that he could
-      purchase in Paternoster-row and elsewhere, and burned ’em in
-      the presence of the gentleman, his friend, who told me this!”
-      It need scarcely be said that it was very unlikely that Savery
-      should have attempted thus to conceal an invention recorded in
-      a printed book which had been in circulation for more than forty
-      years.
-
-How Savery was led to the study of the power of steam has been differently
-stated. Desaguliers says his own account was this,--that having drunk a
-flask of Florence at a tavern, and thrown the empty flask on the fire, he
-called for a basin of water to wash his hands, and perceiving that the
-little wine left in the flask had changed to steam, he took the vessel
-by the neck and plunged its mouth into the water in the basin, when, the
-steam being condensed, the water was immediately driven up into the flask
-by the pressure of the atmosphere. Desaguliers disbelieved this account,
-but admits that Savery made many experiments upon the powers of steam,
-and eventually succeeded in making several engines “which raised water
-very well.” Switzer, who was on intimate terms with Savery, gives another
-account. He says the first hint from which he took the engine was from
-a tobacco-pipe, which he immersed in water to wash or cool it; when he
-discovered by the rarefaction of the air in the tube by the heat or steam,
-and the gravitation or pressure of the exterior air on the condensation
-of the latter, that the water was made to spring through the tube of the
-pipe in a most surprising manner;[28] and that this phenomenon induced
-him to search for the rationale, and to prosecute a series of experiments
-which issued in the invention of his fire-engine.
-
-However Savery may have obtained his first idea of the expansion and
-condensation of steam, and of atmospheric pressure, it is certain that
-the subject occupied his attention for many years. He had the usual
-difficulties to encounter in dealing with a wholly new and untried power,
-in contriving the novel mechanism through which it was to work, and of
-getting his contrivances executed by the hands of mechanics necessarily
-unaccustomed to such kind of work. “Though I was obliged,” he says, “to
-encounter the oddest and almost insuperable difficulties, I spared neither
-time, pains, nor money, till I had absolutely conquered them.”
-
-    [28] Switzer, ‘System of Hydrostaticks and Hydraulicks,’ London,
-      1729.
-
-Having sufficiently matured his design, he had a model of his new “Fire
-Engine,” as he termed it, made for exhibition before the King at Hampton
-Court in 1698. William III., who was himself of a mechanical turn, was
-highly pleased with the ingenuity displayed in Savery’s engine, as well as
-with its efficient action, and he permitted the inventor to dedicate to
-him ‘The Miner’s Friend,’ containing the first published description of
-his invention. The King also promoted Savery’s application for a Patent,
-which was secured in July, 1698,[29] and an Act confirming it was passed
-in the following year.
-
-Savery’s next step was to bring his invention under the notice of the
-Royal Society, whose opinion on all matters of science was listened to
-with profound respect. He accordingly exhibited his model at a meeting
-held on the 14th of June, 1699, and it is recorded in the minutes of that
-date, that “Mr. Savery entertained the Society with showing his engine
-to raise water by the force of fire. He was thanked for showing the
-experiment, which succeeded according to expectation, and was approved
-of.” The inventor presented the Society with a drawing of his engine,
-accompanied by a description, which was printed in the ‘Transactions.’[30]
-
-    [29] The patent is dated the 25th July, 1698, and is entitled,
-      “A grant to Thomas Savery, Gentl., of the sole exercise of
-      a new invenc̃on, by him invented, for raiseing of water, and
-      occasioning moc̃on to all sort of mill works, by the impellant
-      force of fire, which will be of great use for draining mines,
-      serving towns with water, and for the working of all sorts
-      of mills when they have not the benefit of water nor constant
-      winds; to hold for 14 years; with usual clauses.”
-
-    [30] ‘Philosophical Transactions,’ No. 252. Weld’s ‘Royal
-      Society,’ i. 357.
-
-Savery next endeavoured to bring his invention into practical use, but
-this was a matter of much greater difficulty. So many schemes with a like
-object had been brought out and failed, that the mining interest came to
-regard new projects with increasing suspicion. To persuade them that he
-was no mere projector, but the inventor of a practicable working engine,
-Savery wrote and published his ‘Miner’s Friend.’ “I am not very fond,” he
-there said, “of lying under the scandal of a bare projector, and therefore
-present you here with a draught of my machine, and lay before you the uses
-of it, and leave it to your consideration whether it be worth your while
-to make use of it or no.”
-
-Inventors before Savery’s time were wont to make a great mystery of their
-inventions; but he proclaimed that there was no mystery whatever about
-his machine, and he believed that the more clearly it was understood,
-the better it would be appreciated. He acknowledged that there had been
-many pretenders to new inventions of the same sort, who had excited hopes
-which had never been fulfilled; but this invention which he had made was
-a thing the uses of which were capable of actual demonstration. He urged
-that the old methods of raising water could not be carried further; and
-that an entirely new power was needed to enable the miner to prosecute
-his underground labours. “I fear,” said he, “that whoever by the old
-causes of motion pretends to improvements within the last century does
-betray his knowledge and judgment. For more than a hundred years since,
-men and horses would raise by engines then made as much water as they
-have ever done since, or I believe ever will, or, according to the law of
-nature, ever can do. And, though my thoughts have been long employed about
-water-works, I should never have pretended to any invention of that kind,
-had I not happily found out this new, but yet a much stronger and cheaper
-force or cause of motion than any before made use of.” He proceeded to
-show how easy it was to work his engine,--boys of thirteen or fourteen
-years being able to attend and work it to perfection after a few days’
-teaching,--and how he had at length, after great difficulty, instructed
-handicraft artificers to construct the engine according to his design, so
-that, after much experience, said he, “they are become such masters of
-the thing that they oblige themselves to deliver what engines they make
-exactly tight and fit for service, and as such I dare warrant them to
-anybody that has occasion for them.”[31]
-
-Savery’s engine, as described by himself, consisted of a series of
-boilers, condensing vessels, and tubes, the action of which will be
-readily understood with the help of the annexed drawing.[32]
-
-[Illustration: SAVERY’S ENGINE.]
-
-    [31] ‘The Miner’s Friend, or an Engine to Raise Water by Fire,
-      described, and of the manner of fixing it in Mines, with an
-      account of the several uses it is applicable unto; and an
-      answer to the objections made against it. By Tho. Savery, Gent.’
-      London, 1702.
-
-    [32] Two boilers, a large, A, and a smaller, B, were fixed in
-      a furnace, and connected together at the top by a pipe, C.
-      The larger boiler was filled two-thirds full, and the smaller
-      quite full of water. When that in the larger one was raised to
-      the boiling-point, the handle of the regulator, D, was thrust
-      back as far as it would go, by which the steam forced itself
-      through the pipe connected with the vessel E, expelling the
-      air it contained through the clack at F. The handle of the
-      regulator being then drawn towards you, the communication
-      between the boiler and the vessel, E, was closed, and that
-      between the boiler and the second vessel, G, was opened, which
-      latter was also filled with steam, the air being in like manner
-      discharged through the clack, H. Cold water was then poured
-      from the water-cock, I, on to the vessel E, by which the steam
-      was suddenly condensed, and a vacuum being thereby caused, the
-      water to be raised was drawn up through the sucking-pipe, J,
-      its return being prevented by a clack or valve at K. The handle
-      of the regulator D being again thrust back, the steam was again
-      admitted, and pressing upon the surface of the water in E,
-      forced it out at the bottom of the vessel and up through the
-      pipe L, from which it was driven into the open air. The handle
-      of the regulator was then reversed, on which the steam was again
-      admitted to G, and the water in like manner expelled from it,
-      while E, being again dashed with cold water, was refilling from
-      below. Then the cold water was turned upon G, and thus alternate
-      filling and forcing went on, and a continuous stream of cold
-      water kept flowing from the upper opening. The large boiler was
-      replenished with water by shutting off the connection of the
-      small boiler with the cold water pipe, M, which supplied it from
-      above, on which the steam contained in the latter forced the
-      water through the connecting pipe, C, into the large boiler,
-      and kept it running in a continuous stream until the surface of
-      the water in the smaller boiler was depressed below the opening
-      of the connecting pipe, which was indicated by the noise of
-      the clack, when it was refilled from the cold water pipe, M, as
-      before.
-
-Its principal features were two large cylindrical vessels, which were
-alternately filled with steam from an adjoining boiler and with cold water
-from the well or mine out of which the water had to be raised. When either
-of the hollow vessels was filled with steam, and then suddenly cooled by
-a dash of cold water, a vacuum was thereby created, and, the vessel being
-closed at the top and open at the bottom, the water was at once forced
-up into it from the well by the pressure of the atmosphere. The steam,
-being then let into the vessel from the top, pressed upon the surface of
-the water, and forced it out at the bottom by another pipe (its return
-into the well being prevented by a clack), and so up the perpendicular
-pipe which opened into the outer air. The second vessel being treated in
-the same manner, the same result followed; and thus, by alternate filling
-and forcing, a continuous stream of water was poured out from the upper
-opening. The whole of the labour required to work the engine was capable
-of being performed by a single man, or even by a boy, after very little
-teaching.
-
-Although Savery’s plans and descriptions of the arrangement and working
-of his engines are clear and explicit, he does not give any information as
-to their proportions, beyond stating that an engine employed in raising a
-column of water 3½ inches in diameter 60 feet high, requires a fireplace
-20 inches deep. Speaking of their performances, he says, “I have known,
-in Cornwall, a work with three lifts of about 18 feet each, lift and
-carry a 3½-inch bore, that cost 42_s._ a day (reckoning 24 a day) for
-labour, besides the wear and tear of engines, each pump having four men
-working eight hours, at 14_d._ a man, and the men obliged to rest at
-least a third part of that time.” He pointed out that at least one-third
-part of the then cost of raising water might be saved by the adoption
-of his invention, which on many mines would amount to “a brave estate”
-in the course of a year. In estimating the power of his engine, Savery
-was accustomed to compare it with the quantity of work that horses could
-perform, and hence he introduced the term “horse power,” which is still
-in use.
-
-Although, in the treatise referred to, Savery describes an engine with
-two furnaces, the drawing which he presented to the Royal Society showed
-only one; and it appears that in another of his designs he showed only
-one cylindrical vessel instead of two. In order to exhibit the working
-of his engine on a larger scale than in the model, he proceeded to erect
-one in a potter’s house at Lambeth, where, Switzer says, though it was a
-small engine, the water struck up the tiles and forced its way through the
-roof in a manner that surprised all the spectators. Switzer mentions other
-engines erected after Savery’s designs for the raising of water at Camden
-House and Sion House, which proved quite successful. The former, he says,
-was the plainest and best proportioned engine he had seen: it had only a
-single condensing vessel; and “though but a small one in comparison with
-many others of the kind that are made for coal-works, it is sufficient for
-any reasonable family, and other uses required for it in watering middling
-gardens.”[33] Four receivers full of water, or equal to 52 gallons, were
-raised every minute, or 3110 gallons in the hour; whilst, in the case
-of the larger engines with double receivers, 6240 gallons an hour might
-easily be raised. The cost of the smaller engine was about fifty pounds,
-and the consumption of coal about a bushel in the twenty-four hours,
-supposing it was kept constantly at work during that time.
-
-    [33] Switzer, ‘Introduction to a General System of Hydrostaticks
-      and Hydraulicks,’ 237.
-
-[Illustration: HUEL VOR, WITH REMAINS OF THE OLD WORKS.
-
-[By R. P. Leitch.]]
-
-The uses to which Savery proposed to apply his engine were various.
-One was to pump water into a reservoir, from which, by falling on a
-water-wheel, it might produce a continuous rotary motion. Another was to
-raise water into cisterns for the supply of gentlemen’s houses, and for
-use in fountains and as an extinguisher in case of fire. A third was to
-raise water for the supply of towns, and a fourth to drain fens and marsh
-lands. But the most important, in the inventor’s estimation, was its
-employment in clearing drowned mines and coal-pits of water. He showed
-how water might be raised from deep mines by using several engines, placed
-at different depths, one over the other. Thus by three lifts, each of 80
-feet, water might be raised from a mine about 240 feet--then considered a
-very great depth. From Savery’s own account, it is evident that several
-of his engines were erected in Cornwall; and it is said that the first
-was tried at Huel Vor, or “The Great Work in Breage,” a few miles from
-Helstone, then considered the richest tin mine in the county. The engine
-was found to be an improvement on the methods formerly employed for
-draining the mine, and sent the miners to considerably greater depths. But
-the great pressure of steam required to force up a high column of water
-was such as to strain to the utmost the imperfect boilers and receivers
-of those early days; and the frequent explosions which attended its use
-eventually led to its discontinuance in favour of the superior engine of
-Newcomen, which was shortly after invented.
-
-Savery also endeavoured to introduce his engine in the coal-mining
-districts, but without success, and for the same reason. The demand for
-coal in connection with the iron manufacture having greatly increased
-in the county of Stafford, and the coal which lay nearest the surface
-having been for the most part “won,” the mining interest became very
-desirous of obtaining some more efficient means of clearing the pits of
-water, in order to send the miners deeper into the ground. Windlass and
-buckets, wind-mills, horse-gins, rack-and-chain pumps, adits, and all
-sorts of contrivances had been tried, and the limit of their powers had
-been reached. The pits were fast becoming drowned out, and the ironmasters
-began to fear lest their manufacture should become lost through want of
-fuel. Under these circumstances they were ready to hail the invention of
-Captain Savery, which promised to relieve them of their difficulty. He
-was accordingly invited to erect one of his engines over a coal-mine at
-the Broadwaters, near Wednesbury. The influx of water, however, proved
-too much for the engine; the springs were so many and so strong, that all
-the means which Savery could employ failed to clear the mine of water. To
-increase the forcing power he increased the pressure of steam; but neither
-boiler nor receiver could endure it, and the steam “tore the engine to
-pieces; so that, after much time, labour, and expense, Mr. Savery gave up
-the undertaking, and the engine was laid aside as useless.”[34]
-
-    [34] Dr. Wilkes in ‘Shaw’s History of Staffordshire,’ i. 85, 119.
-
-He was no more successful with the engine which he erected at
-York-buildings to pump water from the Thames for the supply of the western
-parts of London. Bradley says that to increase its power he doubled
-every part, but “it was liable to so many disorders, if a single mistake
-happened in the working of it, that at length it was looked upon as a
-useless piece of work, and rejected.”[35] Savery’s later engines thus
-lost him much of the credit which he had gained by those of an earlier
-and simpler construction. It became clear that their application was
-very limited. They involved much waste of fuel through the condensation
-of the hot steam pressing upon the surface of the cold water, previous
-to the expulsion of the latter from the vessel; and eventually their
-use was confined to the pumping of water for fountains and the supply
-of gentlemen’s houses, and in some cases to the raising of water for the
-purpose of working an overshot water-wheel. Various attempts were made to
-improve the engine by Bradley, by Papin, by Desaguliers, and others; but
-no great advance was made in its construction and method of working until
-it was taken in hand by Newcomen and Calley, whose conjoint invention
-marks an important epoch in the history of the steam-engine.
-
-    [35] Bradley, ‘Discourses on Earth and Water, &c.’ Westminster,
-      1727.
-
-Not much is known of the later years of Savery’s life. We find him a
-Captain of Military Engineers in 1702;[36] and in 1705, with the view
-of advancing knowledge in his special branch of military science, he
-gave to the world a translation, in folio, of Cohorn’s celebrated work
-on fortification. The book was dedicated to Prince George of Denmark,
-to whom he was indebted, in the same year, for his appointment to the
-office of Treasurer of the Hospital for Sick and Wounded Seamen. Various
-letters and documents are still to be found in the Transport Office,
-Somerset House, addressed to him in that capacity.[37] In 1714 he was
-further indebted to Prince George for the appointment of Surveyor to
-the Waterworks at Hampton Court; but he did not live to enjoy it, as he
-died in the course of the following year. He is said to have accumulated
-considerable property, which he bequeathed to his wife, together with all
-interest in his inventions. His will was executed on the day of his death,
-the 15th of May, 1715, and was proved four days after in the Prerogative
-Court of Canterbury. He there described himself as “of the parish of Saint
-Margaret, at Westminster, Esquire.” His widow herself died before all his
-effects were administered. There was a considerable amount of unclaimed
-stock, which the Savery family were prevented from claiming, as it had
-passed to the widow; and it has since been transferred to the credit of
-the National Debt.
-
-    [36] We are informed by Quartermaster Conolly, R.E., who has given
-      much attention to the early history of the Royal Engineers,
-      that the book of Warrants and Appointments, anno 1712, No. 172½,
-      in the Tower Record-room, contains the following memorandum in
-      pencil on the inside cover:--[Thomas] “Savery, Engineer officer,
-      1702–14.”
-
-    [37] A pamphlet published in 1712, entitled ‘An Impartial Inquiry
-      into the Management of the War in Spain,’ contains the following
-      reference to Savery:--“Sums allowed by Parliament for carrying
-      on the war in Spain ... for the year 1710. To Thomas Savery,
-      Esq., for Thomas Cale, surgeon, for care of disabled soldiers,
-      306_l._ 6_s._ 4_d._”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER IV.
-
-THOMAS NEWCOMEN--THE ATMOSPHERIC ENGINE.
-
-
-The invention of the steam-engine had advanced thus far with halting
-steps. A new power had been discovered, but it was so dangerous and
-unmanageable that it was still doubtful whether it could be applied to
-any useful purpose. What was still wanting was an engine strong enough to
-resist the internal pressure of highly-heated steam, and so constructed
-as to work safely, continuously, and economically. Many attempts had been
-made to contrive such a machine; but, as we have shown, the results were
-comparatively barren. Savery’s small engine could raise water in moderate
-quantities to limited heights; but the pumping of deep mines was beyond
-its power. It could force water to a height of about sixteen fathoms; but
-as the depth of mines at that time was from fifty to a hundred yards,
-it was obviously incompetent for their drainage. It is true, Savery
-proposed to overcome the difficulty by erecting a series of engines,
-placed one over another in the shaft of the mine; but the expense of their
-attendants, the great consumption of fuel, the cost of wear and tear, the
-constant danger of explosion, and the risk of the works being stopped by
-any one of the engines becoming temporarily deranged, rendered it clear
-that the use of his engine for ordinary mining purposes was altogether
-impracticable.
-
-Such was the state of affairs when Thomas Newcomen of Dartmouth took up
-the subject. Comparatively little is known of the personal history of
-this ingenious man. Mechanical inventors excited little notice in those
-days; they were looked upon as schemers, and oftener regarded as objects
-of suspicion than of respect. Thomas Newcomen was by trade an ironmonger
-and a blacksmith. The house in which he lived and worked stood, until
-quite recently, in Lower Street, Dartmouth. Like many of the ancient
-timber houses of that quaint old town, it was a building of singularly
-picturesque appearance. Lower Street is very narrow; the houses in it are
-tall and irregular, with overhanging peaked gable-ends. A few years since,
-Newcomen’s house began to show indications of decay; the timber supports
-were fast failing; and for safety’s sake it was determined to pull it to
-the ground.
-
-[Illustration: NEWCOMEN’S HOUSE, DARTMOUTH.
-
-[By R. P. Leitch.][38]]
-
-    [38] Newcomen’s house occupies the centre of the above
-      engraving--the house with the peaked gable-end supported by
-      timbers.
-
-The Newcomen family have long since become extinct in Dartmouth. They are
-said to have left the place long ago, and gone northward; but we have been
-unable to trace them. The Newcomens appear to have occupied a respectable
-position in Dartmouth down to about the middle of the last century. Their
-burying-place was in the north-side chapel of the fine old parish church
-of the town, where several tablets are erected to their memory. Amongst
-others, there is one to William Newcomin, Attorney-at-Law, who died
-the 24th of August, 1745, aged 57, supposed to have been a brother, and
-another of the same name, who died in 1787, aged 65, supposed to have been
-a son of the ironmonger.
-
-Thomas Newcomen was a man of strong religious feelings, and from an early
-period of his life occupied his leisure in voluntary religious teaching.
-He belonged to the sect of Baptists; and the place was standing until
-recently in which he regularly preached. When he afterwards went into
-distant parts of the country on engine business, he continued to devote
-his Sundays to the same work. How he first came to study the subject of
-steam is not known. Mr. Holdsworth says a story was current in Dartmouth
-in his younger days, and generally believed, that Newcomen conceived
-the idea of the motive power to be obtained from steam by watching the
-tea-kettle, the lid of which would frequently rise and fall when boiling;
-and, reasoning upon this fact, he contrived, by filling a cylinder with
-steam, to raise the piston, and by immediately injecting some cold water,
-to create a vacuum, which allowed the weight of the atmosphere to press
-the piston down, and so give motion to a pump by means of a beam and
-rods.[39]
-
-    [39] Pamphlet on ‘Dartmouth: the advantages of its Harbour as
-      a Station for Foreign Mail Packets, and a Short Notice of its
-      Ancient and Present Condition.’ By A. H. Holdsworth. London,
-      1841.
-
-It is probable that Newcomen was well aware of the experiments of Savery
-on steam while the latter was living at Modbury, about fifteen miles
-distant. It will be remembered that Savery was greatly hampered in his
-earlier contrivances by the want of skilled workmen; and as Newcomen had
-the reputation of being one of the cleverest blacksmiths in the county,
-it is supposed that he was employed to make some of the more intricate
-parts of Savery’s engine. At all events, he could scarcely fail to hear
-from the men of his trade in the neighbourhood, what his speculative
-neighbour at Modbury was trying to compass in the invention of an engine
-for the purpose of raising water by fire. He was certainly occupied in
-studying the subject about the same time as Savery; and Switzer says he
-was well informed that “Mr. Newcomen was as early in his invention as Mr.
-Savery was in his, only the latter being nearer the Court, had obtained
-the patent before the other knew it; on which account Mr. Newcomen was
-glad to come in as a partner to it.”[40]
-
-Another account[41] states that a draft of Savery’s engine having come
-under Newcomen’s notice, he proceeded to make a model of it, which he
-fixed in his garden, and soon found out its imperfections. He entered
-into a correspondence on the subject with the learned and ingenious Dr.
-Hooke, then Secretary to the Royal Society, a man of remarkable ingenuity,
-and of great mechanical sagacity and insight. Newcomen had heard or read
-of Papin’s proposed method of transmitting motive power to a distance by
-creating a vacuum under a piston in a cylinder, and transmitting the power
-through pipes to a second cylinder near the mine. Dr. Hooke dissuaded
-Newcomen from erecting a machine on this principle, as a waste of time and
-labour; but he added the pregnant suggestion, “could he (meaning Papin)
-make a speedy vacuum under your piston, your work were done.”
-
-    [40] Switzer, ‘Introduction to a System of Hydrostatics and
-      Hydraulics,’ p. 342.
-
-    [41] Harris, ‘Lexicon Technicum.’
-
-The capital idea thus cursorily thrown out--of introducing a moveable
-diaphragm between the active power and the vacuum--set Newcomen at
-once upon the right track. Though the suggestion was merely that of a
-thoughtful bystander, it was a most important step in the history of the
-invention, for it contained the very principle of the atmospheric engine.
-Savery created his vacuum by the condensation of steam in a closed vessel,
-and Papin created his by exhausting the air in a cylinder fitted with a
-piston, by means of an air-pump. It remained for Newcomen to combine the
-two expedients--to secure a sudden vacuum by the condensation of steam;
-but, instead of employing Savery’s closed vessel, he made use of Papin’s
-cylinder fitted with a piston. After long scheming and many failures,
-he at length succeeded, in the year 1705,[42] in contriving a model that
-worked with tolerable precision; after which he sought for an opportunity
-of exhibiting its powers in a full-sized working engine. It ought to be
-mentioned, that in the long course of experiments conducted by Newcomen
-with the object of finding out the new motive power, he was zealously
-assisted throughout by one John Calley, a glazier of Dartmouth, of whom
-nothing further is known than that he was Newcomen’s intimate friend,
-of the same religious persuasion, and afterwards his partner in the
-steam-engine enterprise.
-
-    [42] It has been stated that Newcomen took out a patent for his
-      invention in 1705; but this is a mistake, as no patent was
-      ever taken out by Newcomen. It is supposed that Savery, having
-      heard of his invention, gave him notice that he would regard
-      his method of producing a speedy vacuum by condensation, as
-      an infringement of his patent, and that Newcomen accordingly
-      agreed to give him an interest in the new engine during the
-      term of Savery’s patent. It will, however, be observed that
-      the principle on which Newcomen’s engine worked was entirely
-      different from that of Savery.
-
-Newcomen’s engine may be thus briefly described:--The steam was generated
-in a separate boiler, as in Savery’s engine, from which it was conveyed
-into a vertical cylinder underneath a piston fitting it closely, but
-moveable upwards and downwards through its whole length. The piston was
-fixed to a rod, which was attached by a joint or a chain to the end of
-a lever vibrating upon an axis, the other end being attached to a rod
-working a pump. When the piston in the cylinder was raised, steam was let
-into the vacated space through a tube fitted into the top of the boiler,
-and mounted with a stopcock. The pump-rod at the further end of the lever
-being thus depressed, cold water was applied to the sides of the cylinder,
-on which the steam within it was condensed, a vacuum was produced, and the
-external air, pressing upon the top of the piston, forced it down into
-the empty cylinder. The pump-rod was thereby raised; and the operation
-of depressing and raising it being repeated, a power was thus produced
-which kept the pump continuously at work. Such, in a few words, was the
-construction and action of Newcomen’s first engine.
-
-It will thus be observed that this engine was essentially different in
-principle from that of Savery. While the latter raised water partly by
-the force of steam and partly by the pressure of the atmosphere, that
-of Newcomen worked entirely by the pressure of the atmosphere, steam
-being only used as the most expeditious method of producing a vacuum.
-The engine was, however, found to be very imperfect. It was exceedingly
-slow in its motions; much time was occupied in condensing the contained
-steam by throwing cold water on the outside of the cylinder; and as the
-boiler was placed immediately under the cylinder, it was not easy to
-prevent the cold water from splashing it, and thus leading to a further
-loss of heat. To remedy these imperfections, Newcomen and Calley altered
-the arrangement; and, instead of throwing cold water on the outside of
-the cylinder, they surrounded it with cold water. But this expedient was
-also found inconvenient, as the surrounding water shortly became warm,
-and ceased to condense until replaced by colder water; but the colder it
-was the greater was the loss of heat by condensation, before the steam
-was enabled to fill the cylinder again on each ascent of the piston.
-
-Clumsy and comparatively ineffective though the engine was in this form,
-it was, nevertheless, found of some use in pumping water from mines.
-In 1711 Newcomen and Calley made proposals to the owners of a colliery
-at Griff, in Warwickshire, to drain the water from their pits, which
-until then had been drained by the labour of horses; but, the owners not
-believing in the practicability of the scheme, their offer was declined.
-In the following year, however, they succeeded in obtaining a contract
-with Mr. Back, for drawing the water from a mine belonging to him near
-Wolverhampton. The place where the engine was to be erected being near to
-Birmingham, the ironwork, the pump-valves, clacks, and buckets, were for
-the most part made there, and removed to the mine, where they were fitted
-together. Newcomen had great difficulty at first in making the engine go;
-but after many laborious attempts he at last partially succeeded. It was
-found, however, that the new method of cooling the cylinder by surrounding
-it with cold water did not work so well in practice as had been expected.
-The vacuum produced was very imperfect, and the action of the engine was
-both very slow and very irregular.
-
-While the engine was still in its trial state, a curious accident occurred
-which led to another change in the mode of condensation, and proved of
-essential importance in establishing Newcomen’s engine as a practicable
-working power. The accident was this: in order to keep the cylinder as
-free from air as possible, great pains were taken to prevent it passing
-down by the side of the piston, which was carefully wrapped with cloth or
-leather; and, still further to keep the cylinder air-tight, a quantity
-of water was kept constantly laying on the upper side of the piston. At
-one of the early trials the inventors were surprised to see the engine
-make several strokes in unusually quick succession; and on searching for
-the cause, they found it to consist in _a hole in the piston_, which had
-let the cold water in a jet into the inside of the cylinder, and thereby
-produced a rapid vacuum by the condensation of the contained steam. A new
-light suddenly broke upon Newcomen. The idea of condensing by injection
-of cold water directly into the cylinder, instead of applying it on the
-outside, at once occurred to him; and he proceeded to embody the expedient
-which had thus been accidentally suggested, as part of his machine. The
-result was the addition of the injection-pipe, through which, when the
-piston was raised and the cylinder was full of steam, a jet of cold water
-was thrown in, and the steam being suddenly condensed, the piston was at
-once driven down by the pressure of the atmosphere.
-
-An accident of a different kind shortly after led to the improvement of
-Newcomen’s engine in another respect. To keep it at work, one man was
-required to attend the fire, and another to turn alternately the two
-cocks, one admitting the steam into the cylinder, the other admitting
-the jet of cold water to condense it. The turning of these cocks was easy
-work, usually performed by a boy. It was, however, a very monotonous duty,
-though requiring constant attention. To escape the drudgery and obtain an
-interval for rest, or perhaps for play, a boy named Humphrey Potter, who
-turned the cocks, set himself to discover some method of evading his task.
-He must have been an ingenious boy, as is clear from the arrangement he
-contrived with this object. Observing the alternate ascent and descent
-of the beam above his head, he bethought him of applying the movement
-to the alternate raising and lowering of the levers which governed the
-cocks. The result was the contrivance of what he called the _scoggan_,[43]
-consisting of a catch worked by strings from the beam of the engine. This
-arrangement, when tried, was found to answer the purpose intended. The
-action of the engine was thus made automatic; and the arrangement, though
-rude, not only enabled Potter to enjoy his play, but it had the effect of
-improving the working power of the engine itself; the number of strokes
-which it made being increased from six or eight to fifteen or sixteen in
-the minute. This invention was afterwards greatly improved by Mr. Henry
-Beighton, of Newcastle-on-Tyne, who added the plug-rod and hand-gear. He
-did away with the catches and strings of the boy Potter’s rude apparatus,
-and substituted a rod suspended from the beam, which alternately opened
-and shut the tappets attached to the steam and injection cocks.
-
-[Illustration: NEWCOMEN’S ENGINE.[44]]
-
-    [43] _Scogging_ is a north country word, meaning skulking one’s
-      work, from which probably the boy gave the contrivance its name.
-      Potter, however, grew up to be a highly-skilled workman. He went
-      abroad about the year 1720, and erected an engine at a mine in
-      Hungary, described by Leupold in his ‘Theatrum Machinarum,’ with
-      many encomiums upon Potter, who was considered the inventor.
-
-    [44] The illustration shows the several parts of Newcomen’s
-      atmospheric engine. _a_ is the boiler; _b_, the piston moving
-      up and down; _c_, the cylinder; _d_, a pipe proceeding from the
-      top of the boiler, and inserted into the bottom of the cylinder,
-      having a cock, _e_, to interrupt the flow of steam at pleasure;
-      _f_, cold-water cistern, from which the cold water is conveyed
-      by the pipe _g_, called the injection-pipe, and thrown in a jet
-      into the cylinder, _b_, on turning the injection-cock, _h_;
-      the snifting-valve, _i_, enables the air to escape from the
-      cylinder, while the siphon-pipe, _j_, enables the condensed
-      steam to flow from the same cavity in the form of water; _k_,
-      the main lever beam; _l_, the counterpoise or weight hung on the
-      balance-beam, or on _m_, the pump-rod which works the pump, _n_.
-
-Thus, step by step, Newcomen’s engine grew in power and efficiency,
-and became more and more complete as a self-acting machine. It will be
-observed that, like all other inventions, it was not the product of any
-one man’s ingenuity, but of many. One contributed one improvement, and
-another another. The essential features of the atmospheric engine were
-not new. The piston and cylinder had been known as long ago as the time
-of Hero. The expansive force of steam and the creation of a vacuum by its
-condensation had been known to the Marquis of Worcester, Savery, Papin,
-and many more. Newcomen merely combined in his machine the result of their
-varied experience, and, assisted by the persons who worked with him, down
-to the engine-boy Potter, he advanced the invention several important
-stages; so that the steam-engine was no longer a toy or a scientific
-curiosity, but had become a powerful machine capable of doing useful work.
-
-
-The comparative success which attended the working of Newcomen’s first
-engine at the colliery near Wolverhampton, shortly induced other owners of
-coal-mines to adopt it. There were great complaints in the north, of the
-deeper mines having become unworkable. All the ordinary means of pumping
-them clear of water had failed. In their emergency, the colliery-owners
-called Newcomen and Calley to their aid. They were invited down to
-Newcastle-upon-Tyne, in the neighbourhood of which town they erected their
-second and third engines. They were next summoned to Leeds, and erected
-their fourth engine at Austhorpe, in 1714. It was the sight of this engine
-at work which first induced Smeaton, when a boy, to turn his attention to
-mechanics, and eventually led him to study the atmospheric-engine, with a
-view to its improvement. The cylinder of the engine erected at Austhorpe,
-like those which had preceded it, was about 23 inches in diameter, and
-made about fifteen strokes a minute. The pumps, which were in two lifts,
-and of 9 inches bore, drew the water from a depth of 37 yards. The
-patentees had 250_l._ a year for working and keeping the engine in order.
-Calley superintended its erection, and afterwards its working; but he did
-not long survive its completion, as he died at Austhorpe in 1717.
-
-The next engines were erected by Newcomen in Cornwall, where there was as
-great a demand for increased pumping-power as in any of the collieries of
-the north. The first of Newcomen’s construction in Cornwall was erected
-in 1720, at the Wheal Fortune tin mine, in the parish of Ludgvan, a
-few miles north-east of Penzance. The mine was conducted by Mr. William
-Lemon, the founder of the fortunes of the well-known Cornish family. He
-was born in a humble station in life, from which he honourably raised
-himself by his great industry, ability, and energy. He began his career
-as a mining-boy; was at an early age appointed one of the managers of a
-tin-smelting house at Chiandower, near Penzance; and after the experience
-gained by him in that capacity he engaged in the working of the Wheal
-Fortune mine. With the help of Newcomen’s engine, the enterprise proved
-completely successful; and after realising a considerable sum he removed
-to Truro, and began working the great Gwennap mines on such a scale as
-had never before been known in Cornwall.[45]
-
-    [45] Mr. Lemon eventually became the principal merchant and
-      tin-smelter of Cornwall. Mr. Davies Gilbert says:--“The energies
-      of his mind were not limited to these undertakings, great
-      though they were. He cultivated a taste for literature, and,
-      which is extremely unusual, acquired, amidst business, and at a
-      middle age, the power of reading the classic authors in their
-      original language.... He was distinguished in his district as
-      “the great Mr. Lemon,” but such were the impressions of his
-      abilities, his exertions, and general merit, that a progress so
-      rapid and unexampled does not appear to have excited envy, or
-      any of those bad passions which usually alloy the enjoyment of
-      prosperity.”--‘History of Cornwall,’ ii. 84.
-
-The Wheal Fortune engine was on a larger scale than any that had yet been
-erected, the cylinder being 47 inches in diameter, making about fifteen
-strokes a minute. It drew about a hogshead of water at each stroke, from
-a pump 30 fathoms deep, through pit-barrels 15 inches in diameter, and
-its performances were on the whole regarded as very extraordinary. The
-principal objection to its use consisted in the very large quantity of
-coal that it consumed and the heavy cost of maintaining it in working
-order. There was a great waste, especially in boilers, the making of which
-was then ill understood. Smeaton relates that in the course of four years’
-working of the first Austhorpe engine, not fewer than four boilers were
-burnt out. The Wheal Fortune engine, however, answered its purpose. It
-kept down the water sufficiently to enable Mr. Lemon to draw up his tin,
-and on leaving the mine, he took with him to Truro a clear sum of ten
-thousand pounds. The engine-house is now in ruins, and presents a highly
-picturesque appearance, as seen from the heights of Trewal, reminding one
-of a Border Peel rather than of a mining engine-house.
-
-[Illustration: RUINS OF WHEAL FORTUNE.
-
-[By R. P. Leitch.]]
-
-Another of Newcomen’s engines was erected about the same time at the
-Wheal Rose mine, a few miles north of Redruth. The engineer appointed
-to superintend its erection was Joseph Hornblower, who came from
-Staffordshire for the purpose about the year 1725. Mr. Cyrus Redding, one
-of Hornblower’s descendants, says, “how he became in any way connected
-with Newcomen must have arisen from the latter being at Bromsgrove, when
-he visited Mr. Potter, who got him to build one of his newly-invented
-engines at Wolverhampton in 1712.”[46] Another engine was afterwards
-erected by Hornblower at Wheal Busy, or Chacewater, and a third at
-Polgooth--all rich and well-known mines in Cornwall.
-
-[Illustration: POLGOOTH.]
-
-    [46] “It may be interesting to know that it required three hands
-      to work Newcomen’s first engines. I have heard it said that
-      when the engine was stopped, and again set at work, the words
-      were passed “Snift Benjy!” “Blow the fire, Pomery!” “Work
-      away, Joe!” The last let in the condensing water. Lifting the
-      condensing clack was called “snifting,” because on opening
-      the valve, the air rushing through it made a noise like a man
-      snifting. The fire was increased through artificial means by
-      another hand, and all being ready, the machine was set in motion
-      by a third.”--Cyrus Redding, ‘Yesterday and To-day.’ London,
-      1863. The “snifting clack” was a valve in the cylinder opening
-      outwards, which permitted the escape of air or permanently
-      elastic fluid, which could not be condensed by cold and run off
-      through the eduction-pipe.
-
-Though the use of Newcomen’s engine rapidly extended, nothing is known of
-the man himself during this time. All over the mining districts his name
-was identified with the means employed for pumping the mines clear of
-water, and thereby enabling an important branch of the national industry
-to be carried on; but of Newcomen’s personal history, beyond what has
-been stated above, we can gather nothing. It is not known when or where
-he died, whether rich or poor. The probability is that, being a person
-of a modest and retiring disposition, without business energy, and having
-secured no protection for his invention, it was appropriated and made use
-of by others, without any profit to him, whilst he quietly subsided into
-private life. It is supposed that he died at Dartmouth about the middle
-of last century; but no stone marks the place where he was laid. The
-only memorial of Newcomen to be found at his native place is the little
-steam-boat called by his name, which plies between Totness and Dartmouth.
-
-During Newcomen’s lifetime the proposal was revived of applying the
-steam-engine to the propelling of ships. Since Papin’s time nothing
-had been accomplished in this direction. Now that the steam-engine was
-actively employed in pumping mines, it was natural enough that the idea
-should be revived of applying it to navigation. The most enthusiastic
-advocate of the new power was Jonathan Hulls, a native of Campden, in
-Gloucestershire, where he was born in 1699. He married a wife in 1719,
-before he was out of his teens; an act of indiscretion in which, however,
-he had the example of one no less distinguished than Shakspeare. Living
-as he did in an inland country place, it seems remarkable that he should
-have directed his attention to the subject of steam-navigation. We
-find him making experiments with models of boats on the river Avon, at
-Evesham, and in course of time he duly matured his ideas and embodied
-them in his patent of 1736.[47] He proposed to place a Newcomen engine
-on board a tow-boat, and by its means to work a paddle-wheel placed at
-the stern. His method of converting the rectilinear motion of his piston
-into a rotary one was ingenious, but, like Savery, he missed the crank
-on the paddle-shaft, and many years passed before this simple expedient
-was adopted.[48] “The work to be done by this machine,” said he, “will be
-upon particular occasions, when all other means yet found out are wholly
-insufficient. How often does a merchant wish that his ship were on the
-ocean, when, if she were there, the wind would serve tolerably well to
-carry him on his intended voyage, but does not serve at the same time to
-carry him out of the river he happens to be in, which a few hours’ work
-of the machine would do. Besides, I know engines that are driven by the
-same power as this is, where materials for the purpose are dearer than in
-any navigable river in England; therefore experience demonstrates that the
-expense will be but a trifle to the value of the work performed by those
-sort of machines, which any person that knows the nature of those things
-may easily calculate.” His treatise was illustrated by a drawing, of which
-the following is a copy on a reduced scale.
-
-    [47] In 1737 he published a Treatise on the subject entitled, ‘A
-      description and Draught of a new-invented Machine for carrying
-      Vessels or Ships out of or into any Harbour, Port, or River,
-      against Wind or Tide, and in a Calm,’ by Jonathan Hulls.
-
-[Illustration: JONATHAN HULLS’S STEAM-BOAT.]
-
-    [48] In describing his mode of obtaining rotary motion by ratchet
-      wheels, a weight, and ropes, Hulls states that he uses two
-      axes, one behind the other, each of which is essential to the
-      object; and he then adds, that when his tow-boat is to be used
-      in shallow rivers, the machine works by two cranks fixed to the
-      hindermost axis; to which cranks are fixed two shafts (or poles)
-      of proper length to reach the bottom of the river, and which
-      move alternately forward _from the motion of the wheels by which
-      the vessel is carried on_: so that the cranks, as described
-      by Hulls, receive rotary motion from the axis on which they
-      are placed, and do not, as has been erroneously stated, impart
-      that motion to it.--Bennet Woodcroft, ‘Sketch of the Origin and
-      Progress of Steam Navigation.’ London, 1848.
-
-The inventor, aware of the novelty of his proposal and of the readiness of
-the public to ridicule novelties, deprecated rash censure of his project,
-and only claimed for it a fair and unprejudiced trial. In order to exhibit
-the powers of his steam-boat, he constructed an engine in 1737, and had it
-fixed on board a little vessel for trial in the river Avon at Evesham. The
-trial was not satisfactory, and the engine was taken on shore again. “A
-failure! A failure!” cried the spectators, who stigmatised the projector
-as an ass. The prophet had, indeed, no honour whatever in his own country.
-Long after his steam-boat experiment had been forgotten, these lines about
-him were remembered:--
-
-    “Jonathan Hull,
-      With his paper skull,
-    Tried hard to make a machine
-  That should go against wind and tide:
-      But he, like an ass,
-      Couldn’t bring it to pass,
-    So at last was ashamed to be seen.”[49]
-
-Not much more is known of Jonathan Hulls’s history. In 1754 he published,
-in conjunction with two others, a treatise on ‘The Art of Measuring
-made Easy, by the help of a new Sliding-rule;’ and shortly after ‘The
-Malt-maker’s Instructor;’ but nothing more was heard of Jonathan Hulls’s
-steam-boat.
-
-    [49] There are several versions of the same satire current to this
-      day in the villages of Campden and Hanging Aston.
-
-We return to the Newcomen engine, which became increasingly employed as
-a pumping power in all the mining districts. Borlase, writing in 1758,
-says that “fire-engines” were then in regular use at North Downs near
-Redruth, Pitt-louarn, Polgooth, Wheal-rith, Pool, Dolcoath, Herland, and
-many other places.[50] Indeed there was scarcely a tin or copper mine of
-any importance in Cornwall that had not one or more of Newcomen’s engines
-at work. They were also in general use in Staffordshire, Yorkshire,
-Lancashire, and Northumberland. In the latter counties, where they
-were principally used for pumping water out of the coal mines, fuel was
-ready at hand, cheap and abundant. But in Cornwall it was otherwise. The
-coal had to be brought thither from a great distance, partly by sea and
-partly by land, and the cost of carriage was very heavy. It, therefore,
-became an object of much importance to reduce the consumption of fuel,
-to prevent the profits of the mines being absorbed by the heavy cost of
-working the pumps. This, indeed, was the great objection to Newcomen’s
-engine, especially in Cornwall. The consumption of fuel at some mines
-was so enormous, that it was doubtful whether the cost of steam did not
-exceed that of an equal amount of horse power, and it became more and
-more difficult to realise even a bare margin of profit. The two engines at
-Wheal Rose and Wheal Busy, near Chacewater, of 66 and 72 inches diameter,
-consumed each about thirteen tons of coal daily. To relieve the mining
-interest, in some measure, from this charge, government allowed a drawback
-of five shillings a chaldron on coal; but in some cases this was found
-insufficient, and it began to be complained that the consumption of coal
-was so great, that the mines were barely paying.
-
-    [50] Borlase, ‘Natural History of Cornwall,’ p. 175.
-
-Invention, however, was constantly at work, and new improvements were
-from time to time introduced, with the object of economising fuel and
-increasing the efficiency of the engine. Among the ingenious men who
-devoted themselves to this work, were Payne, Brindley, and Smeaton. Of
-these, the last especially distinguished himself by his improvements of
-the Newcomen engine, which he may be said to have carried to the highest
-perfection of which it was capable. His famous Chacewater engine was
-the finest and most powerful work of the kind which had until then been
-constructed, and it remained unrivalled until superseded by the invention
-of Watt, to whose life and labours we now proceed to direct the attention
-of the reader.
-
-[Illustration: DARTMOUTH, FROM THE HARBOUR.
-
-[By R. P. Leitch.]]
-
-
-
-
-JAMES WATT:
-
-HIS BOYHOOD AND EARLY LIFE: MECHANICAL INSTRUMENT MAKER, SURVEYOR, AND
-INVENTOR.
-
-
-[Illustration: GREENOCK AND THE CLYDE, 1865.
-
-[By R. P. Leitch, after a sketch by J. S. Smiles.]]
-
-
-
-
-[Illustration: GREENOCK HARBOUR, 1768.
-
-[Fac-simile of an old print.]]
-
-CHAPTER V.
-
-JAMES WATT--LINEAGE AND BIRTHPLACE--BOYHOOD AND APPRENTICESHIP.
-
-
-James Watt was born at Greenock, on the Clyde, on the 19th of January,
-1736. His parents were of the middle class, industrious, intelligent, and
-religious people, with a character for probity which had descended to them
-from their “forbears,” and was cherished as their proudest inheritance.
-James Watt was thus emphatically well-born. His father and grandfather
-both held local offices of trust, and honourable mention is made of them
-in the records of Greenock. His grandfather, Thomas Watt, was the first
-of the family who lived in that neighbourhood. He had migrated thither
-from the county of Aberdeen, where his father was a small farmer in the
-time of Charles I. It is supposed that he took part with the Covenanters
-in resisting the Marquis of Montrose in his sudden descent upon Aberdeen
-at the head of his wild Highlanders in the autumn of 1644; and that
-the Covenanting farmer was killed in one of the battles that ensued.
-The district was ravaged by the victorious Royalists; the crops were
-destroyed, cattle lifted, dwellings burnt; and many of the inhabitants
-fled southwards for refuge in more peaceful districts. Hence Thomas
-Watt’s migration to Cartsdyke, where we find him settled as a teacher of
-navigation and mathematics, about the middle of the seventeenth century.
-
-[Illustration: CRAWFORDSBURN HOUSE, NEAR GREENOCK.]
-
-Cartsdyke, or Crawfordsdyke, was then a village situated a little to the
-east of Greenock, though now forming part of it. Crawfordsburn House,
-still standing, was the residence of the lord of the manor, and is a good
-specimen of the old-fashioned country mansion. It is beautifully situated
-on the high ground overlooking the Clyde. In former times a green slope
-stretched down from it towards the beach, along which lay the village,
-consisting of about a hundred cottages, mostly thatched. Cartsdyke was,
-however, in early times, a place of greater importance than Greenock.
-It had a pier, which Greenock as yet had not; and from this pier the
-first Clyde ship which crossed the Atlantic sailed for Darien in 1697.
-What little enterprise existed in the neighbourhood was identified with
-Cartsdyke rather than with Greenock; and hence Thomas Watt’s preference
-for it, in setting up there as a teacher. He, too, like his sire, seems to
-have been a sturdy Covenanter; for we find him, in 1683, refusing to take
-the test in favour of prelacy, and he was consequently proclaimed to be
-a “disorderly schoolmaster officiating contrary to law.” He nevertheless
-continued the teaching of the mathematics, in which he seems to have
-prospered, as, besides marrying a wife, he shortly after bought the house
-and garden which he occupied, and subsequently added to his possessions
-a tenement in the neighbouring village of Greenock.
-
-From the nature of his calling, it is obvious that he must have been a
-thoughtful and intelligent person;[51] and that he was a man of excellent
-character is clear from the confidence he inspired in those who had the
-best opportunities of knowing him. When William and Mary were confirmed
-in their occupancy of the British throne, shortly after the Revolution of
-1688, one of the first acts of Mr. Crawford, of Crawfordsburn, the feudal
-superior, was to appoint Thomas Watt baillie of the barony--a position
-of local importance, involving the direction of public affairs within the
-limits of his jurisdiction.
-
-    [51] Among the few household articles belonging to him which
-      descended to his son, and afterwards to his grandson the
-      engineer, were two portraits, one of Sir Isaac Newton, and the
-      other of John Napier, the inventor of Logarithms.
-
-A few years later, the Kirk Session of Greenock, having found him
-“blameless in life and conversation,” appointed him an Elder of the
-parish, when it became part of his duty to overlook not only the religious
-observances, but the manners and morals, of the little community. Kirk
-Sessions did not then confine themselves to ecclesiastical affairs, but
-assumed the function of magistrates, and almost exercised the powers of
-an inquisition. One of their most important duties was to provide for
-the education of the rising generation, in pursuance of the injunction of
-John Knox, “that no father, of what estate or condition that ever he may
-be, use his children at his own fantasie, especially in their youthhead;
-but all must be compelled to bring up their children in learning and
-virtue,”--words which lie at the root of much of Scotland’s mental
-culture, as well as, probably, of its material prosperity. In 1696 the
-Act was passed by the Scotch Parliament which is usually regarded as the
-charter of the Scotch parish-school system; and in the following year the
-Kirk Session of Greenock proceeded to make provision for the establishment
-of their parish school, which continued until the Town Council superseded
-it by the Grammar School, at which James Watt, the future engineer,
-received the best part of his school education.
-
-After holding the offices of Presbytery Elder and Kirk Treasurer for
-some time, Thomas Watt craved leave to retire into private life. He was
-seventy years old, and felt infirmities growing upon him. The plea was
-acknowledged, and the request granted; and on his retirement from office
-the Kirk Session recorded on their minutes that Thomas Watt had been
-found “diligent and faithful in the management of his trust.” He died at
-the age of 92, and was buried in the old kirkyard of Greenock, where his
-tombstone is still to be seen. He is there described as “Professor of
-Mathematics in Crawfordsdyk.” Not far from his grave lie, “mouldering in
-silent dust,” the remains of Burns’s Highland Mary, who died while on a
-visit to a relative at Greenock.
-
-Two sons survived the “Professor,” John and James, who were well settled
-in life when the old man died. John, the elder, was trained by his father
-in mathematics and surveying; for some time officiating under him as clerk
-to the barony of Cartsdyke, and afterwards removing to Glasgow, where he
-began business on his own account. In the year that his father died (1734)
-he made the first survey of the river Clyde; but he died shortly after,
-and the map was published by his nephew. James, the engineer’s father,
-was bound apprentice to a carpenter and shipwright at Cartsdyke, and on
-the expiry of his term he set up business for himself in the same line at
-Greenock.
-
-About the beginning of the last century, Greenock, now one of the busiest
-ports in the kingdom, was but a little fishing-village, consisting of a
-single row of thatched cottages lying parallel with the sandy beach of the
-Frith of Clyde, in what was then known as “Sir John’s little bay.” Sir
-John Shaw was the superior, or lord of the manor, his mansion standing
-on a height overlooking the town,[52] and commanding an extensive view
-of the Clyde, from Roseneath to Dumbarton. Across the water lay the
-beautiful north shore, broken by the long narrow sea-lochs running far
-away among the Argyleshire hills. Their waters, now plashed by the paddles
-of innumerable Clyde steamers, were then only disturbed by the passing
-of an occasional Highland coble; whilst their shores, now fringed with
-villages, villas, and mansions, were as lonely as Glencoe.
-
-    [52] The mansion house of the Shaws is now principally occupied as
-      manorial offices. The fine old garden and pleasure-grounds have
-      been presented by Sir John Shaw to the people of Greenock as a
-      public park for ever. It is now called “The Watt Park,” and a
-      more beautiful spot (bating the smoke of the busy town below)
-      is scarcely to be found in Britain.
-
-Greenock was in a great measure isolated from other towns by impassable
-roads. The only route to Greenock, on the west, lay along the beach,
-and when strong winds raised a high tide the communication was entirely
-cut off. Greenock was separated from Cartsdyke, on the east, by the Ling
-Burn, which was crossed by a plank, afterwards supplanted by an old ship’s
-rudder; and it was about the middle of the century before a bridge was
-built across the stream. The other provisions of the place for public
-service and convenience were of a like rude and primitive character:
-thus, Greenock could not boast of a public clock until about the middle
-of the last century, when a town clock was mounted in a wooden steeple.
-Till then, a dial, still standing, marked the hours when the sun shone,
-and a bell hung upon a triangle summoned the people to kirk and market.
-Besides the kirk, however, there was another public building--the Black
-Hole, or prison, which, like the other houses in the place, was covered
-with thatch. Before the prison were placed the “jougs,” as a terror to
-evil-doers, as well as a few old pieces of cannon, taken from one of the
-ships of the Spanish Armada wrecked near Pencores Castle. The Black Hole,
-the jougs, and the cannon were thought necessary precautions against
-the occasional visits to which the place was subject from the hungry
-Highlandmen on the opposite shores of the firth.[53]
-
-    [53] In 1715 the Greenock and Cartsdyke men kept strict watch and
-      ward for eighty days against a threatened visit of Rob Roy and
-      his caterans. The conduct of these unruly neighbours continued
-      to cause apprehensions amongst the townspeople until a much
-      later period, especially during fair time, then the great event
-      of the year. The fair was the occasion of the annual gathering
-      of the people from the neighbouring country to buy and to sell.
-      Highlandmen came from the opposite shores and from the lochs
-      down the Clyde, men caring little for Lowland law, but duly
-      impressed by a display of force. Their boats were drawn up on
-      the beach with their prows to the High Street, the north side
-      of which at that time lay open to the sea. The Highland folk
-      lived and slept on board, each boat having a plank or gangway
-      between it and the shore. On the first day of the fair Sir John
-      Shaw, the feudal superior, convened the local dignitaries, the
-      deacons and the trades, and after drinking the King’s health
-      and throwing the glasses amongst the populace, they formed in
-      procession and perambulated the town.
-
-The prosperity of Greenock dates from the year 1707, shortly after the
-Union with England. The British Parliament then granted what the Scottish
-Parliament had refused--the privilege of constructing a harbour. Before
-that time there was no pier,--only a rude landing-stage which Sir John
-Shaw had provided for his barge in the “Little Bay;” but the fishermen’s
-boats and other small craft frequenting the place were beached in the
-usual primitive way. Vessels of burden requiring to load or unload
-their cargoes did so at the pier at Cartsdyke above referred to. When
-the necessary powers were granted to make a harbour at Greenock, the
-inhabitants proceeded to tax themselves to provide the necessary means,
-paying a shilling and fourpence for every sack of malt brewed into ale
-within the barony; ale, not whisky, being then the popular drink of
-Scotland. The devotion of the townspeople to their “yill caups” must have
-been considerable, as the harbour was finished and opened in 1710, and in
-thirty years the principal debt was paid off.
-
-In course of time Greenock was made a custom-house port, and its trade
-rapidly increased. The first solitary vessel, freighted with Glasgow
-merchandise for the American colonies, sailed from the new harbour in
-1719; and now the custom-house dues collected there amount to more than
-six times the whole revenue of Scotland in the time of the Stuarts.
-
-Here James Watt, son of the Cartsdyke teacher of mathematics, and father
-of the engineer, began business about the year 1730. His occupation was of
-a very miscellaneous character, and embraced most branches of carpentry.
-He was a housewright, shipwright, carpenter, and undertaker, as well as
-a builder and contractor, having in the course of his life enlarged the
-western front of Sir John Shaw’s mansion-house, and designed and built
-the Town-hall and Council-chambers. To these various occupations Mr. Watt
-added that of a general merchant. He supplied the ships frequenting the
-port with articles of merchandise as well as with ships’ stores. He also
-engaged in foreign mercantile ventures, and held shares in several ships.
-
-Three months after the death of his father, to a share of whose property
-he succeeded, Mr. Watt purchased a house on the Mid-Quay Head, at the
-lower end of William-street, with a piece of ground belonging to it, which
-extended to the beach. On this piece of ground stood Watt’s carpenter’s
-shop, in which a great deal of miscellaneous work was executed--household
-furniture and ships’ fittings, chairs, tables, coffins, and capstans, as
-well as the ordinary sorts of joinery; while from his stores he was ready
-to supply blocks, pumps, gun-carriages, dead-eyes, and other articles used
-on board ship. He was ready to “touch” ships’ compasses, and to adjust
-and repair nautical instruments generally; while on an emergency he could
-make a crane for harbour uses--the first in Greenock having been executed
-in his shops, and erected on the pier for the convenience of the Virginia
-tobacco-ships beginning to frequent the harbour. These multifarious
-occupations were necessitated by the smallness of the place, the business
-of a single calling being as yet too limited to yield a competency to an
-enterprising man, or sufficient scope for his powers.
-
-Being a person of substance and respectability, Mr. Watt was elected by
-his fellow townsmen to fill various public offices, such as trustee for
-the burgh fund, town councillor, treasurer, and afterwards baillie or
-chief magistrate. He also added to his comfort as well as to his dignity
-by marrying a wife of character, Agnes Muirhead, a woman esteemed by
-her neighbours for her graces of person, as well as of mind and heart.
-She is said to have been not less distinguished for her sound sense and
-good manners than for her cheerful temper and excellent housewifery.[54]
-Such was the mother of James Watt. Three of her five children died in
-childhood; John, her fifth son, perished at sea when on a voyage to
-America in one of his father’s ships; and James, the fourth of the family,
-remained her only surviving child. He was born in the house which stood
-at the corner between the present Dalrymple-street and William-street,
-since taken down and replaced by the building now known as the “James Watt
-Tavern.”
-
-    [54] Some of her neighbours thought her stately and unbending, and
-      that she affected a superior style of living. In the ‘Memorials
-      of Watt,’ by the late George Williamson, Esq., Greenock, are
-      to be found many curious and interesting details as to the
-      Watt family; collected partly from tradition and partly from
-      local records. Of Mrs. Watt’s “superior style of living,”
-      compared with the custom of the period, the following anecdote
-      is given:--“One of the author’s informants on such points,
-      a venerable lady in her eightieth year, was wont to speak of
-      the worthy baillie’s wife with much characteristic interest
-      and animation. As illustrative of the internal economy of the
-      family, the old lady related an occasion on which she had spent
-      an evening, when a girl, at Mrs. Watt’s house, and remembered
-      expressing with much naïveté to her mother on returning home,
-      her childish surprise that ‘Mrs. Watt had _two_ lighted candles
-      on the table.’ Among these and other reminiscences of her youth,
-      our venerable informant described James Watt’s mother, in her
-      expressive Doric, as ‘a braw, braw woman--none now to be seen
-      like her.’” p. 128–9.
-
-[Illustration: JAMES WATT TAVERN, GREENOCK.
-
-[By R. P. Leitch.]]
-
-From his earliest years James Watt was of an extremely fragile
-constitution, requiring the tenderest nurture. Struggling as it were for
-life all through his childhood, he acquired an almost feminine delicacy
-and sensitiveness, which made him shrink from the rough play of robust
-children; and hence, during his early years, his education was entirely
-conducted at home. His mother taught him reading, and his father a little
-writing and arithmetic. His mother, to amuse him, encouraged him to draw
-with a pencil on paper, or with chalk upon the floor; and his father
-supplied him with a few tools from the carpenter’s shop, which he soon
-learnt to handle with expertness. In such occupations he found the best
-resource against _ennui_. He took his toys to pieces, and out of the parts
-ingeniously constructed new ones. The mechanical dexterity which he thus
-cultivated even as a child was probably in a great measure the foundation
-upon which he built the speculations to which he owes his glory; nor,
-without his early mechanical training, is there reason to believe that
-he would afterwards become the improver and almost the creator of the
-steam-engine.
-
-The invalid thus passed his early years almost entirely in the society
-of his mother, whose gentle nature, strong good sense, and unobtrusive
-piety, exercised a most beneficial influence in the formation of his
-character. Nor were his parents without their reward; for as the boy grew
-up to manhood he repaid their anxious care with obedience, respect, and
-affection. Mrs. Watt was in after life accustomed to say that the loss of
-her only daughter, which she had felt so severely, had been fully made up
-to her by the dutiful attentions of her son.
-
-Spending his life indoors, without exercise, his nervous system became
-preternaturally sensitive. He was subject to violent sick headaches, which
-confined him to his room for weeks together; and it almost seems a marvel
-that, under such circumstances, he should have survived his boyhood. It is
-in such cases as his that indications of precocity are generally observed;
-and parents would be less gratified at their display if they knew that
-they are usually the symptoms of disease. Several remarkable instances of
-this precocity are related of Watt. On one occasion, when he was bending
-over the hearth with a piece of chalk in his hand, a friend of his father
-said, “You ought to send that boy to a public school, and not allow him to
-trifle away his time at home.” “Look how my child is occupied,” said the
-father, “before you condemn him.” Though only six years old, it is said
-he was found trying to solve a problem in geometry.
-
-On another occasion he was reproved by Mrs. Muirhead, his aunt, for his
-indolence at the tea-table. “James Watt,” said the worthy lady, “I never
-saw such an idle boy as you are: take a book or employ yourself usefully;
-for the last hour you have not spoken one word, but taken off the lid
-of that kettle and put it on again, holding now a cup and now a silver
-spoon over the steam, watching how it rises from the spout, catching and
-counting the drops it falls into.” In the view of M. Arago, the little
-James before the tea-kettle becomes “the great engineer, preparing the
-discoveries which were soon to immortalize him.” In our opinion the
-judgment of the aunt was the truest. There is no reason to suppose that
-the mind of the boy was occupied with philosophical theories on the
-condensation of steam, which he compassed with so much difficulty in his
-maturer years. This is more probably an afterthought borrowed from his
-subsequent discoveries. Nothing is commoner than for children to be amused
-with such phenomena, in the same way that they will form air-bubbles in a
-cup of tea, and watch them sailing over the surface till they burst. The
-probability is that little James was quite as idle as he seemed.
-
-When he was at length sent to Mr. M‘Adam’s commercial school, the change
-caused him many trials and much suffering. He found himself completely
-out of place in the midst of the boisterous juvenile republic. Against
-the tyranny of the elders he was helpless; their wild play was most
-distasteful to him; he could not join in their sports, nor roam with
-them along the beach, nor shy stones into the water, nor take part in
-their hazardous exploits in the harbour. Accordingly they showered upon
-him contemptuous epithets; and the school being composed of both sexes,
-the girls joined in the laugh. He shone as little in the class as in
-the playground. He did not possess that parrot power of learning and
-confidence in self necessary to achieve distinction at school; and he was
-even considered dull and backward for his age.[55] His want of progress
-may, however, in some measure be accounted for by his almost continual
-ailments, which sometimes kept him for weeks together at home. It was
-not until he reached the age of about thirteen or fourteen, when he was
-put into the mathematical class, that his powers appeared to develop
-themselves, and from that time he made rapid progress.
-
-    [55] The truth in regard to young Watt’s first years in the
-      public school is, that, owing doubtless to infirm health, to
-      the suffering and depression which affected his whole powers,
-      he was prevented for a considerable time displaying even a
-      very ordinary and moderate aptitude for the common routine of
-      school lessons; and during those years he was regarded by his
-      schoolmasters as slow and inapt. Although to some minds facts
-      of such a nature may be conceived to mar the romance of a great
-      man’s history, yet, seeing they rest on authenticity which
-      cannot be impugned, there appears no reasonable ground on which
-      it may be thought that they ought to be passed over as if they
-      had not existed, or were altogether unfounded.--Williamson’s
-      ‘Memorials of Watt,’ p. 130.
-
-When not quite fourteen, he was taken by his mother for change of air
-to Glasgow, then a quiet place without a single long chimney, somewhat
-resembling a rural market-town of the present day. He was left in charge
-of a relation, and his mother returned to Greenock. But he proved so
-wakeful during the visit, and so disposed to indulge in that habit of
-storytelling, which even Sir Walter Scott could afterwards admire in him,
-that Mr. Watt was very soon written to by his friend, and entreated to
-return to Glasgow and take home his son. “I cannot stand the excitement
-he keeps me in,” said Mrs. Campbell; “I am worn out for want of sleep.
-Every evening, before retiring to rest, he contrives to engage me in
-conversation, then begins some striking tale, and whether humorous or
-pathetic, the interest is so overpowering, that the family all listen to
-him with breathless attention, and hour after hour strikes unheeded.”
-He was taken back to Greenock accordingly, and, when well enough, was
-sent to the Grammar School of the town, then kept by Mr. Robert Arrol.
-Under him, Watt made fair progress in the rudiments of Latin and Greek;
-but he was still more successful in the study of mathematics, which he
-prosecuted under Mr. John Marr. It was only when he entered on this branch
-of learning that he discovered his strength, and he very soon took the
-lead in his class.
-
-When at home the boy continued to spend much of his time in drawing, or
-in cutting or carving with his penknife, or in watching the carpenters
-at work in his father’s shop, sometimes trying his own hand at making
-little articles with the tools which lay about. In this he displayed a
-degree of dexterity which seemed so remarkable that the journeymen were
-accustomed to say of him that “little Jamie had gotten a fortune at his
-fingers’ ends.” Even when he had grown old he would recall to mind the
-pleasure as well as the profit which he had derived from working in his
-shirt-sleeves in his father’s shop. He was, in fact, educating himself
-in the most effectual manner in his own way; learning to use his hands
-dexterously; familiarising himself with the art of handling tools; and
-acquiring a degree of expertness in working with them in wood and metal,
-which eventually proved of the greatest value to him. At the same time he
-was training himself in habits of application, industry, and invention.
-Most of his spare time was thus devoted to mechanical adaptations of his
-own contrivance. A small forge was erected for him, and a bench fitted
-up for his special use; and there he constructed many ingenious little
-objects, such as miniature cranes, pulleys, pumps, and capstans. Out of a
-large silver coin he fabricated a punch-ladle, which is still preserved.
-But the kind of work which most attracted him was the repairing of ships’
-compasses, quadrants, and nautical instruments, in executing which he
-exhibited so much neatness, dexterity, and accuracy, that it eventually
-led to his selection of the business he determined to follow,--that of a
-mathematical instrument maker.
-
-The boy at the same time prosecuted his education at school; his improving
-health enabling him to derive more advantage from the instructions of his
-masters than in the earlier part of his career. Not the least influential
-part of his training, as regarded the formation of his character,
-consisted, as already observed, in the example and conversation of his
-parents at home. His frequent illnesses brought him more directly and
-continuously under their influence than is the case with most boys of
-his age; and reading became one of his chief sources of recreation and
-enjoyment. His fathers library-shelf contained well-thumbed volumes of
-Boston, Bunyan, and ‘The Cloud of Witnesses,’ with Henry the Rymer’s ‘Life
-of Wallace,’ and other old ballads, tattered by frequent use. These he
-devoured greedily, and re-read until he had most of them by heart. His
-father would also recount to him the sufferings of the Covenanters,--the
-moors and mosses which lay towards the south of Greenock having been
-among their retreats during the times of the persecution. Then there
-were the local and traditionary stories of the neighbourhood,--such as
-the exploits of the Greenock men under Sir John Shaw, at Worcester, in
-1651,[56]--together with much of that unwritten history, heard only around
-firesides, which kindles the Scotchman’s nationality, and influences his
-future life.
-
-    [56] The Shaw baronetcy was the reward of the feudal superior’s
-      services on the occasion. The banner carried by the tenantry in
-      the civil war was long preserved in Greenock, and was hung up
-      with the other town flags in one of the public rooms.
-
-We may here mention, in passing, that one of the most vividly-remembered
-incidents of James Watt’s boyhood was the Stuart rebellion of the
-“Forty-five,” which occurred when he was about ten years old. Watt himself
-is so intimately identified with the material progress of the nineteenth
-century, that it strikes one almost with surprise that he should have
-been a spectator, in however remote a degree, of incidents belonging to
-an altogether different age. The Stuart Rebellion may be said to have
-been the end of one epoch and the beginning of another; for certain it is
-that the progress of Scotland as an integral part of the British empire,
-and the growth of its skilled industry--which the inventions of Watt did
-so much to develop--appeared as if to spring from the very ashes of the
-rebellion. Like other lowland towns, Greenock was greatly alarmed at the
-startling news from the Highlands of the threatened descent of the clans.
-Sir John Shaw had the trades mustered for drill on the green in front of
-his mansion, and held them in readiness for defence of the town, in case
-of attack. Greenock was otherwise secure, being protected against the
-Highlands by the Clyde; besides, the western clans were either neutral
-or adhered to the house of Hanover. The Pretender with his followers
-passed southward by Stirling, and only approached Greenock on their return
-from England,--a half-starved and ill-clad, though still unbroken army.
-They halted at Glasgow, where they levied a heavy contribution on the
-inhabitants, and sent out roving parties to try their fortunes in the
-neighbouring towns. A small detachment one day approached Greenock, and
-came as near as the Clune Brae; but the townspeople were afoot, and on
-guard; signal was given to the ships of war moored near the old battery,
-and a few well-directed shots speedily sent the Highlanders to the
-right-about. The alarm was over for the present; but it was renewed in the
-following year, when the rumour reached Edinburgh that Prince Charles,
-hunted from the Highlands, had landed at Greenock, and lay concealed
-there. The consequence was that a strict search was made throughout the
-town, and Mr. Watt’s premises were searched like the others; but the
-Pretender had contrived to escape in another direction. Such was one of
-the most memorable incidents in the boy-life of James Watt, so strangely
-in contrast with the later events of his industrial career.
-
-During holiday times, the boy sometimes indulged in rambles along the
-Clyde, occasionally crossing to the north shore, and strolling up the Gare
-Loch and Holy Loch, and even as far as Ben Lomond. He was of a solitary
-disposition, and loved to wander by himself at night amidst the wooded
-pleasure-grounds which surrounded the old mansion-house overlooking the
-town, watching through the trees the mysterious movements of the stars.
-He became fascinated by the wonders of astronomy, and was stimulated to
-inquire into the science by the examination of the nautical instruments
-which he found amongst his father’s shop-stores. For it was a peculiarity
-which characterised him through life, that he could not look upon any
-instrument or machine without being seized with a desire to understand its
-meaning, to unravel its mystery, and master the rationale of its uses.
-Before he was fifteen he had twice gone through with great attention
-S’Gravande’s ‘Elements of Natural Philosophy,’ a book belonging to his
-father. He performed many little experiments in chemistry, and even
-contrived to make an electrical machine, much to the marvel of those
-who felt its shocks. Like most invalids, he read eagerly such books on
-medicine and surgery as came in his way. He went so far as to practise
-dissection; and on one occasion he was found carrying off for this purpose
-the head of a child who had died of some uncommon disease. “He told his
-son,” says Mr. Muirhead, “that, had he been able to bear the sight of the
-sufferings of patients, he would have been a surgeon.”
-
-In his solitary rambles, his love of wild-flowers and plants lured him
-on to the study of botany. Ever observant of the aspects of nature, the
-violent upheavings of the mountain-ranges on the north shores of Loch
-Lomond directed his attention to geology. He was a great devourer of
-books; reading all that came in his way. On a friend once advising him
-to be less indiscriminate in his reading, he replied, “I have never yet
-read a book without gaining information, instruction, or amusement.” This
-was no answer to the admonition of his friend, who merely recommended
-him to bestow upon the best books the time he devoted to the worse. But
-the appetite for knowledge in inquisitive minds is, during youth, when
-curiosity is fresh and unslacked, too insatiable to be fastidious, and
-the volume which gets the preference is usually the first which comes in
-the way.
-
-Watt was not, however, a mere bookworm. In his solitary walks through the
-country he would enter the cottages of the peasantry, gather their local
-traditions, and impart to them information of a similar kind from his own
-ample stores. Fishing, which suited his tranquil nature, was his single
-sport. When unable to ramble for the purpose, he could still indulge the
-pursuit from his father’s yard, which was open to the sea, and the water
-of sufficient depth at high-tide to enable vessels of fifty or sixty tons
-to lie alongside.
-
-But James Watt had now arrived at a suitable age to learn a trade; and
-his rambles must come to a close. His father had originally intended him
-to follow his own business; but having sustained some heavy losses about
-this time--one of his ships having foundered at sea,--and observing the
-strong bias of his son towards manipulative science and exact mechanics,
-he at length decided to send him to Glasgow, in the year 1754, when he
-was eighteen years old, to learn the trade of a mathematical instrument
-maker.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER VI.
-
-JAMES WATT, MATHEMATICAL INSTRUMENT MAKER.
-
-
-When James Watt, a youth of eighteen, went to Glasgow in 1754 to learn
-his trade, the place was very different from the Glasgow of to-day. Not a
-steam-engine was then at work in the town; not a steam-boat disturbed the
-quiet of the Clyde. There was a rough quay along the Broomielaw, then,
-as the name implies, partly covered with broom. The quay was furnished
-with a solitary crane, for which there was very little use, as the river
-was full of sandbanks, and boats and gabberts of only six tons burden
-and under could then ascend the Clyde.[57] Often for weeks together not a
-single masted vessel was to be seen in the river. The principal buildings
-in the town were the Cathedral and the University. The west port, now in
-the centre of Glasgow, was then a real barrier between the town and the
-country. The ground on which Enoch-square stands consisted chiefly of
-gardens. A thick wood occupied the site of the present Custom-house and
-of that part of Glasgow situated behind West Clyde-street. Blythswood
-was grazing-ground. Not a house had yet been erected in Hutchinson-town,
-Laurieston, Tradeston, or Bridgeton. The land between Jamaica-street on
-the east, and Stobcross on the west, and south from Anderston-road to
-the river, now the most densely populated parts of Glasgow, consisted
-of fields and cabbage-gardens. The town had but two main streets, which
-intersected each other at the Cross or Market-place, and the only paved
-part of them was known as “The Plainstanes,” which extended for a few
-hundred yards in front of the public offices and the Town-hall. The two
-main streets contained some stately well-built houses--Flemish-looking
-tenements with crow-stepped gables,--the lower stories standing on
-Doric columns, under which were the principal booths or shops--small,
-low-roofed, and dismal. But the bulk of the houses had only wooden fronts
-and thatched roofs, and were of a very humble character. The traffic along
-the unpaved streets was so small, that the carts were left standing in
-them at night. The town was as yet innocent of police;[58] it contained
-no Irish immigrants, and very few Highlanders. The latter then thought it
-beneath them to engage in any pursuit connected with commerce; and Rob
-Roy’s contempt for the wabsters of Glasgow, as described by Sir Walter
-Scott in the novel, was no exaggeration. No Highland gentleman, however
-poor, would dream of condemning his son to the drudgery of trade; and
-even the poorest Highland cottar would shrink with loathing from the
-life of a weaver or a shopkeeper. He would be a hunter, a fisher, a
-cattle-lifter, or a soldier; but trade he would not touch--that he left
-to the Lowlanders.[59]
-
-[Illustration: TRONGATE, GLASGOW.]
-
-    [57] According to Smeaton’s report in 1755, there were in spring
-      tides only 3 feet 8 inches water at Pointhouse Ford. Measures
-      were taken to deepen the river, and operations with that
-      object were begun in 1768. Salmon abounded in the Clyde, and
-      was so common that servants and apprentices were accustomed to
-      stipulate that they should not have salmon for dinner more than
-      a certain number of days in the week.
-
-    [58] The “middens” in the street were sometimes complained of as
-      a nuisance; and in 1776, the magistrate threatened a penalty
-      of 5_s._ if middens of which complaint had been made were not
-      removed within 48 hours.
-
-    [59] The Highland gentry and people regarded the Lowlanders as
-      their natural enemies, fair subjects for plunder at all times as
-      opportunities offered. The Lowlanders, on their part, regarded
-      the Highlanders very much as the primitive settlers of North
-      America regarded the Cherokee and Chocktaw Indians. Sometimes a
-      band of uncouth half-clad Highlandmen would suddenly rush down
-      upon the Lowlands, swoop up all the cattle within their reach,
-      and drive them off into the mountains. Hence the Lowlanders and
-      the Highlanders were always in a state of feud. Long after the
-      ’45 a Highlandman would “thank God that he had not a drop of
-      Lowland blood in his veins.”
-
-The principal men of business in Glasgow at the time of which we speak
-were the tobacco lords--importers of that article from the plantations in
-Virginia,[60]--who were often to be seen strutting along the Plainstanes,
-dressed in scarlet cloaks, cocked hats, and powdered wigs; the “boddies”
-who kept the adjoining shops eying them over their half-closed doors,
-and humbly watching for a nod of recognition from the mighty potentates.
-Yet even the greatest of the tobacco lords only lived in flats, entering
-from a common stair; and the domestic accommodation was so scanty and so
-primitive, that visitors were of necessity received in the bedrooms. This
-circumstance seems to have had some influence in the formation of the
-Clubs,[61] which then formed a curious feature of society in most Scotch
-towns. They consisted of knots of men of like tastes and pursuits, who
-met in the evenings at public-houses for purposes of gossip and social
-drinking. There they made new and cultivated old acquaintanceships,
-and exchanged news with each other. The Club combined the uses of the
-newspaper and the newsroom, which now accomplish the same objects without
-the drinking. But Glasgow had then no newspaper; and a London news-sheet
-of a week old was looked upon as a novelty. There was no coffee-room nor
-public library in the town; no theatre[62] nor place of resort open,
-except the “Change-house;” so that the Club was regarded as a social
-necessity. The drinking was sometimes moderate, and sometimes “hard.”
-The better class confined themselves to claret and other French wines,
-which were then cheap, being free from duty. Those disposed to indulge
-in more frugal fare confined themselves to oat-cake and small-beer. It
-was not until heavy taxes were laid on foreign wines and malt that the
-hard whisky-drinking of Scotland set in. Whisky was introduced from the
-Highlands shortly after the “Forty-five;” and it soon became the popular
-drink. By 1780 the drinking of raw whisky in Glasgow at midday had become
-general.[63]
-
-    [60] The only trade which Glasgow carried on with foreign
-      countries previous to the Union, was in coal, grindstones, and
-      fish,--Glasgow-cured herrings being in much repute abroad. After
-      the Union partnerships were formed; vessels were built down the
-      Clyde, and chartered for carrying on the trade with Virginia,
-      Maryland, and Carolina. The first _honest_ vessel crossed
-      the Atlantic from the Clyde in 1719; in 1735 the Virginia
-      merchants in Glasgow had fifteen vessels engaged in the trade,
-      and the town shortly after became the great mart for tobacco.
-      Of the 90,000 hogsheads imported into the United Kingdom in
-      1772, Glasgow alone imported 49,000, or more than one-half.
-      The American Revolution had the effect of completely ruining
-      the tobacco trade of Glasgow, after which the merchants were
-      compelled to turn to other fields of enterprise and industry.
-      The capital which they had accumulated from tobacco enabled
-      them to enter upon their new undertakings with spirit, and the
-      steam-engine which had by that time been invented by their
-      townsman James Watt, proved their best helper in advancing
-      the prosperity of modern Glasgow. The rapidity of its progress
-      may be inferred from the following facts. In 1735, though the
-      Glasgow merchants owned half the entire tonnage of Scotland, it
-      amounted to only 5600 tons. In that year the whole shipping of
-      Scotland was only one-fortieth part of that of England: it is
-      now about one-fifth. From 1752 to 1770 the total tonnage dues
-      of the harbour of Glasgow amounted to only 147_l._, or equal to
-      an average of about 8_l._ per annum. In 1780, the Clyde having
-      been deepened in the interval, they reached 1515_l._; and in
-      1854, they amounted to 86,580_l._ The increase has been quite
-      as great in later years. In point of value of exports, Glasgow
-      ranks fourth among the ports of the United Kingdom; and Greenock
-      now takes precedence of Bristol.
-
-    [61] For many curious particulars of Old Glasgow and its society,
-      see Dr. Strang’s ‘Glasgow and its Clubs.’
-
-    [62] a temporary wooden theatre was run up in 1752, but the
-      religious prejudices of the population were violently excited
-      by the circumstance, and the place was attacked by a mob and
-      seriously damaged. The few persons who went there had to be
-      protected from insults. In 1762, when some persons proposed
-      to build a theatre, not a single individual who had ground
-      within the burgh would grant them a site. Two years later the
-      theatre was erected outside the precincts, and on the night on
-      which it was opened it was wilfully set on fire by some persons
-      instigated by the preaching of a neighbouring methodist, when
-      it narrowly escaped destruction.
-
-    [63] When the Lowlanders want to drink a cheering cup, they go
-      to the public-house, called the Change-house, and call for a
-      chopin of twopenny, which is their yeasty beverage, made of
-      malt, not quite so strong as the table-beer of England.... The
-      Highlanders, on the contrary, despise the liquor, and regale
-      themselves with whisky, or malt spirit, as strong as Geneva,
-      which they swallow in great quantities, without any signs of
-      inebriation: they are used to it from the cradle, and find it
-      an excellent preservative against the winter cold, which must
-      be extreme on these mountains.--Smollett, ‘Expedition of Humphry
-      Clinker.’
-
-When young Watt arrived in Glasgow he carried with him but a small
-quantity of baggage; the articles in his trunk including amongst other
-things a quadrant,--probably a specimen of his own handiwork,--a leather
-apron, about a score of carpenters’ and other tools, and “a pair of
-bibels.” On making inquiry for a proper master, under whom to learn the
-business of mathematical instrument making, it was found that there was
-no such person in Glasgow. There was, however, a mechanic in the town, who
-dignified himself with the name of “optician,” under whom Watt was placed
-for a time. He was a sort of Jack-of-all-trades, who sold and mended
-spectacles, repaired fiddles, tuned spinets, made and repaired the simpler
-instruments used in mechanical drawing, and eked out a slender living by
-making and selling fishing-rods and fishing-tackle. Watt was as handy at
-dressing trout and salmon flies as at most other things, and his master,
-no doubt, found him useful enough; but there was nothing to be learnt in
-return for his services. Though his master was an ingenious workman, in a
-small way, and could turn his ready hand to anything, it soon became clear
-to Watt’s relations, the Muirheads, with whom he lived during his stay,
-that the instructions of such an artist were little likely to advance him
-in mathematical instrument making. Among the gentlemen to whom Watt was
-introduced by his relatives was Dr. Dick, Professor of Natural Philosophy
-in Glasgow College, who strongly recommended him to proceed to London,
-and there place himself under the instruction of some competent master.
-Watt consulted his father on the subject, who readily gave his sanction
-to the proposal; and, with a letter of introduction from Dr. Dick in his
-pocket, he set out for the great city accordingly.
-
-No stage-coach then ran between Glasgow and London; so it was determined
-that young Watt should proceed on horseback, then the most convenient
-and speedy mode of travelling. His chest was sent by sea. Old Mr. Watt’s
-memorandum-book at Heathfield contains the following entry, under date
-the 6th June, 1755:--
-
-  “To send James Watt’s chist to the care of Mr. William Oman,
-  Ventener in Leith, to be shypt for London to ye care of Captain
-  William Watson, at the Hermitage, London.
-
-    “P^d. 3_s._ 6_d._ for wagon carage to Edenbrough of chist.
-    P^d. to son James 2_l._ 2_s._
-    P^d. Plaster and Pomet, 1_s._ 4_d._
-    P^d. 4 doz. pencels, 1_s._ 6_d._”
-
-The “plaster and pomet” may possibly have been provided in view of the
-long journey on horseback and its contingencies. It was arranged that the
-youth should travel in the company of a relative, Mr. Marr, a sea-captain,
-who was on his way to join his ship, then lying in the Thames. They set
-out on the 7th of June, travelling by way of Coldstream and Newcastle,
-where they joined the great north road, then comparatively practicable to
-the south of Durham. They reached London safely on the 19th, having been
-about a fortnight on the road.
-
-Mr. Marr immediately proceeded to make inquiries for a mathematical
-instrument maker with whom to place his young friend. But it was found
-that a serious obstacle presented itself in the rules of the trade, which
-prescribed that those employed must either be apprentices serving under
-a seven years’ apprenticeship, or, if journeymen, that they should have
-served for that term. Watt, however, had no intention of binding himself
-to serve for so long a period, and he had no pretensions to rank as a
-journeyman. His object was to learn the business in the shortest possible
-time, and then return to Glasgow and set up for himself. The two went
-about from shop to shop, but only met with rebuffs. “I have not yet got
-a master,” Watt wrote to his father about a fortnight after his arrival;
-“we have tried several, but they all made some objection or other. I find
-that, if any of them agree with me at all, it will not be for less than
-a year; and even for that time they will be expecting some money.”
-
-Mr. Marr continued to exert himself on behalf of the youth. Anxious to
-be employed in any way rather than not at all, Watt offered his services
-gratuitously to a watchmaker named Neale, with whom Mr. Marr did business,
-and he was allowed to occupy himself in his shop for a time, cutting
-letters and figures in metal. At length a situation of a more permanent
-character was obtained for him; and he entered the shop of Mr. John
-Morgan, a respectable mathematical instrument maker in Cornhill, on the
-terms of receiving a year’s instruction in return for a fee of twenty
-guineas and the proceeds of his labour during that time. He soon proved
-himself a ready learner and skilful workman. That division of labour,
-the result of an extensive trade, which causes the best London carriages
-to be superior to any of provincial construction, was even then applied
-to mathematical instruments. “Very few here,” wrote Watt, “know any more
-than how to make a rule, others a pair of dividers, and such like.” His
-first employment was in making brass scales, rules, parallels, and the
-brass-work of quadrants; and by the end of a month he was able to finish
-a Hadley’s quadrant in better style than any apprentice in the shop. From
-rule and quadrant making he proceeded to azimuth compasses, brass sectors,
-theodolites, and the more delicate kinds of instruments. At the end of the
-year he wrote home to his father that he had made “a brass sector with a
-French joint, which is reckoned as nice a piece of framing-work as is in
-the trade;” and he expressed the hope that he would soon be able to work
-for himself, and earn his bread by his own industry.
-
-Up to this time he had necessarily been maintained by his father, on whom
-he drew from time to time. Mr. Watt’s memorandum-books show that on the
-27th of June he remitted him 10_l._; on the 24th of August following he
-enters: “Sent George Anderson by post 8_l._ to buy a bill of 7_l._ or
-8_l._ to send Wheytbread and Gifferd, and ballance of my son’s bill, 2_l._
-2_s._ 3_d._, for which ame to remite him more;” and on the 11th September
-following, the balance was forwarded through the same channel. On the 24th
-October, 4_l._ 10_s._ was in like manner sent to George Anderson “on son
-James’s second bill;” and on the 31st December, 10_l._ was remitted, “to
-be put to the credit of son James’s last bill.” To relieve his father as
-much as possible for the cost of his maintenance in London, Watt lived in
-a very frugal style, avoiding all unnecessary expenses. His living cost
-him only eight shillings a week; and he could not reduce it below that,
-he wrote to his father, “without pinching his belly.” He also sought for
-some remunerative work on his own account; and when he could obtain it he
-sat up at night to execute it.
-
-During Watt’s stay in London he was in a great measure prevented from
-stirring abroad by the hot press for sailors which was then going on. As
-many as forty pressgangs were at work, seizing all able-bodied men they
-could lay hands on. In one night they took not fewer than a thousand
-men. Nor were the kidnappers idle. These were the agents of the East
-India Company, who had crimping-houses in different parts of the city
-for receiving the men whom they had seized upon for service in the
-Indian army. Even when the demand for soldiers abated, the kidnappers
-continued their trade, and sold their unhappy victims to the planters in
-Pennsylvania and other North American colonies. Sometimes severe fights
-took place between the pressgangs and the kidnappers for possession of
-those who had been seized, the law and police being apparently powerless
-to protect them. “They now press anybody they can get,” Watt wrote in the
-spring of 1756, “landsmen as well as seamen, except it be in the liberties
-of the city, where they are obliged to carry them before the Lord Mayor
-first; and unless one be either a prentice or a creditable tradesman,
-there is scarce any getting off again. And if I was carried before my
-Lord Mayor, I durst not avow that I wrought in the city, it being against
-their laws for any unfreeman to work even as a journeyman within the
-liberties.”[64] What a curious glimpse does this give us into the practice
-of man-hunting in London in the eighteenth century!
-
-    [64] Letter to his father quoted in Muirhead’s ‘Life of Watt,’ p.
-      39.
-
-Watt’s enforced confinement, together with his sedentary habits and
-unremitting labour, soon told upon his weak frame. When he hurried to
-his lodgings at night, his body was wearied, and his nerves exhausted, so
-that his hands shook like those of an old man; yet he persevered with the
-extra work which he imposed upon himself, in order to earn a little honest
-money to help to pay for his living. His seat in Mr. Morgan’s shop being
-placed close to the door, which was often opened and shut in the course of
-the day, he caught a severe cold in the course of the winter; and he was
-afflicted by a racking cough and severe rheumatic pains, from the effects
-of which he long continued to suffer. Distressed by a gnawing pain in his
-back, and greatly depressed in spirits, he at length, with his father’s
-sanction, determined to return to Greenock, to seek for renewal of health
-in his native air. His father made him a further remittance to enable
-him to purchase some of the tools required for his trade, together with
-materials for making others, and a copy of Bion’s work on the construction
-and use of Mathematical Instruments. Having secured these, he set out on
-his return journey for Scotland, and reached Greenock in safety in the
-autumn of 1756. There his health soon became sufficiently restored to
-enable him to return to work; and with the concurrence and help of his
-father, he shortly after proceeded to Glasgow, in his twentieth year, to
-begin business on his own account.
-
-In endeavouring to establish himself in his trade, Watt encountered
-the same obstacle which in London had almost prevented his learning it.
-Although there were no mathematical instrument makers in Glasgow, and it
-must have been a public advantage to have so skilled a mechanic settled in
-the place, Watt was opposed by the corporation of hammermen on the ground
-that he was neither the son of a burgess nor had served an apprenticeship
-within the borough.[65] Failing in his endeavours to open a place of
-business, he next tried to prevail on the corporation to allow him to
-make use of a small workshop wherein to make experiments; but this also
-was peremptorily refused. The hammermen were doubtless acting in a very
-narrow spirit, in thus excluding the young mechanic from the privileges
-of citizenship; but such was the custom of the times,--those who were
-within the favoured circles usually putting their shoulders together to
-exclude those who were without. Watt had, however, already been employed
-by Dr. Dick, Professor of Natural Philosophy, to repair some mathematical
-instruments which had been bequeathed to the University by a gentleman in
-the West Indies; and the professors, having an absolute authority within
-the area occupied by the college buildings, determined to give him an
-asylum there, and thus free him from the incubus of the guilds.
-
-    [65] The following “letter of Guildry” embodied the local
-      regulations which existed for the purpose of preventing “loss
-      and skaith” to the burgesses and craftsmen of Glasgow by the
-      intrusion of “strangers”:--“The Dean of Guild and his Council
-      shall have full power to discharge, punish, and unlaw all
-      persons, unfreemen, using the liberty of a freeman within the
-      burgh, as they shall think fit, ay and while the said unfreemen
-      be put off the town, and restrained, or else be made free with
-      the town and their crafts; and sic like, to pursue, upon the
-      judges competent, all persons dwelling within this burgh, and
-      usurping the liberty thereof, obtain decrets against them, and
-      cause the same to be put to speedy execution.”
-
-[Illustration: INNER QUADRANGLE, GLASGOW COLLEGE.]
-
-In the heart of old Glasgow city, not far from the cathedral of St.
-Mungo, which Knox with difficulty preserved from the fury of the Scotch
-iconoclasts, stands the venerable University, a curiously black and
-sombre building, more than 400 years old. Inside the entrance, on the
-right-hand side, is a stone staircase, guarded by fabulous beasts in
-stone. The buildings consist of several quadrangles; but there is not much
-regularity in their design, each part seeming to stand towards the other
-parts, in a state of independent crookedness and irregularity. There are
-turrets in the corners of the quadrangles,--turrets with peaked tops,
-like witches’ caps. In the inner quadrangle, entered from the left-hand
-side of the outer court, a workshop was found for our mechanician, in
-which he was securely established by the midsummer of 1757. The apartment
-appropriated to Watt by the professors is still to be seen in nearly the
-same rude state in which he left it. It is situated on the first floor of
-the range of building forming the north-west side of the inner quadrangle,
-immediately under the gallery of the Natural Philosophy class, with which
-it communicates. It is lighted by three windows, two of which open into
-the quadrangle, and the third, at the back, into the Professors’ court.
-There is a small closet in the corner of the room, where some students
-have cut their names in the plaster,--date “1713.” The access to the room
-used to be from the court by a spiral stone staircase; but that entrance
-is now closed. The apartment is only about twenty feet square; but it
-served Watt, as it has since served others, for high thinking and noble
-working.[66]
-
-    [66] When we visited the room some years since, we found laid
-      there the galvanic apparatus employed by Professor Thomson for
-      perfecting the invention of his delicate process of signalling
-      through the wires of the Atlantic Telegraph.
-
-In addition to his workshop under the Natural Philosophy class, a shop
-for the sale of his instruments was also appropriated to Watt by the
-Professors. It formed the ground-floor of the house situated next to the
-Principal’s Gate, being part of the University Buildings, and was entered
-directly from the pavement of the High Street. It has been described to
-us, on the authority of Professor Fleming, as an old house, with a sort of
-arcade in front, supported on pillars. In making some alterations in the
-building the pillars were too much weakened, and the house, excepting the
-basement, had to be taken down. The shop occupied by Watt is the little
-tenement shown on the right hand of the following engraving; but the lower
-story of the building has since been altered and repaired, and is now
-totally different from what it was in Watt’s time.
-
-[Illustration: ISOMETRIC VIEW OF GLASGOW COLLEGE, 1693, FROM SLEYER’S
-‘THEATRUM SCOTIÆ.’[67]]
-
-    [67] The illustration does not show the Inner Quadrangle, situated
-      to the left of the Main Court, that part of the building having
-      been added since the view was published.
-
-Though his wants were few, and he lived on humble fare, Watt found it
-very difficult to earn a subsistence by his trade. His father sent him
-remittances from time to time; but the old man had suffered serious losses
-in his own business, and had become much less able to help his son with
-money. After a year’s trial, Watt wrote to his father, that “unless it be
-the Hadley’s instruments there is little to be got by it, as at most other
-jobs I am obliged to do the most of them myself; and, as it is impossible
-for one person to be expert at everything, they often cost me more time
-than they should do.” Of the quadrants, he could make three in a week,
-with the help of a lad; but the profit upon the three was not more than
-40_s._ The customers for these were very few in number, as seagoing ships
-with their captains could not yet reach Glasgow.[68]
-
-    [68] The author of ‘Glasgow, Past and Present’ thus writes:--“Last
-      week (Nov. 1851) I was crossing the ferry at the west end of
-      Tradeston, and in the course of our passage over we turned
-      round the bow of a large ship. The ferryman, looking up to her
-      leviathan bulwarks, exclaimed, ‘She came up here yesterday,
-      drawing eighteen feet water!’ Now, upon this very spot seventy
-      years ago, when a very little boy, I waded across the river,
-      my feet never being off the ground, and the water not reaching
-      above my arm-pits. The depth at that time could not have been
-      much more than three feet.”
-
-Failing sufficient customers for his instruments, Watt sent those which
-he had made to Port Glasgow and Greenock, where his father helped him to
-dispose of them. He also bethought him of taking a journey to Liverpool
-and London, for the purpose of obtaining orders for instruments;
-though, for some reason or other--most probably because he was averse to
-“pushing,” and detested the chaffering of trade--his contemplated journey
-was not undertaken. He therefore continued to execute only such orders as
-came to him, so that his business remained very small. He began to fear
-that he must give up the trade that would not keep him, and he wrote to
-his father: “If this business does not succeed, I must fall into some
-other.” To eke out his income, he took to map and chart selling, and,
-amongst other things, offered for sale the Map of the River Clyde,[69]
-originally surveyed by his uncle John.
-
-    [69] The ‘Glasgow Courant’ of Oct. 22, 1759, contains the
-      following advertisement:--
-
-                            “_Just Published_,
-
-        “And to be Sold by James Watt, at his Shop in the College
-          of Glasgow, price 2_s._ 6_d._,
-
-        “A large Sheet Map of the River Clyde, from Glasgow to
-          Portincross, from an Actual Survey.
-
-                            “To which is added,
-
-        “A Draught of Part of the North Channel, with the Frith
-          of Clyde according to the best authorities.”
-
-It is well for the world at large that Watt’s maps and quadrants remained
-on his hands unsold. The most untoward circumstances in life have often
-the happiest results. It is not Fortune that is blind, but man. Had his
-instrument-making business prospered, Watt might have become known as a
-first-class maker of quadrants, but not as the inventor of the condensing
-steam-engine. It was because his own special business failed that he was
-driven to betake himself to other pursuits, and eventually to prosecute
-the invention on which his fame mainly rests. At first he employed part
-of his leisure in making chemical and other experiments; but as these
-yielded him no returns in the shape of money, he was under the necessity
-of making some sort of article that was in demand, and for which he could
-find customers. Although he had no ear for music, and scarcely knew one
-note from another, he followed the example of the old spectacle-maker,
-his first master, in making fiddles, flutes, and guitars, which met with
-a readier sale than his quadrants. These articles were what artists call
-“pot-boilers,” and kept him in funds until a maintenance could be earned
-by higher-class work. We are informed, through a lady at Glasgow, that her
-father bought a flute from Watt, who said to him, in selling it: “Woe be
-to ye, Tam, if you’re no guid luck; for this is the first I’ve sold!”
-
-His friend Dr. Black, probably to furnish him with some profitable
-employment, asked Watt to make a barrel-organ for him, which he at once
-proceeded to construct. Watt was not the man to refuse work of any kind
-requiring the exercise of constructive skill. He first carefully studied
-the principles of harmony,--making science, in a measure, the substitute
-for want of ear,[70] and took for his guide the profound but obscure
-work on ‘Harmonics,’ published by Dr. R. Smith of Cambridge. He next
-made a model of the instrument; after which he constructed the organ,
-which, when finished, was considered a great success. About the same time
-the office-bearers of a Mason’s Lodge in Glasgow sent to ask him if he
-would undertake to build for them a finger-organ. As he had successfully
-repaired an instrument of the same kind, besides making the barrel-organ,
-he readily accepted the order. Watt was always, as he said, dissatisfied
-with other people’s work, as well as his own; and this habit of his mind
-made him study to improve upon whatever came before him. Thus, in the
-process of building this organ, he devised a number of novel expedients,
-such as a sustained monochord, indicators and regulators of the strength
-of the blast, means of tuning the instrument according to any system of
-temperament, with sundry contrivances for improving the efficiency of the
-stops. The qualities of the organ when finished are said to have elicited
-the surprise and admiration of musicians.[71]
-
-    [70] General T. Perronet Thompson is another remarkable instance
-      of a person without ear for music, who has mastered the
-      principles of harmony and applied them in the invention of his
-      “Enharmonic Organ.”
-
-    [71] Watt seems to have made other organs besides those above
-      mentioned. Not long since a barrel-organ of his construction
-      was offered for sale at Glasgow. It was originally in the form
-      of a table, about three feet square, having no appearance of
-      a musical instrument externally. At this table, when Watt and
-      his friends were seated, he would set the concealed mechanism
-      in action, and surprise them with the production of the music.
-      It has since been mounted with an organ front and sides, with
-      gilt pipes. When in proper tune it is of considerable power and
-      pleasing harmony; and continues orthodox in its psalm tunes,
-      which range from “Martyrs” to the “Old Hundred.” A correspondent
-      writes as follows:--“A large organ made and used by Watt when
-      he had his shop in Glasgow, was disposed of by him, when he
-      finally left this city. It came into the possession of the late
-      Mr. Archibald M‘Lellan, coach-builder, Miller Street, Glasgow,
-      and he had it fitted up in his elegant residence in that fine
-      old street. I have heard it played by Mr. M‘Lellan. After his
-      death it was sold, and purchased by Mr. James G. Adam of the
-      Denny print-works. Mr. Adam died, and the organ was advertised
-      for sale, in 1864, and purchased for 10_l._, by Adam Sim, Esq.,
-      of Coulter Mains, in whose possession it now is. Mr. Sim has
-      authentic documents to prove that this organ was really James
-      Watt’s.”
-
-The leisure time which Watt did not occupy with miscellaneous work of
-this sort, he spent in reading. He did not want for books, as the College
-library was near at hand; and the professors as well as students were
-willing to lend him from their stores. He was not afraid of solid, heavy,
-dry books, provided he could learn something from them. All were alike
-welcome; and one of his greatest pleasures was in devouring a novel,
-when it fell in his way. He is even said to have occupied himself in
-writing tales and verses when he had nothing else to do. As none of his
-attempts have been preserved, we cannot offer an opinion upon them; but
-it is doubtful whether Watt’s poetry and fiction would display the same
-originality and power of invention as his steam-engine. The only youthful
-exercises of his which have been preserved are anything but poetical. One
-of them, at Heathfield, is a ‘Treatise on Practical Megethometry;’ and
-another is a ‘Compendium of Definitions,’ in Latin, by Gerard de Vries,
-both written in a neat round hand.
-
-Like most of the Glasgow citizens of that time, Watt occasionally visited
-his club, where he cultivated the society of men of greater culture and
-experience than himself.[72] As he afterwards observed to a friend, “Our
-conversations then, besides the usual subjects with young men, turned
-principally on literary topics, religion, morality, belles-lettres,
-&c.; and to those conversations my mind owed its first bias towards
-such subjects, in which they were all much my superiors, I never having
-attended a college, and being then but a mechanic.”
-
-    [72] The club he frequented was called the Anderston Club, of
-      which Mr. (afterwards Professor) Millar, Dr. Robert Simson, the
-      mathematician, Dr. Adam Smith, Dr. Black, and Dr. Cullen, were
-      members. The standing dish of the club was hen-broth, consisting
-      of a decoction of “how-towdies” (fowls), thickened with black
-      beans, and seasoned with pepper. Dr. Strang says Professor
-      Simson was in the habit of counting the steps from his house to
-      the club, so that he could tell the distance to the fraction of
-      an inch. But it is not stated whether he counted the steps on
-      his return, and found the number of steps the same.
-
-There was another circumstance connected with his situation at this time
-which must have been peculiarly agreeable to a young man of his character,
-aspirations, and thirst for knowledge. His shop, being conveniently
-situated within the College, was a favourite resort of the professors and
-the students. They were attracted by the ingenious instruments and models
-which the shop contained, and the pleasure always felt in witnessing the
-proceedings of a skilful mechanic at his work, but more particularly by
-the easy, unaffected, and original conversation of Watt himself. Though
-a comparative youth, the professors were usually glad to consult him on
-points of mechanical knowledge and practice; and the acuteness of his
-observation, the accuracy of his knowledge, and the readiness with which
-he communicated what he knew, soon rendered him a general favourite.
-Among his most frequent visitors were Dr. Joseph Black, the distinguished
-professor of chemistry, who there contracted a friendship with Watt which
-lasted, uninterrupted, for a period of forty years, until the Doctor’s
-death; Professor Simson, one of the most eminent men of his day, whom Lord
-Brougham has described as the restorer of the science of geometry; Dr.
-Dick, the Professor of Natural Philosophy; and Professor Anderson.[73]
-Dr. Moor and Dr. Adam Smith were also frequent callers. But of all Watt’s
-associates, none is more closely connected with his name and history than
-John Robison, then a student at Glasgow College, and afterwards Professor
-of Natural Philosophy at Edinburgh.
-
-    [73] John Anderson was a native of Greenock, and an intimate
-      friend of James Watt. He was appointed professor of Hebrew in
-      his twenty-seventh year, and succeeded Dr. Dick as professor of
-      Natural Philosophy in 1757. Watt spent many of his evenings at
-      his residence within the College, and had the free use of his
-      excellent private library. Professor Anderson is entitled to the
-      honour of being the first to open classes for the instruction
-      of working men--“anti-toga classes,” as he called them--in the
-      principles of Natural Philosophy; and at his death he bequeathed
-      his property for the purpose of founding an institution with
-      the same object. The Andersonian University was opened in 1796,
-      long before the age of Mechanics’ Institutes.
-
-Robison was nearer Watt’s age than the rest, and stood in the intimate
-relation to him of bosom friend, as well as fellow inquirer in science.
-He was handsome and prepossessing in appearance, frank and lively, full of
-fancy and humour, and a general favourite in the College. He was a capital
-talker, an accomplished linguist, and a good musician; yet, with all his
-versatility, he was a profound thinker and a diligent student, especially
-in mathematical and mechanical science, as he afterwards proved in his
-elaborate ‘System of Mechanical Philosophy,’ edited by Sir David Brewster,
-and his many able contributions to the ‘Encyclopædia Britannica,’ of which
-he was the designer and editor.
-
-Robison’s introduction to Watt has been described by himself. After
-feasting his eyes on the beautifully-finished instruments in his shop,
-Robison entered into conversation with him. Expecting to find only a
-workman, he was surprised to discover a philosopher. “I had the vanity,”
-says Robison, “to think myself a pretty good proficient in my favourite
-study (mathematical and mechanical philosophy), and was rather mortified
-at finding Mr. Watt so much my superior. But his own high relish for
-these things made him pleased with the chat of any person who had the
-same tastes with himself; and his innate complaisance made him indulge
-my curiosity, and even encourage my endeavours to form a more intimate
-acquaintance with him. I lounged much about him, and, I doubt not, was
-frequently teasing him. Thus our acquaintance began.”
-
-In Watt’s workshop also, Robison first met Dr. Black, and there initiated
-a friendship which ended only with death. “My first acquaintance with
-him,” Robison afterwards wrote Watt, “began in your rooms when you were
-rubbing up Macfarlane’s instruments. He used to come in, and, standing
-with his back to us, amuse himself with Bird’s quadrant, whistling softly
-to himself, in a manner that thrilled me to the heart.”
-
-In 1757 Robison applied for the office of assistant to Dr. Dick, Professor
-of Natural Philosophy, in the place of the son of that gentleman, who
-had just died; but though he had already taken the degree of Master of
-Arts, he was thought too young to hold so important an office, being
-only about nineteen years old. His friends wished him to study for the
-church; but, preferring some occupation in which his mechanical tastes
-might be indulged, he turned his eyes to London. Furnished with letters
-from Professor Dick and Dr. Simson, he obtained an introduction to
-Admiral Knowles, who engaged him to take charge of his son’s instruction
-while at sea. In that capacity he sailed from Spithead in 1759, with the
-fleet which assisted the land forces in the taking of Quebec; he and his
-pupil being rated as midshipmen in the Admiral’s ship. Robison was on
-duty in the boat which carried Wolfe to the point where the army scaled
-the heights of Montcalm the night before the battle; and as the sun was
-setting in the west, the General, doubtless from an association of ideas
-suggested by the dangers of the coming struggle, recited, in an under
-tone, Gray’s ‘Elegy on a Country Churchyard;’ and when he had finished,
-said, “Now, gentlemen, I would rather have been the author of that poem
-than take Quebec.”
-
-When Robison returned from his voyagings in 1763, a travelled man,--having
-had the advantage, during his absence, of acting as confidential assistant
-of Admiral Knowles in his marine surveys and observations,--he reckoned
-himself more than on a par with Watt; but he soon found that, during the
-period of his absence from Glasgow, his friend had been even busier than
-himself. When they entered into conversation, he found Watt continually
-striking into new paths where he was obliged to be his follower. The
-extent of the mathematical instrument maker’s investigations was no less
-remarkable than the depth to which he had pursued them. Not only had he
-mastered the principles of engineering, civil and military, but diverged
-into studies in antiquity, natural history, languages, criticism, and
-art. Every pursuit became science in his hands, and he made use of his
-subsidiary knowledge for the purpose of helping him towards his favourite
-objects.
-
-Before long, Watt became to be regarded as one of the ablest men about
-college. “When to the superiority of knowledge in his own line,” said
-Robison, “which every man confessed, there was joined the naïve simplicity
-and candour of his character, it is no wonder that the attachment of
-his acquaintances was so strong. I have seen something of the world,” he
-continued, “and I am obliged to say that I never saw such another instance
-of general and cordial attachment to a person whom all acknowledged to be
-their superior. But this superiority was concealed under the most amiable
-candour, and liberal allowance of merit to every man. Mr. Watt was the
-first to ascribe to the ingenuity of a friend things which were very often
-nothing but his own surmises followed out and embodied by another. I am
-well entitled to say this, and have often experienced it in my own case.”
-
-There are few traits in biography more charming than this generous
-recognition of merit mutually attributed by the one friend to the other.
-Arago, in quoting the words of Robison, has well observed that it is
-difficult to determine whether the honour of having thus recorded them be
-not as great as that of having inspired them.
-
-[Illustration: THE BROOMIELAW IN 1760.]
-
-[Illustration: PROFESSOR ROBISON, Æt. 60.
-
-[By T. D. Scott, after Raeburn.]]
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER VII.
-
-WATT’S EXPERIMENTS ON STEAM--INVENTS THE SEPARATE CONDENSER.
-
-
-It was in the year 1759 that Robison first called the attention of his
-friend Watt to the subject of the steam-engine. Robison was then only
-in his twentieth, and Watt in his twenty-third year. Robison’s idea was
-that the power of steam might be advantageously applied to the driving of
-wheel-carriages, and he suggested that it would be the most convenient
-for the purpose to place the cylinder with its open end downwards to
-avoid the necessity of using a working beam. Watt admits that he was very
-ignorant of the steam-engine at the time; nevertheless, he began making
-a model with two cylinders of tinplate, intending that the pistons and
-their connecting-rods should act alternately on two pinions attached
-to the axles of the carriage-wheels. But the model, being slightly and
-inaccurately made, did not answer his expectations. Other difficulties
-presented themselves, and the scheme was laid aside on Robison leaving
-Glasgow to go to sea. Indeed, mechanical science was not yet ripe for
-the locomotive. Robison’s idea had, however, dropped silently into the
-mind of his friend, where it grew from day to day, slowly and at length
-fruitfully.
-
-At his intervals of leisure and in the quiet of his evenings, Watt
-continued to prosecute his various studies. He was shortly attracted
-by the science of chemistry, then in its infancy. Dr. Black was at that
-time occupied with the investigations which led to his discovery of the
-theory of latent heat, and it is probable that his familiar conversations
-with Watt on the subject induced the latter to enter upon a series of
-experiments with the view of giving the theory some practical direction.
-His attention again and again reverted to the steam-engine, though he
-had not yet seen even a model of one. Steam was as yet almost unknown in
-Scotland as a working power. The first engine was erected at Elphinstone
-Colliery, in Stirlingshire, about the year 1750; and the second more than
-ten years later, at Govan Colliery, near Glasgow, where it was known
-by the startling name of “The Firework.” This had not, however, been
-set up at the time Watt began to inquire into the subject. But he found
-that the College possessed the model of a Newcomen engine for the use of
-the Natural Philosophy class, which had been sent to London for repair.
-On hearing of its existence, he suggested to his friend Dr. Anderson,
-Professor of Natural Philosophy, the propriety of getting back the model;
-and a sum of money was placed by the Senatus at the Professor’s disposal
-“to recover the steam-engine from Mr. Sisson, instrument maker, in
-London.”
-
-In the mean time Watt sought to learn all that had been written on
-the subject of the steam-engine. He ascertained from Desaguliers,
-from Switzer, and other writers, what had been accomplished by Savery,
-Newcomen, Beighton, and others: and he went on with his own independent
-experiments. His first apparatus was of the simplest possible kind. He
-used common apothecaries’ phials for his steam reservoirs, and canes
-hollowed out for his steam pipes.[74] In 1761 he proceeded to experiment
-on the force of steam by means of a small Papin’s digester and a syringe.
-The syringe was only the third of an inch in diameter, fitted with a
-solid piston; and it was connected with the digester by a pipe furnished
-with a stopcock, by which the steam was admitted or shut off at will. It
-was also itself provided with a stopcock, enabling a communication to be
-opened between the syringe and the outer air to permit the steam in the
-syringe to escape. The apparatus, though rude, enabled the experimenter to
-ascertain some important facts. When the steam in the digester was raised
-and the cock turned, enabling it to rush against the lower side of the
-piston, he found that the expansive force of the steam raised a weight of
-fifteen pounds with which the piston was loaded. Then, on turning the cock
-and shutting off the connexion with the digester at the same time that a
-passage was opened to the air, the steam was allowed to escape, when the
-weight upon the piston, being no longer counteracted, immediately forced
-it to descend.
-
-    [74] At a meeting held in Glasgow in 1839 to erect a monument
-      to Watt, Dr. Ure observed:--“As to the latent heat of steam,”
-      said Mr. Watt to me, “it was a piece of knowledge essential to
-      my inquiries, and I worked it out myself in the best way that
-      I could. I used apothecaries’ phials for my apparatus, and by
-      means of them I got approximations sufficient for my purpose at
-      the time.” The passage affords a striking illustration of the
-      large results that may be arrived at by means of the humblest
-      instruments. In like manner Cavendish, when asked by a foreigner
-      to be shown over his laboratories, pointed to an old tea-tray
-      on the table, containing a few watch-glasses, test papers,
-      a balance, and a blowpipe, and observed, “There is all the
-      laboratory I possess.”
-
-[Illustration: PAPIN’S DIGESTER.]
-
-Watt saw that it would be easy to contrive that the cocks should be turned
-by the machinery itself instead of by the hand, and the whole be made
-to work by itself with perfect regularity. But there was an objection to
-this method. Water is converted into vapour as soon as its elasticity is
-sufficient to overcome the weight of the air which keeps it down. Under
-the ordinary pressure of the atmosphere water acquires this necessary
-elasticity at 212°; but as the steam in the digester was prevented
-from escaping, it acquired increased heat, and by consequence increased
-elasticity. Hence it was that the steam which issued from the digester
-was not only able to support the piston and the air which pressed upon
-its upper surface, but the additional load with which the piston was
-weighted. With the imperfect mechanical construction, however, of those
-days, there was a risk lest the boiler should be burst by the steam, which
-was apt to force its way through the ill-made joints of the machine. This,
-conjoined with the great expenditure of steam on the high-pressure system,
-led Watt to abandon the plan; and the exigencies of his business for a
-time prevented him pursuing his experiments. Watt’s own account of his
-early experiments will be found appended as notes to Brewster’s edition
-of the articles ‘Steam and Steam-engines,’ written by Dr. Robison for the
-‘Encyclopædia Britannica,’ and afterwards published in a separate form.
-
-[Illustration: THE NEWCOMEN MODEL.]
-
-At length the Newcomen model arrived from London; and, in 1763, the little
-engine, which was destined to become so famous, was put into the hands of
-Watt. The boiler was somewhat smaller than an ordinary tea-kettle. The
-cylinder of the engine was only of two inches diameter and six inches
-stroke. Watt at first regarded it as merely “a fine plaything.” It was,
-however, enough to set him upon a track of thinking which led to the most
-important results. When he had repaired the model and set it to work, he
-found that the boiler, though apparently large enough, could not supply
-steam in sufficient quantity, and only a few strokes of the piston could
-be obtained, when the engine stopped. The fire was urged by blowing, and
-more steam was produced, but still it would not work properly. Exactly
-at the point at which another man would have abandoned the task in
-despair, the mind of Watt became thoroughly roused. “Everything,” says
-Professor Robison, “was to him the beginning of a new and serious study;
-and I knew that he would not quit it till he had either discovered its
-insignificance, or had made something of it.” Thus it happened with the
-phenomena presented by the model of the steam-engine. Watt referred to
-his books, and endeavoured to ascertain from them by what means he might
-remedy the defects which he found in the model; but they could tell him
-nothing. He then proceeded with an independent course of experiments,
-resolved to work out the problem for himself. In the course of his
-inquiries he came upon a fact which, more than any other, led his mind
-into the train of thought which at last conducted him to the invention of
-which the results were destined to prove so stupendous. This fact was the
-existence of Latent Heat.
-
-In order to follow the track of investigation pursued by Watt, it
-is necessary for a moment to revert to the action of the Newcomen
-pumping-engine. A beam, moving upon a centre, had affixed to one end
-of it a chain attached to the piston of the pump, and at the other a
-chain attached to a piston that fitted into the steam cylinder. It was
-by driving this latter piston up and down the cylinder that the pump was
-worked. To communicate the necessary movement to the piston, the steam
-generated in a boiler was admitted to the bottom of the cylinder, forcing
-out the air through a valve, when its pressure on the under side of the
-piston counterbalanced the pressure of the atmosphere on its upper side.
-The piston, thus placed between two equal forces, was drawn up to the top
-of the cylinder by the greater weight of the pump-gear at the opposite
-extremity of the beam. The steam, so far, only discharged the office which
-was performed by the air it displaced; but, if the air had been allowed
-to remain, the piston once at the top of the cylinder could not have
-returned, being pressed as much by the atmosphere underneath as by the
-atmosphere above it. The steam, on the contrary, which was admitted by
-the exclusion of the air, _could be condensed_, and a vacuum created, by
-injecting cold water through the bottom of the cylinder. The piston being
-now unsupported, was forced down by the pressure of the atmosphere on its
-upper surface. When the piston reached the bottom, the steam was again let
-in, and the process was repeated. Such was the engine in ordinary use for
-pumping water at the time that Watt begun his investigations.
-
-Among his other experiments, he constructed a boiler which showed by
-inspection the quantity of water evaporated in any given time, and the
-quantity of steam used in every stroke of the engine. He was astonished
-to discover that a _small_ quantity of water in the form of steam, heated
-a _large_ quantity of cold water injected into the cylinder for the
-purpose of cooling it; and upon further examination he ascertained that
-steam heated _six times_ its weight of cold water to 212°, which was
-the temperature of the steam itself. “Being struck with this remarkable
-fact,” says Watt, “and not understanding the reason of it, I mentioned it
-to my friend Dr. Black, who then explained to me his doctrine of latent
-heat, which he had taught for some time before this period (the summer of
-1764); but having myself been occupied by the pursuits of business, if I
-had heard of it I had not attended to it, when I thus stumbled upon one
-of the material facts by which that beautiful theory is supported.”[75]
-
-    [75] Watt’s notes to Robison’s Articles on ‘Steam and
-      Steam-engines.’
-
-When Watt found that water, in its conversion into vapour, became such a
-reservoir of heat, he was more than ever bent on economising it; for the
-great waste of heat involving so heavy a consumption of fuel, was felt
-to be the principal obstacle to the extended employment of steam as a
-motive power. He accordingly endeavoured, with the same quantity of fuel,
-at once to increase the production of steam, and to diminish its waste.
-He increased the heating surface of the boiler, by making flues through
-it; he even made his boiler of wood, as being a worse conductor of heat
-than the brickwork which surrounds common furnaces; and he cased the
-cylinders and all the conducting-pipes in materials which conducted heat
-very slowly. But none of these contrivances were effectual; for it turned
-out that the chief expenditure of steam, and consequently of fuel, in the
-Newcomen engine, was occasioned by the reheating of the cylinder after
-the steam had been condensed, and the cylinder was consequently cooled by
-the injection into it of the cold water. Nearly four-fifths of the whole
-steam employed was condensed on its first admission, before the surplus
-could act upon the piston. Watt therefore came to the conclusion, that to
-make a perfect steam-engine, it was necessary that _the cylinder should be
-always as hot as the steam that entered it_; but it was equally necessary
-that the steam should be condensed when the piston descended,--nay, that
-it should be cooled down below 100°, or a considerable amount of vapour
-would be given off, which would resist the descent of the piston, and
-diminish the power of the engine. Thus the cylinder was never to be at a
-less temperature than 212°, and yet at each descent of the piston it was
-to be less than 100°; conditions which, on the very face of them, seemed
-to be wholly incompatible.
-
-We revert for a moment to the progress of Watt’s instrument-making
-business. The shop in the College was not found to answer, being too
-far from the principal thoroughfares. If he wanted business he must go
-nearer to the public, for it was evident that they would not come to him.
-But to remove to a larger shop, in a more central quarter, involved an
-expenditure of capital for which he was himself unequal. His father had
-helped him with money as long as he could, but could do so no longer.
-Though he was as much respected by his neighbours as ever, he had grown
-poor by his losses; and, instead of giving help, himself needed it. Watt
-therefore looked about him for a partner with means, and succeeded in
-finding one in a Mr. John Craig, in conjunction with whom he opened a
-retail shop in the Salt-market, nearly opposite St. Andrew’s Street, about
-the year 1760; removing from thence to Buchanan’s Land, on the north side
-of the Trongate, a few years later.[76] Watt’s partner was not a mechanic,
-but he supplied the requisite capital, and attended to the books. The
-partnership was on the whole successful, as we infer from the increased
-number of hands employed. At first Watt could execute all his orders
-himself, and afterwards by the help of a man and a boy; but by the end of
-1764, the number of hands employed by the firm had increased to sixteen.
-
-
-    [76] The following advertisement in the ‘Glasgow Journal’ of the
-      1st Dec., 1763, fixes the date of this last removal:--
-
-      “James Watt has removed his shop from the Saltmercat to Mr.
-      Buchanan’s land in the Trongate, where he sells all sorts of
-      Mathematical and Musical Instruments, with variety of toys, and
-      other goods.”
-
-His improving business brought with it an improving income, and
-Watt--always a frugal and thrifty man--began to save a little money. He
-was encouraged to economise by another circumstance--his intended marriage
-with his cousin, Margaret Miller. In anticipation of this event, he had
-removed from his rooms in the College to a house in Delftfield Lane--a
-narrow passage then parallel with York Street, but now converted into
-the spacious thoroughfare of Watt Street. Having furnished his house in a
-plain yet comfortable style, he brought home his young wife, and installed
-her there in July, 1764. The step was one of much importance to his
-personal wellbeing. Mrs. Watt was of a lively, cheerful temperament; and
-as Watt himself was of a meditative disposition, prone to melancholy, and
-a frequent sufferer from nervous headache, her presence at his fireside
-could not fail to have a beneficial influence upon his health and comfort.
-
-[Illustration: WATT’S HOUSE, DELFTFIELD LANE.]
-
-Watt continued to pursue his studies as before. Though still occupied
-with his inquiries and experiments as to steam, he did not neglect his
-proper business, but was constantly on the look-out for improvements in
-instrument making. A machine which he invented for drawing in perspective
-proved a success; and he made a considerable number of them to order,
-for customers in London as well as abroad. He was also an indefatigable
-reader, and continued to extend his knowledge of chemistry and mechanics
-by perusal of the best books on these sciences.
-
-Above all other subjects, however, the improvement of the steam-engine
-continued to keep the fastest hold upon his mind. He still brooded over
-his experiments with the Newcomen model, but did not seem to make much
-way in introducing any practical improvement in its mode of working. His
-friend Robison says he struggled long to condense with sufficient rapidity
-without injection, trying one expedient after another, finding out what
-would do by what would _not_ do, and exhibiting many beautiful specimens
-of ingenuity and fertility of resource. He continued, to use his own
-words, “to grope in the dark, misled by many an _ignis fatuus_.” It was a
-favourite saying of his, that “Nature has a weak side, if we can only find
-it out;” and he went on groping and feeling for it, but as yet in vain.
-At length light burst upon him, and all at once the problem over which he
-had been brooding was solved.
-
-One Sunday afternoon, in the spring of 1765, he went to take an afternoon
-walk on the Green, then a quiet, grassy meadow, used as a bleaching and
-grazing-ground. On week-days the Glasgow lasses came thither with their
-largest kail-pots, to boil their clothes in; and sturdy queans might be
-seen, with coats kilted, tramping blankets in their tubs. On Sundays the
-place was comparatively deserted, and hence Watt, who lived close at hand,
-went there to take a quiet afternoon stroll. His thoughts were as usual
-running on the subject of his unsatisfactory experiments with the Newcomen
-engine, when the first idea of the separate condenser suddenly flashed
-upon his mind. But the notable discovery is best told in his own words,
-as related to Mr. Robert Hart, many years after:--
-
-“I had gone to take a walk on a fine Sabbath afternoon. I had entered the
-Green by the gate at the foot of Charlotte Street, and had passed the old
-washing-house. I was thinking upon the engine at the time, and had gone as
-far as the herd’s house, when the idea came into my mind that as steam was
-an elastic body it would rush into a vacuum, and if a communication were
-made between the cylinder and an exhausted vessel, it would rush into it,
-and might be there condensed without cooling the cylinder. I then saw that
-I must get rid of the condensed steam and injection-water if I used a jet,
-as in Newcomen’s engine. Two ways of doing this occurred to me. First, the
-water might be run off by a descending pipe, if an off-let could be got
-at the depth of 35 or 36 feet, and any air might be extracted by a small
-pump. The second was to make the pump large enough to extract both water
-and air. He continued: I had not walked further than the Golf-house[77]
-when the whole thing was arranged in my mind.”[78]
-
-    [77] About the site of the Humane Society’s House.
-
-    [78] Mr. Robert Hart’s ‘Reminiscences of James Watt,’ in
-      ‘Transactions of the Glasgow Archæological Society, 1859.’
-
-Great and prolific ideas are almost always simple. What seems impossible
-at the outset appears so obvious when it is effected that we are prone to
-marvel that it did not force itself at once upon the mind. Late in life
-Watt, with his accustomed modesty, declared his belief that if he had
-excelled, it had been “by chance and the neglect of others.” To Professor
-Jardine he said “that when it was analysed the invention would not appear
-so great as it seemed to be. In the state,” said he, “in which I found the
-steam-engine, it was no great effort of mind to observe that the quantity
-of fuel necessary to make it work would for ever prevent its extensive
-utility. The next step in my progress was equally easy--to inquire what
-was the cause of the great consumption of fuel: this, too, was readily
-suggested, viz., the waste of fuel which was necessary to bring the whole
-cylinder, piston, and adjacent parts from the coldness of water to the
-heat of steam, no fewer than from fifteen to twenty times in a minute.”
-The question then occurred, how was this to be avoided or remedied? It was
-at this stage that the idea of carrying on the condensation in a separate
-vessel flashed upon his mind, and solved the difficulty.[79]
-
-    [79] “The last step of all,” says Professor Jardine, “was more
-      difficult--the forming of the separate condensing vessel.
-      The great knowledge he had acquired of the mechanical powers
-      enabled him to construct it, but I have often heard him say
-      this was a work of great difficulty, and that he met with many
-      disappointments before he succeeded. I have often made use
-      of this beautiful analysis received from Mr. Watt, in another
-      department in which I have been long engaged, to illustrate and
-      encourage the progress of genius in youth, to show, that once
-      in possession of a habit of attention, under proper direction,
-      it may be carried from one easy step to another, till the mind
-      becomes qualified and invigorated for uniting and concentrating
-      effort--the highest exertion of genius.”
-
-Mankind has been more just to Watt than he was to himself. There was no
-accident in the discovery. It had been the result of close and continuous
-study; and the idea of the separate condenser was merely the last step
-of a long journey--a step which could not have been taken unless the
-road which led to it had been traversed. Dr. Black says, “This capital
-improvement flashed upon his mind at once, and filled him with rapture;” a
-statement which, spite of the unimpassioned nature of Watt, we can readily
-believe.
-
-On the morning following his Sunday afternoon’s walk on Glasgow Green,
-Watt was up betimes making arrangements for a speedy trial of his new
-plan. He borrowed from a college friend a large brass syringe, an inch and
-a third in diameter, and ten inches long, of the kind used by anatomists
-for injecting arteries with wax previous to dissection. The body of the
-syringe served for a cylinder, the piston-rod passing through a collar of
-leather in its cover. A pipe connected with the boiler was inserted at
-both ends for the admission of steam, and at the upper end was another
-pipe to convey the steam to the condenser. The axis of the stem of the
-piston was drilled with a hole, fitted with a valve at its lower end, to
-permit the water produced by the condensed steam on first filling the
-cylinder to escape. The first condenser made use of was an improvised
-cistern of tinned plate, provided with a pump to get rid of the water
-formed by the condensation of the steam, both the condensing-pipes and
-the air-pump being placed in a reservoir of cold water.
-
-  “The steam-pipe,” says Watt, “was adjusted to a small boiler.
-  When steam was produced, it was admitted into the cylinder, and
-  soon issued through the perforation of the rod, and at the valve
-  of the condenser; when it was judged that the air was expelled,
-  the steam-cock was shut, and the air-pump piston-rod was drawn
-  up, which leaving the small pipes of the condenser in a state
-  of vacuum, the steam entered them and was condensed. The piston
-  of the cylinder immediately rose and lifted a weight of about
-  18 lbs., which was hung to the lower end of the piston-rod.
-  The exhaustion-cock was shut, the steam was readmitted into the
-  cylinder, and the operation was repeated. The quantity of steam
-  consumed and the weights it could raise were observed, and,
-  excepting the non-application of the steam-case and external
-  covering, the invention was complete, in so for as regarded the
-  savings of steam and fuel.”
-
-[Illustration: WATT’S APPARATUS.]
-
-But, although the invention was complete in Watt’s mind, it took him
-many long and laborious years to work out the details of the engine.
-His friend Robison, with whom his intimacy was maintained during these
-interesting experiments, has given a graphic account of the difficulties
-which he successively encountered and overcame. He relates that on his
-return from the country, after the College vacation in 1765, he went
-to have a chat with Watt and communicate to him some observations he
-had made on Desaguliers’ and Belidor’s account of the steam-engine. He
-went straight into the parlour, without ceremony, and found Watt sitting
-before the fire looking at a little tin cistern which he had on his knee.
-Robison immediately started the conversation about steam, his mind, like
-Watt’s, being occupied with the means of avoiding the excessive waste of
-heat in the Newcomen engine. Watt, all the while, kept looking into the
-fire, and after a time laid down the cistern at the foot of his chair,
-saying nothing. It seems that Watt felt rather nettled at Robison having
-communicated to a mechanic of the town a contrivance which he had hit upon
-for turning the cocks of his engine. When Robison therefore pressed his
-inquiry, Watt at length looked at him and said briskly, “You need not fash
-yourself any more about that, man; I have now made an engine that shall
-not waste a particle of steam. It shall all be boiling hot,--ay, and hot
-water injected, if I please.” He then pushed the little tin cistern with
-his foot under the table.
-
-Robison could learn no more of the new contrivance from Watt at that time;
-but on the same evening he accidentally met a mutual acquaintance, who,
-supposing he knew as usual the progress of Watt’s experiments, observed to
-him, “Well, have you seen Jamie Watt?” “Yes.” “He’ll be in fine spirits
-now with his engine?” “Yes,” said Robison, “very fine spirits.” “Gad!”
-said the other, “the separate condenser’s the thing: keep it but cold
-enough, and you may have a perfect vacuum, whatever be the heat of the
-cylinder.” This was Watt’s secret, and the nature of the contrivance was
-clear to Robison at once.
-
-[Illustration: DR. JOSEPH BLACK.]
-
-It will be observed that Watt had not made a secret of it to his other
-friends. Indeed Robison himself admitted that one of Watt’s greatest
-delights was to communicate the results of his experiments to others, and
-set them upon the same road to knowledge with himself; and that no one
-could display less of the small jealousy of the tradesman than he did. To
-his intimate friend, Dr. Black, he communicated the progress made by him
-at every stage; and the Doctor kindly encouraged him in his struggles,
-cheered him in his encounter with difficulty, and, what was of still more
-practical value at the time, he helped him with money to enable him to
-prosecute his invention. Communicative though Watt was disposed to be, he
-learnt reticence when he found himself exposed to the depredations of the
-smaller fry of inventors. Robison says that had he lived in Birmingham
-or London at the time, the probability is that some one or other of the
-numerous harpies who live by sucking other people’s brains, would have
-secured patents for his more important inventions, and thereby deprived
-him of the benefits of his skill, science, and labour. As yet, however,
-there were but few mechanics in Glasgow capable of understanding or
-appreciating the steam-engine; and the intimate friends to whom he freely
-spoke of his discovery were too honourable-minded to take advantage
-of his confidence. Shortly after, Watt fully communicated to Robison
-the different stages of his invention, and the results at which he had
-arrived, much to the delight of his friend.
-
-It will be remembered that in the Newcomen engine the steam was only
-employed for the purpose of producing a vacuum, and that its working power
-was in the down stroke, which was effected by the pressure of the air
-upon the piston; hence it is now usual to call it the atmospheric engine.
-Watt perceived that the air which followed the piston down the cylinder
-would cool the latter, and that steam would be wasted in re-heating it.
-In order, therefore, to avoid this loss of heat, he resolved to put an
-air-tight cover upon the cylinder, with a hole and stuffing-box for the
-piston-rod to slide through, and to admit steam above the piston, to act
-upon it instead of the atmosphere. When the steam had done its duty in
-driving down the piston, a communication was opened between the upper
-and lower part of the cylinder, and the same steam, distributing itself
-equally in both compartments, sufficed to restore equilibrium. The piston
-was now drawn up by the weight of the pump-gear; the steam beneath it
-was then condensed in the separate vessel so as to produce a vacuum, and
-a fresh jet of steam from the boiler was let in above the piston, which
-forced it again to the bottom of the cylinder. From an atmospheric it had
-thus become a true steam-engine, and with a much greater economy of steam
-than when the air did half the duty. But it was not only important to
-keep the air from flowing down the inside of the cylinder: the air which
-circulated within cooled the metal and condensed a portion of the steam
-within; and this Watt proposed to remedy by a second cylinder, surrounding
-the first with an interval between the two which was to be kept full of
-steam.
-
-One by one these various contrivances were struck out, modified, settled,
-and reduced to definite plans; the separate condenser, the air and water
-pumps, the use of fat and oil (instead of water as in the Newcomen engine)
-to keep the piston working in the cylinder air-tight, and the enclosing
-of the cylinder itself within another to prevent the loss of heat. They
-were all but emanations from the first idea of inventing an engine working
-by a piston, in which the cylinder should be kept continually hot and
-perfectly dry. “When once,” says Watt, “the idea of separate condensation
-was started, all these improvements followed as corollaries in quick
-succession; so that in the course of one or two days the invention was
-thus far complete in my mind.”
-
-The next step was to construct a model engine for the purpose of embodying
-the invention in a working form. With this object Watt hired an old
-cellar, situated in the first wide entry to the north of the beef-market
-in King Street, and there proceeded with his model. He found it much
-easier, however, to prepare his plan than to execute it. Like most
-ingenious and inventive men, Watt was extremely fastidious; and this
-occasioned considerable delay in the execution of the work. His very
-inventiveness to some extent proved a hinderance; for new expedients were
-perpetually occurring to him, which he thought would be improvements, and
-which he, by turns, endeavoured to introduce. Some of these expedients
-he admits proved fruitless, and all of them occasioned delay. Another
-of his chief difficulties was in finding competent workmen to execute
-his plans. He himself had been accustomed only to small metal work, with
-comparatively delicate tools, and had very little experience “in the
-practice of mechanics _in great_,” as he termed it. He was therefore
-under the necessity of depending, in a great measure, upon the handiwork
-of others. But mechanics capable of working out Watt’s designs in metal
-were then with difficulty to be found. The beautiful self-acting tools
-and workmanship which have since been called into being, principally by
-his own invention, did not then exist. The only available hands in Glasgow
-were the blacksmiths and tinners, little capable of constructing articles
-out of their ordinary walks; and even in these they were often found
-clumsy, blundering, and incompetent. The result was, that in consequence
-of the malconstruction of the larger parts, Watt’s first model was only
-partially successful. The experiments made with it, however, served to
-verify the expectations he had formed, and to place the advantages of the
-invention beyond the reach of doubt. On the exhausting-cock being turned,
-the piston, when loaded with 18 lbs., ascended as quick as the blow of
-a hammer; and the moment the steam-cock was opened, it descended with
-like rapidity, though the steam was weak, and the machine snifted at many
-openings.
-
-Satisfied that he had laid hold of the right principle of a working
-steam-engine, Watt felt impelled to follow it to an issue. He could give
-his mind to no other business in peace until this was done. He wrote
-to a friend that he was quite barren on every other subject. “My whole
-thoughts,” said he, “are bent on this machine. I can think of nothing
-else.”[80] He proceeded to make another and bigger, and, he hoped, a
-more satisfactory engine, in the following August; and with that object
-he removed from the old cellar in King-street to a larger apartment in
-the then disused pottery or delftwork near the Broomielaw. There he shut
-himself up with his assistant, John Gardiner, for the purpose of erecting
-his engine. The cylinder was five or six inches in diameter, with a
-two-feet stroke. The inner cylinder was enclosed in a wooden steam-case,
-and placed inverted, the piston working through a hole in the bottom of
-the steam-case. After two months’ continuous application and labour it
-was finished and set to work; but it leaked in all directions, and the
-piston was far from air-tight. The condenser also was in a bad way, and
-needed many alterations. Nevertheless, the engine readily worked with 10½
-lbs. pressure on the inch, and the piston lifted a weight of 14 lbs. The
-improvement of the cylinder and piston continued Watt’s chief difficulty,
-and taxed his ingenuity to the utmost. At so low an ebb was the art of
-making cylinders that the one he used was not bored but hammered, the
-collective mechanical skill of Glasgow being then unequal to the boring of
-a cylinder of the simplest kind; nor, indeed, did the necessary appliances
-for the purpose then exist anywhere else. In the Newcomen engine a little
-water was poured upon the upper surface of the piston, and sufficiently
-filled up the interstices between the piston and the cylinder. But when
-Watt employed steam to drive down the piston, he was deprived of this
-resource, for the water and the steam could not coexist. Even if he had
-retained the agency of the air above, the drip of water from the crevices
-into the lower part of the cylinder would have been incompatible with
-keeping the surface hot and dry, and, by turning into vapour as it fell
-upon the heated metal, it would have impaired the vacuum during the
-descent of the piston.
-
-    [80] “I have now (April, 1765) almost a certainty of the
-      _facturum_ of the fire-engine, having determined the following
-      particulars: The quantity of steam produced; the ultimatum of
-      the lever engine; the quantity of steam destroyed by the cold
-      of its cylinder; the quantity destroyed in mine; and if there
-      be not some devil in the hedge, mine ought to raise water to
-      44 feet with the same quantity of steam that theirs does to
-      32 (supposing my cylinder as thick as theirs), which I think I
-      can demonstrate. I can now make a cylinder 2 feet diameter and
-      3 feet high, only a 40th of an inch thick, and strong enough
-      to resist the atmosphere; _sed tace_. In short, I can think of
-      nothing else but this machine.”--Watt to Dr. Lind, quoted in
-      Muirhead’s ‘Life of Watt,’ 94–5.
-
-While he was occupied with this difficulty, and striving to overcome it
-by the adoption of new expedients, such as leather collars and improved
-workmanship, he wrote to a friend, “My old white-iron man is dead;” the
-old white-iron man, or tinner, being his leading mechanic. Unhappily,
-also, just as he seemed to have got the engine into working order, the
-beam broke, and having great difficulty in replacing the damaged part, the
-accident threatened, together with the loss of his best workman, to bring
-the experiment to an end. But though discouraged by these misadventures,
-he was far from defeated, but went on as before, battling down difficulty
-inch by inch, and holding good the ground he had won, becoming every
-day more strongly convinced that he was in the right track, and that
-the important uses of the invention, could he but find time and means to
-perfect it, were beyond the reach of doubt.
-
-But how to find the means! Watt himself was a comparatively poor
-man; having no money but what he earned by his business of mechanical
-instrument making, which he had for some time been neglecting through his
-devotion to the construction of his engine. What he wanted was capital,
-or the help of a capitalist willing to advance him the necessary funds to
-perfect his invention. To give a fair trial to the new apparatus would
-involve an expenditure of several thousand pounds; and who on the spot
-could be expected to invest so large a sum in trying a machine so entirely
-new, depending for its success on physical principles very imperfectly
-understood?
-
-There was no such help to be found in Glasgow. The tobacco lords, though
-rich, took no interest in steam power, and the manufacturing class, though
-growing in importance, had full employment for their little capital in
-their own concerns.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER VIII.
-
-WATT’S CONNEXION WITH DR. ROEBUCK--WATT ACTS AS SURVEYOR AND ENGINEER.
-
-
-Dr. Black continued to take a lively interest in Watt’s experiments,
-and lent him occasional sums of money from time to time to enable him
-to prosecute them to an issue. But the Doctor’s means were too limited
-to permit him to do more than supply Watt’s more pressing necessities.
-Meanwhile, the debts which the latter had already incurred, small though
-they were in amount, hung like a millstone round his neck. Black then
-bethought him whether it would not be possible to associate Watt with some
-person possessed of sufficient means, and of an active commercial spirit,
-who should join as a partner in the risk, and share in the profits of
-the enterprise. Such a person, he thought, was Dr. Roebuck, the founder
-of the Carron Iron Works, an enterprising man, of undaunted spirit, not
-scared by difficulties, nor a niggard of expense when he saw before him
-any reasonable prospect of advantage.[81]
-
-    [81] For Memoir of Roebuck, see ‘Industrial Biography,’ p. 133.
-
-Roebuck was at that time engaged in sinking for coal on a large scale near
-Boroughstoness, where he experienced considerable difficulty in keeping
-the shafts clear of water. The Newcomen engine, which he had erected, was
-found comparatively useless, and he was ready to embrace any other scheme
-which held out a reasonable prospect of success. Accordingly, when his
-friend Dr. Black informed him of an ingenious young mechanic at Glasgow
-who had invented a steam-engine, capable of working with increased power,
-speed, and economy, Roebuck immediately felt interested, and entered
-into correspondence with Watt on the subject. He was at first somewhat
-sceptical as to the practicability of the new engine, so different in
-its action from that of Newcomen; and he freely stated his doubts to Dr.
-Black. He was under the impression that condensation might in some way
-be effected in the cylinder without injection; and he urged Watt to try
-whether this might not be done. Contrary to his own judgment, Watt tried
-a series of experiments with this object, and at last abandoned them,
-Roebuck himself admitting his error.
-
-Up to this time Watt and Roebuck had not met, though they carried on a
-long correspondence on the subject of the engine. In September, 1765, we
-find Roebuck inviting Watt to come over with Dr. Black to Kinneil (where
-Roebuck lived), and discuss with him the subject of the engine. Watt
-wrote to say that “if his foot allowed him” he would visit Carron on a
-certain day, from which we infer that he intended to walk. But the way
-was long and the road miry, and Watt could not then leave his instrument
-shop, so the visit was postponed. In the mean time Roebuck urged Watt to
-press forward his invention with all speed, “whether he pursued it as a
-philosopher or as a man of business.”
-
-In the month of November following, Watt forwarded to Roebuck the detailed
-drawings of a covered cylinder and piston to be cast at the Carron Works.
-Though the cylinder was the best that could be made there, it was very
-ill-bored, and was eventually laid aside as useless. The piston-rod was
-made at Glasgow, under Watt’s own supervision; and when it was completed
-he was afraid to send it on a common cart, lest the workpeople should see
-it, which would “occasion speculation.” “I believe,” he wrote in July,
-1766, “it would be best to send it in a box.” These precautions would
-seem to have been dictated, in some measure, by fear of piracy; and it is
-obvious that the necessity of acting by stealth increased the difficulty
-of getting the various parts of the proposed engine constructed. Watt’s
-greatest obstacle continued to be the clumsiness and inexpertness of his
-mechanics. “My principal hinderance in erecting engines,” he wrote to
-Roebuck, “is always the smith-work.”
-
-In the mean time it was necessary for Watt to attend to the maintenance
-of his family. He found that the steam-engine experiments brought nothing
-in, while they were a constant source of expense. Besides, they diverted
-him from his retail business, which needed constant attention. It ought
-also to be mentioned that his partner having lately died, the business
-had been somewhat neglected and had consequently fallen off. At length he
-determined to give it up altogether, and begin the business of a surveyor.
-He accordingly removed from the shop in Buchanan’s Land to an office on
-the east side of King-street, a little south of Prince’s-street. It would
-appear that he succeeded in obtaining a fair share of business in his new
-vocation. He already possessed a sufficient knowledge of surveying from
-the study of the instruments which it had been his business to make; and
-application and industry did the rest. His first jobs were in surveying
-lands, defining boundaries, and surveyor’s work of the ordinary sort; from
-which he gradually proceeded to surveys of a more important character.
-
-It affords some indication of the local estimation in which Watt was
-held, that the magistrates of Glasgow should have selected him as a proper
-person to survey a canal for the purpose of opening up a new coal-field
-in the neighbourhood, and connecting it with the city, with a view to a
-cheaper and more abundant supply of fuel. He also surveyed a ditch-canal
-for the purpose of connecting the rivers Forth and Clyde, by what was
-called the Loch Lomond passage; though the scheme of Brindley and Smeaton
-was eventually preferred as the more direct line. Watt came up to London
-in 1767, in connexion with the application to Parliament for powers to
-construct his canal; and he seems to have been very much disgusted with
-the proceedings before “the confounded committee of Parliament,” as he
-called it; adding, “I think I shall not long to have anything to do with
-the House of Commons again. I never saw so many wrong-headed people on
-all sides gathered together.” The fact, however, that they had decided
-against him had probably some share in leading him to form this opinion
-as to the wrong-headedness of the Parliamentary Committee.
-
-Though interrupted by indispensable business of this sort, Watt proceeded
-with the improvement of his steam-engine whenever leisure permitted.
-Roebuck’s confidence in its eventual success was such that in 1767 he
-undertook to pay debts to the amount of 1000_l._ which Watt had incurred
-in prosecuting his project up to that time, and also to provide the means
-of prosecuting further experiments, as well as to secure a patent for
-the engine. In return for this outlay Roebuck was to have two-thirds of
-the property in the invention. Early in 1768 Watt made trial of a new
-and larger model, with a cylinder of seven or eight inches diameter. But
-the result was not very satisfactory. “By an unforeseen misfortune,” he
-wrote Roebuck, “the mercury found its way into the cylinder, and played
-the devil with the solder. This throws us back at least three days, and
-is very vexatious, especially as it happened in spite of the precautions
-I had taken to prevent it.” Roebuck, becoming impatient, urged Watt to
-meet him to talk the matter over; and suggested that as Watt could not
-come as far as Carron, they should meet at Kilsyth, about fifteen miles
-from Glasgow. Watt replied, saying he was too unwell to be able to ride
-so far, and that his health was such that the journey would disable him
-from doing anything for three or four days after. But he went on with
-his experiments, patching up his engine, and endeavouring to get it into
-working condition. After about a month’s labour, he at last succeeded to
-his heart’s content; and he at once communicated the news to his partner,
-intimating his intention of at last paying his long-promised visit to
-Roebuck at Kinneil. “I sincerely wish you joy of this successful result,”
-he said, “and hope it will make some return for the obligations I owe
-you.”
-
-[Illustration: KINNEIL HOUSE.]
-
-Kinneil House, to which Watt hastened to pay his visit of congratulation
-to Dr. Roebuck, is an old-fashioned building, somewhat resembling an old
-French château. It was a former country-seat of the Dukes of Hamilton,
-and is finely situated on the shores of the Frith of Forth. The mansion
-is rich in classical associations, having been inhabited, since Roebuck’s
-time, by Dugald Stewart, who wrote in it his ‘Philosophy of the Human
-Mind.’[82] There he was visited by Wilkie, the painter, when in search
-of subjects for his pictures; and Dugald Stewart found for him, in an
-old farmhouse in the neighbourhood, the cradle-chimney introduced in the
-“Penny Wedding.” But none of these names can stand by the side of that
-of Watt; and the first thought at Kinneil, of every one who is familiar
-with his history, would be of the memorable day when he rode over in
-exultation to wish Dr. Roebuck joy of the success of the steam-engine.
-His note of triumph was, however, premature. He had yet to suffer many
-sickening delays and bitter disappointments; for, though he had contrived
-to get his model executed with fair precision, the skill was still wanting
-to manufacture the parts of their full size with the requisite unity; and
-his present elation was consequently doomed to be succeeded by repeated
-discomfiture.
-
-    [82] When we visited the place many years ago, Miss Stewart’s
-      spinnet still stood in the drawing-room, but there was not a
-      tone left in it. Like many other old houses, Kinneil has the
-      reputation of being haunted. The ghost is that of a “Lady
-      Lilburne,” wife of the Parliamentary General, who is said
-      to have thrown herself out of one of the windows during her
-      husband’s absence.
-
-The model went so well, however, that it was determined at once to take
-out a patent for the engine. The first step was to secure its provisional
-protection, and with that object Watt went to Berwick-upon-Tweed, and made
-a declaration before a Master in Chancery of the nature of the invention.
-In August, 1768, we find him in London on the business of the patent. He
-became utterly wearied with the delays interposed by sluggish officialism,
-and disgusted with the heavy fees which he was required to pay in order
-to protect his invention. He wrote home to his wife at Glasgow in a very
-desponding mood. Knowing her husband’s diffidence and modesty, but having
-the fullest confidence in his genius, she replied, “I beg that you will
-not make yourself uneasy, though things should not succeed to your wish.
-If it [the condensing engine] will not do, _something else will; never
-despair_.” Watt must have felt cheered by these brave words of his noble
-helpmate, and encouraged to go onward cheerfully in hope.
-
-He could not, however, shake off his recurring fits of despondency, and
-on his return to Glasgow, we find him occasionally in very low spirits.
-Though his head was full of his engine, his heart ached with anxiety
-for his family, who could not be maintained on hope, already so often
-deferred. The more sanguine Roebuck was elated with the good working of
-the model, and impatient to bring the invention into practice. He wrote
-Watt in October, 1768, “You are now letting the most active part of your
-life insensibly glide away. A day, a moment, ought not to be lost. And
-you should not suffer your thoughts to be diverted by any other object,
-or even improvement of this, but only the speediest and most effectual
-manner of executing an engine of a proper size, according to your present
-ideas.”
-
-Watt, however, felt that his invention was capable of many improvements,
-and he was never done introducing new expedients. He proceeded, in the
-intervals of leisure which he could spare from his surveying business,
-to complete the details of the drawings and specification,--making
-various trials of pipe-condensers, plate-condensers, and
-drum-condensers,--contriving steam-jackets to prevent the waste of heat
-and new methods for securing greater tightness of the piston,--inventing
-condenser-pumps, oil-pumps, gauge-pumps, exhausting-cylinders,
-loading-valves, double cylinders, beams, and cranks. All these
-contrivances had to be thought out and tested, elaborately and painfully,
-amidst many failures and disappointments; and Dr. Roebuck began to fear
-that the fresh expedients which were always starting up in Watt’s brain,
-would endlessly protract the consummation of the invention. Watt, on
-his part, felt that he could only bring the engine nearer to perfection
-by never resting satisfied with imperfect devices, and hence he left no
-means untried to overcome the many practical defects in it of which he
-was so conscious. Long after, when a noble lord was expressing to him the
-admiration with which he regarded his great achievement, Watt replied:
-“The public only look at my success, and not at the intermediate failures
-and uncouth constructions which have served me as so many steps to climb
-to the top of the ladder.”
-
-As to the lethargy from which Roebuck sought to raise Watt, it was merely
-the temporary reaction of a mind strained and wearied with long-continued
-application to a single subject, and from which it seemed to be
-occasionally on the point of breaking down altogether. To his intimate
-friends, Watt bemoaned his many failures, his low spirits, his bad health,
-and his sleepless nights. He wrote to his friend Dr. Small[83] in January,
-1769, “I have many things I could talk to you about--much contrived, and
-little executed. How much would good health and spirits be worth to me!”
-A month later he wrote, “I am still plagued with headaches, and sometimes
-heart-aches.”
-
-    [83] Dr. Small was born in 1734 at Carmylie, Angus, Scotland, of
-      which parish his father was the minister. He had been for some
-      time the professor of Natural Philosophy in the University of
-      Williamsburg, Virginia, from whence he returned to England and
-      settled at Birmingham.
-
-It is nevertheless a remarkable proof of Watt’s indefatigable perseverance
-in his favourite pursuit, that at this very time, when apparently sunk in
-the depths of gloom, he learnt German for the purpose of getting at the
-contents of a curious book, the _Theatrum Machinarum_ of Leupold, which
-just then fell into his hands, and contained an account of the machines,
-furnaces, methods of working, profits, &c., of the mines in the Upper
-Hartz. His instructor in the language was a Swiss dyer,[84] settled in
-Glasgow. With the like object of gaining access to untranslated books
-in French and Italian--then the great depositories of mechanical and
-engineering knowledge--Watt had already mastered both those languages.
-
-    [84] “I have,” he writes, “just now got a curious book, being
-      an account of all the machines, furnaces, methods of working,
-      profits, &c., of the mines of the Upper Hartz. It is unluckily
-      in German, which I understand little of, but am improving in by
-      the help of a truly Chymical Swiss Dyer, who is come here to dye
-      standing red on linen and cotton, in which he is successful. He
-      is according to the custom of philosophers ennuyé to a great
-      degree, but seems to be more modest than is usual with them;
-      and, what is still more unusual, is attached only to his dyeing,
-      though he has a tolerable knowledge of chymestry. He promises
-      to make me a coat that will not wet though boiled in water. This
-      would be of great use to a hundred people I see just now running
-      by, wet to the skin.... I verily believe the drops are an inch
-      in diameter! To return to the book--it contains an account of
-      all the unsuccessful experiments that have been tried in the
-      Hartz, and I assure you it gives me some consolation to see
-      the great Liebnitz, the rival of Newton, bungling repeatedly,
-      applying wind mills to raise ore while water ran idle past him.
-      There is among other machines the fellow of Blackie’s, only
-      worked by water, and a full and true account of why it did not
-      succeed, which he should read. Their machines in general display
-      great ingenuity though ignorance of principles.”--Watt to Small,
-      May 28, 1769. Boulton MSS.
-
-In preparing his specification, Watt viewed the subject in all its
-bearings. The production of power by steam is a very large one, but Watt
-grasped it thoroughly. The insight with which he searched, analysed,
-arranged, and even provided for future modifications, was the true insight
-of genius. He seems with an almost prophetic eye to have seen all that
-steam was capable of accomplishing. This is well illustrated by his early
-plan of working steam expansively by cutting it off at about half-stroke,
-thereby greatly economising its use;[85] as well as by his proposal to
-employ high-pressure steam where cold water could not be used for purposes
-of condensation.[86] The careful and elaborate manner in which he studied
-the specification, and the consideration which he gave to each of its
-various details, are clear from his correspondence with Dr. Small, which
-is peculiarly interesting, as showing Watt’s mind actively engaged in
-the very process of invention. At length the necessary specification and
-drawings were completed and lodged early in 1769,--a year also remarkable
-as that in which Arkwright took out the patent for his spinning-machine.
-
-
-    [85] “I mentioned to you a method of still doubling the effect of
-      the steam, and that tolerably easy, by using the power of steam
-      rushing into a vacuum, at present lost. This would do a little
-      more than double the effect, but it would too much enlarge the
-      vessels to use it all. It is peculiarly applicable to wheel
-      engines, and may supply the want of a condenser where force
-      of steam is only used; for, open one of the steam valves and
-      admit steam, until one-fourth of the distance between it and the
-      next valve is filled with steam, shut the valve, and the steam
-      will continue to expand and to press round the wheel with a
-      diminishing power, ending in one-fourth of its first exertion.
-      The sum of this series you will find greater than one-half,
-      though only one-fourth steam was used. The power will indeed be
-      unequal, but this can be remedied by a fly, or in several other
-      ways.”--Watt to Small, 28th May, 1769. Boulton MSS.
-
-    [86] He anticipated the use of high-pressure steam, as afterwards
-      employed in the locomotive by Trevithick, in the following
-      passage:--“I intend,” he said, “in many cases to employ the
-      expansive force of steam to press on the piston, or whatever
-      is used instead of one, in the same manner as the weight of the
-      atmosphere is now employed in common fire-engines. In some cases
-      I intend to use both the condenser and this force of steam,
-      so that the powers of these engines will as much exceed those
-      pressed only by the air, as the expansive power of the steam is
-      greater than the weight of the atmosphere. In other cases, when
-      plenty of cold water cannot be had, I intend to work the engines
-      by the force of steam only, and to discharge it into the air by
-      proper outlets after it has done its office.”--Watt to Small,
-      March, 1769. Boulton MSS.
-
-In order to master thoroughly the details of the ordinary Newcomen
-engine, and to ascertain the extent of its capabilities as well as of its
-imperfections, Watt undertook the erection of several engines of this
-construction; and during his residence at Kinneil took charge of the
-Schoolyard engine near Boroughstoness, in order that he might thereby
-acquire a full practical knowledge of its working. Mr. Hart, in his
-interesting ‘Reminiscences of James Watt,’ gives the following account:
-“My late brother had learned from an old man who had been a workman at Dr.
-Roebuck’s coal-works when Mr. Watt was there, that he had erected a small
-engine on a pit they called Taylor’s Pit. The workman could not remember
-what kind of engine it was, but it was the fastest-going one he ever saw.
-From its size, and from its being placed in a small timber-house, the
-colliers called it ‘the Box Bed.’ We thought it likely to have been the
-first of the patent engines made by Mr. Watt, and took the opportunity
-of mentioning this to him at our interview. He said he had erected that
-engine, but he did not wish at the time to venture on a patent one until
-he had a little more experience.”[87]
-
-    [87] Mr. Hart’s “Reminiscences of James Watt,” in ‘Transactions
-      of the Glasgow Archæological Society,’ Part I. 1859.
-
-At length he proceeded to erect the trial engine after his new patent, and
-made arrangements to stay at Kinneil until the work was finished. It had
-been originally intended to erect it in the little town of Boroughstoness;
-but as prying eyes might have there watched his proceedings, and as he
-wished to avoid display, being determined, as he said, “not to puff,”
-he fixed upon an outhouse behind Kinneil, close by the burn-side in the
-glen, where there was abundance of water and secure privacy. The materials
-were brought to the place, partly from Watt’s small works at Glasgow,
-and partly from Carron, where the cylinder--of eighteen inches diameter
-and five feet stroke--had been cast; and a few workmen were placed at his
-disposal.
-
-[Illustration: THE OUTHOUSE BEHIND KINNEIL.]
-
-The process of erection was very tedious, owing to the clumsiness of
-the mechanics employed on the job. Watt was occasionally compelled to be
-absent on other business, and on his return he usually found the men at a
-standstill, not knowing what to do next. As the engine neared completion,
-his “anxiety for his approaching doom” kept him from sleep; for his fears,
-as he said, were at least equal to his hopes. He was easily cast down by
-little obstructions, and especially discouraged by unforeseen expense.
-Roebuck, on the contrary, was hopeful and energetic, and often took
-occasion to rally the other on his despondency under difficulties, and
-his almost painful want of confidence in himself. Roebuck was, doubtless,
-of much service to Watt in encouraging him to proceed with his invention,
-and also in suggesting some important modifications in the construction
-of the engine. It is probable, indeed, that but for his help, Watt could
-not have gone on. Robison says, “I remember Mrs. Roebuck remarking one
-evening, ‘Jamie is a queer lad, and, without the Doctor, his invention
-would have been lost; but Dr. Roebuck won’t let it perish.’”
-
-The new engine, on which Watt had expended so much labour, anxiety, and
-ingenuity, was completed in September, 1759, about six months from the
-date of its commencement. But its success was far from decided. Watt
-himself declared it to be “a clumsy job.” His new arrangement of the
-pipe-condenser did not work well; and the cylinder having been badly cast,
-was found almost useless. One of his greatest difficulties consisted in
-keeping the piston tight. He wrapped it round with cork, oiled rags, tow,
-old hat, paper, horse-dung, and other things, but still there were open
-spaces left, sufficient to let the air in and the steam out. Watt was
-grievously depressed by his want of success, and he had serious thoughts
-of giving up the thing altogether. Before abandoning it, however, the
-engine was again thoroughly overhauled, many improvements were introduced
-in it, and a new trial was made of its powers. But this proved not more
-successful than the earlier ones had been. “You cannot conceive,” he
-wrote to Small, “how mortified I am with this disappointment. It is a
-damned thing for a man to have his all hanging by a single string. If I
-had wherewithal to pay the loss, I don’t think I should so much fear a
-failure; but I cannot bear the thought of other people becoming losers
-by my schemes; and I have the happy disposition of always painting the
-worst.”
-
-Watt was therefore bound to prosecute his project by honour not less than
-by interest; and summoning up his courage, he went on with it anew. He
-continued to have the same confidence as ever in the principles of his
-engine: where it broke down was in workmanship. Could mechanics but be
-found capable of accurately executing its several parts, he believed that
-its success was certain. But there were no such mechanics then at Carron.
-
-By this time Roebuck was becoming embarrassed with debt, and involved in
-various difficulties. The pits were drowned with water, which no existing
-machinery could pump out, and ruin threatened to overtake him before
-Watt’s engine could come to his help. He had sunk in the coal-mine, not
-only his own fortune, but much of the property of his relatives; and
-he was so straitened for money that he was unable to defray the cost of
-taking out the engine patent according to the terms of his engagement, and
-Watt had accordingly to borrow the necessary money from his never-failing
-friend, Dr. Black. He was thus adding to his own debts, without any
-clearer prospect before him of ultimate relief. No wonder that he should,
-after his apparently fruitless labour, express to Small his belief that,
-“of all things in life, there is nothing more foolish than inventing.”
-The unhappy state of his mind may be further inferred from his lamentation
-expressed to the same friend on the 31st of January, 1770. “To-day,” said
-he, “I enter the thirty-fifth year of my life, and I think I have hardly
-yet done thirty-five pence worth of good in the world; but I cannot help
-it.”
-
-Notwithstanding the failure of his engine thus far, and the repeated
-resolution expressed to Small that he would invent no more, leading, as
-inventing did, to only vexation, failure, loss, and increase of headache,
-Watt could not control his irrepressible instinct to invent; and whether
-the result might be profitable or not, his mind went on as before,
-working, scheming, and speculating. Thus, at different times in the course
-of his correspondence with Small, who was a man of a like ingenious turn
-of mind, we find him communicating various new things, “gimcracks,” as he
-termed them, which he had contrived. He was equally ready to contrive a
-cure for smoky chimneys, a canal sluice for economising water, a method
-of determining “the force necessary to dredge up a cubic foot of mud
-under any given depth of water,” and a means of “clearing the observed
-distance of the moon from any given star of the effects of refraction and
-parallax;” illustrating his views by rapid but graphic designs embodied
-in the text of his letters to Small and other correspondents. One of his
-minor inventions was a new method of readily measuring distances by means
-of a telescope.[88] At the same time he was occupied in making experiments
-on kaolin, with the intention of introducing the manufacture of porcelain
-in the pottery work on the Broomielaw, in which he was a partner. He was
-also concerned with Dr. Black and Dr. Roebuck in pursuing experiments with
-the view of decomposing sea-salt by lime, and thereby obtaining alkali
-for purposes of commerce. A patent for the process was taken out by Dr.
-Roebuck, but eventually proved a failure, like most of his other projects.
-We also find Watt inventing a muffling furnace for melting metals, and
-sending the drawings to Mr. Boulton at Birmingham for trial. At other
-times he was occupied with Chaillet, the Swiss dyer, experimenting on
-various chemical substances; corresponding with Dr. Black as to the new
-fluoric or spar acid; and at another time making experiments to ascertain
-the heats at which water boils at every inch of mercury from vacuo to
-air. Later we find him inventing a prismatic micrometer for measuring
-distances, which he described in considerable detail in his letters
-to Small.[89] He was at the same time busy inventing and constructing
-a new surveying quadrant by reflection, and making improvements in
-barometers and hygrometers. “I should like to know,” he wrote to Small,
-“the principles of _your_ barometer: De Luc’s hygrometer is nonsense.
-_Probavi._” Another of his contrivances was his dividing-screw, for
-dividing an inch accurately into 1000 equal parts. He states that he found
-this screw exceedingly useful, as it saved him much needless compass-work,
-and, moreover, enabled him to divide lines into the ordinates of any curve
-whatsoever.
-
-    [88] The telescope was mounted with two parallel horizontal hairs
-      in the focus of the eyeglass, crossed by one perpendicular
-      hair. The measuring pole was divided into feet and inches, so
-      that, wrote Watt, “if the hairs comprehend one foot at one chain
-      distance, they will comprehend ten feet at ten chains,” and so
-      on. This invention Watt made in 1770, and used the telescope
-      in his various surveys. Eight years later, in 1778, the Society
-      of Arts awarded to a Mr. Green a premium for precisely the same
-      invention.
-
-    [89] Letter to Small, 24th Nov. 1772. Watt, however, took no
-      steps to bring this invention before the public, and in 1777,
-      a similar instrument having been invented by Dr. Maskelyne, was
-      presented by him to the Royal Society. Thus Watt also lost the
-      credit of this invention.
-
-Such were the multifarious pursuits in which this indefatigable student
-and inquirer was engaged; all tending to cultivate his mind and advance
-his education, but comparatively unproductive, so far as regarded
-pecuniary return. So unfortunate, indeed, had Watt’s speculations proved,
-that his friend Dr. Hutton, of Edinburgh, addressed to him a New-year’s
-day letter, with the object of dissuading him from proceeding further with
-his unprofitable brain-distressing work. “A happy new year to you!” said
-Hutton; “may it be fertile to you in lucky events, but no new inventions!”
-He went on to say that invention was only for those who live by the
-public, and those who from pride choose to leave a legacy to the public.
-It was not a thing likely to be well paid for under a system where the
-rule was to be the best paid for the work that was easiest done. It was
-of no use, however, telling Watt that he must not invent. One might as
-well have told Burns that he was not to sing because it would not pay,
-or Wilkie that he was not to paint, or Hutton himself that he was not to
-think and speculate as to the hidden operations of nature. To invent was
-the natural and habitual operation of Watt’s intellect, and he could not
-restrain it.
-
-Watt had already been too long occupied with this profitless work: his
-money was all gone; he was in debt; and it behoved him to turn to some
-other employment by which he might provide for the indispensable wants
-of his family. Having now given up the instrument-making business, he
-confined himself almost entirely to surveying. Among his earliest surveys
-was one of a coal canal from Monkland to Glasgow, in 1769; and the Act
-authorising its construction was obtained in the following year. Watt was
-invited to superintend the execution of the works, and he had accordingly
-to elect whether he would go on with the engine experiments, the event
-of which was doubtful, or embrace an honourable and perhaps profitable
-employment, attended with much less risk and uncertainty. His necessities
-decided him. “I had,” he said, “a wife and children, and saw myself
-growing grey without having any settled way of providing for them.” He
-accordingly accepted the appointment offered him by the directors of
-the canal, and undertook to superintend the construction of the works at
-a salary of 200_l._ a year. At the same time he determined not to drop
-the engine, but to proceed with it at such leisure moments as he could
-command.
-
-The Monkland Canal was a small concern, and Watt had to undertake a
-variety of duties. He acted at the same time as surveyor, superintendent,
-engineer, and treasurer, assisted only by a clerk. But the appointment
-proved useful to him. The salary he earned placed his family above want,
-and the out-doors life he was required to lead improved his health and
-spirits. After a few months he wrote Dr. Small that he found himself more
-strong, more resolute, less lazy, and less confused, than when he began
-the occupation. His pecuniary affairs were also more promising. “Supposing
-the engine to stand good for itself,” he said, “I am able to pay all my
-debts and some little thing more, so that I hope in time to be on a par
-with the world.” But there was a dark side to the picture. His occupation
-exposed him to fatigue, vexation, hunger, wet, and cold. Then, the quiet
-and secluded habits of his early life did not fit him for the out-door
-work of the engineer. He was timid and reserved, and had nothing of the
-navvy in his nature. He had neither the roughness of tongue nor stiffness
-of back to enable him to deal with rude labour gangs. He was nervously
-fearful lest his want of practical experience should betray him into
-scrapes, and lead to impositions on the part of his workmen. He hated
-higgling, and declared that he would rather “face a loaded cannon than
-settle an account or make a bargain.” He had been “cheated,” he said, “by
-undertakers, and was unlucky enough to know it.”
-
-Watt continued to act as engineer for the Monkland Canal Company for about
-a year and a half,[90] during which he was employed in other engineering
-works. Among these was a survey of the river Clyde, with a view to the
-improvement of the navigation. Watt sent in his report; but no steps were
-taken to carry out his suggestions until several years later, when the
-beginning was made of a series of improvements, which have resulted in the
-conversion of the Clyde from a pleasant trouting and salmon stream into
-one of the busiest navigable highways in the world.[91]
-
-    [90] The Company afterwards came to grief. The original
-      subscription list was not filled up, and the stagnation in trade
-      which took place at the outbreak of the American war, brought
-      the works to a standstill. In 1782 the concern was sold to the
-      Messrs. Stirling, who eventually became the sole proprietors
-      and finished the undertaking.
-
-    [91] There was then a ford at Dumbuck, a few miles below Glasgow,
-      which prevented boats of more than ten tons burden ascending
-      to the Broomielaw. This was shortly after removed by the Clyde
-      Trust, who have expended 3,564,397_l._ in improvement of the
-      navigation between 1770 and 1863, the revenue collected during
-      the same time in dues having been 2,288,000_l._ Vessels drawing
-      21 feet can now ascend to the Broomielaw; and when the present
-      improvements are completed the depth at high water is expected
-      to be upwards of 24 feet.
-
-Among Watt’s other labours about the same period may be mentioned his
-survey of a canal between Perth and Cupar Angus, through Strathmore; of
-the Crinan Canal, afterwards carried out by Rennie; and other projects in
-the western highlands. The Strathmore Canal survey was conducted at the
-instance of the Commissioners of Forfeited Estates. It was forty miles
-long, through a very rough country. Watt set out to make it in September,
-1770, and was accompanied by snowstorms through almost the entire
-survey. He suffered severely from the cold: the winds swept down from
-the Grampians with fury and chilled him to the bone. The making of this
-survey occupied him forty-three days, and the remuneration he received
-for it was only eighty pounds, which included expenses. The small pay of
-engineers at that time may be further illustrated by the fee paid him in
-the same year for supplying the magistrates of Hamilton with a design for
-the proposed new bridge over the Clyde at that town. It was originally
-intended to employ Mr. Smeaton; but as his charge was ten pounds, which
-was thought too high, Watt was employed in his stead. The Burgh minutes
-record that, after the Act had been obtained in 1770, Baillie Naismith
-was appointed to proceed to Glasgow to see Mr. Watt on the subject of a
-design, and his charge being only 7_l._ 7_s._, he was requested to supply
-it accordingly. “I have lately,” wrote Watt to Small, “made a plan and
-estimate of a bridge over our river Clyde, eight miles above this: it is
-to be of five arches and 220 feet waterway, founded upon piles on a muddy
-bottom.”[92] The bridge, after Watt’s plan, was begun in 1771, but it was
-not finished until 1780.[93]
-
-    [92] Watt to Small, 21st Dec. 1770. Boulton MSS.
-
-    [93] The bridge was partially destroyed by a flood in 1806, when
-      one of the central piers was thrown down. Two of the arches
-      fell, and were rebuilt, but the others stand as originally
-      constructed.
-
-[Illustration: HAMILTON BRIDGE.]
-
-About the same time Watt prepared plans of docks and piers at Port
-Glasgow, and of a new harbour at Ayr. The Port Glasgow works were carried
-out, but those at Ayr were postponed. When Rennie came to examine the
-design for the improvement of the Ayr navigation, of which the new
-harbour formed part, he took objections to it, principally because of
-the parallelism of the piers, and another plan was eventually adopted.
-His principal engineering job, and the last of the kind on which Watt was
-engaged in Scotland, was a survey of the Caledonian Canal, long afterwards
-carried out by Telford. The survey was made in the autumn of 1773, through
-a country without roads. “An incessant rain,” said he, “kept me for three
-days as wet as water could make me; I could hardly preserve my journal
-book.”
-
-In the midst of this dreary work, Watt was summoned to Glasgow by the
-intelligence which reached him of the illness of his wife; and when
-he reached home he found that she had died in childbed.[94] Of all the
-heavy blows he had suffered, this he felt to be the worst. His wife had
-struggled with him through poverty; she had often cheered his fainting
-spirit when borne down by doubt, perplexity, and disappointment; and now
-she was gone, without being able to share in his good fortune as she had
-done in his adversity. For some time after, when about to enter his humble
-dwelling, he would pause on the threshold, unable to summon courage to
-enter the room where he was never more to meet “the comfort of his life.”
-“Yet this misfortune,” he wrote to Small, “might have fallen upon me when
-I had less ability to bear it, and my poor children might have been left
-suppliants to the mercy of the wide world.”
-
-    [94] The child was stillborn. Of four other children who were
-      the fruit of this marriage, two died young. A son and daughter
-      survived; the son, James, succeeded his father, and died
-      unmarried, at Aston Hall, near Birmingham, in 1848. The daughter
-      married Mr. Miller, of Glasgow, whose grandson, the present J.
-      W. Gibson Watt, Esq., succeeded to the Watt property.
-
-Watt tried to forget his sorrow, as was his custom, in increased
-application to work, though the recovery of the elasticity of his mind was
-in a measure beyond the power of his will. There were, at that time, very
-few bright spots in his life. A combination of unfortunate circumstances
-threatened to overwhelm him. No further progress had yet been made with
-his steam-engine, which he almost cursed as the cause of his misfortunes.
-Dr. Roebuck’s embarrassments had reached their climax. He had fought
-against the water which drowned his coal until he could fight no more,
-and he was at last delivered into the hands of his creditors a ruined man.
-“My heart bleeds for him,” said Watt, “but I can do nothing to help him.
-I have stuck by him, indeed, till I have hurt myself.”
-
-But the darkest hour is nearest the dawn. Watt had passed through a long
-night, and a gleam of sunshine at last beamed upon him. Matthew Boulton,
-of Birmingham, was at length persuaded to take up the invention on
-which Watt had expended so many of the best years of his life, and the
-turning-point in Watt’s fortunes had arrived.
-
-[Illustration: PORT GLASGOW.
-
-[By R. P. Leitch.]]
-
-
-
-
-[Illustration: _Mathew Boulton, F.R.S._
-
-_Engraved by W. Hall, after the portrait by Sir W. Beechy, R.A._
-
-_Published by John Murray Albemarle Street. 1865._]
-
-
-BOULTON AND WATT, ENGINEERS, BIRMINGHAM.
-
-
-[Illustration: BIRMINGHAM.
-
-[By Percival Skelton.]]
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER IX.
-
-BIRMINGHAM--MATTHEW BOULTON.
-
-
-From an early period, Birmingham has been one of the principal centres
-of mechanical industry in England. The neighbourhood abounds in coal
-and iron, and has long been famous for the skill of its artisans. Swords
-were forged there in the time of the Ancient Britons. The first guns made
-in England bore the Birmingham mark. In 1538 Leland found “many smiths
-in the town that use to make knives and all manner of cutting tools,
-and many loriners that make bittes, and a great many nailers.” About a
-century later Camden described the place as “full of inhabitants, and
-resounding with hammers and anvils, for the most part of them smiths.”
-As the skill of the Birmingham artisans increased, they gradually gave
-up the commoner kinds of smithery, and devoted themselves to ornamental
-metal-work, in brass, steel, and iron. They became celebrated for their
-manufacture of buckles, buttons, and various fancy articles; and they
-turned out such abundance of toys that towards the close of last century
-Burke characterised Birmingham as “the great toy-shop of Europe.”
-
-The ancient industry of Birmingham was of a staid and steady character,
-in keeping with the age. Each manufacturer kept within the warmth of his
-own forge. He did not go in search of orders, but waited for the orders to
-come to him. Ironmongers brought their money in their saddle-bags, took
-away the goods in exchange, or saw them packed ready for the next waggon
-before they left. Notwithstanding this quiet way of doing business, many
-comfortable fortunes were made in the place; the manufacturers, like their
-buttons, moving off so soon as they had received the stamp and the gilt.
-Hutton, the Birmingham bookseller, says he knew men who left the town in
-chariots who had first approached it on foot. Hutton himself entered the
-town a poor boy, and lived to write its history, and make a fortune by
-his industry.
-
-Until towards the end of last century the town was not very easy of
-approach from any direction. The roads leading to it had become worn by
-the traffic of many generations. The hoofs of the pack-horses, helped
-by the rains, had deepened the tracks in the sandy soil, until in many
-places they were twelve or fourteen feet deep, so that it was said of
-travellers that they approached the town by sap. One of these old hollow
-roads, still called Holloway-head, though now filled up, was so deep that
-a waggon-load of hay might pass along it without being seen. There was
-no direct communication between Birmingham and London until about the
-middle of the century. Before then, the Great Road from London to Chester
-passed it four miles off, and the Birmingham manufacturer, when sending
-wares to London, had to forward his package to Castle Bromwich, there to
-await the approach of the packhorse train or the stage-waggon journeying
-south. The Birmingham men, however, began to wake up, and in 1747 a coach
-was advertised to run to London in two days “if the roads permit.” Twenty
-years later a stage-waggon was put on, and the communication by coach
-became gradually improved.
-
-When Hutton entered Birmingham in 1740, he was struck by the activity of
-the place and the vivacity of the inhabitants, which expressed itself
-in their looks as he passed them in the streets. “I had,” he says,
-“been among dreamers, but now I saw men awake. Their very step showed
-alacrity. Every man seemed to know and to prosecute his own affairs.”
-The Birmingham men were indeed as alert as they looked--steady workers
-and clever mechanics--men who struck hard on the anvil. The artisans of
-the place had the advantage of a long training in mechanical skill. It
-had been bred in their bone, and descended to them from their fathers as
-an inheritance.[95] In no town in England were there then to be found so
-many mechanics capable of executing entirely new work; nor, indeed, has
-the ability yet departed from them, the Birmingham artisans maintaining
-their individual superiority in intelligent execution of skilled work to
-the present day. We are informed that inventors of new machines, foreign
-as well as English, are still in the practice of resorting to them for
-the purpose of getting their inventions embodied in the best forms, with
-greater chances of success than in any other town in England.
-
-    [95] There seems reason to believe that the capacity for
-      skilled industry is to a certain extent transmissible; and
-      that the special aptitude for mechanics which characterises
-      the population of certain districts, is in a great measure
-      the result of centuries of experience, transmitted from one
-      generation to another. Mr. Morell takes the same view: “We
-      have every reason to believe,” he says, “that the power of
-      specialised instincts is transmitted, and when the circumstances
-      favour it, goes on increasing from age to age in intensity,
-      and in a particular adaptation to the purposes demanded. All
-      confirmed habits which become a part of the animal nature, seem
-      to be imparted by hereditary descent; and thus what _seems_ to
-      be an original instinct may, after all, be but the accumulated
-      growth and experience of many generations.”
-
-About the middle of last century the two Boultons, father and son, were
-recognised as among the most enterprising and prosperous of Birmingham
-manufacturers. The father of the elder Matthew Boulton was John Boulton
-of Northamptonshire, in which county Boultons or Boltons have been
-settled for a long period, and where there are records of many clergymen
-of the name. About the end of the seventeenth century, this John Boulton
-settled at Lichfield, where he married Elizabeth, heir of Matthew Dyott of
-Stitchbrooke, by whom he obtained considerable property. His means must,
-however, have become reduced; in consequence of which his son Matthew was
-sent to Birmingham to enter upon a career of business, and make his own
-way in the world. He became established in the place as a silver stamper
-and piecer, to which he added other branches of manufacture, which his
-son Matthew afterwards largely extended.
-
-Matthew Boulton the younger was born at Birmingham on the 3rd September,
-1728. Little is known of his early life, beyond that he was a bright,
-clever boy, and a general favourite with his companions. He received his
-principal education at a private academy at Deritend, kept by the Rev. Mr.
-Ansted, under whom he acquired the rudiments of a good ordinary English
-education. Though he left school early for the purpose of following his
-father’s business, he nevertheless continued the work of self-instruction,
-and afterwards acquired considerable knowledge of Latin and French,
-as well as of drawing and mathematics. But his chief pleasure was in
-pursuing the study of chemistry and mechanics, in which, as we shall
-shortly find, he became thoroughly accomplished. Long after he joined his
-father in business, he delighted to revert to his classical favourites.
-From an entry in his private memorandum-book of expenses at the age of
-about thirty, though then very economical in other respects, we find him
-expending considerable sums in experiments on electricity, and on one
-occasion laying out a guinea on a copy of Virgil, from which it appears
-that trade had not spoilt his taste for either science or letters.
-
-Young Boulton appears to have engaged in business with much spirit. By the
-time he was seventeen he had introduced several important improvements in
-the manufacture of buttons, watch-chains, and other trinkets; and he had
-invented the inlaid steel buckles which shortly after became the fashion.
-These buckles were exported in large quantities to France, from whence
-they were brought back to England and sold as the most recent productions
-of French ingenuity. The elder Boulton, having every confidence in his
-son’s discretion and judgment, adopted him as a partner so soon as he came
-of age, and from that time forward he took almost the entire management of
-the concern. Although in his letters he signed “for father and self,” he
-always spoke in the first person of matters connected with the business.
-Thus, in 1757, we find him writing to Timothy Holles, London, as to the
-prices of “coat-link and vest buttons,” intimating that to lower them
-would be to beat down price and quality until it became no business at
-all; “yet,” said he, “as I have put myself to greater expense than anybody
-else in erecting the best conveniences and the completest tools for the
-purpose, I am not willing that any interlopers should run away with it.”
-We find him at the same time carrying on a correspondence with Benjamin
-Huntsman, of Sheffield, the celebrated inventor of cast-steel.[96] On
-the 19th January, 1757, he sends Huntsman “a parcel of goods of the
-newest patterns,” and at the same time orders a quantity of Huntsman’s
-steel. “When thou hast some of a proper size and quality for me, and an
-opportunity of sending it, thou may’st, but I should be glad to have it
-a little tougher than the last.” He concludes--“I hope thy Philosophic
-Spirit still laboureth within thee, and may it soon bring forth Fruit
-useful to mankind, but more particularly to thyself, is the sincere wish
-of Thy Obliged Friend.” With a view to economy, Boulton in course of time
-erected a steel-house of his own for the purpose of making steel; and he
-frequently used it to convert the cuttings and scraps of the small iron
-wares which he manufactured, into ordinary steel, afterwards melting and
-converting it into cast-steel in the usual way.
-
-    [96] For Memoir of Huntsman, see ‘Industrial Biography,’ 102–110.
-
-From the earliest glimpses we can get of Boulton as a man of business, it
-would appear to have been his aim to be at the top of whatsoever branch
-of manufacture he undertook. He endeavoured to produce the best possible
-articles in regard of design, material, and workmanship. Taste was then
-at a low ebb, and “Brummagem” had become a byword for everything that was
-gaudy, vulgar, and meretricious. Boulton endeavoured to get rid of this
-reproach, and aimed at raising the standard of taste in manufacture to the
-highest point. With this object, he employed the best artists to design
-his articles, and the cleverest artisans to manufacture them. Apart from
-the question of elevating the popular taste, there can be no doubt that
-this was good policy on his part, for it served to direct public attention
-to the superior and honest quality of the articles produced by his firm,
-and eventually brought him a large accession of business.
-
-In 1759, Boulton’s father died, bequeathing to him the considerable
-property which he had accumulated by his business. The year following,
-when thirty-two years of age, Matthew married Anne, the daughter of Luke
-Robinson, Esq., of Lichfield. The lady was a distant relation of his own;
-the Dyotts of Stitchbrooke, whose heir his grandfather had married, being
-nearly related to the Babingtons of Curborough, from whom Miss Robinson
-was lineally descended--Luke Robinson having married the daughter and
-co-heir of John Babington of Curborough and Patkington. Considerable
-opposition was offered to the marriage by the lady’s friends, on account
-of Matthew Boulton’s occupation; but he pressed his suit, and with good
-looks and a handsome presence to back him, he eventually succeeded
-in winning the heart and hand of Anne Robinson. He was now, indeed,
-in a position to have retired from business altogether. But a life of
-inactivity had no charms for him. He liked to mix with men in the affairs
-of active life, and to take his full share in the world’s business.
-Indeed, he hated ease and idleness, and found his greatest pleasure in
-constant occupation.
-
-Instead, therefore, of retiring from trade, he determined to engage in it
-more extensively. He entertained the ambition of founding a manufactory
-that should be the first of its kind, and serve as a model for the
-manufacturers of his neighbourhood. His premises on Snow-hill,[97]
-Birmingham, having become too small for his purpose, he looked about
-him for a suitable spot on which to erect more commodious workshops;
-and he was shortly attracted by the facilities presented by the property
-afterwards so extensively known as the famous Soho.
-
-    [97] While on Snow-hill, Mr. Boulton’s business was principally
-      confined to the making of buttons, shoe-buckles, articles in
-      steel, and various kinds of trinkets. His designation was that
-      of “toymaker,” as is shown by the following document copied
-      from the original:--“Received of Matthew Boulton, toymaker,
-      Snow-hill, three shillings and sixpence, for which sum I
-      solemnly engage, if he should be chosen by lot to serve in
-      the militia for this parish, at the first meeting for that
-      purpose, to procure a substitute that shall be approved of.
-      Birmingham, January 11, 1762, Henry Brookes, Sergt.” The
-      Birmingham toymaker was, however, often a man doing a large
-      business, producing articles of utility as well as ornament.
-      Mr. Osler, the Birmingham manufacturer of glass beads and other
-      toys, when examined before a Committee of the House of Commons
-      many years since, astonished the members by informing them that
-      trifling though dolls’ eyes might appear to be as an article of
-      manufacture, he had once obtained an order for 500_l._ worth of
-      the article. “Eighteen years ago,” said he, “on my first going
-      to London, a respectable-looking man in the city asked me if I
-      could supply him with dolls’ eyes; and I was foolish enough to
-      feel half offended; I thought it derogatory to my dignity as a
-      manufacturer to make dolls’ eyes. He took me into a room quite
-      as wide, and perhaps twice the length of this, and we had just
-      room to walk between the stacks, from the floor to the ceiling,
-      of parts of dolls. He said, ‘These are only the legs and the
-      arms; the trunks are below.’ But I saw enough to convince
-      me, that he wanted a great many eyes.... He ordered various
-      quantities, and of various sizes and qualities. On returning
-      to the Tavistock Hotel, I found that the order amounted to
-      upwards of 500_l._... Calculating on every child in this country
-      not using a doll till two years old, and throwing it aside at
-      seven, and having a new one annually, I satisfied myself that
-      the eyes alone would produce a circulation of a great many
-      thousand pounds. I mention this merely to show the importance
-      of trifles.”--Babbage, ‘Economy of Machinery and Manufactures,’
-      243–5.
-
-Soho is about two miles north of Birmingham, on the Wolverhampton road.
-It is not in the parish of Birmingham, nor in the county of Warwick, but
-just over the border, in the county of Stafford. Down to the middle of
-last century the ground on which it stands was a barren heath, used only
-as a rabbit-warren. The sole dwelling on it was the warrener’s hut, which
-stood near the summit of the hill, on the spot afterwards occupied by
-Soho House; and the warrener’s well is still to be found in one of the
-cellars of the mansion. In 1756, Mr. Edward Ruston took a lease of the
-ground for ninety-nine years from Mr. Wyerley, the lord of the manor,
-with liberty to make a cut about half a mile in length for the purpose
-of turning the waters of Hockley Brook into a pool under the brow of the
-hill. The head of water thus formed was used to drive a feeble mill below,
-which Mr. Ruston had established for laminating metals. He also built
-a small dwelling-house about 150 yards from the mill, and expended upon
-the place a sum of about 1000_l._ in all. When Mr. Boulton was satisfied
-that the place would suit his purpose, he entered into arrangements with
-Mr. Ruston for the purchase of his lease,[98] on the completion of which
-he proceeded to rebuild the mill on a large scale, and in course of time
-removed thither the whole of his tools, machinery, and workmen. The new
-manufactory, when finished, consisted of a series of roomy workshops
-conveniently connected with each other, and capable of accommodating
-upwards of a thousand workmen. The building and stocking of the premises
-cost upwards of 20,000_l._
-
-    [98] Mr. Boulton afterwards purchased the fee simple of the
-      property, together with much of the adjoining land. The nature
-      of his tenure caused him to take a lively interest in the
-      question of common lands enclosure, and at a much later period
-      (17th April, 1790) we find him writing to the Right Hon. Lord
-      Hawkesbury as follows:--“The argument of robbing the poor [by
-      enclosures of wastes] is fallacious. They have no legal title
-      to the common land; and the more of it that is cultivated, the
-      more work and the more bread there will be for them. I speak
-      from experience; for I founded my manufactory upon one of the
-      most barren commons in England, where there existed but a few
-      miserable huts filled with idle beggarly people, who by the
-      help of the common land and a little thieving made shift to
-      live without working. The scene is now entirely changed. I have
-      employed a thousand men, women, and children, in my aforesaid
-      manufactory for nearly thirty years past. The Lord of the Manor
-      hath exterminated these very poor cottages, and hundreds of
-      clean comfortable cheerful houses are found erected in their
-      place. Thus the inhabitants of the parish have been trebled
-      without at all increasing the poor levies. I am more confirmed
-      in this view when I turn my eyes to a neighbouring parish
-      (Sutton Colefield), where there are 10,000 acres of common land
-      uncultivated, and yet the poor rates are very high. Let this
-      land be divided, enclosed, cultivated, and rendered saleable to
-      active, industrious, and spirited men; and the poor will then
-      have plenty of work, and the next generation of them will be
-      fully reconciled to earning their bread instead of begging for
-      it.”--Boulton MSS.
-
-[Illustration: SOHO MANUFACTORY.]
-
-Before removing to Soho, Mr. Boulton took into partnership Mr. John
-Fothergill, with the object of more vigorously extending his business
-operations. Mr. Fothergill possessed a very limited capital, but he was a
-man of good character and active habits of business, with a considerable
-knowledge of foreign markets. On the occasion of his entering the concern,
-stock was taken of the warehouse on Snow Hill; and some idea of the extent
-of Boulton’s business at the time may be formed from the fact, that his
-manager, Mr. Zaccheus Walker, assisted by Farquharson, Nuttall, Frogatt,
-and half-a-dozen labourers, were occupied during eight days in weighing
-metals, counting goods, and preparing an inventory of the effects and
-stock in trade. The partnership commenced at midsummer, 1762, and shortly
-after the principal manufactory was removed to Soho.
-
-Steps were immediately taken to open up new connexions and agencies at
-home and abroad; and a large business was shortly established with many
-of the principal towns and cities of Europe, in filagree and inlaid work,
-livery and other buttons, buckles, clasps, watch-chains, and various
-kinds of ornamental metal wares. The firm shortly added the manufacture
-of silver plate and plated goods to their other branches,[99] and turned
-out large quantities of candlesticks, urns, brackets, and various articles
-in ormolu. The books of the firm indicate the costly nature of their
-productions, 500 ounces of silver being given out at a time, besides
-considerable quantities of gold and platina for purposes of fabrication.
-Boulton himself attended to the organization and management of the works
-and to the extension of the trade at home, while Fothergill devoted
-himself to establishing and superintending the foreign agencies.
-
-    [99] Mr. Keir, in a MS. memoir of Mr. Boulton now before us,
-      says he was the first to introduce the silver plate business at
-      Birmingham, and to make complete services in solid silver. But
-      the business was not profitable, in consequence of the great
-      value of the material, the loss of interest upon which was not
-      compensated by the additional price put upon it for workmanship.
-      One good consequence of the silver plate business, however,
-      was the establishment of an assay office in Birmingham, the
-      necessary Act for which was obtained at Mr. Boulton’s expense,
-      and proved of much advantage to the town.
-
-From the first, Boulton aimed at establishing a character for the
-excellence of his productions. They must not only be honest in
-workmanship, but tasteful in design. He determined, so far as in him
-lay, to get rid of the “Brummagem” reproach. Thus we find him writing to
-his partner from London:--“The prejudice that Birmingham hath so justly
-established against itself makes every fault conspicuous in all articles
-that have the least pretensions to taste. How can I expect the public to
-countenance rubbish from Soho, while they can procure sound and perfect
-work from any other quarter?”
-
-He frequently went to town for the express purpose of reading and making
-drawings of rare works in metal in the British Museum, sending the
-results down to Soho. When rare objects of art were offered for sale, he
-endeavoured to secure them. “I bid five guineas,” he wrote his partner on
-one occasion, “for the Duke of Marlborough’s great blue vase, but it sold
-for ten.... I bought two bronzed figures, which are sent herewith.” He
-borrowed antique candlesticks, vases, and articles in metal from the Queen
-and from various members of the nobility. “I wish Mr. Eginton,” he wrote,
-“would take good casts from the Hercules and the Hydra, and then let it
-be well gilt and returned with the seven vases; for ’tis the Queen’s. I
-perceive we shall want many such figures, and therefore we should omit
-no opportunity of taking good casts.” The Duke of Northumberland lent
-Boulton many of his most highly-prized articles for imitation by his
-workmen. Among his other liberal helpers in the same way, we find the Duke
-of Richmond, Lord Shelburne, and the Earl of Dartmouth. The Duke gave
-him an introduction to Horace Walpole, for the purpose of enabling him
-to visit and examine the art treasures of Strawberry Hill. “The vases,”
-said he, in writing to Boulton, “are, in my opinion, better worth your
-seeing than anything in England, and I wish you would have exact drawings
-of them taken, as I may very possibly like to have them copied by you.”
-Lord Shelburne’s opinion of Boulton may be gathered from his letter to
-Mr. Adams, the architect, in which he said:--“Mr. Boulton is the most
-enterprising man in different ways in Birmingham, and is very desirous
-of cultivating Mr. Adams’s taste in his productions, and has bought his
-Dioclesian by Lord Shelburne’s advice.”
-
-Boulton, however, did not confine himself to England; he searched
-the Continent over for the best specimens of handicraft as models for
-imitation; and when he found them he strove to equal, if not to excel them
-in style and quality. He sent his agent, Mr. Wendler, on a special mission
-of this sort, to Venice, Rome, and other Italian cities, to purchase
-for him the best specimens of metal-work, and obtain for him designs of
-various ornaments--vases, cameos, intaglios, and statuary. On one occasion
-we find Wendler sending him 456 prints, Boulton acknowledging that they
-will prove exceedingly useful for the purposes of his manufacture. At the
-same time, Fothergill was travelling through France and Germany with a
-like object, while he was also establishing new connexions with a view to
-extended trade.[100]
-
-    [100] “If, in the course of your future travelling,” he wrote
-      Mr. Wendler (July, 1767), “you can pick up for me any metallic
-      ores or fossil substances, or any other curious natural
-      productions, I should be much obliged to you, as I am fond of
-      all those things that have a tendency to improve my knowledge in
-      mechanical arts, in which my manufactory will every year become
-      more and more general, and therefore wish to know the taste, the
-      fashions, the toys, both useful and ornamental, the implements,
-      vessels, &c., that prevail in all the different parts of Europe,
-      as I should be glad to work for all Europe in all things that
-      they may have occasion for--gold, silver, copper, plated, gilt,
-      pinchbeck, steel, platina, tortoiseshell, or anything else that
-      may become an article of general demand. I have lately begun to
-      make snuff-boxes, instrument-cases, tooth-picks, &c., in metal,
-      gilt, and in tortoiseshell inlaid, likewise gilt and pinchbeck
-      watch-chains. We are now being completely fixed at Soho, and
-      when Mr. Fothergill returns (which will not be for six months),
-      I shall then have more time to attend to improvements than I
-      have at present.”--Boulton MSS.
-
-While Boulton was ambitious of reaching the highest excellence in his own
-line of business, he did not confine himself to that, but was feeling his
-way in various directions outside of it. Thus to his friend Wedgwood he
-wrote on one occasion, that he admired his vases so much that he “almost
-wished to be a potter.” At one time, indeed, he had serious thoughts of
-beginning the fictile manufacture; but he rested satisfied with mounting
-in metal the vases which Wedgwood made. “The mounting of vases,” he wrote,
-“is a large field for fancy, in which I shall indulge, as I perceive it
-possible to convert even a very ugly vessel into a beautiful vase.”[101]
-
-
-    [101] Boulton to Wedgwood, January, 1769.--Wedgwood was one of
-      his most intimate friends; the two alike aiming at excellence in
-      their respective branches of production. Their kindred efforts
-      seem to have excited the ire of some satirist, whose effusion
-      against them in the ‘Public Ledger’ is thus referred to in the
-      postscript of a letter from Wedgwood to Boulton, dated 19th
-      February, 1771:--“If you take in the ‘Public Ledger’ you’ll see
-      that Mr. Antipuffado has done me the honour to rank me with the
-      most _stupendous geniuses_ of the age, and has really _cut me
-      up very cleanly_. He talks, too, that he should not wonder if
-      some surprising genius at Birmingham should be tempted to make
-      _Roman medals_ and _tenpenny nails_, or _Corinthian knives_ and
-      _daggers_, and style himself Roman medal and Etruscan tenpenny
-      nail-maker to the Empress of Abyssinia. But see the paper: I
-      believe it is the first week in February, and is one of the
-      better sort of this class.”--Boulton MSS.
-
-Another branch of business that he sought to establish was the manufacture
-of clocks. It was one of his leading ideas, that articles in common
-use might be made much better and cheaper if manufactured on a large
-scale with the help of the best machinery; and he thought this might be
-successfully done in the making of clocks and timepieces. The necessary
-machinery was erected accordingly, and the new branch of business was
-started. Some of the timepieces were of an entirely novel arrangement.
-One of them, invented by Dr. Small, contained but a single wheel, and was
-considered a piece of very ingenious construction. Boulton also sought
-to rival the French makers of ornamental timepieces, by whom the English
-markets were then almost entirely supplied; and some of the articles of
-this sort turned out by him were of great beauty. One of his most ardent
-encouragers and admirers, the Hon. Mrs. Montagu, wrote to him,--“I take
-greater pleasure in our victories over the French in the contention of
-arts than of arms. The achievements of Soho, instead of making widows
-and orphans, make marriages and christenings. Your noble industry, while
-elevating the public taste, provides new occupations for the poor, and
-enables them to bring up their families in comfort. Go on, then, sir,
-to triumph over the French in taste, and to embellish your country with
-useful inventions and elegant productions.”
-
-Boulton’s efforts to improve the industrial arts did not, however, always
-meet with such glowing eulogy as this. Two of his most highly finished
-astronomical clocks could not find purchasers at his London sale; on
-which he wrote to his wife at Soho, “I find philosophy at a very low ebb
-in London, and I have therefore brought back my two fine clocks, which I
-will send to a market where common sense is not out of fashion. If I had
-made the clocks play jigs upon bells, and a dancing bear keeping time, or
-if I had made a horse-race upon their faces, I believe they would have
-had better bidders. I shall therefore bring them back to Soho, and some
-time this summer will send them to the Empress of Russia, who, I believe,
-would be glad of them.”[102] During the same visit to London, he was more
-successful with the king and queen, who warmly patronised his productions.
-“The king,” he wrote to his wife, “hath bought a pair of cassolets, a
-Titus, a Venus clock, and some other things, and inquired this morning how
-yesterday’s sale went. I shall see him again, I believe. I was with them,
-the queen and all the children, between two and three hours. There were,
-likewise, many of the nobility present. Never was man so much complimented
-as I have been; but I find that compliments don’t make fat nor fill the
-pocket. The queen showed me her last child, which is a beauty, but none
-of ’em are equal to the General of Soho or the fair Maid of the Mill.[103]
-God bless them both, and kiss them for me.”
-
-    [102] The clocks, with several other articles, were sent out to
-      Russia, and submitted to the Empress through the kindness of
-      Earl Cathcart. His lordship, in communicating the result to
-      Mr. Boulton, said--“I have the pleasure to inform you that her
-      Imperial Majesty not only bought them all, last week, but did
-      me the honour to tell me that she was extremely pleased with
-      them, and thought them superior in every respect to the French,
-      as well as cheaper, which entitled them in all lights to a
-      preference.”
-
-In another letter he described a subsequent visit to the palace. “I am to
-wait upon their majesties again so soon as our Tripod Tea-kitchen arrives,
-and again upon some other business. The queen, I think, is much improved
-in her person, and she now speaks English like an English lady. She
-draws very finely, is a great musician, and works with her needle better
-than Mrs. Betty. However, without joke, she is extremely sensible, very
-affable, and a great patroness of English manufactures. Of this she gave
-me a particular instance; for, after the king and she had talked to me for
-nearly three hours, they withdrew, and then the queen sent for me into
-her boudoir, showed me her chimneypiece, and asked me how many vases it
-would take to furnish it; ‘for,’ said she, ‘all that china shall be taken
-away.’ She also desired that I would fetch her the two finest steel chains
-I could make. All this she did of her own accord, without the presence of
-the king, which I could not help putting a kind construction upon.”[104]
-
-    [103] Pet names of his two children, Matthew Robinson and Anne
-      Boulton.
-
-    [104] These letters are without date, but we infer that they were
-      written in the summer of 1767.
-
-Thus stimulated by royal and noble patronage, Boulton exerted himself
-to the utmost to produce articles of the highest excellence. Like his
-friend Wedgwood, he employed Flaxman and other London artists to design
-his choicer goods; but he had many foreign designers and skilled workmen,
-French and Italian, in his regular employment. He attracted these men
-by liberal wages, and kept them attached to him by kind and generous
-treatment. On one occasion we find the Duke of Richmond applying to him to
-recommend a first-class artist to execute some special work in metal for
-him. Boulton replies that he can strongly recommend one of his own men,
-an honest, steady workman, an excellent metal turner. “He hath made for
-me some exceeding good achromatic telescopes [another branch of Boulton’s
-business].... I give him two guineas a week and a house to live in. He is
-a Frenchman, and formerly worked with the famous M. Germain; he afterwards
-worked for the Academy of Sciences at Berlin, and he hath worked upwards
-of two years for me.”[105]
-
-Before many years had passed, Soho was spoken of with pride, as one
-of the best schools of skilled industry in England. Its fame extended
-abroad as well as at home, and when distinguished foreigners came into
-England, they usually visited Soho as one of the national sights. When
-the manufactory was complete[106] and in full work, Boulton removed from
-his house on Snow-hill to the mansion of Soho, which he had by this time
-considerably enlarged and improved. There he continued to live until the
-close of his life, maintaining a splendid hospitality. Men of all nations,
-and of all classes and opinions, were received there by turns,--princes,
-philosophers, artists, authors, merchants, and poets. In August, 1767,
-while executing the two chains for the queen, we find him writing to
-his London agent as his excuse for a day’s delay in forwarding it: “I
-had lords and ladies to wait on yesterday; I have French and Spaniards
-to-day; and to-morrow I shall have Germans, Russians, and Norwegians.”
-For many years the visitors at Soho House were so numerous and arrived in
-such constant succession, that it more resembled an hotel than a private
-mansion.
-
-    [105] Boulton to the Duke of Richmond, April 8, 1770. The Duke
-      was engaged at the time in preparing a set of machines for
-      making the various experiments in Natural Philosophy described
-      in S’Gravande’s book. The Duke was himself a good turner and
-      worker in metal.
-
-    [106] The manufactory was complete so far as regarded the hardware
-      manufacture. But additions were constantly being made to it;
-      and, as other branches of industry were added, it became more
-      than doubled in extent and accommodation.
-
-[Illustration: SOHO HOUSE.]
-
-The rapid extension of the Soho business necessarily led to the increase
-of the capital invested in it. Boulton had to find large sums of money
-for increased stock, plant, and credits. He raised 3000_l._ on his wife’s
-estate; he borrowed 5000_l._ from his friend Baumgarten; and he sold
-considerable portions of the property left him by his father, by which
-means he was enabled considerably to extend his operations. There were
-envious busybodies about who circulated rumours to his discredit, and
-set the report on foot, that to carry on a business on so large a scale
-would require a capital of 80,000_l._ “Their evil speaking,” said he to
-a correspondent, “will avail but little, as our house is founded on so
-firm a rock that envy and malice will not be able to shake it; and I am
-determined to spare neither pains nor money to establish such a house
-as will acquire both honour and wealth.” The rapid strides he was making
-may be inferred from the statement made to the same correspondent, which
-showed that the gross returns of the firm, which were 7000_l._ in 1763,
-had advanced to 30,000_l._ in 1767, with orders still upon the increase.
-
-
-Though he had a keen eye for business, Boulton regarded character
-more than profit. He would have no connexion with any transaction of a
-discreditable kind. Orders were sent to him from France for base money,
-but he spurned them with indignation. “I will do anything,” he wrote to
-M. Motteaux, his Paris agent, “short of being common informer against
-particular persons, to stop the malpractices of the Birmingham coiners.”
-He declared he was as ready to do business on reasonable terms as any
-other person, but he would not undersell; “for,” said he, “to run down
-prices would be to run down quality, which could only have the effect of
-undermining confidence, and eventually ruining trade.” His principles
-were equally honourable as regarded the workmen of rival employers. “I
-have had many offers and opportunities,” he said to one, “of taking your
-people, whom I could, with convenience to myself, have employed; but it is
-a practice I abhor. Nevertheless, whatever game we play at, I shall always
-avail myself of the rules with which ’tis played, or I know I shall make
-but a very indifferent figure in it.”[107]
-
-He was frequently asked to take gentlemen apprentices into his works, but
-declined to receive them, though hundreds of pounds’ premium were in many
-cases offered with them. He preferred employing the humbler class of boys,
-whom he could train up as skilled workmen. He was also induced to prefer
-the latter for another reason, of a still more creditable kind. “I have,”
-said he, in answer to a gentleman applicant, “built and furnished a house
-for the reception of one kind of apprentices--fatherless children, parish
-apprentices, and hospital boys; and gentlemen’s sons would probably find
-themselves out of place in such companionship.”
-
-    [107] Boulton to John Taylor, 23rd January, 1769. Boulton MSS.
-
-While occupied with his own affairs, and in conducting what he described
-as “the largest hardware manufactory in the world,” Boulton found time to
-take an active part in promoting the measures then on foot for opening up
-the internal navigation of the country. He was a large subscriber to the
-Grand Trunk and Birmingham Canal schemes, the latter of which was of the
-greater importance to him personally, as it passed close by Soho, and thus
-placed his works in direct communication both with London and the northern
-coal and manufacturing districts.[108]
-
-    [108] When the canal came to be constructed at the point at which
-      it passed Soho, it occasioned him great anxiety through the
-      leakage of the canal banks and loss of water for the purposes
-      of his manufactory. The supply, especially in dry summers,
-      was already too limited; but the canal threatened to destroy
-      it altogether. Writing to Mr. Thomas Gilbert, M.P., on the
-      subject in February, 1769, he said, “The very holes which Mr.
-      Smeaton hath dug to try the ground, drink up the water nearly
-      as fast as you can pour it in.... Let Smeaton or Brindley, or
-      all the engineers upon earth give what evidence they will before
-      Parliament, I am convinced by last summer’s experience that if
-      the proprietors of the canal continue to take the two streams
-      on which my mill depends, it is ruined. I might as well have
-      built it upon the summit of the hill.” After the act had passed
-      he wrote his friend Garbett, “I have seen the testimony of the
-      two engineers, Smeaton and Yeoman, but I value the opinions
-      of neither of them, nor of Brindley nor Simcox (in this case),
-      nor of the whole tribe of jobbing ditchers, who are retained as
-      evidence on any side which first applies for them.” His alarms,
-      however, proved unfounded, as the leakage of the canal was
-      eventually remedied; and in November, 1772, we find him writing
-      to the Earl of Warwick, “Our navigation goes on prosperously;
-      the junction with the Wolverhampton Canal is complete; and we
-      already sail from Birmingham to Bristol and to Hull.”--Boulton
-      MSS.
-
-Coming down to a few years later, in 1770, we find his business still
-growing, and his works and plant absorbing still more capital, principally
-obtained by borrowing. In a letter to Mr. Adams, the celebrated architect,
-requesting him to prepare the design of a new sale-room in London, he
-described the manufactory at Soho as in full progress, from 700 to 800
-persons being employed as metallic artists and workers in tortoiseshell,
-stones, glass, and enamel. “I have almost every machine,” said he, “that
-is applicable to those arts; I have two water-mills employed in rolling,
-polishing, grinding, and turning various sorts of lathes. I have trained
-up many, and am training up more plain country lads into good workmen;
-and wherever I find indications of skill and ability, I encourage them.
-I have likewise established correspondence with almost every mercantile
-town in Europe, and am thus regularly supplied with orders for the grosser
-articles in common demand, by which I am enabled to employ such a number
-of hands as to provide me with an ample choice of artists for the finer
-branches of work; and I am thereby encouraged to erect and employ a more
-extensive apparatus than it would be prudent to provide for the production
-of the finer articles only.”
-
-It is indeed probable--though Boulton was slow to admit it--that he
-had been extending his business more rapidly than his capital would
-conveniently allow; for we find him becoming more and more pressed for
-means to meet the interest on the borrowed money invested in buildings,
-tools, and machinery. He had obtained 10,000_l._ from a Mr. Tonson of
-London; and on the death of that gentleman, in 1772, he had considerable
-difficulty in raising the means to pay off the debt. His embarrassment
-was increased by a serious commercial panic, aggravated by the failure
-of Fordyce brothers, by which a considerable sum deposited with them
-remained locked up for some time, and he was eventually a loser to the
-extent of 2000_l._ Other failures and losses followed; and trade came
-almost to a standstill. Yet he bravely held on. “We have a thousand mouths
-at Soho to feed,” he says; “and it has taken so much labour and pains to
-get so valuable and well-organised a staff of workmen together, that the
-operations of the manufactory must be carried on at whatever risk.” He
-continued to receive distinguished visitors at his works. “Last week,” he
-wrote Mr. Ebbenhouse, “we had Prince Poniatowski, nephew of the King of
-Poland, and the French, Danish, Sardinian, and Dutch Ambassadors; this
-week we have had Count Orloff, one of the five celebrated brothers who
-are such favourites with the Empress of Russia; and only yesterday I had
-the Viceroy of Ireland, who dined with me. Scarcely, a day passes without
-a visit from some distinguished personage.”
-
-Besides carrying on the extensive business connected with his manufactory
-at Soho, this indefatigable man found time to prosecute the study of
-several important branches of practical science. It was scarcely to be
-supposed that he had much leisure at his disposal; but in life it often
-happens that the busiest men contrive to find the most leisure; and he
-who is “up to the ears” in work, can, nevertheless, snatch occasional
-intervals to devote to inquiries in which his heart is engaged. Hence we
-find Boulton ranging at intervals over a wide field of inquiry; at one
-time studying geology, and collecting fossils, minerals, and specimens
-for his museum; at another, reading and experimenting on fixed air; and at
-another studying Newton’s works with the object of increasing the force of
-projectiles.[109] But the subject which perhaps more than all interested
-him was the improvement of the Steam Engine, which shortly after led to
-his introduction to James Watt.
-
-    [109] Among Boulton’s scientific memoranda, we find some curious
-      speculations, bearing the date of 1765, relative to improvements
-      which he was trying to work out in gunnery. He proposed the
-      truer boring of the guns, the use of a telescopic sight, and a
-      cylindrical shot with its end of a parabolic form as presenting
-      in his opinion the least resistance to the air.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER X.
-
-BOULTON AND THE STEAM ENGINE--CORRESPONDENCE WITH WATT.
-
-
-Want of water-power was one of the great defects of Soho as a
-manufacturing establishment, and for a long time Boulton struggled with
-the difficulty. The severe summer droughts obliged him to connect a
-horse-mill with the water-wheel. From six to ten horses were employed as
-an auxiliary power, at an expense of from five to eight guineas a week.
-But this expedient, though costly, was found very inconvenient. Boulton
-next thought of erecting a pumping-engine after Savery or Newcomen’s
-construction, for the purpose of raising the water from the mill-stream
-and returning it back into the reservoir--thereby maintaining a head of
-water sufficient to supply the water-wheel and keep the mill in regular
-work. “The enormous expense of the horse-power,” he wrote to a friend,
-“put me upon thinking of turning the mill by fire, and I made many
-fruitless experiments on the subject.”
-
-In 1766 we find him engaged in a correspondence with the distinguished
-Benjamin Franklin as to steam power. Eight years before, Franklin had
-visited Boulton at Birmingham and made his acquaintance. They were
-mutually pleased with each other, and continued to correspond during
-Franklin’s stay in England, exchanging their views on magnetism,
-electricity, and other subjects.[110] When Boulton began to study the
-fire-engine with a view to its improvement, Franklin was one of the first
-whom he consulted. Writing him on the 22nd February, 1766, he said,--
-
-  “My engagements since Christmas have not permitted me to make any
-  further progress with my fire-engine; but, as the thirsty season
-  is approaching apace, necessity will oblige me to set about it
-  in good earnest. Query,--Which of the steam-valves do you like
-  best? Is it better to introduce the jet of cold water at the
-  bottom of the receiver, or at the top? Each has its advantages
-  and disadvantages. My thoughts about the secondary or mechanical
-  contrivances of the engine are too numerous to trouble you with
-  in this letter, and yet I have not been lucky enough to hit upon
-  any that are objectionless. I therefore beg, if any thought occurs
-  to your fertile genius which you think may be useful, or preserve
-  me from error in the execution of this engine, you’ll be so kind
-  as to communicate it to me, and you’ll very greatly oblige me.”
-
-    [110] On the 22nd May, 1765, Franklin writes Boulton,--“Mr.
-      Baskerville informs me that you have lately had a considerable
-      addition to your fortune, on which I sincerely congratulate
-      you. I beg leave to introduce my friend Doctor Small to your
-      acquaintance, and to recommend him to your civilities. I would
-      not take this freedom, if I were not sure it would be agreeable
-      to you; and that you will thank me for adding to the number of
-      those who from their knowledge of you must respect you, one who
-      is both an ingenious philosopher and a most worthy honest man.
-      If anything new in magnetism or electricity, or any other branch
-      of natural knowledge, has occurred to your fruitful genius since
-      I last had the pleasure of seeing you, you will by communicating
-      it greatly oblige me.”
-
-From a subsequent letter it appears that Boulton, like Watt--who was
-about the same time occupied with his invention at Glasgow--had a model
-constructed for experimental purposes, and that this model was now with
-Franklin in London; for we find Boulton requesting the latter to “order a
-porter to nail up the model in the box again and take it to the Birmingham
-carrier at the Bell Inn, Smithfield.” After a silence of about a month
-Franklin replied,--
-
-  “You will, I trust, excuse my so long omitting to answer your kind
-  letter, when you consider the excessive hurry and anxiety I have
-  been engaged in with our American affairs.... I know not which of
-  the valves to give the preference to, nor whether it is best to
-  introduce your jet of cold water above or below. Experiments will
-  best decide in such cases. I would only repeat to you the hint I
-  gave, of fixing your grate in such a manner as to burn all your
-  smoke. I think a great deal of fuel will then be saved, for two
-  reasons. One, that smoke is fuel, and is wasted when it escapes
-  uninflamed. The other, that it forms a sooty crust on the bottom
-  of the boiler, which crust not being a good conductor of heat,
-  and preventing flame and hot air coming into immediate contact
-  with the vessel, lessens their effect in giving heat to the water.
-  All that is necessary is, to make the smoke of fresh coals pass
-  descending through those that are already thoroughly ignited. I
-  sent the model last week, with your papers in it, which I hope
-  got safe to hand.”[111]
-
-    [111] Franklin to Boulton, March 19, 1766. Boulton MSS.
-
-The model duly arrived at Soho, and we find Boulton shortly after occupied
-in making experiments with it, the results of which are duly entered in
-his note-books. Dr. Erasmus Darwin, with whom he was on very intimate
-terms, wrote him from Lichfield, inquiring what Franklin thought of the
-model and what suggestions he had made for its improvement. “Your model
-of a steam-engine, I am told,” said he, “has gained so much approbation
-in London, that I cannot but congratulate you on the mechanical fame you
-have acquired by it, which, assure yourself, is as great a pleasure to me
-as it could possibly be to yourself.”[112] Another letter of Darwin to
-Boulton is preserved, without date, but apparently written earlier than
-the preceding, in which the Doctor lays before the mechanical philosopher
-the scheme of “a fiery chariot” which he had conceived,--in other words,
-of a locomotive steam-carriage. He proposed to apply an engine with a
-pair of cylinders working alternately, to drive the proposed vehicle;[113]
-and he sent Boulton some rough diagrams illustrative of his views, which
-he begged might be kept a profound secret, as it was his intention, if
-Boulton approved of his plan and would join him as a partner, to endeavour
-to build a model engine, and, if it answered, to take out a joint patent
-for it. But Dr. Darwin’s scheme was too crude to be capable of being
-embodied in a working model; and nothing more was heard of his fiery
-chariot.
-
-    [112] Darwin to Boulton, March 11, 1766. Boulton MSS.
-
-    [113] The following passage occurs in his letter:--“Suppose one
-      piston up, and the vacuum made under it by the jet d’eau froid.
-      That piston cannot yet descend, because the cock is not yet
-      opened which admits the steam into its antagonist cylinder.
-      Hence the two pistons are in equilibrio, being either of them
-      pressed by the atmosphere. Then, I say, if the cock which admits
-      the steam into the antagonist cylinder be opened gradually
-      and not with a jerk, that the first mentioned [piston in the]
-      cylinder will descend gradually and yet not less forcibly.
-      Hence by the management of the steam cocks the motion may be
-      accelerated, retarded, destroyed, revived, instantly and easily.
-      And if this answers in practice as it does in theory, the
-      machine cannot fail of success! Eureka!”
-
-Another of Boulton’s numerous correspondents about the same time was Dr.
-Roebuck, of Kinneil, then occupied with his enterprise at Carron, and
-about to engage in working the Boroughstoness coal mines, of the results
-of which he was extremely sanguine. He also wished Boulton to join him
-as a partner, offering a tenth share in the concern, and to take back the
-share if the result did not answer expectations. But Boulton’s hands were
-already full of business nearer home, and he declined the venture. Roebuck
-then informed him of the invention made by his ingenious friend Watt,
-and of the progress of the model engine. This was a subject calculated
-to excite the interest of Boulton, himself occupied in studying the
-same subject, and he expressed a desire to see Watt, if he could make it
-convenient to visit him at Soho.
-
-It so happened that Watt had occasion to be in London in the summer of
-1767, on the business connected with the Forth and Clyde Canal Bill, and
-he determined to take Soho on his way home. When Watt paid his promised
-visit, Boulton was absent; but he was shown over the works by his friend
-Dr. Small, who had settled in Birmingham as a physician, and already
-secured a high place in Boulton’s esteem. Watt was much struck with
-the admirable arrangements of the Soho manufactory, and recognised at a
-glance the admirable power of organisation which they displayed. Still
-plodding wearily with his model, and contending with the “villanous bad
-workmanship” of his Glasgow artisans, he could not but envy the precision
-of the Soho tools and the dexterity of the Soho workmen. Some conversation
-on the subject must have occurred between him and Small, to whom he
-explained the nature of his invention; for we find the latter shortly
-after writing Watt, urging him to come to Birmingham and join partnership
-with Boulton and himself in the manufacture of steam-engines.[114]
-Although nothing came of this proposal at the time, it had probably some
-effect, when communicated to Dr. Roebuck, in inducing him to close with
-Watt as a partner, and thus anticipate his Birmingham correspondents, of
-whose sagacity he had the highest opinion.
-
-    [114] Small wrote Watt from Birmingham, on the 7th January,
-      1768:--“Our friend Boulton will by this post send letters both
-      to you and Dr. Roebuck. I know not well how to resolve without
-      seeing you. I have not the pleasure of being enough acquainted
-      with Dr. R. to judge whether we should all suit one another.
-      His integrity and generosity everybody agrees are great. You
-      certainly know the proposal he has made to Boulton, who will
-      tell you his determination about it. Before I knew of your
-      connexion with Dr. R. my idea was that you should settle here,
-      and that Boulton and I should assist you as much as we could,
-      which in any case we will most certainly do. I have no kind of
-      doubt of your success, nor of your acquiring fortune, if you
-      proceed upon a proper plan as to the manner of doing business;
-      which, if you do, you will be sole possessor of the affair even
-      after your patent has expired. I had not thoroughly considered
-      this part of the matter when you left me. In a partnership that
-      I liked, I should not hesitate to employ any sum of money I can
-      command on your scheme, and I am certain it may be managed with
-      only a moderate capital. Whether it would be possible to manage
-      the wheel and reciprocating engines by separate partnerships
-      without their interfering I am not certain. If it is, Boulton
-      and I would engage with you in either, _provided you will live
-      here_.”--Boulton MSS.
-
-In the following year Watt visited London on the business connected with
-the engine patent. Small wrote to him there, saying, “Get your patent
-and come to Birmingham, with as much time to spend as you can.” Watt
-accordingly again took Birmingham on his way home. There he saw his
-future partner for the first time, and they at once conceived a hearty
-liking for each other. They had much conversation about the engine, and it
-greatly cheered Watt to find that the sagacious and practical Birmingham
-manufacturer should augur so favourably of its success as he did. Shortly
-after, when Dr. Robison visited Soho, Boulton told him that although
-he had begun the construction of his proposed pumping-engine, he had
-determined to proceed no further with it until he saw what came of Watt
-and Roebuck’s scheme. “In erecting my proposed engine,” said he, “I would
-necessarily avail myself of what I learned from Mr. Watt’s conversation;
-but this would not now be right without his consent.” Boulton’s conduct in
-this proceeding was thoroughly characteristic of him, and merely affords
-another illustration of the general fairness and honesty with which he
-acted in all his business transactions.
-
-Watt returned to Glasgow to resume his engine experiments and to proceed
-with his canal surveys. He kept up a correspondence with Boulton, and
-advised him from time to time of the progress made with his model. Towards
-the end of the year we find him sending Boulton a package from Glasgow
-containing “one dozen German flutes at 5_s._, and a copper digester 1_l._
-10_s._” He added, “I have almost finished a most complete model of my
-reciprocating-engine: when it is tried, I shall advise the success.” To
-Dr. Small he wrote more confidentially, sending him in January, 1769, a
-copy of the intended specification of his steam-engine. He also spoke
-of his general business: “Our pottery,” said he, “is doing tolerably,
-though not as I wish. I am sick of the people I have to do with, though
-not of the business, which I expect will turn out a very good one. I
-have a fine scheme for doing it all by fire or water mills, but not in
-this country nor with the present people.”[115] Later, he wrote: “I have
-had another three days of fever, from which I am not quite recovered.
-This cursed climate and constitution will undo me.” Watt must have told
-Small when at Birmingham of the probability of his being able to apply
-his steam-engine to locomotion; for the latter writes him, “I told Dr.
-Robison and his pupil that I hoped soon to travel in a fiery chariot of
-your invention.” Later, Small wrote: “A linendraper at London, one Moore,
-has taken out a patent for moving wheel-carriages by steam. This comes
-of thy delays. I dare say he has heard of your inventions.... Do come to
-England with all possible speed. At this moment, how I could scold you
-for negligence! However, if you will come hither soon, I will promise to
-be very civil, and buy a steam-chaise of you and not of Moore. And yet it
-vexes me abominably to see a man of your superior genius neglect to avail
-himself properly of his great talents. These short fevers will do you
-good.”[116] Watt replied: “If linendraper Moore does not use _my_ engines
-to drive his chaises, he can’t drive them by steam. If he does, I will
-stop them. I suppose by the rapidity of his progress and puffing he is
-too volatile to be dangerous.... You talk to me about coming to England,
-just as if I was an Indian that had nothing to remove but my person. Why
-do we encumber ourselves with anything else? I can’t see you before July
-at soonest, unless you come here. If you do I can recommend you to a
-fine sweet girl, who will be anything you want her to be if you can make
-yourself agreeable to her.” Badinage apart, however, there was one point
-on which Watt earnestly solicited the kind services of his friend. He had
-become more than ever desirous of securing the powerful co-operation of
-Matthew Boulton in introducing his invention to public notice:--
-
-  “Seriously,” says he, “you will oblige me if you will negotiate
-  the following affair:--I find that if the engine succeeds my
-  whole time will be taken up in planning and erecting Reciprocating
-  engines, and the Circulator must stand still unless I do what I
-  have done too often, neglect certainty for hope. Now, Mr. Boulton
-  wants one or more engines for his own use. If he will make a
-  model of one of 20 inches diameter at least, I will give him my
-  advice and as much assistance as I can. He shall have liberty
-  to erect one of any size for his own use. If he should choose
-  to have more the terms will be easy, and I shall consider myself
-  much obliged to him. If it should answer, and he should not think
-  himself repaid for his trouble by the use of it, he shall make
-  and use it until he is repaid. If this be agreeable to him let me
-  know, and I will propose it to the Doctor [Roebuck], and doubt
-  not of his consent. I wish Mr. Boulton and you had entered into
-  some negotiation with the Doctor about coming in as partners.
-  I am afraid it is now too late; for the nearer it approaches to
-  certainty, he grows the more tenacious of it.[117] For my part, I
-  shall continue to think as I did, that it would be for our mutual
-  advantage. His expectations are solely from the Reciprocator.
-  Possibly he may be tempted to part with the half of the Circulator
-  to you. This I say of myself. Mr. Boulton asked if the Circulator
-  was contrived since our agreement. It was; but it is a part of
-  the scheme, and virtually included in it.”[118]
-
-    [115] Watt to Small, January 28, 1769. Boulton MSS.
-
-    [116] Small to Watt, 18th April, 1769. Boulton MSS.
-
-    [117] Roebuck was at this time willing to admit Boulton as a
-      partner in the patent, but only as respected the profits of
-      engines sold in the counties of Warwick, Stafford, and Derby.
-      This Boulton declined, saying, “It would not be worth my while
-      to make engines for three counties only; but it might be worth
-      my while to make for all the world.”
-
-    [118] Watt to Small, 28th April, 1769. Boulton MSS.
-
-From this it will be seen how anxious Watt was to engage Boulton in taking
-an interest in his invention. But though the fly was artfully cast over
-the nose of the fish, still he would not rise. The times were out of
-joint, business was stagnant, and Boulton was of necessity cautious about
-venturing upon new enterprises. Small doubtless communicated the views
-thus confidentially conveyed to him by Watt; and in his next letter he
-again pressed him to come to Birmingham and have a personal interview with
-Boulton as to the engine, adding, “bring this pretty girl with you when
-you come.” But, instead of Watt, Roebuck himself went to see Boulton on
-the subject. During the time of this visit, Watt again communicated to
-Small his anxiety that Boulton should join in the partnership. “As for
-myself,” said he, “I shall say nothing; but if you three can agree among
-yourselves, you may appoint me what share you please, and you will find
-me willing to do my best to advance the good of the whole; or, if this
-[the engine] should not succeed, to do any other thing I can to make you
-all amends, only reserving to myself the liberty of grumbling when I am
-in an ill humour.”[119]
-
-Small’s reply was discouraging. Both Boulton and he had just engaged in
-another scheme, which would require all the ready money at their command.
-Possibly the ill-success of the experiment Watt had by this time made with
-his new model at Kinneil may have had some influence in deterring them
-from engaging in what still looked a very unpromising speculation. Watt
-was greatly cast down at this intelligence, though he could not blame his
-friend for the caution he displayed in the matter.[120] He nevertheless
-again returned to the subject in his letters to Small; and at last Boulton
-was persuaded to enter into a conditional arrangement with Roebuck, which
-was immediately communicated to Watt, who received the intelligence with
-great exultation. “I shake hands,” he wrote to Small, “with you and Mr.
-Boulton in our connexion, which I hope will prove agreeable to us all.”
-His joy, however, proved premature, as it turned out that the agreement
-was only to the effect, that if Boulton thought proper to exercise the
-option of becoming a partner in the engine to the extent of one-third,
-he was to do so within a period of twelve months, paying Roebuck a sum
-of 1000_l._; but this option Boulton never exercised, and the engine
-enterprise seemed to be as far from success as ever.
-
-    [119] Watt to Small, 20th September, 1769. Boulton MSS.
-
-    [120] “I am really very sorry on my own account,” he wrote, “that
-      your engagements hinder you from entering into our scheme, for
-      that ought to be the result of your deliberation. Though there
-      are few things I have wished more for than being connected with
-      you on many accounts, yet I should be very loath to purchase
-      that pleasure at the expense of your quiet, which might be the
-      case if you involved yourself in more business than you could
-      easily manage, or, what is worse, find money for. Besides, this
-      is not a trade, but a project; and no man should risk more money
-      on a project than he can afford to lose.”--Watt to Small, 21st
-      October, 1769. Boulton MSS.
-
-In the mean time Watt became increasingly anxious about his own position.
-He had been spending more money on fruitless experiments, and getting
-into more debt. The six months he had been living at Kinneil had brought
-him in nothing. He had been neglecting his business, and could not afford
-to waste more time in prosecuting an apparently hopeless speculation. He
-accordingly returned to his regular work, and proceeded with the survey
-of the river Clyde, at the instance of the Glasgow Corporation. “I would
-not have meddled with this,” he wrote to Dr. Small, “had I been certain of
-being able to bring the engine to bear. But I cannot, on an uncertainty,
-refuse every piece of business that offers. I have refused some common
-fire-engines, because they must have taken my attention so up as to hinder
-my going on with my own. However, if I cannot make it answer soon, I
-shall certainly undertake the next that offers, for I cannot afford to
-trifle away my whole life, which--God knows--may not be long. Not that I
-think myself a proper hand for keeping men to their duty; but I must use
-my endeavours to make myself square with the world, though I much fear I
-never shall.”[121]
-
-    [121] Watt to Small, 20th September, 1769.
-
-Small lamented this apparent abandonment of the engine to its fate.
-But though he had failed in inducing Boulton heartily to join Watt in
-the enterprise, he did not yet despair. He continued to urge Watt to
-complete his engine, as the fourteen years for which the patent lasted
-would soon be gone. At all events he might send drawings of his engine
-to Soho; and Mr. Boulton and he would undertake to do their best to have
-one constructed for the purpose of exhibiting its powers.[122] To this
-Watt agreed, and about the beginning of 1770, the necessary drawings were
-sent to Soho, and an engine was immediately put in course of execution.
-Patterns were made and sent to Coalbrookdale to be cast; but when the
-castings were received, they were found exceedingly imperfect, and were
-thrown aside as useless. They were then sent to an ironfounder at Bilston
-to be executed; but the result was only another failure.
-
-    [122] Small informed Watt that it was intended to make an engine
-      for the purpose of _drawing canal boats_. “What Mr. Boulton and
-      I,” he wrote, “are very desirous of is, to move canal boats by
-      this engine; so we have made this model of a size sufficient for
-      that purpose. We propose first to operate without any condenser,
-      because coals are here exceedingly cheap, and because you can,
-      more commodiously than we, make experiments on condensers,
-      having several already by you. Above 150 boats are now employed
-      on these new waveless canals, so if we can succeed, the field
-      is not narrow.” This suggestion of working canal boats by steam
-      immediately elicited a reply from Watt on the subject. Invention
-      was so habitual to him that a new method of employing power was
-      no sooner hinted than his active mind at once set to work to
-      solve the problem. “Have you ever,” he wrote Small, “considered
-      _a spiral oar_ for that purpose, or are you for two wheels?” And
-      to make his meaning clear, he sketched out a rough but graphic
-      outline of a screw propeller. Small’s reply was unfavourable:
-      he replied, “I have tried models of spiral oars, and have
-      found them all inferior to oars of either of the other forms;
-      I believe because a cylinder of water immersed in water can be
-      easily turned round its own axis. We propose to try gun-lock
-      springs with the fixed part longer than the moving. If we cannot
-      succeed, we will have recourse to what you have so obligingly
-      and clearly described.” Finally Watt writes a fortnight later,
-      “concerning spirals, I do not continue fond of them.”
-
-About the beginning of 1770, another unsuccessful experiment was made
-by Watt and Roebuck with the engine at Kinneil. The cylinder had been
-repaired and made true by beating, but as the metal of which it was
-made was soft, it was feared that the working of the piston might throw
-it out of form. To prevent this, two firm parallel planes were fixed,
-through which the piston worked, in order to prevent its vibration. “If
-this should fail,” Roebuck wrote to Boulton, in giving an account of the
-intended trial, “then the cylinder must be made of cast-iron. But I have
-great confidence that the present engine will work completely, and by this
-day se’nnight you may expect to hear the result of our experiments.”[123]
-The good news, however, never went to Birmingham; on the contrary, the
-trial proved a failure. There was some more tinkering at the engine, but
-it would not work satisfactorily; and Watt went back to Glasgow with a
-heavy heart.
-
-    [123] Roebuck to Boulton, February 12, 1770.
-
-Small again endeavoured to induce Watt to visit Birmingham, to superintend
-the erection of the engine, the materials for which were now lying at
-Soho. He also held out to Watt the hope of obtaining some employment
-for him in the midland counties as a consulting engineer. But Watt could
-not afford to lose more time in erecting trial-engines; and he was too
-much occupied at Glasgow to leave it for the proposed uncertainty at
-Birmingham. He accordingly declined the visit, but invited Small to
-continue the correspondence; “for,” said he, “we have abundance of matters
-to discuss, though the damned engine sleep in quiet.” Small wrote back,
-professing himself satisfied that Watt was so fully employed in his
-own profession at Glasgow. “Let nothing,” he said, “divert you from the
-business of engineering. You are sensible that both Boulton and I engaged
-in the patent scheme much more from inclination to be in some degree
-useful to you than from any other principle; so that if you are prosperous
-and happy, we do not care whether you find the scheme worth prosecuting or
-not.”[124] Replying to Small’s complaint of himself, that he felt _ennuyé_
-and stupid, taking pleasure in nothing but sleep, Watt said: “You complain
-of physic; I find it sufficiently stupifying to be obliged to think on
-any subject but one’s hobby; and I really am become monstrously stupid,
-and can seldom think at all. I wish to God I could afford to live without
-it; though I don’t admire your sleeping scheme. I must fatigue myself,
-otherwise I can neither eat nor sleep. In short, I greatly doubt whether
-the silent mansion of the grave be not the happiest abode. I am cured of
-most of my youthful desires, and if ambition or avarice do not lay hold
-of me, I shall be almost as much _ennuyé_ as you say you are.”[125]
-
-    [124] Small to Watt, 17th September, 1770. Boulton MSS.
-
-Small again recurred to the subject of Watt’s removal to Birmingham,
-informing him that he had provided accommodation for him, “having kept a
-whole house in my power, in hopes you may come to live here.”
-
-Watt’s prospects were, however, brightening. He was then busily occupied
-in superintending the construction of the Monkland Canal. He wrote Small
-that he had a hundred men working under him, who had “made a confounded
-gash in a hill,” at which they had been working for twelve months; that
-by frugal living he had contrived to save money enough to pay his debts,
-and that he had plenty of remunerative work before him. He had also become
-concerned in a pottery, which, he said, “does very well, though we make
-monstrous bad ware.”[126] He had not, indeed, got rid of his headaches,
-though he was not so much afflicted by low spirits as he had been. But he
-confessed that after all he hated the business of engineering, and wished
-himself well rid of it, for the reasons stated in a preceding chapter.
-
-    [125] Watt to Small, 20th October, 1770. Boulton MSS.
-
-    [126] He then held an eighth share in the pottery, which brought
-      him in about 70_l._ a year clear.
-
-This comparatively prosperous state of Watt’s affairs did not, however,
-last long. The commercial panic of 1772 put a sudden stop to most of
-the canal schemes then on foot. The proprietors of the Monkland Canal
-could not find the necessary means for carrying on the works, and Watt
-consequently lost his employment as their engineer. He was thus again
-thrown upon the world, and where was he to look for help? Naturally
-enough, he reverted to his engine. But it was in the hands of Dr. Roebuck,
-who was overwhelmed with debt, and upon the verge of insolvency. It
-was clear that no help was to be looked for in that quarter. Again he
-bethought him of Small’s invitations to Birmingham, and of the interest
-that Boulton had taken in the engine scheme. Could he be induced at last
-to become a partner? He again broached the subject to Small, telling him
-how business had failed him; that he was now ready to go to Birmingham
-and engage in English surveys, or do anything that would bring him in an
-honest income. But, above all, would Boulton and Small, now that Roebuck
-had failed, join him as partners in the engine business?
-
-By this time Boulton himself had become involved in difficulties arising
-out of the commercial pressure of the time, and was more averse than ever
-to enter upon such an enterprise. But having lent Roebuck a considerable
-sum of money, it occurred to Watt that the amount might be taken as part
-of the price of Boulton’s share in the patent, if he would consent to
-enter into the proposed partnership. He represented to Small the great
-distress of Roebuck’s situation, which he had done all that he could to
-relieve. “What little I can do for him,” he said, “is purchased by denying
-myself the conveniences of life my station requires, or by remaining in
-debt, which it galls me to the bone to owe.” Reverting to the idea of a
-partnership with Boulton, he added, “I shall be content to hold a very
-small share in it, or none at all, provided I am to be freed from my
-pecuniary obligations to Roebuck, and have any kind of recompense for
-even a part of the anxiety and ruin it has involved me in.” And again:
-“Although I am out of pocket a much greater sum upon these experiments
-than my proportion of the profits of the engine, I do not look upon that
-money as the price of my share, but as money spent on my education. I
-thank God I have now reason to believe that I can never, while I have
-health, be at any loss to pay what I owe, and to live at least in a decent
-manner; more, I do not violently desire.”[127]
-
-In a subsequent letter Watt promised Small that he would pay an early
-visit to Birmingham, and added, “there is nowhere I so much wish to be.”
-In replying, Small pointed out a difficulty in the way of the proposed
-partnership: “It is impossible,” he wrote, “for Mr. Boulton and me, or any
-other honest man, to purchase, especially from two particular friends,
-what has no market price, and at a time when they might be inclined
-to part with the commodity at an under value.”[128] He added that the
-high-pressure wheel-engine constructing at Soho, after Watt’s plans, was
-nearly ready, and that Wilkinson, of Bradley, had promised that the boiler
-should be sent next week. “Should the experiment succeed, or seem likely
-to succeed,” he said, “you ought to come hither immediately upon receiving
-the notice, which I will instantly send. In that case we propose to unite
-three things under your direction, which would altogether, we hope, prove
-tolerably satisfactory to you, at least until your merit shall be better
-known.”[129]
-
-    [127] Watt to Small, 30th August, 1772. Boulton MSS.
-
-    [128] Small to Watt, 16th November, 1772. Boulton MSS.
-
-    [129] About this time, in order to bring himself and his engine
-      into notice, Watt contemplated writing a treatise on steam and
-      its applications. “I have some thoughts,” he wrote to Small, “of
-      writing a book on the elements of the theory of steam-engines,
-      in which, however, I shall only give the enunciation of the
-      perfect engine. This book might do me and the scheme good.
-      It would still leave the world in the dark as to the true
-      construction of the engine. Something of this kind is necessary,
-      as Smeaton is labouring hard at the subject, and if I can
-      make no profit, at least I ought not to lose the honour of my
-      experiments.”--Watt to Small, 17th August, 1773. Boulton MSS.
-      To this letter Small replied, “The more I consider the propriety
-      of your publishing about steam, the more I wish you to publish.
-      Smeaton has only trifled hitherto, though he may perhaps
-      discover something. He told Boulton some time ago that the
-      circular engine would not do. He said he had considered it, and
-      was sure of this. As B. does not much respect his genius, this
-      had no effect.” Watt’s treatise was, however, never written; his
-      attention being shortly after fully occupied by other and more
-      engrossing subjects.
-
-But before the experiment with the wheel-engine could be tried at Soho,
-the financial ruin of Dr. Roebuck brought matters to a crisis. He was
-now in the hands of his creditors, who found his affairs in inextricable
-confusion. He owed some 1200_l._ to Boulton, who, rather than claim
-against the estate, offered to take Roebuck’s two-thirds share in the
-engine patent in lieu of the debt. The creditors did not value the engine
-as worth one farthing, and were but too glad to agree to the proposal.
-As Watt himself said, it was only “paying one bad debt with another.”
-Boulton wrote to Watt requesting him to act as his attorney in the matter.
-He confessed that he was by no means sanguine as to the success of the
-engine, but, being an assayer, he was willing “to assay it and try how
-much gold it contains.” “The thing,” he added, “is now a shadow; ’tis
-merely ideal, and will cost time and money to realise it. We have made
-no experiment yet that answers my purpose, and the times are so horrible
-throughout the mercantile part of Europe, that I have not had my thoughts
-sufficiently disengaged to think of new schemes.”[130]
-
-    [130] Boulton to Watt, 29th March, 1773. Boulton MSS.
-
-So soon as the arrangement for the transfer of Roebuck’s share to Boulton
-was concluded, Watt ordered the engine in the outhouse at Kinneil to be
-taken to pieces, packed up, and sent to Birmingham.[131] Small again
-pressed him to come and superintend the work in person. But before he
-could leave Scotland it was necessary that he should complete the survey
-of the Caledonian Canal, which was still unfinished. This done, he
-promised at once to set out for Soho. In any case, he had made up his mind
-to leave his own country, of which he declared himself “heart-sick.”[132]
-He hated its harsh climate, so trying to his fragile constitution.
-Moreover, he disliked the people he had to deal with. He was also badly
-paid for his work, a whole year’s surveying having brought him in only
-about 200_l._ Out of this he had paid some portion to Dr. Roebuck to help
-him in his necessity, “so that,” he said, “I can barely support myself and
-keep untouched the small sum I have allotted for my visit to you.”[133]
-
-Watt’s intention was either to try to find employment as a surveyor or
-engineer in England, or obtain a situation of some kind abroad. He was,
-however, naturally desirous of ascertaining whether it was yet possible to
-do anything with the materials which now lay at Soho; and with the object
-of visiting his friends there and superintending the erection of the
-trial-engine, he at length made his final arrangements to leave Glasgow.
-We find him arrived in Birmingham in May, 1774, where he at once entered
-on a new and important phase of his professional career.
-
-    [131] “As I found the engine at Kinneil perishing, and as it is
-      from circumstances highly improper that it should continue there
-      longer, and as I have nowhere else to put it, I have this week
-      taken it to pieces and packed up the ironwork, cylinder, and
-      pump, ready to be shipped for London on its way to Birmingham,
-      as the only place where the experiments can be completed with
-      propriety. I suppose the whole will not weigh above four tons.
-      I have left the whole of the woodwork until we see what we are
-      to do.”--Watt to Small, 20th May, 1773. Boulton MSS.
-
-    [132] In a letter to Small, Watt wrote, “I begin now to see
-      daylight through the affairs that have detained me so long, and
-      think of setting out for you in a fortnight at furthest. I am
-      monstrously plagued with my headaches, and not a little with
-      unprofitable business. I don’t mean my own whims: these I never
-      work at when I can do any other thing; but I have got too many
-      acquaintances; and there are too many beggars in this country,
-      which I am afraid is going to the devil altogether. Provisions
-      continue excessively dear, and laws are made to keep them so.
-      But luckily the spirit of emigrating rises high, and the people
-      seem disposed to show their oppressive masters that they can
-      live without them. By the time some twenty or thirty thousand
-      more leave the country, matters will take a turn not much to the
-      profit of the landholders.”--Watt to Small, 29th April, 1774.
-      Boulton MSS.
-
-    [133] Watt to Small, 25th July, 1773. Boulton MSS.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XI.
-
-BOULTON AND WATT--THEIR PARTNERSHIP.
-
-
-Watt had now been occupied for about nine years in working out the details
-of his invention. Five of these had passed since he had taken out his
-patent, and he was still struggling with difficulty. Several thousand
-pounds had been expended on the engine, besides much study, labour,
-and ingenuity; yet it was still, as Boulton expressed it, “a shadow, as
-regarded its practical utility and value.” So long as Watt’s connexion
-with Roebuck continued, there was indeed very little chance of getting
-it favourably introduced to public notice. What it was yet to become as a
-working power depended in no small degree upon the business ability, the
-strength of purpose, and the length of purse of his new partner.
-
-Had Watt searched Europe through, probably he could not have found a man
-better fitted than Matthew Boulton for bringing his invention fairly
-before the world. Many would have thought it rash on the part of the
-latter, burdened as he was with heavy liabilities, to engage in a new
-undertaking of so speculative a character. Feasible though the scheme
-might be, it was an admitted fact that nearly all the experiments with
-the models heretofore made had proved failures. It is true Watt firmly
-believed that he had hit upon the right principle, and he was as sanguine
-as ever of the eventual success of his engine. But though inventors are
-usually sanguine, men of capital do not take up their schemes on that
-account. Capitalists are rather disposed to regard sanguine inventors
-as visionaries, full of theories of what is possible rather than of
-well-defined plans of what is practicable and useful.
-
-Boulton, however, amongst his many other gifts possessed an admirable
-knowledge of character. His judgment of men was almost unerring. In
-Watt he had recognised at his first visit to Soho, not only a man of
-original inventive genius, but a plodding, earnest, intent, and withal
-an exceedingly modest man; not given to puff, but on the contrary rather
-disposed to underrate the merit of his inventions. Different though
-their characters were in most respects, Boulton at once conceived a
-hearty liking for him. The one displayed in perfection precisely those
-qualities which the other wanted. Boulton was a man of ardent and
-generous temperament, bold and enterprising, undaunted by difficulty, and
-possessing an almost boundless capacity for work. He was a man of great
-tact, clear perception, and sound judgment. Moreover, he possessed that
-indispensable quality of perseverance, without which the best talents
-are of comparatively little avail in the conduct of important affairs.
-While Watt hated business, Boulton loved it. He had, indeed, a genius
-for business,--a gift almost as rare as that for poetry, for art, or for
-war. He possessed a marvellous power of organisation. With a keen eye
-for details he combined a comprehensive grasp of intellect. While his
-senses were so acute, that when sitting in his office at Soho he could
-detect the slightest stoppage or derangement in the machinery of that
-vast establishment, and send his message direct to the spot where it had
-occurred, his power of imagination was such as enabled him to look clearly
-along extensive lines of possible action in Europe, America, and the East.
-For there is a poetic as well as a commonplace side to business; and the
-man of business genius lights up the humdrum routine of daily life by
-exploring the boundless region of possibility wherever it may lie open
-before him.
-
-Boulton had already won his way to the very front rank in his calling,
-honestly and honourably; and he was proud of it. He had created many
-new branches of industry, which gave regular employment to hundreds of
-families. He had erected and organised a manufactory which was looked upon
-as one of the most complete of its kind in England, and was resorted to
-by visitors from all parts of the world. But Boulton was more than a man
-of business: he was a man of culture, and the friend of cultivated men.
-His hospitable mansion at Soho was the resort of persons eminent in art,
-in literature, and in science; and the love and admiration with which
-he inspired such men affords one of the best proofs of his own elevation
-of character. Among the most intimate of his friends and associates were
-Richard Lovell Edgeworth,[134] a gentleman of fortune, enthusiastically
-devoted to his long-conceived design of moving land-carriages by steam;
-Captain Keir, an excellent practical chemist, a wit and a man of learning;
-Dr. Small, the accomplished physician, chemist, and mechanist; Josiah
-Wedgwood, the practical philosopher and manufacturer, founder of a new and
-important branch of skilled industry; Thomas Day, the ingenious author of
-‘Sandford and Merton;’ Dr. Darwin, the poet-physician; Dr. Withering, the
-botanist; besides others who afterwards joined the Soho circle,--not the
-least distinguished of whom were Joseph Priestley and James Watt.[135]
-
-    [134] Mr. Edgeworth was first introduced to the notice of Mr.
-      Boulton in the following letter from Dr. Darwin (1767):--“Dear
-      Boulton, I have got with me a mechanical friend, Mr. Edgeworth,
-      from Oxfordshire,--the greatest conjurer I ever saw. God send
-      fine weather, and pray come to my assistance, and prevail on
-      Dr. Small and Mrs. Boulton to attend you to-morrow morning,
-      and we will reconvey you to Birmingham if the devil permit. E.
-      has the principles of nature in his palm, and moulds them as he
-      pleases,--can take away polarity, or give it to the needle by
-      rubbing it thrice on the palm of his hand! And can see through
-      two solid oak boards without glasses! Wonderful! astonishing!!
-      diabolical!!! Pray tell Dr. Small he must come to see these
-      miracles. Adieu, E. Darwin.”
-
-    [135] Richard Lovell Edgeworth says of this distinguished
-      coterie,--“By means of Mr. Keir I became acquainted with Dr.
-      Small of Birmingham, a man esteemed by all who knew him, and
-      by all who were admitted to his friendship beloved with no
-      common enthusiasm. Dr. Small formed a link which combined Mr.
-      Boulton, Mr. Watt, Dr. Darwin, Mr. Wedgwood, Mr. Day, and myself
-      together--men of very different characters, but all devoted
-      to literature and science. This mutual intimacy has never
-      been broken but by death, nor have any of the number failed to
-      distinguish themselves in science or literature. Some may think
-      that I ought with due modesty to except myself. Mr. Keir with
-      his knowledge of the world and good sense; Dr. Small, with his
-      benevolence and profound sagacity; Wedgwood, with his increasing
-      industry, experimental variety, and calm investigation; Boulton,
-      with his mobility, quick perception, and bold adventure; Watt,
-      with his strong inventive faculty, undeviating steadiness,
-      and bold resources; Darwin, with his imagination, science, and
-      poetical excellence; and Day, with his unwearied research after
-      truth, his integrity and eloquence;--proved altogether such a
-      society as few men have had the good fortune to live with; such
-      an assemblage of friends, as fewer still have had the happiness
-      to possess, and keep through life.”--Memoirs, i. 186.
-
-Boulton could not have been very sanguine at first as to the success of
-Watt’s engine. There were a thousand difficulties in the way of getting
-it introduced to general use. The principal one was the difficulty of
-finding workmen capable of making it. Watt had been constantly worried
-by “villanous bad workmen,” who failed to make any model that would go
-properly. It mattered not that the principle of the engine was right;
-if its construction was beyond the skill of ordinary handicraftsmen,
-the invention was practically worthless. The great Smeaton was of this
-opinion. When he saw the first model working at Soho, he admitted the
-excellence of the contrivance, but predicted its failure, on the ground
-that it was too complicated, and that workmen were not to be found capable
-of manufacturing it on any large scale for general uses.
-
-Watt himself felt that, if the engine was ever to have a fair chance,
-it was now; and that if Boulton, with his staff of skilled workmen at
-command, could not make it go, the scheme must be abandoned henceforward
-as impracticable. Boulton must, however, have seen the elements of success
-in the invention, otherwise he would not have taken up with it. He knew
-the difficulties Watt had encountered in designing it, and he could well
-appreciate the skill with which he had overcome them; for Boulton himself,
-as we have seen, had for some time been occupied with the study of the
-subject. But the views of Boulton on entering into his new branch of
-business, cannot be better expressed than in his own words, as stated in
-a letter written by him to Watt in 1769, when then invited to join the
-Roebuck partnership:--
-
-  “The plan proposed to me,”[136] said he, “is so very different
-  from that which I had conceived at the time I talked with you
-  upon the subject, that I cannot think it a proper one for me to
-  meddle with, as I do not intend turning engineer. I was excited
-  by two motives to offer you my assistance--which were, love of
-  you, and love of a money-getting ingenious project. I presumed
-  that your engine would require money, very accurate workmanship,
-  and extensive correspondence, to make it turn out to the best
-  advantage; and that the best means of keeping up our reputation
-  and doing the invention justice, would be to keep the executive
-  part out of the hands of the multitude of empirical engineers,
-  who, from ignorance, want of experience, and want of necessary
-  convenience, would be very liable to produce bad and inaccurate
-  workmanship; all which deficiencies would affect the reputation of
-  the invention. To remedy which, and to produce the most profit,
-  my idea was to settle a manufactory near my own, by the side of
-  our canal, where I would erect all the conveniences necessary for
-  the completion of engines, and from which manufactory we would
-  serve the world with engines of all sizes. By these means and your
-  assistance we could engage and instruct some excellent workmen,
-  who (with more excellent tools than would be worth any man’s while
-  to procure for one single engine) could execute the invention 20
-  per cent. cheaper than it would be otherwise executed, and with as
-  great a difference of accuracy as there is between the blacksmith
-  and the mathematical instrument maker.”
-
-    [136] Dr. Roebuck proposed to confine Boulton’s profits to the
-      engine business done only in three counties. It will be observed
-      that Boulton declined to negotiate on such a basis.
-
-He went on to state that he was willing to enter upon the speculation
-with these views, considering it well worth his while “to make engines
-for all the world,” though it would not be worth his while “to make for
-three counties only;” besides, he declared himself averse to embark in any
-trade that he had not the inspection of himself. He concluded by saying,
-“Although there seem to be some obstructions to our partnership in the
-engine trade, yet I live in hopes that you or I may hit upon some scheme
-or other that may associate us in this part of the world, which would
-render it still more agreeable to me than it is, by the acquisition of
-such a neighbour.”[137]
-
-Five years had passed since this letter was written, during which the
-engine had made no way in the world. The partnership of Roebuck and Watt
-had yielded nothing but vexation and debt; until at last, fortunately for
-Watt--though at the time he regarded it as a terrible calamity--Roebuck
-broke down, and the obstruction was removed which had prevented Watt and
-Boulton from coming together. The latter at once reverted to the plan
-of action which he had with so much sagacity laid down in 1769; and he
-invited Watt to take up his abode at Soho until the necessary preliminary
-arrangements could be made. He thought it desirable, in the first place,
-to erect the engine, of which the several parts had been sent to Soho from
-Kinneil, in order, if possible, to exhibit a specimen of the invention
-in actual work. Boulton undertook to defray all the necessary expenses,
-and to find competent workmen to carry out the instructions of Watt,
-whom Boulton was also to maintain until the engine business had become
-productive.[138]
-
-    [137] Boulton to Watt, 7th February, 1769. Boulton MSS.
-
-    [138] In a statement prepared by Mr. Boulton for the consideration
-      of the arbitrators between himself and Fothergill as to the
-      affairs of that firm, the following passage occurs:--“The first
-      engine that was erected at Soho I purchased of Mr. Watt and
-      Dr. Roebuck. The cylinder was cast of solid grain tin, which
-      engine, with the boiler, the valves, the condenser, and the
-      pumps, were all sent from Scotland to Soho. This engine was
-      erected for the use of the Soho manufactory, and for the purpose
-      of making experiments upon by Mr. Watt, who occupied two years
-      of his time at Soho with that object: and lived there at Mr.
-      Boulton’s expense. Nevertheless Mr. Watt often assisted Boulton
-      and Fothergill in anything in his power, and made one journey
-      to London upon their business, when he worked at adjusting and
-      marking weights manufactured by Boulton and Fothergill.” In
-      another statement of a similar kind, Mr. Boulton says,--“The
-      only fire-engine that was erected at Soho prior to Boulton and
-      Watt obtaining the Act of Parliament, was entirely made and
-      erected in Scotland, and was removed here by sea, being a part
-      of my bargain with Roebuck. All that were afterwards erected
-      were for persons that ordered them, and were at the expense of
-      erecting them.”--Boulton MSS.
-
-The materials brought from Kinneil were accordingly put together with as
-little delay as possible; and, thanks to the greater skill of the workmen
-who assisted in its erection, the engine, when finished, worked in a more
-satisfactory manner than it had ever done before. In November, 1774, Watt
-wrote Dr. Roebuck, informing him of the success of his trials; on which
-the Dr. expressed his surprise that the engine should have worked at all,
-“considering the slightness of the materials and its long exposure to the
-injuries of the weather.” Watt also wrote to his father at Greenock. “The
-business I am here about has turned out rather successful; that is to say,
-the fire-engine I have invented is now going, and answers much better than
-any other that has yet been made; and I expect that the invention will be
-very beneficial to me.”[139] Such was Watt’s modest announcement of the
-successful working of the engine on which such great results depended.
-
-    [139] Quoted in Muirhead’s ‘Mechanical Inventions of James Watt,’
-      ii. 79.
-
-Much, however, remained to be done before either Watt or Boulton could
-reap any benefit from the invention. Six years out of the fourteen for
-which the patent was originally taken had already expired; and all that
-had been accomplished was the erection of this experimental engine at
-Soho. What further period might elapse before capitalists could be brought
-to recognise the practical uses of the invention could only be guessed
-at; but the probability was that the patent right would expire long before
-such a demand for the engines arose as should remunerate Boulton and Watt
-for their investment of time, labour, and capital. And the patent once
-expired, the world at large would be free to make the engines, though Watt
-himself had not recovered one farthing towards repaying him for the long
-years of experiment, study, and ingenuity bestowed by him in bringing his
-invention to perfection. These considerations made Boulton hesitate before
-launching out the money necessary to provide the tools, machinery, and
-buildings, for carrying on the intended manufacture on a large scale and
-in the best style.
-
-When it became known that Boulton had taken an interest in a new engine
-for pumping water, he had many inquiries about it from the mining
-districts. The need of a more effective engine than any then in use
-was every year becoming more urgent. The powers of Newcomen’s engine
-had been tried to the utmost. So long as the surface-lodes were worked,
-its power was sufficient to clear the mines of water; but as they were
-carried deeper, it was found totally inadequate for the work, and many
-mines were consequently becoming gradually drowned out and abandoned.
-The excessive consumption of coals by the Newcomen engines was another
-serious objection to their use, especially in districts such as Cornwall,
-where coal was very dear. When Small was urging Watt to come to Birmingham
-and make engines, he wrote: “A friend of Boulton’s, in Cornwall, sent
-us word a few days ago that four or five copper-mines are just going to
-be abandoned because of the high price of coals, and begs us to apply to
-them instantly. The York Buildings Company delay rebuilding their engine,
-with great inconvenience to themselves, waiting for yours. Yesterday
-application was made to me by a Mining Company in Derbyshire to know when
-you are to be in England about the engines, because they must quit their
-mine if you cannot relieve them.” The necessity for an improved pumping
-power had set many inventors to work besides Watt, and some of the less
-scrupulous of them were already trying to adopt his principle in such a
-way as to evade his patent. Moore, the London linendraper, and Hatley,
-one of Watt’s Carron workmen, had brought out and were pushing engines
-similar to Watt’s; the latter having stolen and sold for a considerable
-sum working drawings of the Kinneil engine.
-
-From these signs Boulton saw that, in the event of the engine proving
-successful, he and his partner would have to defend the invention against
-a host of pirates; and he became persuaded that he would not be justified
-in risking his capital in the establishment of a steam-engine manufactory
-unless a considerable extension of the patent-right could be secured. To
-ascertain whether this was practicable, Watt proceeded to London in the
-beginning of 1775, to confer with his patent agent and take the opinion of
-counsel on the subject. Mr. Wedderburn, who was advised with, recommended
-that the existing patent should be surrendered, and in that case he did
-not doubt that a new one would be granted. While in London, Watt looked
-out for possible orders for his engine: “I have,” he wrote Boulton, “a
-prospect of two orders for fire-engines here, one to water Piccadilly, and
-the other to serve the south end of Blackfriars Bridge with water. I have
-taken advice of several people whom I could trust about the patent. They
-all agree that an Act would be much better and cheaper, a patent being
-now 130_l._, the Act, if obtainable, 110_l._ The present patent has eight
-years still to run, bearing date January, 1769. I understand there will
-be an almost unlimited sale for wheel-engines to the West Indies, at the
-rate of 100_l._ for each horse’s power.”[140]
-
-    [140] Watt to Boulton, 31st January, 1775. Boulton MSS.
-
-Watt also occupied some of his time in London in superintending the
-adjustment of weights manufactured by Boulton and Fothergill, then sold
-in considerable quantities through their London agent. That he continued
-to take an interest in his old business of mathematical instrument making
-is apparent from the visits which he made to several well-known shops.
-One of the articles which he examined with most interest was Short’s
-Gregorian telescope. At other times, by Boulton’s request, he went to see
-the few steam-engines then at work in London and the neighbourhood, and
-make inquiries as to their performances. With that object he examined the
-engines at the New River, Hungerford, and Chelsea. At the latter place, he
-said, “it was impossible to try the quantity of injection, and the fellow
-told me lies about the height of the column of water.” But Watt soon grew
-tired of London, “running from street to street all day about gilding,”
-inquiring after metal-rollers, silver-platers, and button-makers. He did
-his best, however, to execute the commissions which Boulton from time to
-time sent him; and when these were executed, he returned to Birmingham to
-confer with his friends as to the steps to be taken with respect to the
-patent. The result of his conferences with Boulton and Small was, that it
-was determined to take steps to apply for an Act for its extension in the
-ensuing session of Parliament.
-
-Watt went up to London a second time for the purpose of having the Bill
-drawn. He had scarcely arrived there when the sad intelligence reached
-him of the death of Dr. Small. He had long been ailing, yet the event
-was a shock alike to himself and Boulton. The latter wrote Watt in the
-bitterness of his grief, “If there were not a few other objects yet
-remaining for me to settle my affections upon, I should wish also to
-take up my abode in the mansions of the dead.” Watt replied, reminding
-him of the sentiments of their departed friend, as to the impropriety of
-indulging in unavailing sorrow, the best refuge from which was the more
-sedulous performance of duty. “Come, my dear sir,” said he, “and immerse
-yourself in this sea of business as soon as possible. Pay a proper respect
-to your friend by obeying his precepts. I wait for you with impatience,
-and assure yourself no endeavour of mine shall be wanting to render life
-agreeable to you.”
-
-It had been intended to include Small in the steam-engine partnership
-on the renewal of the patent. He had been consulted in all the stages of
-the proceedings, and one of the last things he did was to draw up Watt’s
-petition for the Bill. No settled arrangement had yet been made--not even
-between Boulton and Watt. Everything depended upon the success of the
-application for the extension of the patent.
-
-Meanwhile, through the recommendation of his old friend Dr. Robison, then
-in Russia officiating as Mathematical Professor at the Government Naval
-School at Cronstadt, Watt was offered an appointment under the Russian
-Government, at a salary of about 1000_l._ a year. He was thus presented
-with a means of escape from his dependence upon Boulton, and for the
-first time in his life had the prospect before him of an income that to
-him would have been affluence. But he entertained strong objections to
-settling in Russia: he objected to its climate, its comparative barbarism,
-and, notwithstanding the society of his friend Robison, to the limited
-social resources of St. Petersburg. Besides, Boulton’s favours were so
-gracefully conferred, that the dependence on him was not felt; for he made
-the recipient of his favours feel as if the obligation were entirely on
-the side of the giver. “Your going to Russia staggers me,” he wrote to
-Watt; “the precariousness of your health, the dangers of so long a journey
-or voyage, and my own deprivation of consolation, render me a little
-uncomfortable; but I wish to assist and advise you for the best, without
-regard to self.” The result was, that Watt determined to wait the issue
-of the application for the extension of his patent.
-
-The Bill was introduced to Parliament on the 28th of February, 1775, and
-it was obvious from the first that it would have considerable opposition
-to encounter. The mining interest had looked forward to Watt’s invention
-as a means of helping them out of their difficulties and giving a new
-value to their property by clearing the drowned mines of water. They
-therefore desired to have the free use of the engine at the earliest
-possible period; and when it was proposed to extend the patent by Act of
-Parliament, they set up with one accord the cry of “No monopoly.” Up to
-the present time, as we have seen, the invention had been productive to
-Watt of nothing but loss, labour, anxiety, and headaches; and it was only
-just that a reasonable period should be allowed to enable him to derive
-some advantage from the results of his application and ingenuity. But the
-mining interest took a different view of the matter. They did not see the
-necessity of recognising the rights of the inventor beyond the term of
-his existing patent, and they held that the public interests would suffer
-if the proposed “monopoly” were granted. Nor were they without supporters
-in Parliament, for among the most strenuous we find the name of Edmund
-Burke,--influenced, it is supposed, by certain mining interests in the
-neighbourhood of Bristol, which city he then represented.
-
-There is no doubt that the public would have benefited by Watt’s invention
-having been made free to all. But it was not for the public merely that
-Watt had been working at his engine for fifteen long years. He was a man
-of comparatively small means, and had been buoyed up and stimulated to
-renewed exertion during that time by the hope of ultimate reward in the
-event of its success. If labour could give a man a title to property in
-his invention, Watt’s claim was clear. The condensing-engine had been
-the product of his own skill, contrivance, and brain-work. But there
-has always been a difficulty in getting the claims of mere brain-work
-recognised. Had he expended his labour in building a house instead of
-in contriving a machine, his right of property would at once have been
-acknowledged. As it was, he had to contend for justice and persuade the
-legislature of the reasonableness of granting his application for an
-extension of the patent. In the “Case” which he drew up for distribution
-amongst the members of the Lower House, on the motion being carried
-for the recommittal of the Bill, he set forth that having, after great
-labour and expense extending over many years, succeeded in completing
-working engines of each of the two kinds he had invented, he found that
-they could not be carried into profitable execution without the further
-expenditure of large sums of money in erecting mills, and purchasing the
-various materials and utensils necessary for making them; and from the
-reluctance with which the public generally adopt new inventions, he was
-afraid that the whole term granted by his patent would expire before the
-engines should have come into general use and any portion of his expenses
-be repaid:--
-
-  “The inventor of these new engines,” said he, “is sorry that
-  gentlemen of knowledge, and avowed admirers of his invention,
-  should oppose the Bill by putting it in the light of a monopoly.
-  He never had any intention of circumscribing or claiming the
-  inventions of others; and the Bill is now drawn up in such a
-  manner as sufficiently guards those rights, and must oblige him
-  to prove his own right to every part of his invention which may
-  at any time be disputed.... If the invention be valuable, it has
-  been made so by his industry, and at his expense; he has struggled
-  with bad health, and many other inconveniences, to bring it to
-  perfection, and all he wishes is to be secured in the profits
-  which he may reasonably expect from it,--profits which he cannot
-  obtain without an exertion of his abilities to bring it into
-  practice, by which the public must be the greatest gainers, and
-  which are limited by the performance of the common engines; for
-  he cannot expect that any person will make use of his contrivance,
-  unless he can prove to them that savings will take place, and that
-  his demand for the privilege of using the invention will amount
-  only to a reasonable part of them. No man will lay aside a known
-  engine, and stop his work to erect one of a new contrivance,
-  unless he is certain to be a very great gainer by the exchange;
-  and if any contrivance shall so far excel others as to enforce the
-  use of it, it is reasonable that the author of such a contrivance
-  should be rewarded.”
-
-These weighty arguments could not fail to produce an impression on the
-minds of all reasonable men, and the result was, that Parliament passed
-an Act extending Watt’s patent right for the further term of twenty-four
-years. Watt wrote Boulton on the 27th May,--“I hope to be clear to come
-away by Wednesday or Thursday. I am heartily sick of this town and _fort
-ennuyée_ since you left it. Dr. Roebuck is likely to get an order, out of
-Smeaton’s hands, for an engine in Yorkshire that, according to Smeaton’s
-calculation, will burn 1200_l._ per annum in coals. But this has had one
-bad effect. It has made the Doctor repent of his bargain and wish again
-to be upon the 1-10th [profits]; but we must see to keep him right if
-possible, so don’t vex yourself about it.” Dr. Roebuck had been finally
-settled with before the passing of the Act. It had been arranged that
-Boulton should pay him 1000_l._ out of the first profits arising from
-his share in the engine, making about 2200_l._ in all paid by Boulton to
-Roebuck for his two-thirds of the patent.[141]
-
-    [141] Bonds were given for the 1000_l._, but the assignees of
-      Roebuck becoming impatient for the money, Boulton discharged
-      them to get rid of their importunity, long before any profits
-      had been derived from the manufacture of the engines.
-
-Watt returned to Birmingham to set about the making of the engines for
-which orders had already been received. Boulton had been busily occupied
-during his absence in experimenting on the Soho engine. A new 18-inch
-cylinder had been cast for it at Bersham by John Wilkinson, the great
-ironfounder,[142] who had contrived a machine for boring it with accuracy.
-This cylinder was substituted for the tin one brought from Kinneil,
-and other improvements having been introduced, the engine was again set
-to work with very satisfactory results. Watt found his partner in good
-spirits; not less elated by the performances of the model than by the
-passing of the Act; and arrangements were at once set on foot for carrying
-on the manufacture of engines upon an extensive scale. Applications for
-terms, followed by orders, shortly came in from the mining districts; and
-before long the works at Soho were resounding with the clang of hammers
-and machinery employed in manufacturing steam-engines for all parts of
-the civilised world.
-
-    [142] John Wilkinson, the “father of the iron-trade” as he styled
-      himself, was a man of extraordinary energy of character.
-      He was strong-headed and strong-tempered and of inflexible
-      determination. His father, Isaac Wilkinson, who originally
-      started the iron trade at Wrexham, was a man possessed of
-      quick discernment and versatile talents, though he wanted
-      that firmness and constancy of purpose which so eminently
-      distinguished his son. Isaac Wilkinson used thus to tell his
-      own history:--“I worked,” said he, “at a forge in the north.
-      My masters gave me 12_s._ a week: I was content. They raised
-      me to 14_s._: I did not ask them for it. They went on to
-      16_s._, 18_s._: I never asked them for the advances. They gave
-      me a guinea a week! Said I to myself, if I am worth a guinea
-      a week to you, I am worth more to myself! I left them, and
-      began business on my own account--at first in a small way. I
-      prospered. I grew tired of my leathern bellows, and determined
-      to make iron ones. Everybody laughed at me. I did it, and
-      applied the steam-engine to blow them; and they all cried,
-      ‘Who could have thought it!’” His son John carried on the
-      operations connected with the iron manufacture on a far more
-      extensive scale than his father at Bradley, Willey, Snedshill,
-      and Bersham. His castings were the largest until then attempted,
-      and the boring machinery which he invented was the best of its
-      kind. All the castings for Boulton and Watt’s large Cornish
-      engines were manufactured by him, previous to the erection
-      of the Soho foundry. He also bored cannon for the government
-      on a large scale. Amongst his other merits, John Wilkinson
-      is clearly entitled to that of having built the first iron
-      vessel. It was made to bring peat-moss to his iron furnace at
-      Wilson House, near Castle Head, in Cartmel, in order to smelt
-      the hematite iron-ore of Furness. This was followed by other
-      larger iron vessels, one of which was of 40 tons burden, and
-      used to carry iron down the Severn. Before Wilkinson’s first
-      iron boat was launched, people laughed at the idea of its
-      _floating_,--as it was so well known that iron immediately sank
-      in water! In a letter to Mr. Stockdale, of Carke, Cartmel, the
-      original of which is before us, dated Broseley, 14th July,
-      1787, Mr. Wilkinson says, “Yesterday week my iron boat was
-      launched,--answers all my expectations, and has convinced the
-      unbelievers, who were 999 in 1000. It will be only a nine days’
-      wonder, and afterwards a Columbus’s egg.” In another letter,
-      dated Bradley Iron Works, 24th Oct., 1788, he writes to the
-      same,--“There have been two iron vessels launched in my service
-      since 1st September. One is a canal-boat for this navigation,
-      the other a barge of 40 tons, for the river Severn. The last was
-      floated on Monday, and is, I expect, now at Stourport, a-lading
-      with bar-iron. My clerk at Broseley advises me that she swims
-      remarkably light, and exceeds even my own expectations.” For
-      further notice of John Wilkinson, see ‘Lives of the Engineers,’
-      ii. 337, 356.
-
-
-
-
-[Illustration: WATT’S HOUSE, HARPER’S HILL, BIRMINGHAM.]
-
-CHAPTER XII.
-
-BOULTON AND WATT BEGIN THE MANUFACTURE OF STEAM-ENGINES.
-
-
-Watt now arranged to take up his residence in Birmingham until the issue
-of the steam-engine enterprise could be ascertained, and he went down
-to Glasgow to bring up his two children, whom he had left in charge of
-their relatives. Boulton had taken a house on Harper’s Hill, which was in
-readiness for the reception of the family on their arrival about the end
-of August, 1775. Regent’s-place, Harper’s Hill, was then the nearest house
-to Soho on that side of Birmingham. It was a double house, substantially
-built in brick, with stone facings, standing on the outskirts of the town,
-surrounded by fields and gardens. St. Paul’s, the nearest church, was not
-built until four years after Watt took up his abode there. But the house
-at Harper’s Hill is in the country no longer: it is now surrounded in
-all directions by dense masses of buildings, and is itself inhabited by
-working people.
-
-The first engine made at Soho was one ordered by John Wilkinson to
-blow the bellows of his ironworks at Broseley. Great interest was,
-of course, felt in the success of this engine. Watt took great pains
-with the drawings; the workmen did their best to execute the several
-parts accurately, for it was understood that many orders depended upon
-whether it worked satisfactorily or not. Wilkinson’s iron-manufacturing
-neighbours, who were contemplating the erection of Newcomen engines,
-suspended their operations until they had an opportunity of seeing
-what Boulton and Watt’s engine could do; and all looked forward to its
-completion with the most eager interest. When all was ready at Soho, the
-materials were packed up and sent to Broseley, Watt accompanying them
-to superintend the erection. He had as yet no assistant to whom he could
-intrust such a piece of work, on which so much depended. The engine was
-erected and ready for use about the beginning of 1776. As it approached
-completion Watt became increasingly anxious to make a trial of its powers.
-But Boulton wrote to him not to hurry--not to let the engine make a stroke
-until every possible hinderance to its successful action had been removed;
-“and then,” said he, “in the name of God, fall to and do your best.” The
-result of the extreme care taken with the construction and erection of
-the engine was entirely satisfactory. It worked to the admiration of all
-who saw it, and the fame of Boulton and Watt became great in the midland
-counties.
-
-While Watt was thus occupied, Boulton was pushing on the new buildings
-at Soho. He kept his partner fully advised of all that was going on.
-“The new forging-shop,” he wrote, “looks very formidable: the roof is
-nearly put on, and the hearths are both built.” Tools and machinery were
-being prepared, and all looked hopeful for the future. Orders were coming
-in for engines. One in hand for Bloomfield Colliery was well advanced.
-Many inquiries had come from Cornwall. Mr. Papps, of Truro, was anxious
-to introduce the engine in that county. Out of forty engines there,
-only eighteen were in work; so that there was a fine field for future
-operations. “Pray tell Mr. Wilkinson,” Boulton added, “to get a dozen
-cylinders cast and bored, from 12 to 50 inches diameter, and as many
-condensers of suitable sizes. The latter must be sent here, as we will
-keep them ready fitted up, and then an engine can be turned out of hand
-in two or three weeks. I have fixed my mind upon making from twelve to
-fifteen reciprocating and fifty rotative engines per annum. I assure you
-that of all the toys and trinkets which we manufacture at Soho, none shall
-take the place of fire-engines in respect of my attention.”[143]
-
-Boulton was not, however, exclusively engrossed by engine affairs. Among
-other things he informed Watt that he had put his little boy Jamie to a
-good school, and that he was very much occupied, as usual, in entertaining
-visitors. “The Empress of Russia,” he wrote, “is now at my house,
-and a charming woman she is.” The Empress afterwards sent Boulton her
-portrait, and it was long one of the ornaments of Soho. Amidst his various
-occupations he contrived to find leisure for experiments on minerals,
-having received from a correspondent in Wales a large assortment of
-iron-ores to assay. He was also trying experiments on the model engine,
-the results of which were duly communicated to his partner.[144]
-
-    [143] Boulton to Watt, 24th February, 1776. Boulton MSS.
-
-    [144] Watt was himself occupied, during his temporary residence at
-      Broseley, in devising improvements in the details of his engine.
-      Boulton says--“I observe you are thinking of making an inverted
-      cylinder. Pray how are you to counterbalance the descent of
-      the piston and pump rods, which will be a vast weight? If by a
-      counterweight you gain nothing. But if you can employ the power
-      that arises from the descent of that vast weight to strain a
-      spring that will repay its debts--if by it you can compress
-      air in an iron cylinder which in its return will contribute to
-      overcome the _vis inertiæ_ of the column of water to be raised,
-      you will thereby get rid of that unmechanical tax, and very
-      much improve the reciprocating engine.”--Boulton to Watt, 24th
-      February, 1776. Boulton MSS.
-
-On Watt’s return to Soho, Boulton proceeded to London on financial
-affairs, as well as to look after engine orders. He there found reports
-in circulation among the engineering class that the new engine had proved
-a failure. The Society of Engineers in Holborn, of which Smeaton was the
-great luminary, had settled it that neither the tools nor the workmen
-existed that could manufacture so complex a machine with sufficient
-precision, and it was asserted that all the ingenuity and skill of Soho
-had been unable to conquer the defects of the piston. “So said Holmes, the
-clockmaker,” wrote Boulton,--Holmes being the intimate friend of Smeaton;
-“but no language will be sufficiently persuasive on that head except the
-good performance of the engines themselves.”[145] Boulton, therefore,
-urged the completion of the engine then in hand for Cooke and Company’s
-distillery at Stratford-le-Bow, near London. “Wilby,” [the managing
-partner,] said he, “seems very impatient, and so am I, both for the sake
-of reputation as well as to begin to turn the tide of money,”--the current
-of which had as yet been all outwards. Boulton went to see the York
-Buildings engine, which had been reconstructed by Smeaton, and was then
-reckoned one of the best on the Newcomen plan. The old man who tended it
-lauded the engine to the skies, and notwithstanding Boulton’s description
-of the new engines at work in Staffordshire, he would not believe that
-any engine in existence could excel his own.
-
-    [145] Boulton to Watt, 23rd April, 1776. Boulton MSS.
-
-In the course of the summer Watt again visited Glasgow,--this time for the
-purpose of bringing back a wife. The lady he proposed to marry was Miss
-Anne Macgregor, daughter of a respectable dyer. The young lady’s consent
-was obtained, as well as her father’s, to the proposed union; but the
-latter, before making any settlement on his daughter, intimated to Watt
-that he desired to see the partnership agreement between him and Boulton.
-Now, although the terms of partnership had been generally arranged, they
-had not yet been put into legal form, and Watt asked that this should be
-done for the cautious old gentleman’s satisfaction without delay.[146]
-About his love affair Watt wrote,--
-
-  “Whether a man of the world, such as you, look upon my present
-  love as the folly of youth or the dotage of age [Watt was then in
-  his fortieth year], I find myself in no humour to lay it aside, or
-  to look upon it in either of these lights, but consider it as one
-  of the wisest of my actions, and should look upon a disappointment
-  in it as one of the greatest of my misfortunes.... I have had
-  better health since I left you than has been my lot for years, and
-  my spirits have borne me through my vexations wonderfully. I have
-  lost all dread of any future connexion with Monsieur la Verole,
-  and, if I carry my point in this matter, I hope to be very much
-  more useful to you than has hitherto been in my power. The spur
-  will be greater.”[147]
-
-    [146] The arrangement between the partners is indicated by the
-      following passage of Watt’s letter to Boulton:--“As you may have
-      possibly mislaid my missive to you concerning the contract, I
-      beg just to mention what I remember of the terms.
-
-      “1. I to assign to you two-thirds of the property of the
-      invention.
-
-      “2. You to pay all expenses of the Act or others incurred before
-      June, 1775 (the date of the Act), and also the expense of future
-      experiments, which money is to be sunk without interest by you,
-      being the consideration you pay for your share.
-
-      “3. You to advance stock in trade bearing interest, but having no
-      claim on me for any part of that, further than my intromissions;
-      the stock itself to be your security and property.
-
-      “4. I to draw one-third of the profits so soon as any arise
-      from the business, after paying the workmen’s wages and goods
-      furnished, but abstract from the stock in trade, excepting the
-      interest thereof, which is to be deducted before a balance is
-      struck.
-
-      “5. I to make drawings, give directions, and make surveys, the
-      company paying the travelling expenses to either of us when upon
-      engine business.
-
-      “6. You to keep the books and balance them once a year.
-
-      “7. A book to be kept wherein to be marked such transactions as
-      are worthy of record, which, when signed by both, to have the
-      force of the contract.
-
-      “8. Neither of us to alienate our share without consent of the
-      other, and if either of us by death or otherwise shall be
-      incapacitated from acting for ourselves, the other of us to be
-      the sole manager without contradiction or interference of heirs,
-      executors, assignees, or others; but the books to be subject to
-      their inspection, and the acting partner of us to be allowed a
-      reasonable commission for extra trouble.
-
-      “9. The contract to continue in force for twenty-five years,
-      from the 1st of June, 1775, when the partnership commenced,
-      notwithstanding the contract being of later date.
-
-      “10. Our heirs, executors, and assignees, bound to observance.
-
-      “11. In case of demise of both parties, our heirs, &c., to succeed
-      in same manner, and if they all please, they may burn the
-      contract.
-
-      “If anything be very disagreeable in these terms, you will
-      find me disposed to do everything reasonable for your
-      satisfaction.”--Boulton MSS.
-
-    [147] Watt to Boulton, 3rd July, 1776. Boulton MSS.
-
-While in Scotland Watt obtained orders for several engines; amongst
-others, he undertook to supply one for the Torryburn Colliery, in Fife, on
-the terms of receiving one-third of the savings effected by it compared
-with the engine then at work, with such further sum as might be judged
-fair. Another was ordered by Sir Archibald Hope for his colliery near
-Edinburgh, on similar terms. At the same time Watt proceeded with the
-collection of his old outstanding debts, though these did not amount to
-much. “I believe,” he wrote to Boulton, “I shall have no occasion to draw
-on you for any money, having got in some of my old scraps, which will
-serve, or nearly serve, my occasions here.”
-
-The deed of partnership not arriving, Watt wrote again, pressing Boulton
-for some communication from him to satisfy the old gentleman as to his
-situation.
-
-  “Don’t let me be detected in a falsehood,” said he, “or accused of
-  imprudence. The thing which sticks most in his [Mr. Macgregor’s]
-  stomach is, that somehow or other, in case of the failure of
-  success, I may be brought into a load of debt which may totally
-  ruin me. I hope you will excuse his caution in this matter, as I
-  do, when you consider that he is disposing of a favourite child,
-  and consequently must expect all the security possible for her
-  wellbeing. I must also do him the justice to say that he has
-  behaved to me in a very open and friendly manner; and, when he
-  found that his daughter’s affections were engaged beyond recall,
-  gave his consent with a good grace.... I have nothing to write
-  you in the way of news. I am bandied about like a football, and
-  perfectly impatient to leave this country, but do not care to
-  come away without my errand. I long vastly to hear from you, how
-  you all are, and how matters go on. I hope Jemmy is minding his
-  school and is well: you need not tell him nor anybody else that
-  I am going to bring him home a mamma.”[148]
-
-Boulton’s reply was perfectly satisfactory. He confirmed the heads of
-the agreement, as sketched out by Watt himself, adopting his own words.
-He warmly congratulated him on his approaching marriage, being convinced
-that it was the goddess of wisdom that had led him to the altar of love.
-But he thought Watt might be over delicate as to money matters.
-
-  “You certainly,” said he, “have a right to expect from the lady’s
-  father a child’s share, both present and reversionary; and you
-  certainly have a right to expect some ready money, as a small sum
-  may be of more importance to you in the meridian of life than a
-  large one at the close of it. I have always heard you speak of
-  the old gentleman as a man of exceeding good sound sense, and
-  therefore I should think you will have the less difficulty in
-  settling matters with him. No doubt he will expect some settlement
-  to be made upon his daughter, and all that I advise is, that you
-  do not undervalue (according to your custom) your own abilities
-  or your property. It may be difficult to say what is the value of
-  your property in partnership with me. However, I will give it a
-  name, and I do say that I would willingly give you two or perhaps
-  three thousand pounds for the assignment of your third part of
-  the Act of Parliament; but I should be sorry to make you so bad
-  a bargain, or to make any bargain at all that tended to deprive
-  me of your friendship, acquaintance, and assistance,--hoping, as
-  I do, that we shall harmoniously live to wear out the twenty-five
-  years together, which I had rather do than gain a Nabob’s fortune
-  by being the sole proprietor.... I wish I had more time to tell
-  you all the circumstances that have occurred in the engine trade;
-  but that shall be the subject of my next. All is well, and when
-  you return you’ll be quite charmed at the simplicity and quietness
-  of the Soho engine.”[149]
-
-    [148] Watt to Boulton, 8th July, 1776. Boulton MSS.
-
-    [149] Boulton to Watt, 15th July, 1776. Boulton MSS.
-
-With his usual want of confidence in himself, Watt urged Boulton to
-come down to Glasgow and assist him in concluding matters with the old
-gentleman.
-
-  “I am afraid,” he wrote, “that I shall otherwise make a very bad
-  bargain in money matters, which wise men like you esteem the most
-  essential part, and I myself, although I be an enamoured swain,
-  do not altogether despise. You may perhaps think it odd that in
-  the midst of my friends here I should call for your help; but the
-  fact is, that from several reasons I do not choose to place that
-  confidence in any of my friends here that would be necessary in
-  such a case, and I do not know any of them that have more to say
-  with the gentleman in question than I have myself. Besides, you
-  are the only person who can give him satisfactory information
-  concerning my situation.”
-
-But Boulton was too busy at the time to go down to Glasgow to the help
-of his partner. He was full of work, full of orders, full of Soho. He
-replied,--
-
-  “Although I have added to the list of my bad habits by joking
-  upon matrimony, yet my disposition and my judgment would lead me
-  to marry again were I in your case. I know you will be happier as
-  a married man than as a single one, and therefore it is wisdom
-  in you to wed; and if that could not be done without my coming
-  to Scotland, I certainly would come if it were as far again;
-  but I am so beset with difficulties, that nothing less than the
-  absolute loss of your life, or wife--which is virtually the same
-  thing--could bring me.”
-
-He further explained that a good deal of extra work had fallen upon
-him, through the absence of some of his most important assistants. Mr.
-Matthews, his London financial agent, like Watt, was about to be married,
-and would be absent abroad for a tour on a wedding trip, in which he was
-to be accompanied by Fothergill, Boulton’s partner in the toy and button
-trade. Mr. Scale, the manager, was also absent, added to which the button
-orders were in arrear some 16,000 gross; so that, said Boulton, “I have
-more real difficulties to grapple with than I hope ever to have in any
-other year in my life.”
-
-There were also constant visitors arriving at Soho: among others the Duke
-of Buccleuch, who had called to see the works and inquire after Mr. Watt;
-and Mr. Moor, of the Society of Engineers in the Adelphi, who had come to
-see with his own eyes whether the reports in circulation against the new
-engine were true or false. The perfecting of the details of the engine
-also required constant attention.
-
-  “Our copper bottom,” said Boulton, “hath plagued us very much
-  by steam leaks, and therefore I have had one cast (with its
-  conducting pipe) all in one piece; since which the engine doth
-  not take more than 10 feet of steam, and I hope to reduce that
-  quantity, as we have just received the new piston, which shall be
-  put in and at work to-morrow. Our Soho engine never was in such
-  good order as at present. Bloomfield and Willey [engines] are both
-  well, and I doubt not but Bow engine will be better than any of
-  ’em.”
-
-Boulton was almost as full of speculation as Watt himself as to the means
-of improving the engine. “I did not sleep last night,” he wrote, “my mind
-being absorbed by steam.” One of his speculations was as to the means of
-increasing the heating surface, and with that object he proposed to apply
-the fire “in copper spheres within the water.” His mind was also running
-on economising power by working steam expansively, “being clear that the
-principle is sound.”
-
-Later, he wrote Watt that he had an application from a distiller at
-Bristol for an engine to raise 15,000 gallons of ale per hour 15 feet
-high; another for a coal mine in Wales, and two others for London
-distilleries. To add to his anxieties, one Humphry Gainsborough, a
-dissenting minister at Henley-on-Thames, had instituted proceedings
-against Watt for an alleged piracy of his invention! On this Boulton
-wrote to his partner,--“I have just received a summons to attend the
-Solicitor-General next week in opposition to Gainsborough, otherwise
-the solicitor will make his report. This is a disagreeable circumstance,
-particularly at this season, when you are absent. Joseph [Harrison] is in
-London, and idleness is in our engine-shop.” There was therefore every
-reason why Watt should make haste to get married, and return to Soho as
-speedily as possible. On the 28th July, 1776, Watt wrote to apologise
-for his long absence, and to say that the event was to come off on the
-following Monday, after which he would set out immediately for Liverpool,
-where he proposed to meet Boulton, unless countermanded. He also intimated
-that he had got another order for an engine at Leadhills.[150] Arrived
-at Liverpool, a letter from Boulton met him, saying he had been under the
-necessity of proceeding to London.
-
-  “Gainsborough,” said he, “hath appointed to meet me at Holt’s,
-  his attorney, on Monday, when I shall say little besides
-  learning his principles and invention. If we had a hundred wheels
-  [wheel-engines] ready made, and a hundred small engines, like
-  Bow engine, and twenty large ones executed, we could readily
-  dispose of them. Therefore let us make hay while the sun shines,
-  and gather our barns full before the dark cloud of age lowers
-  upon us, and before any more Tubal Cains, Watts, Dr. Faustuses,
-  or Gainsboroughs, arise with serpents like Moses’s to devour
-  all others.... As to your absence, say nothing about it. I will
-  forgive it this time, provided you promise me never to marry
-  again.”[151]
-
-    [150] During his Scotch visit, Watt spent much of his time in
-      arranging his father’s affairs, which had got into confusion.
-      He was now seventy-five years old, and grown very infirm. “He
-      is perfectly incapable,” wrote his son, “of giving himself the
-      least help, and the seeing him in such a situation has much hurt
-      my spirits.”--Watt to Boulton, 28th July, 1766. Boulton MSS.
-
-    [151] Boulton to Watt (without date), 1776. Boulton MSS. In
-      this letter, Boulton throws out a suggestion for Watt’s
-      consideration--“When,” he says, “we have got our two-foot pumps
-      up, I think it would be right to try our Soho engine with a
-      steam strong enough to work the pumps with the axis in the
-      centre of the beam, which will be almost 19 lb. upon the inch.”
-
-Watt hastened back to Birmingham, and after settling his wife in her new
-home, proceeded with the execution of the orders for engines which had
-come in during his two months’ absence. Mr. Wilby was impatient for the
-delivery of the Bow engine, and as soon as it was ready, which was early
-in September, the materials were forwarded to London with Joseph Harrison,
-to be fitted and set to work. Besides careful verbal instructions, Watt
-supplied Joseph with full particulars in writing of the measures he was to
-adopt in putting the engine together. Not a point in detail was neglected,
-and if any difficulty arose, Joseph was directed at once to communicate
-with him by letter. When the engine was set to work, it was found that
-the steam could not be kept up, on which Watt suggested that as it had
-been calculated to make only ten strokes per minute--that being enough
-to raise the quantity of water desired--the reason of the defect must be
-that, as it was going at fourteen or fifteen strokes the minute, it must
-be going too fast. He also pointed out that probably the piston was not
-quite good, and perhaps there was some steam-leak into the inner cylinder,
-or by the regulators into the condenser; or it was possible that the
-injection might spout too far up the horizontal steam-pipe and throw water
-into the inner nozzle. All these points Joseph must carefully look to. On
-further trials the engine improved; still its performances did not come
-up to Watt’s expectations, and there were consequently more directions
-from him as to the packing of the pistons and measures for the prevention
-of leaks. But to see that his suggestions were properly carried out, Watt
-himself went up to town in November, and had the machine put in complete
-working trim. His partner, however, could not spare him long, as other
-orders were coming in. “We have a positive order,” wrote Boulton, “for an
-engine for Tingtang mine, and, from what I heard this day from Mr. Glover,
-we may soon expect other orders from Cornwall. Our plot begins to thicken
-apace, and if Mr. Wilkinson don’t bustle a little, as well as ourselves,
-we shall not gather our harvest before sunset.” ... “I hope to hear,” he
-added, “that Joseph hath made a finish, for he is much wanted here.... I
-perceive we shall be hard pushed in engine-work; but I have no fears of
-being distanced when once the exact course or best track is determined
-on.”[152] Joseph Harrison got quite knocked up and ill through his anxiety
-about the Bow engine, on which Boulton wrote Watt to send at once for Dr.
-Fordyce to attend him, “let the expense be what it will, until you think
-him safe landed.”
-
-    [152] Boulton to Watt, 3rd November, 1776. In the same letter
-      Boulton informs Watt that Perrins, another fireman, had returned
-      from Bedworth, and had not a stroke to do, the fittings for the
-      second engine not having arrived. The first engine was working
-      twenty-four hours a day, but the pit was so full of water that
-      the owners feared they would before long be drowned out; and
-      if the work was stopped, the loss would be far greater than the
-      whole value of the engine. But the sales of coal, though large,
-      were but “a small consideration in comparison with the starving
-      to death of the poor ribbon-weavers of Coventry and a great part
-      of Oxfordshire.... Coals are 9_d._ and 10_d._ per cwt., and ’tis
-      said they will be a shilling at Birmingham on Monday.”
-
-A letter reached Soho from the Shadwell Waterworks Company relative to a
-pumping-engine, and Boulton asked Watt, while in town, to wait upon them
-on the subject; but he cautioned Watt that he “never knew a Committee
-but, in its corporate capacity, was both rogue and fool, and that the
-Shadwell Committee were rich rogues.” Watt, by his own account, treated
-them very cavalierly. “Yesterday,” said he, “I went again to Shadwell
-to meet the deputies of the Committee, and to examine their engines when
-going. We came to no terms further than what we wrote them before, which I
-confirmed, and offered moreover to keep the engine in order for one year.
-They modestly insisted that we should do so for the whole twenty-five
-years, which I firmly refused. They seemed to doubt the reality of the
-performances of the Bow engine; so I told them we did not solicit their
-orders and would wait patiently until they were convinced,--moreover, that
-while they had any doubts remaining, we would not undertake their business
-on any terms. I should not have been so sharp with them had they not begun
-with bullying me, _selon la mode de Londres_. But the course I took was
-not without its effect, for in proportion as they found I despised their
-job, they grew more civil. After parting with these heroes I went down
-to Stratford, where I found that the engine had gone very well. I caused
-it to be kept going all the afternoon, and this morning I new-heat the
-piston and kept it going till dinner time at about fifteen strokes per
-minute, with a steam of one inch or at most two inches strong, and the
-longer it went the better it grew.... I propose that Joseph should not
-leave it for a few days, until both his health and that of the engine be
-confirmed. A relapse of the engine would ruin our reputation here, and
-indeed elsewhere.”[153]
-
-    [153] Watt to Boulton, 3rd December, 1776. Boulton MSS.
-
-The Bow engine had, however, a serious relapse in the following spring,
-and it happened in this way:--Mr. Smeaton, the engineer, having heard
-of its success, which he doubted, requested Hadley, Boulton’s agent, to
-go down with him to Stratford-le-Bow to witness its performances. He
-carefully examined the engine, and watched it while at work, and the
-conclusion he arrived at was, that it was a pretty engine, but much
-too complex for practical uses. On leaving the place Smeaton gave the
-engineman some money to drink, and he drank so much that next day he let
-the engine run quite wild, and it was thrown completely out of order. Mr.
-Wilby, the manager, was very wroth at the circumstance. He discharged the
-engineman and called upon Hadley to replace the valves, which had been
-broken, and make good the other damage that had been done to the engine.
-When the repairs were made, everything went satisfactorily as before.
-
-Watt had many annoyances of this sort to encounter, and one of his
-greatest difficulties was the incapacity and unsteadiness of his workmen.
-Although the original Soho men were among the best of their kind, the
-increasing business of the firm necessarily led to the introduction of
-a large number of new hands, who represented merely the average workmen
-of the day. They were for the most part poor mechanics, very inexpert at
-working in metal, and greatly given to drink.[154]
-
-    [154] Fire-engines at work were objects of curiosity in those
-      days, and had many visitors. The engineman at the York Buildings
-      reminded those who went to see his engine that something was
-      expected, placing over the entrance to the engine room the
-      following distich:--
-
-        “Whoever wants to see the engine here,
-        Must give the engine-man a drop of beer.”
-
-In organising the works at Soho, Boulton and Watt found it necessary
-to carry division of labour to the farthest practicable point. There
-were no slide-lathes, planing-machines, or boring-tools, such as now
-render mechanical accuracy of construction almost a matter of certainty.
-Everything depended upon the individual mechanic’s accuracy of hand and
-eye; and yet mechanics generally were then much less skilled than they are
-now. The way in which Boulton and Watt contrived partially to get over the
-difficulty was, to confine their workmen to special classes of work, and
-make them as expert in them as possible. By continued practice in handling
-the same tools and fabricating the same articles, they thus acquired great
-individual proficiency. “Without our tools and our workmen,” said Watt,
-“very little could be done.”
-
-But when the men got well trained, the difficulty was to keep them.
-Foreign tempters were constantly trying to pick up Boulton and Watt’s men,
-and induce them by offers of larger wages to take service abroad. The two
-fitters sent up to London to erect the Bow engine were strongly pressed
-to go out to Russia.[155] There were also French agents in England at the
-same time, who tried to induce certain of Boulton and Watt’s men to go
-over to Paris and communicate the secret of making the new engines to M.
-Perrier, who had undertaken to pump water from the Seine for the supply
-of Paris. The German States also sent over emissaries with a like object,
-Baron Stein having been specially commissioned by his Government to master
-the secret of Watt’s engine--to obtain working plans of it and bring away
-workmen capable of making it,--the first step taken being to obtain access
-to the engine-rooms by bribing the workmen.
-
-    [155] “Mr. White told me this morning as a great secret,” wrote
-      Boulton’s London agent, “that he has reason to believe that
-      Carless and Webb were going beyond sea, for Carless had told him
-      he had 1000_l._ offered for six years, and he overheard Webb say
-      that he was ready at an hour’s warning.” Carless and Webb were
-      immediately ordered back to Soho, and the firm obtained warrants
-      for the apprehension of the men as well as of the person who
-      had bribed them, if they attempted to abscond “even though,”
-      said Watt to Boulton, “Carless be a drunken and comparatively
-      useless fellow.” Later he wrote, “I think there is no risk of
-      Webb’s leaving us soon, and he offers to re-engage. Carless has
-      been working very diligently this week, and is well on with his
-      nozzle patterns. I mentioned to William the story of Sir John
-      Fielding’s warrant, to show him that we are determined to act
-      with spirit in case of interlopers.”--Watt to Boulton, May 3,
-      1777.
-
-Besides the difficulties Boulton and Watt had to encounter in training
-and disciplining their own workmen, they had also to deal with the want
-of skill on the part of those to whom the working of their engines
-was intrusted after they had been delivered and fixed complete. They
-occasionally supplied trustworthy men of their own; but they could not
-educate mechanics fast enough, and needed all the best men for their own
-work. They were therefore compelled to rely on the average mechanics of
-the day, the greater part of whom were comparatively unskilled and knew
-nothing of the steam-engine. Hence such mishaps as those which befell the
-Bow engine, through the engineman getting drunk and reckless, as above
-described. To provide for this contingency Watt endeavoured to simplify
-the engine as much as possible, so as to bring its working and repair
-within the capacity of the average workman.
-
-At a very early period, while experimenting at Kinneil, he had formed the
-idea of working steam expansively, and altered his model from time to time
-with that object. Boulton had taken up and continued the experiments at
-Soho, believing the principle to be sound and that great economy would
-attend its adoption. The early engines were accordingly made so that the
-steam might be cut off before the piston had made its full stroke, and
-expand within the cylinder, the heat outside it being maintained by the
-expedient of the steam-case. But it was shortly found that this method of
-working was beyond the capacity of the average engineman of that day, and
-it was consequently given up for a time.
-
-  “We used to send out,” said Watt to Robert Hart, “a cylinder of
-  double the size wanted, and cut off the steam at half stroke. This
-  was a great saving of steam so long as the valves remained as at
-  first; but when our men left her to the charge of the person who
-  was to keep her, he began to make or try to make improvements,
-  often by giving more steam. The engine did more work while the
-  steam lasted, but the boiler could not keep up the demand. Then
-  complaints came of want of steam, and we had to send a man down
-  to see what was wrong. This was so expensive that we resolved to
-  give up the expansion of the steam until we could get men that
-  could work it, as a few tons of coal per year was less expensive
-  than having the work stopped. In some of the mines a few hours’
-  stoppage was a serious matter, as it would cost the proprietor as
-  much as 70_l._ per hour.”[156]
-
-The principle was not, however, abandoned. It was of great value and
-importance in an economical point of view, and was again taken up by Watt
-and embodied in a more complete form in a subsequent invention. Since his
-time, indeed, expansive working has been carried to a much farther extent
-than he probably ever dreamt of, and has more than realised the beneficial
-results which his sagacious insight so early anticipated.
-
-    [156] Robert Hart’s ‘Reminiscences of James Watt,’ cited above.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XIII.
-
-WATT IN CORNWALL--INTRODUCTION OF HIS PUMPING-ENGINES.
-
-
-The Cornish miners continued baffled by their attempts to get rid of the
-water which hindered the working of their mines. The Newcomen engines
-had been taxed to the utmost, but were unable to send them deeper into
-the ground, and they were accordingly ready to welcome any invention
-that promised to relieve them of their difficulty. Among the various new
-contrivances for pumping water, that of Watt seemed to offer the greatest
-advantages; and if what was alleged of it proved true--that it was of
-greater power than the Newcomen engine, while its consumption of fuel was
-much less,--then it could not fail to prove of the greatest advantage to
-Cornish industry.
-
-Long before Watt’s arrival in Birmingham, the Cornishmen had been in
-correspondence with Boulton, making inquiries about the new Scotch
-invention, of which they had heard; and Dr. Small, in his letters to
-Watt, repeatedly urged him to perfect his engine, with a view to its being
-employed in the drainage of the Cornish mines. Now that the engine was at
-work in several places, Boulton invited his correspondents in Cornwall
-to inquire as to its performances, at Soho, or Bedworth, or Bow, or any
-other place where it had been erected. The result of the inquiry and
-inspection was satisfactory, and several orders for engines for Cornwall
-were received at Soho by the end of 1776. The two first that were ready
-for erection were those ordered for Wheal Busy, near Chacewater, and for
-Tingtang, near Redruth. The materials for the former were shipped by the
-middle of 1777; and, as much would necessarily depend upon the successful
-working of the first engines put up in Cornwall, Watt himself went to
-superintend their erection in person.
-
-[Illustration: MAP OF UNITED MINES DISTRICT.]
-
-Watt reached his destination after a long and tedious journey over bad
-roads. He rode by stage as far as Exeter, and posted the rest of the way.
-At Chacewater he found himself in the midst of perhaps the richest mining
-district in the world. From thence to Camborne, which lies to the west,
-and Gwennap to the south, is a constant succession of mines. The earth
-has been burrowed in all directions for many miles in search of ore,
-principally copper--the surface presenting an unnaturally blasted and
-scarified appearance by reason of the “deads” or refuse run out in heaps
-from the mine-heads. Engine-houses and chimneys are the most prominent
-features in the landscape, and dot the horizon as far as the eye can
-reach.
-
-When Watt arrived at Chacewater he found the materials for the Wheal Busy
-engine had come to hand, and that some progress had been made with its
-erection. The materials for the Tingtang engine, however, had not yet
-been received from Soho, and the owners of the mine were becoming very
-impatient for it. Watt wrote to his partner urging despatch, otherwise
-the engine might be thrown on their hands, especially if the Chacewater
-engine, now nearly ready for work, did not give satisfaction. From Watt’s
-account, it would appear that the Cornish mines were in a very bad way.
-“The Tingtang people,” he said, “are now fairly put out by water, and the
-works are quite at a stand.” The other mines in the neighbourhood were
-in no better plight. The pumping-engines could not keep down the water.
-“Poldice has grown worse than Wheal Virgin was: they have sunk 400_l._ a
-month for some months past, and 700_l._ the last month; they will probably
-soon give up. North Downs seems to be our next card.”[157] The owners of
-the Wheal Virgin mine, though drowned out, like many others, could not
-bring their minds to try Watt’s engine. They had no faith in it, and stuck
-by the old atmospheric of Newcomen. They accordingly erected an additional
-engine of this kind to enable them to go about eight fathoms deeper, “and
-they have bought,” wrote Watt, “an old boiler of monstrous size at the
-Briggin, which they have offered 50_l._ to get carried to its place.”
-
-    [157] Watt to Boulton, 4th August, 1777.
-
-At Chacewater Watt first met Jonathan Hornblower, son of the Joseph
-Hornblower who had come into Cornwall from Staffordshire, some fifty years
-before, to erect one of the early Newcomen engines. The son had followed
-in his father’s steps, and become celebrated in the Chacewater district
-as an engineer. It was natural that he should regard with jealousy the
-patentees of the new engine; for if it proved a success, his vocation as
-a maker of atmospheric engines would be at an end. Watt thus referred to
-him in a letter to Boulton: “Hornblower seems a very pleasant sort of old
-Presbyterian: he carries himself very fair, though I hear that he is an
-unbelieving Thomas.” His unbelief strongly showed itself on the starting
-of the Wheal Busy engine shortly after, when he exclaimed, “Pshaw! it’s
-but a bauble: I wouldn’t give twopence halfpenny for her.” There were
-others beside Hornblower who disliked and resented what they regarded as
-the intrusion of Boulton and Watt in their district, and indeed never
-became wholly reconciled to the new engine, though they were compelled
-to admit the inefficiency of the old one. Among these was old Bonze, the
-engineer, a very clever mechanic, who positively refused to undertake the
-erection of the proposed new engine at Wheal Union if Boulton and Watt
-were to be in any way concerned with it. But the mine-owners had to study
-their own interest rather than the humour of their former engineers, and
-Watt secured the order for the Wheal Union engine. Several other orders
-were promised, conditional on the performances of the Wheal Busy engine
-proving satisfactory. “Ale and Cakes,”[158] wrote Watt, “must wait the
-result of Chacewater: several new engines will be erected next year, for
-almost all the old mines are exhausted, or have got to the full power of
-the present engines, which are clumsy and nasty, the houses cracked, and
-everything dropping with water from their cisterns.”[159]
-
-    [158] A mine so-called. Many of the Cornish mines have very odd
-      names. “Cook’s Kitchen,” near Camborne, is one of the oldest
-      and richest. Another is called “Cupboard.” There are also Wheal
-      Fannys and Wheal Abrahams; and Wheal Fortunes and Wheal Virgins
-      in great numbers.
-
-    [159] Watt to Boulton, 14th August, 1777.
-
-Watt liked the people as little as he did their engines. He thought them
-ungenerous, jealous, and treacherous. “Certainly,” said he, “they have
-the most ungracious manners of any people I have ever yet been amongst.”
-At the first monthly meeting of the Wheal Virgin adventurers, which he
-attended, he found a few gentlemen, but “the bulk of them would not be
-disgraced by being classed with Wednesbury colliers.” What annoyed him
-most was, that the miners invented and propagated all sorts of rumours
-to his prejudice. “We have been accused,” said he, “of working without
-leather upon our buckets, and making holes in the clacks in order to
-deceive strangers.... I choose to keep out of their company, as every word
-spoken by me would be bandied about and misrepresented. I have already
-been accused of making several speeches at Wheal Virgin, where, to the
-best of my memory, I have only talked about eating, drinking, and the
-weather. The greater part of the adventurers at Wheal Virgin are a mean
-dirty pack, preying upon one another, and striving who shall impose most
-upon the mine.”[160] Watt was of too sensitive and shrinking a nature
-to feel himself at home amongst such people. Besides, he was disposed
-to be peevish and irritable, easily cast down, and ready to anticipate
-the worst. It had been the same with him when employed amongst the rough
-labourers on the Monkland Canal, where he had declared himself as ready to
-face a loaded cannon as to encounter the altercations of bargain-making.
-But Watt must needs reconcile himself to his post as he best could; for
-none but himself could see to the proper erection of the Wheal Busy engine
-and get it set to work with any chance of success. Meanwhile, the native
-engineers were stimulated by his presence, and by the reputed power of
-the new engine, to exert themselves in improving the old one. Bonze was
-especially active in contriving new boilers and new arrangements, by which
-he promised to outstrip all that Watt could possibly accomplish.[161]
-
-    [160] Watt to Boulton, 25th August, 1777. Boulton MSS.
-
-    [161] “I have seen five of Bonze’s engines,” wrote Watt, “but was
-      far from seeing the wonders promised. They were 60, 63, and 70
-      inch cylinders. At Dalcoath and Wheal Chance they are said to
-      use each about 130 bushels of coals in the 24 hours, and to make
-      about 6 or 7 strokes per minute, the strokes being under 6 feet
-      each. They are burdened to 6, 6½, and 7 lbs. per inch. One of
-      the 60 inches threw out about two cubic feet of hot water per
-      stroke, heated from 60° to 165°. The 63 inches, with a 5 feet
-      stroke, threw out 1½ cubic foot, heated from 60° to 159°,” and
-      so on with the others.--Watt to Boulton, 25th August, 1777.
-      Boulton MSS.
-
-A letter from Mrs. Watt to Mrs. Boulton, dated Chacewater, September 1st,
-1777, throws a little light on Watt’s private life during his stay in
-Cornwall. She describes the difficulty they had in obtaining accommodation
-on their arrival, “no such thing as a house or lodging to be had for any
-money within some miles of the place where the engine was to be erected;”
-hence they had been glad to accept of the hospitality of Mr. Wilson, the
-superintendent of the mine.
-
-  “I scarcely know what to say to you of the country. The spot we
-  are at is the most disagreeable in the whole county. The face of
-  the earth is broken up in ten thousand heaps of rubbish, and there
-  is scarce a tree to be seen. But don’t think that all Cornwall
-  is like Chacewater. I have been at some places that are very
-  pleasant, nay beautiful. The sea-coast to me is charming, but not
-  easy to be got at. In some cases my poor husband has been obliged
-  to mount me behind him to go to some of the places we have been
-  at. I assure you I was not a little perplexed at first to be set
-  on a great tall horse with a high pillion. At one of our jaunts we
-  were only charged twopence a piece for our dinner. You may guess
-  what our fare would be from the cost of it; but I assure you I
-  never ate a dinner with more relish in my life, nor was I ever
-  happier at a feast, than I was that day at Portreath.... One thing
-  I _must_ tell you of is, to take care Mr. Boulton’s principles
-  are well fixed before you trust him here. Poor Mr. Watt is turned
-  Anabaptist, and duly attends their meeting; he is, indeed, and
-  goes to chapel most devoutly.”
-
-At last the Chacewater engine was finished and ready for work. Great
-curiosity was felt about its performances, and mining men and engineers
-came from all quarters to see it start. “All the world are agape,” said
-Watt, “to see what it can do.” It would not have displeased some of the
-spectators if it had failed. But to their astonishment it succeeded. At
-starting, it made eleven eight-feet strokes per minute; and it worked
-with greater power, went more steadily, and “forked” more water than
-any of the ordinary engines, with only about one-third the consumption
-of coal. “We have had many spectators,” wrote Watt, “and several have
-already become converts. I understand all the west-country captains are
-to be here to-morrow to see the prodigy.”[162] Even Bonze, his rival,
-called to see it, and promised not only to read his recantation as soon
-as convinced, but never to touch a common engine again. “The velocity,
-violence, magnitude, and horrible noise of the engine,” Watt added, “give
-universal satisfaction to all beholders, believers or not. I have once
-or twice trimmed the engine to end its stroke gently, and to make less
-noise; but Mr. Wilson cannot sleep without it seems quite furious, so I
-have left it to the engine-men; and, by the by, the noise seems to convey
-great ideas of its power to the ignorant, who seem to be no more taken
-with modest merit in an engine than in a man.” In a later letter he wrote,
-“The voice of the country seems to be at present in our favour; and I hope
-will be much more so when the engine gets on its whole load, which will
-be by Tuesday next. So soon as that is done, I shall set out for home.”
-
-[Illustration: WATT’S SINGLE-ACTING PUMPING-ENGINE FOR MINES.]
-
-    [162] Watt to Boulton, 13th September, 1777.
-
-A number of orders for engines had come in at Soho during Watt’s absence;
-and it became necessary for him to return there as speedily as possible,
-to prepare the plans and drawings, and put the work in hand. There was
-no person yet attached to the concern who was capable of relieving him of
-this part of his duties; while Boulton was fully occupied with conducting
-the commercial part of the business. By the end of autumn he was again
-at home; and for a week after his return he kept so close to his desk in
-his house on Harper’s Hill, that he could not even find time enough to
-go out to Soho and see what had been doing in his absence. At length he
-felt so exhausted by the brain-work and confinement that he wrote to his
-partner, “a very little more of this hurrying and vexation will knock me
-up altogether.” To add to his troubles, letters arrived from Tingtang,
-urging his return to Cornwall, to erect the engine, the materials for
-which had at last arrived. “I fancy,” said Watt, “that I must be cut in
-pieces, and a portion sent to every tribe in Israel.”
-
-After four month’s labour of this sort, during which seven out of the
-ten engines then in hand were finished and erected, and the others
-well advanced, Watt again set out for Cornwall, which he reached by
-the beginning of June, 1778. He took up his residence at Redruth, as
-being more convenient for Tingtang than Chacewater, hiring a house at
-Plengwarry, a hamlet on the outskirts of the town. Redruth is the capital
-of the mining districts of Camborne, Redruth, and Gwennap. It is an
-ancient town, consisting for the most part of a long street, which runs
-down one hill and up another.
-
-All round it the country seems to have been disembowelled; and heaps of
-scoriæ, “deads,” rubbish, and granite blocks cover the surface. The view
-from the lofty eminence of Carn Brea, a little to the south of Redruth,
-strikingly shows the scarified and apparently blasted character of the
-district, and affords a prospect the like of which is rarely to be seen.
-
-[Illustration: REDRUTH HIGH STREET.
-
-[By R. P. Leitch.]]
-
-On making inquiry as to the materials which had arrived during his
-absence, Watt was much mortified to find that the Soho workmen had made
-many mistakes. “Forbes’s eduction-pipe,” he wrote, “is a most vile job,
-and full of holes. The cylinder they have cast for Chacewater is still
-worse, for it will hardly do at all. The Soho people have sent here
-Chacewater eduction-pipe instead of Wheal Union; and the gudgeon pipe has
-not arrived with the nozzles. These repeated disappointments,” said he,
-“will undoubtedly ruin our credit in the country; and I cannot stay here
-to bear the shame of such failures of promise.”
-
-Watt had a hard time of it while in Cornwall, what with riding and walking
-from mine to mine, listening to complaints of delay in the arrival of
-the engines from Soho, and detecting and remedying the blunders and bad
-workmanship of his mechanics. Added to which, everybody was low-spirited
-and almost in despair at the bad times,--ores falling in price, mines
-filled with water, engine-men standing idle, and adventurers bemoaning
-their losses. Another source of anxiety was the serious pecuniary
-embarrassments in which the Soho firm had become involved. Boulton had
-so many concerns going that a vast capital was required for the purpose
-of meeting current engagements; and the engine business, instead of
-relieving him, had hitherto only proved a source of additional outlay, and
-increased his difficulties at a time of general commercial depression. He
-wrote Watt, urging him to send remittances for the Cornish engines; but
-the materials, though partly delivered, were not erected; and the miners
-demurred to paying on account until they were fixed complete and at work.
-Boulton then suggested to Watt that he should try to obtain an advance
-from the Truro bankers, on security of the engine materials. “No,” replied
-Watt, “that cannot be done, as the knowledge of our difficulties would
-damage our position in Cornwall, and hurt our credit. Besides,” said he,
-“no one can be more cautious than a Cornish banker; and the principal of
-the firm you name is himself exceedingly distressed for money.”[163] Nor
-was there the least chance, in Watt’s opinion, even if they had the money
-to advance, of their accepting any security that Boulton and Watt had to
-offer. “Such is the nature of the people here,” said he, “and so little
-faith have they in our engine, that very few of them believe it to be
-materially better than the ordinary one, and so far as I can judge, no one
-I have conversed with would advance us 500_l._ on a mortgage of it.”[164]
-
-    [163] Watt to Boulton, 2nd July, 1778. Boulton MSS.
-
-    [164] Watt to Boulton, 8th July, 1778, Boulton MSS.
-
-All that Watt could do was to recommend that the evil day should be
-staved off as long as possible, or at all events until the large engines
-he was then erecting were at work, when he believed their performances
-would effect a complete change in the views of the adventurers. The
-only suggestion he could offer was to invite John Wilkinson, or some
-other moneyed man, to join them as partner and relieve them of their
-difficulties; for “rather than founder at sea,” said he, “we had better
-run ashore.”[165] Meanwhile, he urged Boulton to apply the pruning-knife
-and cut down expenses, assuring him that he himself was practising all the
-frugality in his power. But as Watt’s personal expenses at the time did
-not amount to 2_l._ a week, it is clear that any savings he could effect,
-however justifiable and laudable, were but a drop in the ocean compared
-with the liabilities to be met, and which must be provided without delay
-to avoid insolvency and ruin.
-
-    [165] Watt to Boulton, 8th July, 1778. Boulton MSS.
-
-Fothergill, Boulton’s other partner, was even more desponding than Watt.
-When Boulton left Soho on his journeys to raise ways and means, Fothergill
-pursued him with dolorous letters, telling him of mails that had arrived
-without remittances, of bills that must be met, of wages that must be paid
-on Saturday night, and of the impending bankruptcy of the firm, which
-he again and again declared to be “inevitable.” “Better stop payment at
-once,” said he, “call our creditors together, and face the worst, than
-go on in this neck-and-neck race with ruin.” Boulton would hurry back to
-Soho, to quiet Fothergill, and keep the concern going; on which another
-series of letters would pour in upon him from Mr. Matthews, the London
-financial agent, pressing for remittances, and reporting the increasingly
-gloomy and desperate state of affairs.
-
-Boulton himself was, as usual, equal to the occasion. His courage and
-determination rose in proportion to the difficulties to be overcome. He
-was borne up by his invincible hope, by his unswerving purpose, and above
-all by his unshaken belief in the commercial value of the condensing
-engine. If they could only weather the storm until its working powers
-could be fully demonstrated, all would yet be well.
-
-In illustration of his hopefulness, we may mention that in the midst
-of his troubles a fire took place in the engine-room at Soho, which was
-happily extinguished, but not before it had destroyed the roof and done
-serious damage to the engine, which was brought to a standstill. Boulton
-had long been desirous of rebuilding the engine-house in a proper manner,
-but had been hindered by Watt, who was satisfied with alterations merely
-sufficient to accommodate the place to the changes made from time to time
-in the engine which he called “Beelzebub.”[166] On hearing of the damage
-done by the fire, Boulton, instead of lamenting over it, exclaimed, “_Now_
-I shall be able at last to have the engine-house built as it should be.”
-
-    [166] While in Cornwall in the previous year, Watt wrote long
-      letters to his partner as to certain experimental alterations
-      of “Beelzebub.” This was the original engine brought from
-      Kinneil, which continued to be the subject of constant changes.
-      “I send a drawing,” he wrote on the 4th August, 1777, “of the
-      best scheme I can at present devise for equalising the power
-      of Beelzebub, and obliging him to save part of his youthful
-      strength to help him forward in his old age.... As the head of
-      one of the levers will rise higher than the roof, a hole must
-      be cut for it, which may after trial be covered over. If the
-      new beam answer to be centred upon the end wall and to go out
-      at a window, it will make the execution easy.... I long (he
-      concluded) to have some particulars of Beelzebub’s doings, and
-      to learn whether he has got on his jockey coat yet [_i. e._ an
-      outer cylinder], for till that be done, you can form no idea
-      of his perfection.” The engine continued to be the subject of
-      repeated alterations, and was renewed, as Watt observed, like
-      the Highlandman’s gun, in stock, lock, and barrel. After the
-      occurrence of the above fire, we learn from Watt’s MS. Memoir of
-      Boulton, that “Beelzebub” was replaced by a larger engine, the
-      first on the expansive principle, afterwards known by the name
-      of “Old Bess.” This engine continued in its place long after
-      the career of Boulton and Watt had come to an end; and in the
-      year 1857, the present writer saw “Old Bess” working as steadily
-      as ever, though eighty years had passed over her head. The old
-      engine has since found an honourable asylum in the Museum of
-      Patents at South Kensington.
-
-After many negotiations, Boulton at length succeeded in raising a sum of
-7000_l._ by granting a Mr. Wiss security for the payment of an annuity,
-while the London bankers, Lowe, Vere, and Williams, allowed an advance
-of 14,000_l._ on security of a mortgage granted by Boulton and Watt on
-the royalties derived from the engine patent, and of all their rights and
-privileges therein. Though the credit of the house was thus saved, the
-liabilities of Boulton and his partners continued to press heavily upon
-them for a long time to come. Meanwhile, however, a gleam of light came
-from Cornwall. Watt sent the good news to Soho that “both Chacewater and
-Tingtang engines go on exceedingly well, and give great satisfaction.
-Chacewater goes 14 strokes of 9 foot long per minute, and burns about 128
-bushels per 24 hours. The water has sunk 12 fathoms in the mine, and the
-engine will fork [_i. e._ pump out] the first lift this night. No cross
-nor accident of any note has happened, except the bursting of a pump
-at Tingtang, which was soon repaired.” Four days later Watt wrote, “The
-engines are both going very well, and Chacewater has got the water down
-18½ fathoms; but after this depth it must make slower progress, as a very
-large house of water begins there, and the feeders grow stronger as we go
-deeper.”[167]
-
-    [167] Watt to Boulton, 8th August, 1778. Boulton MSS.
-
-Watt looked upon the Chacewater trial as the _experimentum crucis_,
-and continued to keep his partner duly informed of every circumstance
-connected with it. “They say,” he wrote, “that if the new engine can fork
-the water from Chacewater, it can fork anything, as that is the heaviest
-to fork in the whole county.” On the 15th of August he wrote, “Chacewater
-is now down to 10 fathoms of the second lift, and works steady and well;
-it sinks 9 feet per day. Chacewater people in high spirits: Captain
-Mayor furiously in love with the engine.” On the 29th he wrote again,
-“Chacewater engine is our capital card, for should it succeed in forking
-this mine all doubts will then be removed.” The adventurers of the great
-Poldice mine watched the operations at Chacewater with much interest. Two
-common engines, pumping night and day for months, had failed to clear
-their mine of water; and now they thought of ordering one of the new
-engines to take their place; “but all this,” said Watt, “depends on the
-success of Chacewater, which God protect: it is now down 31½ fathoms, and
-will be in fork of this lift to-morrow, when it is to be put down three
-fathoms lower, and fixed there.” On the 17th he wrote, “I have been at
-Chacewater to-day, where they are in fork of the second lift 34½ fathoms.
-The great connexion-rod still unbalanced. The engine went yesterday 14
-strokes per minute. To-morrow I go to Wheal Union, and on Saturday to
-Truro, to meet Poldice adventurers.... By attending to the business of
-this county alone,” said he, “we may at least live comfortably; for I
-cannot suppose that less than twelve engines will be wanted in two or
-three years, but after that very few more, as these will be sufficient
-to get ore enough; though you cannot reckon the average profits to us at
-above 200_l._ per engine.”
-
-When Boulton and Watt first started the manufacture of steam-engines,
-they were mainly concerned to get orders, and were not very particular as
-to the terms on which they were obtained. But when the orders increased,
-and the merits of the invention gradually became recognised, they found
-it necessary to require preliminary agreements to be entered into as to
-the terms on which the patent was to be used. It occurred to them, that
-as one of its principal merits consisted in the saving of fuel, it would
-be a fair arrangement to take one-third of the value of such saving by
-way of royalty, leaving the owners of the engines to take the benefit
-of the remaining two-thirds. Nothing could be fairer than the spirit of
-this arrangement, which, it will be seen, was of even more advantage to
-the owners of the engines than to the patentees themselves. The first
-Cornish engines were, however, erected without any condition as to terms;
-and it was only after they had proved their power by “forking” the water,
-and sending the miners twenty fathoms deeper into the ground, that the
-question of terms was raised. Watt proposed that agreements should be
-entered into on the basis above indicated. But the Cornish men did not see
-the use of agreements. They had paid for the engines, which were theirs,
-and Boulton and Watt could not take them away. Here was the beginning of
-a long series of altercations, which ended only with the patent right
-itself. The miners could not do without the engine. It was admitted to
-be of immense value to them, rendering many of their mines workable that
-would otherwise have been valueless. But why should they have to pay
-for the use of such an invention? This was what they never could clearly
-understand.
-
-To prevent misunderstandings in future, Watt wrote to Boulton,
-recommending that no further orders for engines should be taken unless the
-terms for using them were definitely settled beforehand. “You must excuse
-me,” he added, “when I tell you that, for my part, I will not put pen to
-paper [_i. e._ make the requisite drawings] on a new subject until that is
-done. Until an engine is ordered, our power is greater than that of the
-Lord Chancellor; as I believe even he cannot compel us to make it unless
-we choose. Let our terms be moderate, and, if possible, consolidated into
-money _à priori_, and it is certain we shall get _some_ money, enough
-to keep us out of jail, in continual apprehension of which I live at
-present.”[168]
-
-    [168] Watt to Boulton, 29th August, 1778. Later, Watt wrote from
-      Redruth, “Captain Paul desires me to attend at Wheal Virgin
-      meeting on Thursday, where several Tingtang people will be;
-      but I shall only write, as I know they will be just in the
-      worst of humours about Wheal Virgin affairs, and they are
-      very disagreeable at the best. Every article must be settled
-      and sealed with Cornish adventures before we begin, otherwise
-      never.... Do not let Chelsea begin until signed and sealed. I
-      hope you will not take amiss my writing so positively on this
-      subject of agreements; but really my faith in mankind will carry
-      me no further, and if I can’t get money, I’m resolved to save
-      my bacon and to live in hunger and ease. As it is, we don’t get
-      such a share of reputation as our works deserve, for every man
-      who cheats us defames us in order to justify himself.”--Watt to
-      Boulton, 6th September, 1778. Boulton MSS.
-
-To meet the case, a form of agreement was drawn up and required to be
-executed before any future engine was commenced. It usually provided that
-an engine of certain given dimensions and power was to be erected at the
-expense of the owners of the mine; and that the patentees were to take as
-their recompense for the use of their invention, one-third of the value of
-the fuel saved by it compared with the consumption of the ordinary engine.
-It came to be understood that the saving of fuel was to be estimated
-according to the number of strokes made. To ascertain this, Watt contrived
-an ingenious piece of clockwork, termed the Counter, which, being attached
-to the main beam, accurately marked and registered, under lock and key,
-the number of its vibrations. Thus the work done was calculated, and the
-comparative saving of fuel was ascertained.
-
-Though the Cornish miners had been full of doubts as to the successful
-working of Watt’s engine, they could not dispute the evidence of their
-senses after it had been erected and was fairly at work. There it was,
-“forking water” as never engine before had been known to “fork.” It had
-completely mastered the water at Wheal Busy; and if it could send the
-workmen down that mine, it could in like manner send them down elsewhere.
-Wheal Virgin was on the point of stopping work, in which case some two
-thousand persons would be thrown out of bread. Bonze’s new atmospheric
-engine had proved a failure, and the mine continued flooded. It had also
-failed at Poldice, which was drowned out. “Notwithstanding the violence
-and prejudice against us,” wrote Watt, “nothing can save the mines but our
-engines.... _Even the infidels of Dalcoath_ are now obliquely inquiring
-after our terms! Cook’s Kitchen, which communicates with it, has been
-drowned out some time.” Watt, accordingly, had many applications about
-engines; and on that account he entreated his partner to come to his
-help. He continued to hate all negotiating about terms, and it did not
-seem as if he would ever learn to like it. He had neither the patience
-to endure, nor the business tact to conduct a negotiation. He wanted
-confidence in himself, and did not feel equal to make a bargain. He would
-almost as soon have wrestled with the Cornish miners as higgled with
-them. They were shrewd, practical men, rough in manner and speech, yet
-honest withal;[169] but Watt would not encounter them when he could avoid
-it. Hence his repeated calls to Boulton to come and help him. Writing
-to him about the proposed Wheal Virgin engine, he said, “Before I make
-any bargain with these people, I must have you here.” A few days after,
-when communicating the probability of obtaining an order for the Poldice
-engine, he wrote,--“I wish you would dispose yourself for a journey here,
-and strike while this iron is hot.” A fortnight later he said, “Poldice
-people are now welding hot, and must not be suffered to cool. They are
-exceedingly impatient, as they lose 150_l._ a month until our engine
-is going.... I hope this will find you ready to come away. At Redruth,
-inquire for Plengwarry Green, where you will find me.”
-
-    [169] “With all the faults of the Cornish people, I think we have
-      a better chance for tolerable honesty here than elsewhere, as,
-      their meetings being public, they will not choose to expose
-      themselves any further than strict dealing may justify; and
-      besides, there are generally too many to cabal.”--Watt to
-      Boulton, 29th August, 1778. Boulton MSS.
-
-Boulton must have been greatly harassed by the woes of his partners.
-Fothergill was still uttering lamentable prophecies of impending ruin;
-his only prospect of relief being in the success of the engine. He urged
-Boulton to endeavour to raise money by the sale of engine contracts or
-annuities, in order to avert a crash. Matthews, the London agent, also
-continued to represent the still urgent danger of the house, and pressed
-Boulton to go to Cornwall and try to raise money there upon his engine
-contracts. Indeed, it was clear that the firm of Boulton and Fothergill
-had been losing money by their business for several years past; and
-that, unless the engine succeeded, they must, ere long, go to the wall.
-But when Boulton turned to Cornwall, he found little comfort. Though the
-engines there were successful, Watt could not raise money upon them. The
-adventurers were poor,--were for the most part losing by their ventures,
-in consequence of the low price of the ore; and they almost invariably put
-off payment by excuses. Thus, while Boulton was in London trying to obtain
-accommodation from his bankers, the groans of his partner in Birmingham
-were more than re-echoed by the lamentations of his other partner in
-Cornwall, who rang the changes of misery through all the notes of the
-gamut.
-
-At length, about the beginning of October, 1778, Boulton contrived to
-make his long-promised journey into Cornwall.[170] He went round among
-the mines, and had many friendly conferences with the managers. He found
-the engine had grown in public favour, and that the impression prevailed
-throughout the mining districts that it would before long become generally
-adopted. Encouraged by his London financial agent, he took steps to turn
-this favourable impression to account.[171] Before he left Cornwall, where
-he remained until the end of the year, he succeeded in borrowing a sum
-of 2000_l._ from Elliot and Praed, the Truro bankers, on security of the
-engines erected in the county; and the money was at once forwarded to the
-London agents for the relief of the Birmingham firm. He also succeeded
-in getting the terms definitely arranged for the use of several of the
-more important engines erected and at work. It was agreed that 700_l._ a
-year should be paid as royalty in respect of the Chacewater engine,--an
-arrangement even more advantageous to the owners of the mine than to
-the patentees, as it was understood that the saving of coals amounted to
-upwards of 2400_l._ a year. Other agreements were entered into for the
-use of the engines erected at Wheal Union and Tingtang, which brought in
-about 400_l._ per annum more, so that the harvest of profits seemed at
-length fairly begun.
-
-    [170] During his absence Mr. Keir took charge of the works at
-      Soho. It had been intended to introduce him as a partner, and
-      he left the glass-making concern at Stourbridge, into which he
-      had entered, for the purpose; but when he came to look into the
-      books of the Soho firm, he was so appalled by their liabilities
-      that he eventually declined the connexion.
-
-    [171] Matthews wrote him on the 8th October, 1778, that he had met
-      a Mr. Boldero at the Goldsmiths’ Hall, who had much influence in
-      Cornwall, and that he expressed the opinion that, if the engines
-      could do what Boulton and Watt promised, they might soon get
-      from 40,000_l._ to 80,000_l._ for them in Cornwall. Matthews
-      accordingly recommended Boulton to apply to Elliot and Praed,
-      the Cornish bankers, for an advance on security of the engine
-      contracts.--It would appear from a letter written to Boulton a
-      few days later, by Mr. Barton, Matthews’s partner, that Boulton
-      was, amidst his many speculations, engaged in a privateering
-      adventure during the war of the American Revolution:--“It may
-      give you some pleasure,” wrote Barton, “to hear we are likely
-      to receive some produce from our adventure to New York. One
-      of the vessels our little brig took last year was fitted out
-      at New York, and in a cruise of 13 weeks has taken 13 prizes,
-      12 of which are carried safe in, and we have advice of 200
-      hogsheads of tobacco being shipped as part of the prizes, which,
-      if now here, would fetch us 10,000_l._ But while the embargo on
-      shipping at New York continues, they cannot stir out of port.
-      However, _I think we shall see them before you raise that sum
-      from your engine concern, and yet I hope that is not very far
-      off_.”
-
-Watt remained at Cornwall for another month, plodding at Poldice and
-Wheal Virgin engines, and returned to Birmingham early in January, 1779.
-Though the pumping-engine had thus far proved remarkably successful, and
-accomplished all that Watt had promised, he was in no better spirits than
-before. “Though we have, in general, succeeded in our undertakings,”
-he wrote Dr. Black, “yet that success has, from various unavoidable
-circumstances, produced small profits to us; the struggles we have
-had with natural difficulties, and with the ignorance, prejudices, and
-villanies of mankind, have been very great, but I hope are now nearly
-come to an end, or vanquished.”[172] His difficulties were not, however,
-nearly at an end, as the heavy liabilities of the firm had still to be
-met. More money had to be borrowed; and Watt continued to groan under his
-intolerable burden. “The thought of the debt to Lowe, Vere, and Co.,” he
-wrote to his partner, “lies too heavy on my mind to leave me the proper
-employment of my faculties in the prosecution of our business; and,
-besides, common honesty will prevent me from loading the scheme with debts
-which might be more than it could pay.”[173]
-
-    [172] Watt to Black, 12th December, 1778.
-
-    [173] Watt to Boulton, 15th Jan., 1779.
-
-A more hopeful man would have borne up under these difficulties; for the
-reputation of the engine was increasing, and orders were coming in from
-various quarters. Soho was full of work; and, provided their credit could
-be maintained, it was clear that the undertaking on which the firm had
-entered could not fail to prove remunerative. Watt could not see this,
-but his partner did; and Boulton accordingly strained every nerve to
-keep up the character of the concern. While Watt was urging upon him to
-curtail the business, Boulton sought in all ways to extend it. He sent
-accounts of his marvellous engines abroad, and orders for them came in
-from France[174] and Holland. Watt was more alarmed than gratified by the
-foreign orders, fearing that the engine would be copied and extensively
-manufactured abroad, where patents had not yet been secured. He did not
-see that the best protection of all was in the superiority of his tools
-and mechanics, enabling first-class work to be turned out,--important
-advantages, in which the Soho firm had the start of the world. It
-is true his mechanics were liable to be bribed, and foreigners were
-constantly haunting Soho for the purpose of worming out the secrets of the
-manufacture, and decoying away the best men. Against this every precaution
-was taken, though sometimes in vain. Two Prussian engineers came over from
-Berlin in 1779, to whom Watt showed every attention; after which, in his
-absence, they got into the engine-room, and carefully examined all the
-details of “Old Bess,” making notes. When Watt returned, he was in high
-dudgeon, and wrote to his partner that he “could not help it unless by
-discountenancing every foreigner who does not come avowedly to have an
-engine.”[175]
-
-    [174] M. Perrier, of Paris, ordered an engine early in 1779, and
-      the materials were despatched to Nantes by the end of May in
-      the same year. The engine was erected by M. Jary at a colliery
-      near Nantes, but the fitting was so bad--the steam-case having
-      been forgotten--that it went only four strokes per minute. As
-      Boulton and Watt sought a patent for France, it was necessary
-      in the first place that Commissioners should certify that the
-      new engine was superior to the common engine. This they could
-      not do, and the patent was not secured. Watt feared that there
-      was “a plot” against him; as Perrier immediately proceeded with
-      a manufacture of steam-engines after the alleged invention of
-      M. Betancourt, though this “invention” turned out to be a close
-      copy of the engine M. Betancourt himself had imported from Soho.
-
-Their principal reliance, however, was necessarily on home orders, and
-these came in satisfactorily. Eight more engines were wanted for Cornwall,
-those already at work continuing to give satisfaction. Inquiries were
-also made about pumping engines for collieries in different parts of
-England. But where coals were cheap, and the saving of fuel was of less
-consequence, the patentees were not solicitous for orders unless the
-purchasers would fix a fair sum for the patent right, or rate the coals
-used at a price that would be remunerative in proportion to the savings
-effected. The orders were, indeed, becoming so numerous, that the firm,
-beginning to feel their power, themselves fixed the annual royalty, though
-it was not always so easy to get it paid.
-
-    [175] Watt to Boulton, 27th January, 1779. Boulton MSS.
-
-The working power of Watt himself was but limited. He still continued to
-suffer from intense headaches; and, as all the drawings of new engines
-were made by his own hands, it was necessary in some measure to limit
-the amount of work undertaken. “I beg,” he wrote to his partner in May,
-1779, relative to proposals made for two new engines, “that you will
-not undertake to do anything for them before Christmas. It is, in fact,
-impossible, at least on my part; I am quite crushed.” But he was not
-always so dispirited, for in the following month we find him writing
-Boulton an exultant letter, announcing orders for three new engines from
-Cornwall.[176]
-
-    [176] The following is Watt’s letter, written in a very unusual
-      style:--
-
-                             “Birmingham, June 30th, 1779.
-            “Hallelujah! Hallelujee!
-          We have concluded with Hawkesbury,
-          217_l._ per annum from Lady-day last;
-          275_l._ 5_s._ for time past; 157_l._ on account.
-          We make them a present of 100 guineas--
-          Peace and good-fellowship on earth--
-          Perrins and Evans to be dismissed--
-          3 more engines wanted in Cornwall--
-          Dudley repentant and amendant--
-
-                                          Yours rejoicing,
-                                              JAMES WATT.”
-
-Watt continued for some time longer to suffer great annoyance from the
-shortcomings of his workmen. He was himself most particular in giving
-his instructions, verbally, in writing, and in drawings. When he sent
-a workman to erect an engine, he sent with him a carefully drawn up
-detail of the step by step proceedings he was to adopt in fitting the
-parts together. Where there was a difficulty, and likely to be a hitch,
-he added a pen and ink drawing, rapid but graphic, and pointed out how
-the difficulty was to be avoided. It was not so easy, however, to find
-workmen capable of intelligently fitting together the parts of a machine
-so complicated and of so novel a construction. Moreover, the first engines
-were in a great measure experimental, and to have erected them perfectly,
-and provided by anticipation for their various defects, would have argued
-a knowledge of the principles of their construction almost as complete as
-that of Watt himself. He was not sufficiently disposed to make allowances
-for the workmen’s want of knowledge and want of experience, and his
-letters were accordingly full of complaints of their shortcomings. He was
-especially annoyed with the mistakes of a foreman, named Hall, who had
-sent the wrong articles to Cornwall, and he urged Boulton to dismiss him
-at once. But Boulton knew better. Though Watt understood engines, he did
-not so well understand men. Had Boulton dismissed such as Hall because
-they made mistakes, the shop would soon have been empty. The men were as
-yet but at school, learning experience, and Boulton knew that in course
-of time they would acquire dexterity. He was ready to make allowance
-for their imperfections, but at the same time he did not abate in his
-endeavours to find out and engage the best hands, wherever they were to be
-found--in Wales, in Cornwall, or in Scotland. He therefore kept on Hall,
-notwithstanding Watt’s protest, and the latter submitted.[177]
-
-    [177] Watt wrote Boulton, 2nd July, 1778,--“On the subject of Mr.
-      Hall I should not have been so earnest had I not been urged on
-      by the prospect of impending ruin, which may be much accelerated
-      by a wicked or careless servant in his place.” Later, on the 6th
-      August, Watt wrote, “I look upon Hall as a very great blunderer,
-      and very inattentive to everything that has hitherto been
-      committed to his care; but I think that our present necessities
-      will oblige us to employ him.”--Boulton MSS.
-
-Watt was equally wroth with the enginemen at Bedworth. “I beg and expect,”
-he wrote Boulton, “that so soon as everything is done to that engine,
-you will instantly proceed to trial before creditable witnesses, and if
-possible have the whole brood of these enginemen displaced, if any others
-can be procured; for nothing but slovenliness, if not malice, is to be
-expected of them.” It must, however, be acknowledged that the Bedworth
-engine was at first very imperfect, having been made of bad iron, in
-consequence of which it frequently broke down. In Cornwall the men were
-no better. Dudley, Watt’s erector at Wheal Chance and Hallamanin, was
-pronounced incapable and a blunderer. “If something be not very bad in
-London, I wish you would employ Hadley to finish those engines, and send
-Joseph here to receive his instructions and proceed to Cornwall, otherwise
-Dudley will ruin us.”[178]
-
-The trusty “Joseph” was accordingly despatched to Cornwall to look after
-Dudley, and remedy the defects in Wheal Chance and Hallamanin engines; but
-when Watt arrived at Chacewater shortly after, he found that Joseph, too,
-had proved faithless. He wrote to Boulton, “Joseph has pursued his old
-practice of drinking in the neighbourhood in a scandalous manner, until
-the very enginemen turned him into ridicule.... I have not heard how he
-behaved in the west; but that he gave the ale there a bad character.”[179]
-Notwithstanding, however, his love of strong potations, Joseph was
-a first-rate workman. Two days later, Watt wrote, “Though Joseph has
-attended to his drinking, he has done much good at his leisure hours,
-and has certainly prevented much mischief at Hallamanin and some at Wheal
-Union. He has had some hard and long jobs, and consequently merits some
-indulgence for his foibles.” By the end of the month “Joseph had conquered
-Hallamanin engine, all but the boiler,” but Watt added, “His indulgence
-has brought on a slight fit of the jaundice, and as soon as the engine is
-finished, he must be sent home.”[180]
-
-    [178] Watt to Boulton, 11th August, 1779.
-
-    [179] Watt to Boulton, 4th October, 1779.
-
-    [180] Watt to Boulton, 28th October, 1779.
-
-By this time Watt had called to his aid two other skilled workmen, Law and
-Murdock, who arrived in Cornwall in the beginning of September, 1779. In
-Watt’s letters we find frequent allusions to Murdock. Wherever any work
-had to be done requiring more than ordinary attention, Watt specially
-directed that “William” should be put to it. “Let William be sent for
-from Bedworth,” he wrote from Cornwall in 1778, “to set the patterns for
-nozzles quite right for Poldice.” Boulton wished to send him into Scotland
-to erect the engine at Wenlockhead, but Watt would not hear of it.
-“William” was the only man he could trust with the nozzles. Then William
-was sent to London to take the charge of Chelsea engine; next to Bedworth,
-to see to the completion of the repairs previous to the final trial; then
-to Birmingham again to attend to some further special instructions of
-Watt; and now we find him in Cornwall, to take charge of the principal
-engines erecting there.
-
-William Murdock was not only a most excellent and steady workman, but
-a man of eminent mechanical genius. He was the first maker of a model
-locomotive in this country; he was the introducer of lighting by gas, and
-the inventor of many valuable parts of the working steam-engine, hereafter
-to be described. His father was a millwright and miller, at Bellow Mill,
-near Old Cumnock, in Ayrshire, and was much esteemed for his probity and
-industry, as well as for his mechanical skill. He was the inventor of
-bevelled cast-iron gear for mills, and his son was proud to exhibit, on
-the lawn in front of his house at Sycamore Hill, Handsworth, a piece of
-the first work of the kind executed in Britain. It was cast for him at
-Carron Ironworks, after the pattern furnished by him, in 1766. William
-was born in 1754, and brought up to his father’s trade. On arriving at
-manhood, he became desirous of obtaining a larger experience of mill-work
-and mechanics than he could acquire in his father’s little mill. Hearing
-of the fame of Boulton and Watt, and the success of their new engine, he
-determined to travel south, and seek for a job at Soho. Many Scotchmen
-were accustomed to call there on the same errand, probably relying on the
-known clanship of their countrymen, and thinking that they would find
-a friend and advocate in Watt. But strange to say, Watt did not think
-Scotchmen capable of becoming first-class mechanics.[181]
-
-    [181] Watt told Sir Walter Scott that though hundreds probably
-      of his northern countrymen had sought employment at his
-      establishment, he never could get one of them to become a
-      first-rate mechanic. “Many of them,” said he, “were too good
-      for that, and rose to be valuable clerks and bookkeepers;
-      but those incapable of this sort of advancement had always
-      the same insuperable aversion to toiling so long at any one
-      point of mechanism as to gain the highest wages among the
-      workmen.”--Note to Lockhart’s ‘Life of Scott.’ The fact, we
-      suppose was, that the Scotch mechanics were only as yet in
-      course of training,--the English having had a long start of
-      them. Though Watt’s statement that Scotchmen were incapable of
-      being first-class mechanics may have been true in his day, it
-      is so no longer, as the workshops of the Clyde can prove; some
-      of the most highly finished steam-engines of modern times having
-      been turned out of Glasgow workshops.
-
-When Murdock called at Soho, in the year 1777, to ask for a job, Watt was
-from home, but he saw Boulton, who was usually accessible to callers of
-every rank. In answer to Murdock’s inquiry whether he could have a job,
-Boulton replied that work was rather slack with them then, and that every
-place was filled up. During the brief conversation that ensued, the blate
-young Scotchman, like most country lads in the presence of strangers, had
-some difficulty in knowing what to do with his hands, and unconsciously
-kept twirling his hat with them. Boulton’s attention was directed to the
-twirling hat, which seemed to be of a peculiar make. It was not a felt
-hat, nor a cloth hat, nor a glazed hat; but it seemed to be painted, and
-composed of some unusual material. “That seems to be a curious sort of
-hat,” said Boulton, looking at it more closely; “why, what is it made
-of?” “Timmer, sir,” said Murdock, modestly. “Timmer! Do you mean to say
-that it is made of wood?” “Yes, sir.” “Pray, _how_ was it made?” “I turned
-it mysel’, sir, in a bit lathey of my own making.” Boulton looked at the
-young man again. He had risen a hundred degrees in his estimation. He was
-tall, good-looking, and of open and ingenuous countenance; and that he had
-been able to turn a wooden hat for himself in a lathe of his own making
-was proof enough that he was a mechanic of no mean skill. “You may call
-again, my man,” said Boulton. “Thank you, sir,” said Murdock, giving his
-hat a final twirl.
-
-When Murdock called again, he was at once put upon a trial job,
-after which he was entered as a regular hand. We learn from Boulton’s
-memorandum-book that he was engaged for two years, at 15_s._ a week when
-at home, 17_s._ when from home, and 18_s._ when in London. Boulton’s
-engagement of Murdock was amply justified by the result. Beginning as a
-common mechanic, he applied himself diligently and conscientiously to his
-work, and became trusted. More responsible duties were confided to him,
-and he strove to perform them to the best of his power. His industry and
-his skilfulness soon marked him for promotion, and he rose from grade
-to grade until he became Boulton and Watt’s most trusted co-worker and
-adviser in all their mechanical undertakings of importance.
-
-When Murdock went into Cornwall to take charge of the engines, he gave
-himself no rest until he had conquered their defects and put them in
-thorough working order. He devoted himself to his duties with a zeal and
-ability that completely won Watt’s heart. He was so filled with his work,
-that when he had an important job in hand, he could scarcely sleep at
-nights for thinking of it. When the engine at Wheal Union was ready for
-starting, the people of the house at Redruth, in which Murdock lodged,
-were greatly disturbed one night by a strange noise in his room. Several
-heavy blows on the floor made them start from their beds, thinking the
-house was coming down. They rushed to Murdock’s room, and there was he
-in his shirt, heaving away at the bedpost in his sleep, calling out, “Now
-she goes, lads! now she goes.”
-
-Murdock was not less successful in making his way with the Cornishmen
-with whom he was brought into daily contact; indeed, he fought his way
-to their affections. One day at Chacewater, some half-dozen of the mining
-captains came into the engine-room and began bullying him. This he could
-not stand, and adopted a bold expedient. He locked the door, and said,
-“Now, then, you shall not leave this place until I have it fairly out with
-you.” He selected the biggest, and put himself in a fighting attitude.
-The Cornishmen love fair play, and while the two engaged in battle, the
-others, without interfering, looked on. The contest was soon over; for
-Murdock was a tall, powerful fellow, and speedily vanquished his opponent.
-The others, seeing the kind of man they had to deal with, made overtures
-of reconciliation; and they shook hands all round, and parted the best of
-friends.[182]
-
-    [182] The above anecdotes, of Murdock’s introduction to Soho,
-      and the fight with the captains, were communicated by his
-      son, the late Mr. Murdock of Sycamore Hill near Birmingham.
-      He also informed us that Murdock fought a duel with Captain
-      Trevithick (father of the Trevithick of Locomotive celebrity),
-      in consequence of a quarrel between him and Watt, in which
-      Murdock conceived his master to have been unfairly and harshly
-      treated.
-
-Watt continued to have his differences and altercations with the
-Cornishmen, but he had no such way of settling them. Indeed, he was
-almost helpless when he came in contact with rough men of business. Most
-of the mines were then paying very badly, and the adventurers raised all
-sorts of objections to making the stipulated payment of the engine dues.
-Under such circumstances, altercations with them took place for which
-Watt was altogether unprepared. He was under the apprehension that they
-were constantly laying their heads together for the purpose of taking
-advantage of him and his partner. He never looked on the bright side
-of things, but always on the darkest. “The rascality of mankind,” said
-he to Dr. Black, “is almost beyond belief.” Though his views of science
-were large, his views of men were narrow. Much of this may have been the
-result of his recluse habits and closet life, as well as of his constant
-ill-health. With his racking headaches, it was indeed difficult for him
-to be cheerful. But no one could be more conscious of his own defects--of
-his want of tact, his want of business qualities, and his want of
-temper--than he was himself. He knew his besetting infirmities, from which
-even the best and wisest are not exempt. His greatness was mingled with
-imperfections, and his strength with weakness, else had he been more than
-human. It is not in the order of Providence that the gifts and graces of
-life should be concentrated in any one perfectly adjusted character. Even
-when we inquire into the “Admirable Crichton” of biography, and seek to
-trace his life, it vanishes almost into a myth.
-
-In the midst of his many troubles and difficulties, Watt’s invariable
-practice was to call upon Boulton for help. Boulton was satisfied to take
-men as he found them, and try to make the best of them. Watt was a man of
-the study; Boulton a man of the world. Watt was a master of machines; but
-Boulton, of men. Though Watt might be the brain, Boulton was the heart
-of the concern. “If you had been here,” wrote Watt to Boulton, after one
-of his disagreeable meetings with the adventurers, “If you had been here,
-and gone to that meeting with your cheerful countenance and brave heart,
-perhaps they would not have been so obstinate.” The scene referred to by
-Watt occurred at a meeting of the Wheal Union Adventurers, at which the
-savings effected by the new engine were to be calculated and settled. Here
-is Watt’s own description of the affair, and his feelings on the occasion,
-which will give a good idea of the irksomeness of his position, and the
-disagreeable people he had occasionally to encounter:--
-
-  “At Wheal Union account our savings were ordered to be charged to
-  the interest of Messrs. Edwards and Phillips; but when to be paid,
-  God knows! Bevan said in a month. After all this was settled, in
-  came Capt. Trevithick, I believe on purpose, as he came late and
-  might have heard that I was gone there. He immediately fell foul
-  of our account, in a manner peculiar to himself ... laboured to
-  demonstrate that Dalcoath engines not only surpassed the table,
-  but even did more work with the coals than Wheal Union did, and
-  concluded with saying that we had taken or got the advantage
-  of the adventurers. I think he first said the former and then
-  hedged off by the latter statement. Mr. Phillips defended, and
-  Mr. Edwards, I thought, seemed staggered, though candid. Mr.
-  Phillips desired the data that he might calculate it over in his
-  way. Mr. Edwards slipped away, but I found afterwards that he was
-  in another room with Capt. Gundry (who, and Hodge also, behaved
-  exceedingly well--I believe Gundry to be a very sincere, honest
-  man). I went out to speak to Joseph, and on my return found only
-  Trevithick, Bevan, Hodge, and some others. Soon after, Mr. Edwards
-  called out Trevithick to him and Gundry. I heard them very loud,
-  and waited their return for an hour; but they not seeming ready to
-  return, night coming on, and feeling myself very uncomfortable, I
-  came away--so know not what passed further. During all this time,
-  I was so confounded with the impudence, ignorance, and overbearing
-  manner of the man that I could make no adequate defence, and
-  indeed could scarcely keep my temper; which however I did, perhaps
-  to a fault; for nothing can be more grievous to an ingenuous mind
-  than the being suspected or accused of deceit. To mend the matter,
-  it had been an exceedingly rainy morning, and I had got a little
-  wet going thither, which had rather hurt my spirits. Yesterday I
-  had a violent headache and could do nothing.... Some means must
-  be taken to satisfy the country, otherwise this malicious man
-  will hurt us exceedingly. The point on which Mr. Edwards seemed
-  to lay the most stress was the comparing with a 77-1/10 cylinder,
-  as he alleged they would not have put in so large an engine; and
-  in this there is some reason, as I do not think they believed
-  that the engine would be so powerful as it is. Add to this, that
-  the mine barely pays its way. Trevithick made a great noise about
-  short strokes at setting on, &c. The Captains seemed to laugh at
-  that; and I can demonstrate that, were it allowed for, it would
-  not come to 2_s._ 6_d._ per month. I believe they can be brought
-  to allow that they would have put in a 70-inch. Now, query if we
-  ought to allow this to be calculated from a 70 (at which it will
-  come to near 400_l._ a year), and on making this concession insist
-  on our having a good paymaster to pay regularly once a month,
-  and not be obliged to go like beggars to their accounts to seek
-  our due and be insulted by such scoundrels into the bargain. As
-  to Hallamanin, they have not met yet, and when they do meet, I
-  shall not go to them. I cannot bear such treatment, but it is not
-  prudent to resent it too warmly just now. I believe you _must_
-  come here. I think fourteen days would settle matters. Besides my
-  inability to battle such people, I really have not time to bestow
-  on them.”[183]
-
-In subsequent letters Watt continued to urge Boulton to come to him.
-His headaches were constant, unfitting him for work. Besides, he could
-scarcely stir out of doors for the rain. “It rains here,” said he,
-“prodigiously. When you come, bring with you a waxed linen cloak for
-yourself, and another for me, as there is no going out now for a few miles
-without getting wet to the skin. When it rains in Cornwall, and it rains
-often, it rains solid.”
-
-[Illustration: CARDOZOS PUMPING-ENGINE, UNITED MINES.]
-
-    [183] Watt to Boulton, from Chacewater, 16th October, 1779.
-      Boulton MSS.
-
-
-
-
-[Illustration: UNITED MINES DISTRICT--ST. DAY IN THE MIDDLE DISTANCE.
-
-[By R. P. Leitch]]
-
-CHAPTER XIV.
-
-FINANCIAL DIFFICULTIES--BOULTON IN CORNWALL--ATTACK AND DEFENCE OF THE
-ENGINE PATENT.
-
-
-Boulton again went to Watt’s help in Cornwall at the end of autumn,
-1779. He could not afford to make a long stay, but left so soon as he
-had settled several long-pending agreements with the mine proprietors.
-The partners then returned to Birmingham together. Before leaving,
-they installed Lieutenant Henderson as their representative, to
-watch over their interests in their absence. Henderson was a sort of
-Jack-of-all-trades and master of none. He had been an officer of marines,
-and afterwards a West India sugar-planter. He lost all that he possessed
-in Jamaica, but gained some knowledge of levelling, draining, and
-machinery. He was also a bit of an inventor, and first introduced himself
-to Boulton’s notice by offering to sell him a circular motion by steam
-which he alleged he had discovered. This led to a correspondence, which
-resulted in his engagement to travel for the firm, and to superintend the
-erection of engines when necessary.
-
-Henderson experienced the same difficulty that Watt had done in managing
-the adventurers, and during his stay in Cornwall he was never done calling
-upon Boulton to hasten to his assistance and help him, as he said, “to
-put them in good spirits and good temper.” As the annual meetings drew
-near, Henderson anticipated a stormy time of it, and pleaded harder than
-ever for Boulton to come to him. It seemed as if it would be necessary
-for Boulton to take up his residence in Cornwall; and as the interests at
-stake were great, it might be worth his while to do so. By the summer of
-1780, Boulton and Watt had made and sold forty pumping-engines, of which
-number twenty were erected and at work in different parts of Cornwall;
-and it was generally expected that before long there would scarcely be
-an engine of the old construction at work in the county. This was, in
-fact, the only branch of Boulton’s extensive concerns that promised to be
-remunerative.[184] He had become loaded with a burden of debt, from which
-the success of the engine-business seemed to offer the only prospect of
-relief.
-
-    [184] It appears from a statement prepared by Zaccheus Walker,
-      the accountant of Boulton and Fothergill, that on an invested
-      capital of about 20,000_l._, the excess of losses over profits
-      during the eighteen years ending 1780, had been upwards of
-      11,000_l._; and that but for the capital and credit of Matthew
-      Boulton, that concern must have broken down.
-
-Boulton’s affairs seemed indeed fast approaching to a crisis. He had
-raised money in all directions to carry on his extensive concerns. He
-had sold the Patkington estate, which came to him by his wife, to Lord
-Donegal, for 15,000_l._; he had sold the greater part of his father’s
-property, and raised further sums by mortgaging the remainder; he had
-borrowed largely from Day,[185] Wedgwood, and others of his personal
-friends, and obtained heavy advances from his bankers; but all this was
-found insufficient, and his embarrassments seemed only to increase. Watt
-could do nothing to help him with money, though he had consented to the
-mortgage of the steam-engine royalties to Mr. Wiss, by which the sum of
-7000_l._ had been raised. This liability lay heavy on the mind of Watt,
-who could never shake himself free of the horror of having incurred such a
-debt; and many were the imploring letters that he addressed to Boulton on
-the subject. “I beg of you,” said he, “to attend to these money affairs.
-I cannot rest in my bed until they [_i. e._ the mortgage and banker’s
-advance] have some determinate form. I beg you will pardon my importunity,
-but I cannot bear the uneasiness of my own mind, and it is as much your
-interest as mine to have them settled.”[186]
-
-    [185] Thomas Day, the eccentric but kindly author of ‘Sandford
-      and Merton,’ lent Boulton 3000_l._ at 4 per cent. When Boulton
-      came to pay a higher rate of interest on other loans, he wrote
-      Day proposing to pay him the same rate; but Day refused to
-      accept the advance, as he could not make more of his money
-      elsewhere. Day, however, offered him some good advice. “Give me
-      leave,” said he, “with the real interest of a sincere friend,
-      to express my wishes that now at last when a fortune is within
-      your power, you will contract that wide sphere of business in
-      which your ingenuity has so long kept you engaged, and which
-      has prevented you hitherto, if I may believe the words of one
-      of your sincerest friends, the late Dr. Small, from acquiring
-      that independence which you ought to have had long ago. I should
-      think that now, like a good Christian, thoroughly convinced of
-      the inutility of other works, you ought to attach yourself to
-      the one thing needful, and determine to be saved ‘even as by
-      fire.’ You are now, dear Sir, not of an age to sport any longer
-      with fortune. Forgive the freedom of these sentiments, and
-      believe me, with the greatest sincerity and regard, Yours, &c.,
-                                                          “THOMAS DAY.”
-
-    [186] Watt to Boulton, 20th January, 1779.
-
-The other partner, Fothergill, was quite as downhearted. He urged that
-the firm of Boulton and Fothergill should at once stop payment and wind
-up; but as this would have seriously hurt the credit of the engine firm,
-Boulton would not listen to the suggestion. They must hold on as they
-had done before, until better days came round. Fothergill recommended
-that at least the unremunerative branches of the business should be
-brought to a close. The heaviest losses had indeed been sustained
-through Fothergill himself, whose foreign connexions, instead of being
-of advantage to the firm, had proved the reverse; and Mr. Matthews, the
-London agent, repeatedly pressed Boulton to decline further transactions
-with foreigners.
-
-There was one branch of the Boulton and Fothergill business which Boulton
-at once agreed to give up. This was the painting and japanning business;
-by which, as appears from a statement prepared by Mr. Walker, now before
-us, the firm were losing at the rate of 500_l._ a year.
-
-The picture-painting business seems to have been begun in 1777, and
-was carried on for some years under the direction of Mr. Eginton,
-who afterwards achieved considerable reputation at Birmingham as a
-manufacturer of painted glass. A degree of interest has been recently
-raised on the subject of the Soho pictures, in consequence of the
-statements hazarded as to the method by which they are supposed to have
-been produced. It has been surmised that they were taken by some process
-resembling photography. We have, however, been unable to find anything
-in the correspondence of the firm calculated to support this view. On
-the contrary, they are invariably spoken of as “mechanical paintings,”
-“pictures,” or “prints,” produced by means of “paints” or “colours.”
-Though the precise process by which they were produced is not now known,
-there seems reason to believe that they were impressions from plates
-prepared in a peculiar manner. The impressions were taken “mechanically”
-on paper; and both oil and water colours[187] were made use of. Some
-of the pictures were of large size--40 by 50 inches--the subjects being
-chiefly classical. This branch of the business being found unproductive,
-was brought to a close in 1780, when the partnership with Eginton was at
-the same time dissolved.
-
-    [187] Some of the specimens in water colour are to be seen at the
-      Museum of Patents, South Kensington. When the paper is moistened
-      with the finger, the colour easily rubs off. The whole subject
-      of these pictures has recently been thoroughly sifted by M.
-      P. W. Boulton, Esq., in his ‘Remarks on some Evidence recently
-      communicated to the Photographic Society’ (Bradbury and Evans,
-      1864), apropos of the Papers of Mr. W. P. Smith on the same
-      subject, in which it was surmised that they were the result
-      of some photographic process. Mr. Boulton clearly shows, from
-      the original correspondence, that the process was mechanical
-      colour-printing. He also adds,--“From the brief statements
-      which I remember to have heard from my father concerning the
-      polygraphic process, my impression of it was that it copied
-      colour mechanically, not merely chiaro-scuro. And I agree with
-      the opinion which has been expressed to other persons, that in
-      the coloured specimens in the Museum, there are indications that
-      the colour was laid on _mechanically_,--not by hand or brush.”
-      As the process of “dead-colouring” the pictures is occasionally
-      referred to, it is probable that the pictures passed through
-      more stages than one, as in the case of modern colour-printing.
-      In one of Eginton’s letters, three plates were spoken of as
-      necessary for taking impressions of one of the pictures.
-
-Another and more fortunate branch of business into which Boulton
-entered with Watt and Keir, about the same time, was the manufacture
-of letter-copying machines. Watt made the invention, Boulton found the
-money for taking out the patent, and Keir conducted the business. Watt
-was a very voluminous correspondent, and the time occupied by him in
-copying letters, the contents of which he desired to keep secret from
-third parties, was such that in order to economise it he invented the
-method of letter-copying in such common use. The invention consisted in
-the transfer, by pressure, of the writing made with mucilaginous ink, to
-damped and unsized transparent copying-paper, by means either of a rolling
-press or a screw press. Though Watt himself preferred the rollers, the
-screw press is now generally adopted as the more simple and efficacious
-process.
-
-This invention was made by Watt in the summer of 1778. In June we find
-him busy experimenting on copying-papers of different kinds, requesting
-Boulton to send him specimens of “the most even and whitest unsized
-paper;” and in the following month he wrote Dr. Black, “I have lately
-discovered a method of copying writing instantaneously, provided it has
-been written the same day, or within twenty-four hours. I send you a
-specimen, and will impart the secret if it will be of any use to you. It
-enables me to copy all my business letters.”[188] For two years Watt kept
-his method of copying a secret; but hearing that certain persons were
-prying into it with the view of turning it to account, he determined to
-anticipate them by taking out a patent, which was secured in May, 1780. By
-that time Watt had completed the details of the press and the copying-ink.
-Sufficient mahogany and lignum-vitæ had been ordered for making 500
-machines, and Boulton went up to London to try and get the press
-introduced in the public offices. He first waited upon several noblemen
-to interest them in the machine, amongst others on Lord Dartmouth, who
-proposed to show it to George III. “The King,” said Boulton, in a letter
-to Watt, “writes a great deal, and takes copies of all he writes with
-his own hand, so that Lord Dartmouth thinks it will be a very desirable
-thing for His Majesty.” Several of those to whom the machine was first
-shown, apprehended that it would lead to increase of forgery--then a great
-source of terror to commercial men. The bankers concurred in this view,
-and strongly denounced the invention; and they expostulated with Boulton
-and Watt’s agent for offering the presses for sale. “Mr. Woodmason,”
-wrote Boulton, “says the bankers mob him for having anything to do with
-it; they say that it ought to be suppressed.” Boulton was not dismayed by
-this opposition, but proceeded to issue circulars to the members of the
-Houses of Lords and Commons, descriptive of the machine, inviting them
-to an inspection of it, after which he communicated the results to his
-partner:--
-
-  ... “On Tuesday morning last I waited on some particular noblemen,
-  according to promise, at their own houses, with the press, and
-  at one o’clock I took possession of a private room adjoining
-  the Court of Requests, Westminster Hall, where I was visited by
-  several members of both Houses, who in general were well pleased
-  with the invention; but all expressed their fears of forgery,
-  which occasioned and obliged me to exercise my lungs very much.
-  Many of the members tried to copy bank notes, but in vain. I had a
-  full audience till half-past eight o’clock.... I had quite a mob
-  of members next day; some of them mobbed me for introducing such
-  wicked arts; however, upon the whole, I had a greater majority
-  than Lord North hath had this year.
-
-  On Thursday ... at half-past two ... I had a tolerable good
-  House, even a better than the Speaker, who was often obliged
-  to send his proper officer to fetch away from me the members to
-  vote, and sometimes to make a House. As soon as the House formed
-  into a Committee upon the Malt-tax, the Speaker left the chair
-  and sent for me and the machine, which was carried through the
-  gallery in face of the whole House into the Speaker’s Chamber.
-  I found him full of fears about the dreadful consequences,
-  which I quieted before I left him, and he with his two friends
-  subscribed. I attended again on Friday, but, from a very thin
-  House and curiosity abating, I had very few [subscriptions]. Mr.
-  Banks came to see the machine on Thursday. I thought it might be
-  of service to show it to the Royal Society that evening.... After
-  the business of the Society was over, he announced Mr. Watt’s
-  invention, and my readiness to show it, and it was accordingly
-  brought in and afforded much satisfaction to a crowded audience.
-  I did not show the list of subscribers and the proposals, nor
-  dishonour philosophy by trade in that room.... I spent Friday
-  evening with Smeaton and other engineers at a coffee-house, when a
-  gentleman (not knowing me) exclaimed against the copying-machine,
-  and wished the inventor was hanged and the machines all burnt,
-  which brought on a laugh, as I was known to most present.... There
-  are great names enough already among the subscribers to give a
-  sanction and authority to it, as well as to make it fashionable,
-  which has more influence upon the minds of three-fourths of the
-  Londoners than the intrinsic merit of the thing, and without which
-  it would have been some years in making its way.”[189]
-
-    [188] Watt to Dr. Black, 24th July, 1778.
-
-    [189] Boulton to Watt, 14th May, 1780. Boulton MSS.
-
-By the end of the year, the 150 machines first made were sold off, and
-more orders were coming in. Thirty were wanted for exportation abroad,
-and a still greater number were wanted at home. The letter-copying
-machine gradually and steadily made its way, until at length there was
-scarcely a house of any extensive business transactions in which it was
-not to be found. Watt himself, writing of the invention some thirty years
-later, observed that it had proved so useful to himself that it had been
-worth all the trouble of inventing it, even had it been attended with no
-pecuniary profit whatever.
-
-Boulton’s principal business, however, while in town, was not so much
-to push the letter-copying machine, but to set straight the bankers’
-account, which had been overdrawn to the amount of 17,000_l._ He was able
-to satisfy them to a certain extent by granting mortgages on the engine
-royalties payable in Cornwall, besides giving personal bonds for repayment
-of the advances within a given time. It was necessary to obtain Watt’s
-consent to both these measures; but, though Watt was willing to agree to
-the former expedient, he positively refused to be a party to the personal
-bonds.[190] Boulton was therefore under the necessity of arranging the
-matter himself. He was thereby enabled to meet the more pressing claims
-upon the firm, and to make arrangements for pushing on the engine business
-with renewed vigour. Watt was, however, by no means so anxious on this
-score as Boulton was. He was even desirous of retiring from the concern,
-and going abroad in search of health. “Without I can spare time this next
-summer,” he wrote, “to go to some more healthy climate to procure a little
-health, if climate will do, I must give up business and the world too. My
-head is good for nothing.”[191] While Boulton was earnestly pressing the
-invention on the mining interest, and pushing for orders, Watt shuddered
-at the prospect of one. He saw in increase of business only increase of
-headaches. “The care and attention which our business requires,” said
-he, “make me at present dread a fresh order with as much horror as other
-people with joy receive one. What signifies it to a man though he gain the
-whole world, if he lose his health and his life? The first of these losses
-has already befallen me, and the second will probably be the consequence
-of it, without some favourable circumstances which at present I cannot
-foresee should prevent it.”
-
-    [190] On the 18th May, 1780, Watt wrote Boulton, then in London,
-      as follows:--“I am sorry, my dear Sir, to prove in any shape
-      refractory to what you desire, but my quiet, my peace of mind,
-      perhaps my very existence, depend on what I have told you. I
-      am unhappy in not having any person I can advise with on this
-      subject; and my own knowledge of it is insufficient. Therefore,
-      if I appear too rigid, do not blame me, but my ignorance and
-      timidity.” And again, on the 19th, on returning the draft
-      mortgage, he wrote:--“If my executing this deed cannot be
-      dispensed with, I will do it, but will not execute any personal
-      bond for the money. I would rather assign you all Cornwall on
-      proper conditions than execute this.”
-
-    [191] Watt to Boulton, 11th April, 1780.
-
-Judging by the correspondence of Watt, his sufferings of mind and body at
-this time must have been excessive; and the wonder is how he lived through
-it. But “the creaking gate hangs long on its hinges,” and he lived to
-the age of eighty-three, long surviving his stronger and more courageous
-partner. Intense headache seemed to be his normal state, and his only
-tolerable moments were those in which the headache was less violent than
-usual. His son has since described how he remembered seeing his father
-about this time, sitting by the fireside for hours together, with his
-head leaning on his elbow, suffering from most acute sick-headaches, and
-scarcely able to give utterance to his thoughts. “My headache,” he would
-write to Boulton, “keeps its week-aversary to-day.” At another time,
-“I am plagued with the blues; my head is too much confused to do any
-brain-work.” Once, when he had engaged to accompany his wife to an evening
-concert, he wrote, “I am quite eat up with the mulligrubs, and to complete
-the matter I am obliged to go to an oratorio, or serenata, or some other
-nonsense, to-night.” Mrs. Watt tried her best to draw him out of himself,
-but it was not often that she could divert him from his misery. What
-relieved him most was sleep, when he could obtain it; and, to recruit
-his powers, he was accustomed to take from nine to eleven hours sleep
-at night, besides naps during the day. When Boulton had erysipelas, in
-Cornwall, and could not stir abroad, he wrote to his partner complaining
-of an unusual lowness of spirits, on which Watt undertook to be his
-comforter in his own peculiar way. “There is no pitch of low spirits,”
-said he, “that I have not a perfect notion of, from hanging melancholy to
-peevish melancholy: conquer the devil when he is young.” Watt experienced
-all the tortures of confirmed dyspepsia, which cast its dark shadow over
-the life of every day. His condition was often most pitiable. It is true,
-many of the troubles which beset him were imaginary, but he suffered
-from them in idea as much as if they had been real. Small evils fretted
-him, and great ones overwhelmed him. He met them all more than halfway,
-and usually anticipated the worst. He had few moments of cheerfulness,
-hopefulness, or repose. Speaking of one of his violent headaches, he said,
-“I believe it was caused by something making my stomach very acid;” and
-unhappily, as in the case of most dyspeptics, the acidity communicated
-itself to his temper. When these fits came upon him, and the world was
-going against him, and ruin seemed about to swallow him up quick, he
-would sit down and pen a long gloomy letter to his partner, full of agony
-and despair. His mental condition at the time shows at what expense of
-suffering in mind and body the triumphs of genius are sometimes achieved.
-
-In the autumn of 1780, Boulton went into Cornwall for a time to look
-after the business there. Several new engines had been ordered, and were
-either erected or in progress, at Wheal Treasury, Tresavean, Penrydee,
-Dalcoath, Wheal Chance, Wheal Crenver, and the United Mines. One of the
-principal objects of his visit was to settle the agreements with the
-mining companies for the use of these engines.
-
-It had been found difficult to estimate the actual savings of fuel, and
-the settlement of the accounts was a constant source of cavil. There was
-so much temptation on the one side to evade the payments according to the
-tables prepared by Watt, and so much occasion for suspicion on the other
-that they had been evaded by unfair means, that it appeared to Boulton
-that the only practicable method was to agree to a fixed annual payment
-for each engine erected, according to its power and the work it performed.
-Watt was very averse to giving up the tables which had cost him so much
-labour to prepare; but Boulton more wisely urged the adoption of the
-plan that would work most smoothly, and get rid of the heartburnings on
-both sides. Boulton accordingly sent down to Watt a draft agreement with
-the Wheal Virgin adventurers, who were prepared to pay the large sum of
-2500_l._ a year in respect of five new engines erected for their firm;
-and urged him to agree to the terms. “You must not be too rigid,” said
-he, “in fixing the dates of payment. A hard bargain is a bad bargain.”
-Watt replied in a long letter, urging the accuracy of his tables, and
-intimating his reluctance to depart from them. To this Boulton responded,
-“Now, my dear Sir, the way to do justice to our own characters, and to
-trample under our feet envy, hatred, and malice, is to dispel the doubts,
-and to clear up the minds of the gentlemanly part of this our best of all
-kingdoms; for if they think we do wrong, it operates against us although
-we do none, just as much as if we really did the wrong. Patience and
-candour should mark all our actions, as well as firmness in being just to
-ourselves and others. A fair character and standing with the people is
-attended with great advantage as well as satisfaction, of which you are
-fully sensible, so I need say no more.”[192]
-
-    [192] Boulton, at Plengwarry, to Watt, at Birmingham, 14th
-      September, 1780. This day was Boulton’s birthday, and alluding
-      to the circumstance he wrote,--“As sure as there are 1728 inches
-      in a cubic foot, so sure was I born in that year; and as sure
-      as there are 52 weeks in the year and 52 cards in the pack, so
-      surely am I 52 years old this very day. May you and Mrs. Watt
-      live very long and be very happy.”
-
-Watt did not give up his favourite tables without further expostulation
-and argument, but at length he reluctantly gave his assent to the Wheal
-Virgin agreement, by which the annual payment of 2500_l._ was secured.
-Though this was really an excellent bargain, Watt seemed to regard
-it in the light of a calamity. In the letter intimating his reluctant
-concurrence, he observed: “These disputes are so very disagreeable to
-me, that I am very sorry I ever bestowed so great a part of my time and
-money on the steam-engine. I can bear with the artifices of the designing
-part of mankind, but having myself no intention to deceive others, I
-cannot brook the suspicions of the honest part, which I am conscious
-I never merited even in intention, far less by any actual attempt to
-deceive;”[193] Two days later Watt again wrote, urging the superiority of
-his tables, concluding thus: “I have been so much molested with headaches
-this week, that I have perhaps written in a more peevish strain than I
-should have done if I had been in better health, which I hope you will
-excuse.” Boulton replied, expressing regret at his lowness of spirits and
-bad health, advising him to cheer up. “At your leisure,” said he, “you may
-amuse yourself with a calculation of what all the engines we shall have
-in eighteen months erected in Cornwall will amount to; you will find it
-good for low spirits.” “I assure you,” he said at another time, “you have
-no cause for apprehension as to anything in this country; all is going on
-well.” Boulton seemed to regard his partner in the light of a permanent
-invalid, which he was; and on writing to his various correspondents on
-matters of business at Soho, he would abjure them not to cross Mr. Watt.
-To Fothergill he wrote respecting the execution of an order, “the matter
-must be managed with some delicacy respecting Mr. Watt, as you know that
-when he is low-spirited he is vexed at trifles.”
-
-    [193] Watt to Boulton, 10th October, 1780. Boulton MSS.
-
-Another important part of Boulton’s business in Cornwall, besides settling
-the engine agreement, was to watch the mining adventures themselves, in
-which by this time Boulton and Watt had become largely interested. In the
-then depressed state of the mining interest, it was in many cases found
-difficult to raise the requisite money to pay for the new engines; and the
-engineers must either go without orders or become shareholders to prevent
-the undertakings dropping through altogether. Watt’s caution impelled him
-at first to decline entering into such speculations. He was already in
-despair at what he considered the bad fortunes of the firm, and the load
-of debts they had incurred in carrying on the manufacture of engines. But
-there seemed to be no alternative, and he at length came to the conclusion
-with Boulton, that it was better “not to lose a sheep for a ha’porth of
-tar.”[194]
-
-    [194] Watt to Boulton, 20th April, 1780.
-
-Rather than lose the orders, therefore, or risk the losses involved by
-the closing of the mines worked by their engines, the partners resolved
-to incur the risk of joining in the adventures, and in course of time they
-became largely interested in them. They also induced friends in the North
-to join them, more particularly Josiah Wedgwood and John Wilkinson, who
-took shares to a large amount.
-
-Boulton now made it his business to attend the meetings of the
-adventurers, in the hope of improving their working arrangements, which
-he believed were very imperfect. He was convinced of this after his first
-meeting with the adventurers of the Wheal Virgin mine. He found their
-proceedings conducted without regard to order. The principal attention was
-paid to the dining, and after dinner and drink little real business could
-be done. No minutes were made of the proceedings; half the company were
-talking at the same time on different subjects; no one took the lead in
-conducting the discussions, which were disorderly and anarchical in the
-extreme. Boulton immediately addressed himself to the work of introducing
-order and despatch. He called upon his brother adventurers to do their
-business first, and dine and talk afterwards. He advised them to procure
-a minute-book in which to enter the resolutions and proceedings. His
-clear-headed suggestions were at once agreed to; and the next meeting, for
-which he prepared the agenda, was so entirely different from all that had
-preceded it, in respect of order, regularity, and the business transacted,
-that his influence with the adventurers was at once established. “The
-business,” he wrote to Watt, “was conducted with more regularity, and
-more of it was done, than was ever known at any previous meeting.” He
-perceived, however, that there was still room for great improvements,
-and added, “somebody must be here all next summer ... I shall be here
-myself the greater part of it, for there will want more kicking than you
-can do.... _Grace au Dieu!_ I neither want health, nor spirits, nor even
-flesh, for I grow fat.”[195]
-
-    [195] Boulton to Watt, 25th and 30th September, 1780. Boulton MSS.
-
-To increase his influence among the adventurers, and secure the advantages
-of a local habitation among them, Boulton deemed it necessary to take
-a mansion capable of accommodating his family, and which should serve
-the same purpose for his partner when sojourning in the neighbourhood.
-Boulton’s first idea was to have a portable wooden house built and fitted
-up in the manner of a ship’s cabin, which might readily be taken to
-pieces and moved from place to place as business required. This plan was,
-however, eventually abandoned in favour of a residence of a more fixed
-kind. After much searching, a house was found which promised to answer
-the intended purpose,--an old-fashioned, roomy mansion, with a good-sized
-garden full of fruit trees, prettily situated at Cosgarne, in the Gwennap
-valley. Though the United Mines district was close at hand, and fourteen
-of Boulton and Watt’s engines were at work in the immediate neighbourhood,
-not an engine chimney was to be seen from the house, which overlooked
-Tresamble Common, then an unenclosed moor. Here the partners by turns
-spend much of their time for several successive years, travelling about
-from thence on horseback from mine to mine to superintend the erection
-and working of their engines.
-
-[Illustration: COSGARNE HOUSE.]
-
-By this time the old Newcomen engines had been almost completely
-superseded, only one of that construction remaining at work in the whole
-county of Cornwall. The prospects of the engine business were, indeed, so
-promising, that Boulton even contemplated retiring altogether from his
-other branches of business at Soho, and settling himself permanently in
-Cornwall.[196]
-
-    [196] His partner Fothergill would not, however, consent to let
-      Boulton go, and the Soho business was continued until the death
-      of Fothergill (bankrupt) in 1782, after which it was continued
-      for some time longer under the firm of Boulton and Scale.
-
-Notwithstanding the great demand for engines, the firm continued for some
-time in serious straits for money, and Boulton was under the necessity of
-resorting to all manner of expedients to raise it, sometimes with Watt’s
-concurrence, but oftener without. Watt’s inexperience in money matters,
-conjoined with his extreme timidity and nervousness, made him apprehend
-ruin and bankruptcy from every fresh proposition made to him on the
-subject of raising money. He was kept so utterly wretched by his fears as
-to be on occasions quite unmanned, and he would brood for days together
-on the accumulation of misery and anxiety which his great invention had
-brought upon him. His wife was kept almost as miserable as himself, and as
-Matthew Boulton was the only person, in her opinion, who could help him
-out of his troubles, she privately appealed to him in the most pathetic
-terms:--
-
-  “I know,” she wrote, “the goodness of your heart will readily
-  forgive me for this freedom, and your friendship for Mr. Watt
-  will, I am sure, excuse me for pointing out a few things that
-  press upon his mind. I am very sorry to tell you that both his
-  health and spirits have been much worse since you left Soho. It
-  is all that I can do to keep him from sinking under that fatal
-  depression. Whether the badness of his health is owing to the
-  lowness of his spirits, or the lowness of his spirits to his bad
-  health, I cannot pretend to tell. But this I know, that there
-  are several things that prey so upon his mind as to render him
-  perfectly miserable. You know the bond that he is engaged in
-  to Vere’s house has been the source of great uneasiness to him.
-  It is still so, and the thought of it bows him down to the very
-  ground. He thinks that company has used both you and him very ill
-  in refusing to release him, when you can give them security for a
-  vast deal more than you are bound for. Forgive me, dear Sir, if I
-  express myself wrong. It is a subject I am not used to write on.
-  I know if you can you will set his mind at rest on this affair.
-  I need not tell you that the seeing him so very unhappy must of
-  consequence make me so. There is another affair that sits very
-  heavy on his mind; that is, some old accounts that have remained
-  unsettled since the commencement of the business. They never
-  come across his mind but he is rendered unfit for doing anything
-  for a long time. A thousand times have I begged him to mention
-  them to you.... I am sure he would suffer every kind of anxiety
-  rather than ask you to do a thing you seemed not to approve of. I
-  know the humanity of your nature would make you cheerfully give
-  relief to any of the human race that was in distress, as far as
-  was within your power. The knowledge of this makes me happy in
-  the thought that you will exert every nerve to give ease to the
-  mind of your friend. Believe me, there is not on earth a person
-  who is dearer to him than you are. It causes him pain to give
-  you trouble. The badness of his constitution, and his natural
-  dislike to business, make him leave many things undone that he
-  knows ought to be done, and, when it is perhaps too late, to make
-  himself unhappy at their being neglected.... In his present state
-  of weakness, every ill, however trifling, appears of a gigantic
-  size, while on the other hand every good is diminished. Again,
-  I repeat, that from the certain knowledge I have of his temper,
-  nothing could contribute more to his happiness and make him go
-  on cheerfully with business than having everything finished as
-  he goes along, and have no unsettled scores to look back to and
-  brood over in his mind.”[197]
-
-    [197] Mrs. Watt to Mr. Boulton, then in London, 15th April, 1781.
-      Boulton MSS.
-
-Mrs. Watt concluded by entreating that no mention would be made to her
-husband of her having written this letter, as it would only give him pain,
-and explaining that she had adopted the expedient merely in the hope that
-something might be done to alleviate his sufferings. This, however, was a
-very difficult thing to do. Boulton could remind his hopeless partner of
-the orders coming in for engines, and that such orders meant prosperity,
-not ruin; but he could not alter the condition of a mind essentially
-morbid. Boulton was himself really in far greater straits than Watt. He
-had risked his whole fortune on the enterprise; and besides finding money
-for buildings, plant, wages, materials, and credits, he was maintaining
-Watt until the engine business became productive. We find from the annual
-balance-sheets that Watt was regularly paid 330_l._ a year, which was
-charged upon the hardware business; and that this continued down to the
-year 1785. Till then everything had been out-go; the profits were all to
-come. It was estimated that upwards of 40,000_l._ were invested in the
-engine business before it began to yield profits; and all this was found
-by Boulton. In one of his letters to Matthews he wrote, “I find myself
-in the character of P, pay for all,” but so long as his credit held good,
-Watt’s maintenance was secure.
-
-So soon, however, as it became clear that the enterprise would be a
-success, and that the demand for engines must shortly become national, the
-firm was threatened with a danger of another kind, which occasioned almost
-as much alarm to Boulton as it did to Watt. This was the movement set on
-foot in Cornwall and elsewhere with the object of upsetting their patent.
-Had the engine been a useless invention, no one could have questioned
-their right of property in it; but, being recognised as of boundless
-utility, it began to be urged that the public ought to be free to use it
-without paying for it. It was alleged that it had become indispensable
-for the proper working of the mines, and that the abolition of the patent
-right would be an immense boon to the mining interest, and enable them to
-work the ores at a much reduced cost, while the general industry of the
-country would also be greatly benefited.
-
-When Boulton wrote Watt from Cornwall, informing him that the Cornishmen
-were agitating the repeal of the special Act by which their patent had
-been extended, and getting up petitions with that object, Watt replied,
-“I suspected some such move as this; and you may depend upon it they will
-never be easy while they pay us anything. This is a match of all Cornwall
-against Boulton and Watt; and though we may be the better players, yet
-they can hold longer out. However, if we do die, let us die hard.”[198]
-
-    [198] In another letter Watt described himself as “worried by the
-      Wheal Chanceians.... In short,” says he, “I am at this moment so
-      provoked at the undeserved rancour with which we are persecuted
-      in Cornwall, that, were it not on account of the deplorable
-      state of debt I find myself in, I would live on bread and
-      cheese, and suffer the water to run out at their adits, before
-      I would relax the slightest iota of what I thought my right in
-      their favour.”--Watt to Boulton, 17th October, 1780. Boulton
-      MSS.
-
-But would Parliament really take away that right of property in the
-invention which they had granted, and deprive Watt and his partner of
-the fruits of their long labour and anxiety, and their heavy outlay,
-now that the superiority of the engine had become established? Would
-the legislature consign them to certain ruin because it would be for the
-advantage of the Cornish miners to have the use of the invention without
-paying for it? Watt would not for a moment believe this, and both he and
-Boulton felt strong in the conviction that their patent right would be
-maintained.
-
-Time was, when Watt would have gladly parted with his invention for a very
-small sum, and made the engine free to all, so far as he was concerned.
-Even after it had been perfected at Soho, after repeated and costly
-experiments, he declared his willingness to sell all his interest in it
-for 7000_l._, which would have barely remunerated him for the time and
-labour he had bestowed upon it, then extending over nearly twenty years of
-the best period of his life. And now, after six years of the partnership
-had run, and the heavy expenditure incurred by Boulton in introducing
-the engine was still unproductive, he regarded it as cruel in the extreme
-to attempt to deprive him of his just reward. To Boulton he disburdened
-himself fully, in strong and sometimes bitter terms. “They charge us,”
-he said, “with establishing a monopoly, but if a monopoly, it is one
-by means of which their mines are made more productive than ever they
-were before. Have we not given over to them two-thirds of the advantages
-derivable from its use in the saving of fuel, and reserved only one-third
-to ourselves, though even that has been still further reduced to meet
-the pressure of the times? They say it is inconvenient for the mining
-interest to be burdened with the payment of engine dues; just as it is
-inconvenient for the person who wishes to get at my purse that I should
-keep my breeches-pocket buttoned. It is doubtless also very inconvenient
-for the man who wishes to get a slice of the squire’s land, that there
-should be a law tying it up by an entail. Yet the squire’s land has not
-been of his own making, as the condensing engine has been of mine. He has
-only passively inherited his property, while this invention has been the
-product of my own labour, and of God knows how much anguish of mind and
-body;”--
-
-  “Why don’t they,” he asked, “petition Parliament to take Sir
-  Francis Bassett’s mines from him? He acknowledges that he has
-  derived great profits from using our engines, which is more than
-  we can say of our invention; for it appears by our books that
-  Cornwall has hitherto eaten up all the profits we have drawn
-  from it, as well as all that we have got from other places, and
-  a good sum of our own money into the bargain. We have no power to
-  compel anybody to erect our engines. What, then, will Parliament
-  say to any man who comes there to complain of a grievance he can
-  avoid, and which does not exist but in his own imagination? Will
-  Parliament give away our property without an equivalent? Will they
-  not collect that equivalent from the county of Cornwall? Will they
-  adjudge them to pay us any less sum than it has cost ourselves?
-  Will they not further add some reward for the quantity of life
-  that has been devoted to the pursuit of what is evidently for
-  the advantage of others, but hitherto has not been for our own?
-  Lastly, will Parliament compel us to work for anybody without a
-  remuneration adequate to our experience, or will they oblige us
-  to labour for any one without our consent? We are in the state of
-  the old Roman who was found guilty of raising better crops than
-  his neighbours, and was therefore ordered to bring before the
-  assembly of the people his instruments of husbandry, and to tell
-  them of his art. He complied, and when he had done said, ‘These
-  O Romans, are the instruments of our art; but I cannot bring into
-  the forum the labours, the sweats, the watchings, the anxieties,
-  the cares, which produced these crops.’ So, every one sees the
-  reward which we may yet probably receive from _our_ labours; but
-  few consider the price we have paid for that reward, which is by
-  no means a certain annuity, but a return of the most precarious
-  sort. To put an end, as far as lies in my power, to all disputes
-  with the people of Cornwall, let them pay my debts and give me a
-  reasonable sum for the time I have lost, and I will resign my part
-  in their favour, and think myself well off by the bargain. Or,
-  if you can find any man who is agreeable to yourself, I’ll sell
-  him my share on reasonable terms, and, like the sailor, I will
-  promise to contrive no more fire-engines. In short, my dear Sir,
-  with a good cause in hand, I do not fear going before Parliament
-  or anywhere. I am sure that if they did anything they would put
-  us in a better position than we are in now.”[199]
-
-    [199] Watt to Boulton, 31st October, 1780. Boulton MSS.
-
-The petition to Parliament, though much talked about, was not, however,
-presented; and the schemers who envied Boulton and Watt the gains which
-they had now the prospect of deriving from the use of their engine,
-shortly after resorted to other means of participating in them, to
-which we shall hereafter refer. In the mean time Boulton, at the urgent
-entreaty of Watt, who described himself as “loaded to 12 lbs. on the
-inch,” returned to Birmingham; though he had scarcely left before
-urgent entreaties were sent after him that he must come back again to
-Cornwall.[200]
-
-    [200] “Though your long stay, when you were last here,” wrote
-      Henderson, the resident agent, “must have been attended with
-      great inconveniences, yet you are now very much wanted in Wheal
-      Virgin affairs. Different interests have produced a sort of
-      anarchy.... Were Mr. Watt here now, I don’t think his health
-      would allow him to stand the battles with the different people.
-      I have not written to him freely on this subject, as I am afraid
-      it would hurt him.... Your authority here as an adventurer has
-      much greater weight than anything I can propose.”--Henderson to
-      Boulton, 4th February, 1781. Boulton MSS.
-
-While Boulton was in Cornwall, the principal manufacturers of Birmingham,
-dissatisfied with the bad and dear supply of copper, resolved to form
-themselves into a company for the purpose of making brass and spelter;
-and they wrote to Boulton offering to raise the requisite means,
-provided he would take the lead in the management of the concern. He
-could not but feel gratified at this best of all proofs of the esteem
-in which his townsmen held him, and of their confidence in his business
-qualities. Boulton, however, declined to undertake so large an addition
-to his labours. He felt that he would soon be an old man, and that it
-would be necessary for him to contract rather than extend the field of
-his operations; besides, the engine business was already sufficiently
-prosperous to induce him to devote to it the chief share of his attention.
-But he promised to his Birmingham friends that he would always be glad to
-give them his best advice and assistance. He accordingly furnished them
-with a plan of operations, and drew up a scheme for their consideration,
-which was unanimously adopted, and the whole of the share capital was at
-once subscribed for. He also made arrangements with his Cornish friends
-for a regular supply of copper direct from the mines on the best terms. On
-his return to Birmingham, we find him entering upon an elaborate series of
-experiments, to determine the best constituents of brass; in the course
-of which he personally visited the principal calamine works in Wales
-and Derbyshire, for the purpose of testing their different produce. He
-diligently read all the treatises on the subject, and made inquiries as
-to the practice adopted in foreign countries. Finding, however, that the
-continuance of his connexion with the brass company was absorbing more
-of his time than he could afford to bestow upon it, he shortly withdrew
-from the concern,--partly also, because he was dissatisfied with what
-he considered the illiberal manner in which the managing committee were
-conducting its affairs.
-
-Another subject which occupied much of Boulton’s attention about the
-same time, was the improvement of engine boilers. At an early period he
-introduced tubes in them, through which the heated air of the furnace
-passed, thereby greatly increasing the heating surface and enabling steam
-to be raised more easily and rapidly. We find him in correspondence with
-Watt on the subject, while residing at Redruth in the autumn of 1780. He
-first suggested iron tubes; but Watt wrote, “I cannot advise iron for the
-tubes of boilers, but they may be thought of.”[201] Next Boulton suggested
-the employment of copper tubes; to which Watt replied, “I approve of what
-you observe about making copper flanches to the boiler pipes in future,
-and Ale and Cakes can easily be converted to that way whenever they put up
-a second boiler.” We find Boulton introducing four copper tubes 20 inches
-in diameter into the Wheal Busy boiler, which was 26 feet in length,--the
-fire passing through two of the tubes, and returning through the other
-two. Here, therefore, we have Boulton anticipating the invention of the
-tubular boiler, and clearly adopting it in practice, before the existence
-of the locomotive, for which it was afterwards re-invented. In fact,
-the multitubular boiler is but a modification and extension of Boulton’s
-principle, as applied by him at so early a period in the Cornish boilers.
-
-    [201] Watt to Boulton, 17th October, 1780.
-
-The numerous MS. books left by Boulton show the care with which he
-made his experiments, and the scrupulousness with which he recorded
-the results. Copies of his observations and experiments on boilers
-were sent to Watt, to be entered by him in “the calculation book,” in
-which was recorded the tabulated experience of the firm. Boulton was
-also an excellent mechanical draughtsman, as appears from his tablets,
-which contain a number of beautifully executed drawings of engines
-and machinery, with very copious and minutely-written instructions for
-erecting them. Some of the drawings of sugar-mills are especially well
-executed, and delicately coloured. A rough sketch is given in one of
-the books, with a written explanation in Boulton’s hand, of a mode of
-applying power in taking canal-boats through tunnels. It consists of
-an engine-boat, with toothed claws attached to it for the purpose of
-catching metal racks fastened along the sides of the tunnel, such being
-his design for working boats upon canals. While in Cornwall, he occupied
-his evenings in drawing sections of various mines, showing the adits, and
-the method of applying the pumping machinery, to which were also added
-numerous elaborate calculations of the results of engine working. He
-also continued to devise improvements in the construction and working of
-the steam-engine, on which subject he exchanged his views with Watt at
-great length. In one of his letters he says: “I like your plan of making
-all the principal wearing parts of tempered steel, and the racks of best
-Swedish iron, with the teeth cut out. Query: Would it not be worth while
-to make _a machine_ for dividing and cutting the teeth in good form out
-of sectors? The iron would be less strained by that mode of cutting.” At
-other times, when the steam-engine subject seemed exhausted, he proceeded
-with the designing of road-carriages, in which he was an adept, filling
-a quarto drawing-book, entitled ‘Thoughts on Carriages,’ with sketches of
-different kinds of vehicles, some in pencil and Indian ink, and others in
-colours, beautifully finished. Such were the leisure employments of this
-indefatigably industrious man.
-
-[Illustration: ENTRANCE TO COSGARNE HOUSE.]
-
-
-
-
-[Illustration: THE ‘WAGGON AND HORSES,’ HANDSWORTH.]
-
-CHAPTER XV.
-
-WATT AGAIN VISITS CORNWALL--INVENTION OF THE ROTARY MOTION--THE PATENT
-RIGHT AGAIN ASSAILED.
-
-
-Watt’s presence being much wanted in Cornwall, he again proceeded thither,
-accompanied by his wife and family, and arrived at Cosgarne towards
-the end of June, 1781. He found that many things had gone wrong for
-want of the master’s eye, and it was some time before he succeeded in
-putting affairs in order. The men had been neglecting their work, “going
-a-drinking.” Cartwright had “contracted a fever in his working arm, and
-been swallowing ale for a cure,” until he heard Watt had come, when the
-fever left him. Mrs. Watt also found occasion to complain of sundry little
-grievances, and favoured Boulton with a long catalogue of them. Gregory
-and Jessy had caught cold on the journey, and workmen were hammering about
-the house making repairs. There was, however, one gleam of brightness in
-her letter: “James’s spirits were surprisingly mended since his arrival.”
-
-Watt was a most voluminous correspondent. He wrote Boulton several times
-a week great folio sheets, written close, in small hand. The letters must
-have occupied much of his time to write, and of Boulton’s to read. The
-latter, seeing his partner’s tendency to indulge in “worrit” about petty
-troubles, advised him in a kindly spirit not to vex himself so much about
-such matters, but to call philosophy to his aid. Why should he not occupy
-some of his spare time in writing out a history of all his steam-engine
-contrivances, to be dedicated to Sir Joseph Banks, and published in the
-‘Transactions of the Royal Society’? But Watt was extremely averse to
-writing anything for publication, and the suggestion was not acted on.
-Then, knowing Watt’s greatest pleasure to be in inventing, Boulton in a
-subsequent letter advised him to take up afresh, and complete a plan which
-they had often discussed, of producing rotary motion, by which the engine
-might be applied to work mills and drive machinery.
-
-Watt had from the first regarded the employment of the steam-engine in
-producing continuous rotary motion as one of its most useful applications,
-and with this object he invented his original wheel-engine. No steps were
-taken to introduce the invention to practical use; but it occurred to Watt
-that the same object might be better effected by employing the ordinary
-engine for the purpose, with certain modifications.[202] The subject had
-partially occupied his attention during his first visit to Cornwall; for
-we find him writing Boulton from Chacewater, in 1779, “As to the circular
-motion, I will apply it as soon as I can, but foresee that I shall be
-very busy shortly, and much out of doors.” On his subsequent return to
-Birmingham, after frequent conferences with his partner on the subject, he
-proceeded to prepare a model, in which he made use of a crank connected
-with the working beam of the engine to produce the rotary motion. There
-was no originality in the employment of the crank, which was an expedient
-that Watt had long before made use of.[203] The crank was, indeed, one of
-the most common of mechanical appliances. It was in daily use in every
-spinning-wheel, in every grindstone turned by hand, in every turner’s
-and knife-grinder’s foot-lathe, and in every potter’s wheel. It was one
-of the commonest, as it must have been one of the oldest, of mechanical
-expedients. “The true inventor of the crank rotative motion,” said Watt,
-“was the man who first contrived the common foot-lathe: applying it to
-the engine was like taking a knife to cut cheese which had been made to
-cut bread.”
-
-    [202] In June, 1780, we find Boulton describing to Colonel Watson
-      the progress of the Soho business, as follows:--“Since I had
-      the honour of seeing you in England we have erected upwards of
-      40 of our new steam-engines, and have (from so much experience)
-      obviated every difficulty, and made it a most practicable
-      and perfect machine. The steam wheel we have not meddled with
-      since you were at Soho, as we have been fully employed upon
-      large beam-engines; besides, we have applied the beam engine
-      to rotative motions so successfully that the wheel engine seems
-      almost unnecessary.”
-
-    [203] Watt had made use of the crank at a very early period.
-      Thus we find him writing to Dr. Small on the 20th September,
-      1769,--“As to the condenser, I laid aside the spiral wheels
-      because of the noise and thumping, and substituted a crank: in
-      other respects it performed well enough.”
-
-[Illustration: THE CRANK AS APPLIED IN THE FOOT-LATHE.]
-
-[Illustration: INTERIOR OF THE “WAGGON AND HORSES.”
-
-[By Percival Skelton.]]
-
-Though Watt had become very reserved, especially to strangers, about
-his inventions, he could not altogether keep from the knowledge of his
-workmen the contrivances on which his thoughts were occupied. He was
-under the necessity of employing them to make patterns after his drawings,
-from which any ingenious man might readily apprehend what he was aiming
-at. The Soho workmen were naturally curious about the new inventions
-and adaptations which Watt was constantly producing, and these usually
-formed the subject of conversation at their by-hours. While the model of
-the crank engine was under construction at Soho in the summer of 1780,
-a number of the workmen met one Saturday evening, according to custom,
-to drink together at the “Waggon and Horses,” a little old-fashioned,
-low-roofed, roadside public-house, still standing in the village of
-Handsworth. The men were seated round the little kitchen-parlour, talking
-about their work, and boasting, as men will do over their beer, of the new
-and wonderful things which they were carrying forward in the shops. Dick
-Cartwright, the pattern maker, was one of the loudest of the party. He was
-occupied upon a model for the purpose of producing rotary motion, which
-he declared would prove one of the best things Mr. Watt had ever brought
-out. The other men were curious to know all about it, and to illustrate
-the action of the machine, Cartwright proceeded to make a rude sketch of
-the crank upon the wooden table with a bit of chalk. A person who sat in
-the kitchen corner in the assumed garb of a workman, drank in greedily all
-that the men had been saying; for there were many eavesdroppers constantly
-hanging about Soho, some for the purpose of picking up surreptitious
-information, and others to decoy away skilled workmen who were in the
-secrets of the manufacture. Watt himself had never thought of taking
-out a patent for the crank, not believing it to be patentable; but the
-stranger aforesaid had no such hesitation, and it is said he posted
-straight to London and anticipated Watt by securing a protection for the
-contrivance.[204]
-
-    [204] The invention was patented by James Pickard, a Birmingham
-      button-maker, on the 23rd August, 1780 (No. 1263). Matthew
-      Washborough of Bristol arranged with Pickard for employing it
-      in the engine invented by him for securing circular motion.
-      Washborough’s own patent has no reference to the crank, though
-      he is usually named as the inventor of it.
-
-Watt was exceedingly wroth when he discovered the trick which had been
-played him, and he suspected that Matthew Washborough was at the bottom of
-it. Washborough was a Bristol mechanic, who carried on several branches of
-mechanical trade, amongst others that of clock-making on a large scale.
-Watt had employed Washborough to make nozzles for several of the Cornish
-engines, but was not satisfied with his work; for we find him writing
-to his partner, “If Washborough makes no better engines than he does
-eduction-pipes, he will soon be blown: the Wheal Union pipe is the worst
-job you ever saw, being worse than Forbes’s, which was very bad; I scarce
-know what to do with it.” It would appear from this that Washborough had
-begun to make engines, thereby turning to account the knowledge he had
-acquired in Cornwall. One of the first he made was for the purpose of
-driving the lathes of his own manufactory at Bristol; and it affords a
-clear proof of Washborough’s ingenuity that in this engine he employed
-both the fly-wheel and the crank. He has been styled the inventor of
-the fly-wheel, but he was no more its inventor than he was of the crank;
-the Irish Professor Fitzgerald having proposed to employ it as part of
-a Papin’s engine as early as the year 1757. Washborough shortly after
-erected an engine after the same plan for a manufacturer on Snow Hill,
-Birmingham; and then it was that Watt learned that he had been “bolted
-out,” as he termed it, from making use of the crank.
-
-At first he was puzzled what to do to overcome the difficulty, but his
-prolific mind was rarely at a loss, and before many months were over he
-had contrived several other methods for effecting rotary motion. “I dare
-not, however,” he wrote to Boulton, “_make_ my new scheme, lest we be
-betrayed again; I believe we had best take the patent first.” At the same
-time Watt was persuaded that no contrivance could surpass the crank[205]
-for directness, simplicity, and efficiency. He was therefore desirous,
-if possible, of making use of it in his rotative engine, as originally
-proposed; and he wrote to Boulton, then at Redruth, “I think you ought
-to call upon Washborough as you return, and let him know that we will
-dispute his having an exclusive right to those cranks.”[206] Boulton
-called upon Washborough accordingly, and gave him notice to this effect.
-But Watt hesitated to use the crank after all. Although the contrivance
-was by no means new, its application to the steam-engine was new; and,
-notwithstanding the unfair way in which Pickard had anticipated him, Watt
-did not like to set the example of assailing a patent, however disputable,
-as it might furnish a handle to those who were at the time seeking to
-attack his own. The proposal was made to him that he should allow the
-Washborough Company to use his steam-engine in exchange for their allowing
-him to use the crank; but this he positively refused to agree to, as he
-felt confident in yet being able to produce a circular motion without
-employing the crank at all.
-
-    [205] At a later date we find him writing to his partner thus:--“I
-      cannot agree with Mr. Palmer’s notion about the crank engine,
-      as, though a crank is not new, yet that application of it is
-      new and never was practised except by us. It is by no means our
-      interest to demolish the crank patent, because then all our own
-      machines of that kind will be of no use, and I am convinced that
-      the crank can be made their superior.”--Watt to Boulton, 15th
-      October, 1781.
-
-    [206] Watt to Boulton, 19th November, 1780.
-
-Thus matters stood until the beginning of the year 1781, when Washborough,
-having entered into an arrangement with the Commissioners of the Navy to
-erect an engine for grinding flour at the Deptford Victualling Yard,[207]
-a formal application was made to Boulton and Watt to apply their engine
-for the purpose. Watt protested that he could not bring himself to submit
-to such an indignity. If the Commissioners thought proper to employ him
-to erect the necessary engine, rotative motion, and machinery, he would
-exert every faculty which God had given him in doing so, but he “would
-never consent to hold the candle to Washborough.”
-
-    [207] Boulton and Watt were by this time employing their engine
-      for a like purpose, as appears from a letter of Boulton to S.
-      Wyatt, dated 28th February, 1781, in which he says,--“We are now
-      applying our engines to all kinds of mills, such as corn mills,
-      rolling iron and copper, winding coals out of the pit, and every
-      other purpose to which the wind or water mill is applicable. In
-      such applications, one hundred weight of coals will produce as
-      much mechanical power as is equal to the work of ten men for ten
-      hours, and these mills may be made very much more powerful than
-      any water-mills in England.” To Mr. Henderson he wrote at the
-      same date:--“I make no scruple to say but that I could readily
-      build a more powerful and in every respect better copper-rolling
-      mill by steam than any water-mill now in England. As soon as
-      the Cornish engines are at work, I intend to turn millwright
-      and make our steam-mills universally known.”
-
-  “Had I esteemed him,” he wrote to Boulton, “a man of ingenuity and
-  the real inventor of the thing in question, I should not have made
-  any objection; but, when I know that the contrivance is my own,
-  and has been stolen from me by the most infamous means, and, to
-  add to the provocation, a patent been surreptitiously obtained for
-  it, I think it would be descending below the character of _a man_
-  to be found in any way aiding or assisting him in his pretended
-  invention.... I think, therefore, that you should propose to the
-  Honourable Board to undertake the direction of the whole; and,
-  provided you can agree with them about the customary premium
-  for the savings by our engine, you should do the whirligig part
-  [the rotative motion] for love. If this proposal should not be
-  accepted, I beg of you to decline having any concern with it, and
-  leave the field clear to Washborough. We may perhaps gain more
-  by so doing than we can lose, as I assure you I have a very mean
-  opinion of the mechanical abilities of our opponents. They have
-  committed many gross errors in such of their works as I have had
-  occasion to know about, and we may get honour by rectifying their
-  mistakes. Perhaps this may seem to you to savour of vanity. If
-  it does, excuse it on account of the very provoking circumstances
-  which have extorted the confession. If these engineers had let us
-  alone, I should not have meddled with them; but, as it is, I think
-  we should be wanting in common prudence if we suffered a marriage
-  between our machine and theirs, and if we did not do all we could
-  to strip them of their borrowed feathers, which I hope there is
-  justice enough left in England to enable us to do.”[208]
-
-    [208] Watt to Boulton, 21st April, 1781. On the following day
-      (the 22nd April) Watt wrote another long letter to Boulton on
-      the same subject. His mind could not be at rest, and he thus
-      unburdened himself of his indignation:--“If you find yourself
-      so circumstanced, as you say you are, that you _dare_ not refuse
-      [to erect the proposed engine for the Navy Board], then let them
-      pay M. Washborough and have done with him, and let the engine be
-      erected under our direction or Mr. Smeaton’s. With the latter
-      I will go hand in hand; nay I will do more--I will submit to
-      him in all mechanical matters; but I will by no means submit to
-      go on with thieves and puppies, whose knowledge and integrity
-      I contemn. Though I am not so saucy as many of my countrymen,
-      I have enough of innate pride to prevent me from doing a mean
-      action because a servile prudence may dictate it. If a king were
-      to think Matt Washborough a better engineer than me, I should
-      scorn to undeceive him. I should leave that to Matthew. The
-      connexion would be stronger as the evidence would be undeniable.
-      So much for heroics!... I will never meanly sue a thief to give
-      me my own again, unless I have nothing left behind. As it now
-      stands, I have enough left to make their patent tremble, and
-      shall leave no mechanical stone unturned to aggrieve them. I
-      will do more. I will publish my inventions, by which means they
-      will be entirely precluded, because they must be fools indeed
-      that will pay _them_ for what they can have for nothing. I
-      am very ill with a headache, therefore can write no more than
-      passion dictates.”
-
-Boulton acted on his partner’s advice, and declined the proposed
-connexion. The Navy Board were placed in a dilemma by this decision.
-They then referred the matter to Mr. Smeaton, and requested him to
-report to them as to the most suitable plan of a flour-mill, and the
-steam-engine best calculated to drive it. To the great surprise of Watt
-as well as Washborough, Smeaton reported that both their engines were
-alike unsuited for such a purpose. “I apprehend,” he said, “that no
-motion communicated from the reciprocating lever of a fire-engine can
-ever produce a perfect circular motion, like the regular efflux of water
-in turning a water-wheel!” This report relieved the Commissioners. They
-abandoned their scheme, and the order for Washborough’s engine was at once
-countermanded.[209]
-
-So soon as Watt had got fairly settled at Cosgarne, in the summer of 1781,
-he proceeded to work out the plan of a rotary-working engine. Boulton was
-making experiments with the same object at Soho, communicating to him the
-results from day to day. He was stimulated to prosecute the inquiry by
-the applications which he received from many quarters for steam-engines
-suitable for driving mills. He therefore urged Watt to complete the
-invention, and to prepare the drawings and specification, declaring his
-readiness at any time to provide the money requisite for taking out a
-patent. “The people in London, Manchester, and Birmingham,” said he,
-“are _steam-mill mad_. I don’t mean to hurry you, but I think that in
-the course of a month or two we should determine to take out a patent
-for certain methods of producing rotative motion from the vibrating or
-reciprocating motion of the fire-engine,--remembering that we have four
-months in which to describe the particulars of the invention.”[210]
-
-    [209] Washborough was much mortified by the decision of the Navy
-      Board, and alleged that he had been badly used by them. The
-      anxieties occasioned by his failure, and the pecuniary losses he
-      had sustained, preyed heavily upon his mind, and he was seized
-      by a fever which carried him off in October, 1781, when only
-      in his 28th year. He was unquestionably a young man of much
-      ingenuity and merit, and had he lived would have achieved high
-      eminence and distinction as an engineer.
-
-    [210] Boulton to Watt, 21st June, 1781.
-
-Watt proceeded to put his ideas in a definite shape as fast as his bad
-health and low spirits would allow. Every now and then a fit of despair
-came upon him about his liability to the bankers, and so long as it lasted
-he was unmanned, and could do nothing. At the very time that Boulton was
-writing the letter last quoted, Watt was thus bewailing his unhappy lot:--
-
-
-  “When I executed the mortgage,” said he, “my sensations were such
-  as were not to be envied by any man who goes to death in a just
-  cause; nor has time lessened the acuteness of my feelings....
-  I thought I was resigning in one hour the fruits of the labour
-  of my whole life,--and that if any accident befell you or me, I
-  should have left a wife and children destitute of the means of
-  subsistence, by throwing away the only jewel Fortune had presented
-  me with.... These transactions have been such a burden upon my
-  mind that I have become in a manner indifferent to all other
-  things, and can take pleasure in nothing until my mind is relieved
-  from them; and perhaps, from so long a disuse of entertaining
-  pleasing ideas, never may be capable of receiving them any
-  more.”[211]
-
-    [211] Watt to Boulton, 21st June, 1781.
-
-Boulton made haste to console his partner, and promised to take immediate
-steps to relieve his mind of the anxiety that weighed so heavy upon
-it; and he was as good as his word. At the same time he told Watt that
-he must not suppose he was the only man in the world who had cares and
-troubles to endure. Boulton himself had, perhaps, more than his share,
-but he tried to bear them as lightly as he could. With his heavy business
-engagements to meet, his large concerns to keep going, he was not a man
-much to be envied; yet he continued to receive his visitors as usual at
-Soho, and to put on a cheerful countenance. “I am obliged,” he wrote, “to
-smile, to laugh, to be good-humoured, sometimes to be merry, and even go
-to the play! Oh, that I were at the Land’s End!” Such was his playful way
-of reminding Watt of the necessity of cheerfulness to enable one to get
-through work pleasantly.[212] But Watt’s temperament was wholly different.
-His philosophy never rose to the height of taking things easy. He could
-not cast his cares behind him, nor lose sight of them; but carried them
-about with him by day, and took them to bed with him at night; thus making
-life a sort of prolonged vexation--a daily and nightly misery.
-
-    [212] While Boulton spoke good humouredly to his partner in
-      Cornwall with the object of cheering him up, he privately
-      unbosomed himself to his friend Matthews in London. When
-      requesting him to call at once on the bankers and get the
-      account reduced to an advance of 12,000_l._, and thus obtain
-      Mr. Watt’s release, he complained of the distress which the
-      communications of the latter had caused him. He thought his
-      conduct ungenerous, taking all the circumstances into account,
-      and considering that the firm were within a year of being
-      tolerably easy in money matters. “When I reflect,” he wrote, “on
-      his situation in 1772 and my own at that time, and compare them
-      with his and mine now, I think I owe him little.... I some time
-      ago gave him a security of all my two-thirds, after paying off
-      L. V. and W. [the bankers], from which you may judge how little
-      reason he has to complain. He talks of his duty to his wife
-      and children; by the same rule I ought not to neglect mine. His
-      wife’s fortune joined to his own did not amount to sixpence: my
-      wife brought me in money and land 28,000_l._ I advanced him all
-      he wanted without a security, but in return he is not content
-      with an ample security for advancing nothing at all but what he
-      derived from his connexion with me.”--Boulton to Matthews, 28th
-      June, 1781. Boulton MSS.
-
-But a new and still more alarming source of anxiety occurred to disturb
-the mind of poor Watt, and occasion him many more sleepless nights. The
-movement to abolish the patent by repeal of the Act of Parliament having
-broken down, attempts were now made in many quarters to evade it by
-ingenious imitations, in which the principle of Watt’s engine was adopted
-in variously disguised forms. But to do this successfully would have
-required an inventive faculty almost as potent as that of Watt himself;
-and he had drawn the specification of his patent too carefully to be
-easily broken through by the clumsy imitators who made the attempt. It
-was, however, only natural that the success of the new engine should draw
-the attention of ingenious mechanics to the same subject. Watt had drawn a
-great prize, and why should not they? though they little knew the burden
-of sorrow which his prize had brought upon him. They only knew of the
-large annual dues--probably exaggerated by the tongue of rumour--which
-were being paid to the patentees for the use of their engines; and
-they not unnaturally sought to share in the good fortune. There might
-possibly be other mechanical methods by which the same objects were to
-be accomplished, without borrowing from Watt; at all events it was worth
-trying. Hence the number of mechanical schemers who made their appearance
-almost simultaneously in all parts of the country, and the number of new
-methods of various kinds contrived by them for the production of motive
-power.
-
-Watt was very soon informed of the schemes which were on foot in his
-immediate neighbourhood--much too soon for his peace of mind. He at
-once wrote to his partner: “Some Camborne gentlemen (supposed to be
-Bonze and Trevithick) have invented a new engine which they say beats
-ours two-thirds, and one of the partners has gone to London to procure
-a patent for it. A Mr. Vice says he has also invented a new engine,
-and that they have stolen his and compounded it with ours; he intends
-to take out a caveat against them.”[213] Though Bonze was an excellent
-engineer, and elicited the admiration of Watt himself, it turned out that
-he had no concern with the new invention. Its projectors proved to be
-the Hornblowers, also engineers of considerable local repute. Watt had
-befriended the family, and employed them in erecting his engines, by which
-means they became perfectly familiar with their construction and mode of
-action. Jonathan Hornblower had a large family of sons, of whom Jabez,
-Jesse, Jethro, and Jonathan were engineers, like their father. Jabez,
-one of the cleverest, had spent some time in Holland, from whence he had
-returned with some grand scheme in his head for carrying out an extensive
-system of drainage in that country. Like his father and the other sons,
-he was employed in erecting Watt’s engines,[214] which had the effect
-of directing his attention to the invention of a new power which should
-supersede that of his employer.
-
-    [213] Watt to Boulton, 24th June, 1781.
-
-    [214] Watt befriended Jabez like the other members of his family,
-      as appears from the following passage in a letter to Boulton
-      (6th September, 1778):--“Capt. Paul has turned Jabez adrift,
-      having for some time taken umbrage at him because he would
-      do his work well and therefore expensively. Jabez has a bad
-      wife, is poor and unhappy. He is very clever, a good engineer,
-      and industrious, though he seems not to have the faculty of
-      conciliating people’s affections. I fear he will go to Holland,
-      and as he can hurt us [there being no patent for the engine
-      secured there] I must try to get him bread here.” Later,
-      Boulton wrote Watt from Redruth (18th November, 1780),--“Old
-      Hornblower has disobliged Mr. Daniel. I have my fears they will
-      not employ him; but when our own business is sealed to-morrow,
-      I will make a push in his favour. That family hath not been
-      successful in conciliating the affections of the people in this
-      neighbourhood.”
-
-It was for some time doubtful what was the precise character of the new
-engine. Indeed the Hornblowers themselves long remained undecided about
-its actual form, being still in the throes of invention. They knew that
-they must copy discreetly, so as not to lay themselves too open to attack;
-and though they urged the superiority of their engine so strongly as
-to induce several of the mining companies to believe in them, and even
-to withhold orders from Boulton and Watt, they refrained as yet from
-publishing their invention. Watt wrote to his partner that he understood
-the Hornblowers’ engine was on some new principle, and the only novelty
-he could think of was a caloric air-engine. He therefore asked Boulton
-to make all the inquiries he could as to the respective bulks and prices
-per 1000 feet of all possible kinds of air in their most expanded states.
-“I am much vexed,” he continued, “by this affair. Jabez does not want
-abilities: the rest are fools. If they have really found a prize, it will
-ruin us.... Bankruptcy might ensue to both. But I don’t fear getting my
-bread independent of engines, though much easier with them.”[215] Watt
-was, however, in error as to the nature of the Hornblowers’ engine, which
-he discovered three days later, when he wrote Boulton,--
-
-    [215] Watt to Boulton, 16th July, 1781.
-
-  “The matter is this: Ever since the ungrateful, idle, insolent
-  Hornblowers knew anything about our engines, they have laboured
-  to evade our Act, and for that purpose have long been possessed
-  of a copy of our specification. They made an attempt at Wheal
-  Maid two years ago, by connecting two cylinders together and
-  injecting into one of them, which did not succeed, although they
-  had gathered together numbers of their friends in order to make
-  a great exhibition. Since that, Jonathan the coppersmith, who,
-  like Alexander of the like trade, hath done me much evil, has
-  laboured close at some more successful evasion, which he says
-  he has now completed and taken a patent for,--concerning which
-  I hear as follows from public reports, propagated by Jethro’s
-  confidants:--1st. That Jonathan Hornblower is the inventor and
-  patentee; that Winwood, Jones and Company, of Bristol, are his
-  partners and supporters with money (that Winwood was lately in
-  this country on a sleeveless errand is certain); that they have
-  made their model work to 14 lbs. on the inch, and expect it will
-  work to 18 lbs. 2ndly. That they press the piston down by steam,
-  and maintain they have a right to do so, because, say they, it
-  can be proved that such was done before my patent. I suppose by
-  this they allude to Gainsborough’s bauble, which, by-the-by, was
-  _after_ the patent. If they do not mean this I am at a loss, as
-  I now declare that I do not know of any one having done it before
-  the patent except myself. However, it behoves us to inquire into
-  this, and if the exhibition was not a public one it avails not.
-  3rdly. That they pretend to condense the steam in the cylinder;
-  but I have heard that they do it in a separate vessel within the
-  cylinder, or close to it. 4thly. That they do not use an air or
-  water pump, from which I conjecture that they let the hot water
-  down the shaft by a pipe more than 30 feet long, as you know I
-  proposed but had several objections to. You will remember, and I
-  dare say Joseph and Peploe also do, that we made the 18-inch Soho
-  cylinder work by blowing the hot water out of the eduction-pipe
-  and used no air-pump, but found a waste of steam by so doing.
-  There is also some confused report about a wheel being employed
-  on their engine, which makes me suspect that M. Washborough may
-  be the Bristol man concerned with them.”[216]
-
-    [216] Watt to Boulton, 19th July, 1781. Boulton MSS.
-
-Two days later Watt wrote,--“My principal hope is that almighty Nature
-will prove Lord Chancellor, and put a negative on their scheme. Amen, so
-be it! I abhor lawsuits, and reckon a cause half lost that is litigated.”
-
-On the 23rd of July he returned to the subject:--
-
-  “The Horners,” said he, “continue bragging of what they are to
-  do, and I hear the country in general takes part with them, as
-  even the aversion they have to the Horners does not equal the
-  pleasure they would feel at our undoing.... The Horners say they
-  can make a common engine equal to ours, but that their new engine
-  is one-third better. We must now attend to making use of all the
-  elastic power of the steam, which, unless I am much deceived,
-  will save one-half over our best engines, and at any rate it may
-  easily be applied to work the condenser, which will save about
-  one-eighth. I will not conceal from you that I am rendered very
-  unhappy by one thing and another, but fight with it all I can.”
-
-In the mean time Boulton continued to urge Watt to complete the
-specification and drawings of his rotative engine, informing him of the
-success of the model which he had now completed at Soho:--
-
-  “Though you studied a thousand years,” said he, “I do not think
-  you could make one ten per cent. better than a small model with
-  two cones which Joseph has executed after my drawings. It has
-  little friction, goes sweeter than anything of the kind you have
-  yet touched, and has not the least shake. It is so perfect that
-  I don’t consider it worth while even to think of any other for
-  horizontal motions. I am therefore positively decided in my mind
-  as to the necessity of taking out a patent and including in it
-  all the principles and constructions you please; for if it be not
-  secured soon we may lose it.”[217]
-
-    [217] Boulton to Watt, 28th June, 1781. On the 3rd July following
-      he writes,--“The great rotative engine is finished, and I
-      expected the union between it and the little engine would have
-      been performed this evening, but it can’t be till to-morrow.
-      Robert set the elliptic out so true that it had no shake and
-      required no alteration. It goes so much better than the little
-      model made by Joseph that I am now ashamed to send the little
-      one. The great model makes a delightful horizontal foot-lathe. I
-      gave it a few strokes with my foot, and it made 30 revolutions
-      after I withdrew it, and that in a quiet and peaceable manner,
-      which shows how steady and frictionless it is.”
-
-In the same letter, Boulton communicated to Watt the rumours that had
-reached him from Scotland of more inventions of engines that were to beat
-Watt’s out of the field. “The cry is still, they come!” said he. “Hatley
-from Scotland is going with Lord Dunmore to Virginny; says that he and
-somebody else in Scotland have invented an engine that is three times
-better than yours.” Boulton recommended that a search should be made at
-the Patent-Office, to ascertain what was going on in new engine patents.
-Watt entirely approved of this, and urged that the search should be made
-at once. “I do not think we are safe a day to an end,” he wrote, “in
-this enterprising age. One’s thoughts seem to be stolen before one speaks
-them. It looks as if Nature had taken an aversion to monopolies, and put
-the same thing into several people’s heads at once to prevent them; and
-I begin to fear that she has given over inspiring me, as it is with the
-utmost difficulty that I can hatch anything new.”
-
-Notwithstanding this confession on the part of Watt, his inventive
-faculties were really never at any period of his life more vigorous than
-now; for he was rapidly maturing his rotative engine, with its various
-ingenious methods for securing circular motion; and working out the
-details of the double-cylinder expansion engine, with its many admirable
-contrivances hereafter to be described. Boulton continued to receive
-applications at Soho, from various quarters, for engines capable of
-working flour-mills and other machinery, and Watt himself was urged by
-like inquiries from manufacturers in Cornwall. “Mr. Edwards,” he wrote
-Boulton, “waits impatiently the success of our rotative machine. He
-wants a power able to lift a hammer of 700 lbs., 2 feet high, 120 times
-per minute.... In relation to the circular engine, an experiment should
-be made on a large scale, and to work a hammer. I want your ideas on
-that head.”[218] A fortnight later, Watt had matured his own ideas, and
-made the necessary declaration of his invention before a magistrate,
-preliminary to making the usual application for a patent.[219]
-
-    [218] Watt to Boulton, 5th July, 1781.
-
-    [219] “Yesterday I went to Penryn and swore that I had invented
-      ‘certain new methods of applying the vibrating or reciprocating
-      motion of steam or fire engines to produce a continued rotation
-      or circular motion round an axis or centre, and thereby to
-      give motion to the wheels of mills or other machines,’ which
-      affidavit and petition I transmit to Mr. Hadley by this post
-      with directions to get it passed with all due expedition.”--Watt
-      to Boulton, 26th July, 1781.
-
-Watt was exceedingly busy about this time in superintending the erection
-of new engines. No fewer than twelve were in progress in different
-parts of the county. As he travelled about from one mine to another on
-horseback, and spent a good deal of his time in the open air, his mind
-was diverted from preying upon itself according to his ordinary habit,
-and his health and spirits improved accordingly. Boulton was equally
-busy at Soho, where he was erecting a powerful engine for blowing the
-furnaces at Walker’s ironworks at Rotherham, and another for Wilkinson’s
-forges at Bradley, in which he proposed to employ a double cylinder,
-with a double crank[220] and a pair of fly-wheels. At intervals he went
-into Yorkshire, Lancashire, and Shropshire, to look after various other
-engines in progress; writing Watt cheerful letters as to the improving
-prospects of the firm. He found the steam-engine everywhere gaining in
-public estimation. “The more it is known,” he wrote, “the more it will be
-in demand. As to the scheme of the Hornblowers, they shall sooner press me
-down into the earth than they shall press down a piston with steam.” And
-again, “Give yourself no uneasiness about the Horners’ engine. Our title
-to the invention is as clear as can be; and it is as well secured as an
-Act of Parliament can make it--
-
-  “Doubt that the sun is fire,
-  Doubt all the powers of sight,
-  Doubt truth to be a lyer,
-  But never doubt our right.”
-
-    [220] Watt suggested caution as to making use of the cranks.
-      “In relation to Wilkinson’s forges, I wish you would execute
-      them without the double crank. We shall soon have a bad enough
-      lawsuit on our hands without it.”--Watt to Boulton, 19th July,
-      1781.
-
-Watt’s first surmise, that the Hornblowers intended to work their engine
-by heated air or gas, had set Boulton upon a series of inquiries and
-experiments on the subject, in which he was assisted by Dr. Priestley, who
-had shortly before settled in Birmingham, and was a willing co-operator
-in all investigations of this nature. Their object was to ascertain
-whether it was practicable to produce mechanical power by the absorption
-and condensation of gas on the one hand, and by its disengagement and
-expansion on the other.
-
-  “What you propose,” Watt wrote, “is exceeding probable, and akin
-  to what I have long contemplated--the use of mixed air and steam,
-  which have a wonderful expansion and contraction. Nevertheless,
-  I fear that there is in all such cases a proportional assumption
-  of latent heat; but be it tried though it be beginning a new
-  series of vexations and expense.... I suspect that a forcible
-  compression would hinder the gas from separating from the water,
-  and on the contrary any tolerable degree of vacuum would hinder
-  the water from attracting it; but perhaps part of both may be
-  used.... My greatest hope is in the expansive engine with double
-  or single cylinder, which I consider as proved by many facts,
-  and shall send you my ideas of the execution of it very soon.
-  At the same time I am clear to take the air patent, which, as I
-  have worded the petition, may include some other improvements on
-  the steam-engine.... I hope my last letters have relieved you, as
-  the knowledge of the Horners’ being a steam-engine working on our
-  principle relieved me. I have some trust in the judges, though I
-  have little in the law; and I think impartial people will regard
-  us as injured persons, and not suffer the thief of our horse to
-  escape because he has painted him of another colour.”[221]
-
-    [221] Watt to Boulton, 28th July, 1781. A few days later
-      Boulton wrote Watt that Dr. Priestley had proceeded with the
-      experiments, and that he had come to the conclusion that “there
-      is nothing to be feared from any of the tribe of gases, which
-      cannot be produced nearly so cheap as steam; and as to steam
-      _you_ know its limits better than any man.”
-
-Watt’s fears for his patent were about this time excited anew by the
-great Arkwright trial, in which Arkwright was nonsuited, and compelled
-to forego the rights derived from his improvements and combinations of
-spinning-machinery. The principal ground on which the patent was set aside
-was that the specification was unintelligible. On this, Watt observed,--
-
-  “Though I do not love Arkwright, I don’t like the precedent of
-  setting aside patents through default of specification. I fear
-  for our own. The specification is not perfect according to the
-  rules lately laid down by the judges. Nevertheless, it cannot be
-  said that we have hid our candle under a bushel. We have taught
-  all men to erect our engines, and are likely to suffer for our
-  pains.... I begin to have little faith in patents; for, according
-  to the enterprising genius of the present age, no man can have a
-  profitable patent but it will be pecked at, and no man can write a
-  specification of a fire-engine that cannot be evaded, if the words
-  and not the true intent and meaning be attended to. As kissing
-  goes by favour, and as, in dubious cases, men are actuated by
-  their prejudices, so, where a blue is very like a green they may
-  decide either way.”[222]
-
-    [222] Watt to Boulton, 30th July, 1781. Later he wrote,--“I am
-      tired of making improvements which by some quirk or wresting
-      of the law may be taken from us, as I think has been done in
-      the case of Arkwright, who has been condemned merely because
-      he did not specify quite clearly. This was injustice, because
-      it is plain that he has given this trade a being--has brought
-      his invention into use and made it of great public utility.
-      Wherefore he deserved all the money he has got. In my opinion
-      his patent should not have been invalidated without it had
-      clearly appeared that he did not invent the things in question.
-      I fear we shall be served with the same sauce _for the good
-      of the public_! and in that case I shall certainly do what
-      he threatens. This you may be assured of, that we are as
-      much envied here as he is at Manchester, and all the bells in
-      Cornwall would be rung at our overthrow.”--Watt to Boulton, 13th
-      August, 1781.
-
-Watt continued to be alarmed by the rumours of the forthcoming
-Hornblowers’ engine. “I have heard,” he wrote, “that a female confidant
-of Jonathan’s has seen the engine, and says that they evaporate half a
-hogshead of water with _one ounce_ of coals! ... that in a few days they
-are to publish in print what their invention is, illustrated with a
-copper-plate. Then we shall see and admire, if God pleaseth; I hope we
-shall not believe and tremble.” Later he wrote,--“Our cause is good, and
-yet it has a bad aspect. We are called monopolists, and exactors of money
-from the people for nothing. Would to God the money and price of the time
-the engine has cost us were in our pockets again, and the devil might then
-have the draining of their mines in place of me. Yet all are not alike.
-Some are just, and I believe do not grudge us, and some are friendly. All
-this is to no purpose. The law must decide whether we have property in
-this affair or not, and we must submit to what we cannot help.”[223]
-
-At length Watt learnt the precise nature of the Hornblowers’ invention.
-“It is no less,” he wrote Boulton, “than our double-cylinder engine,
-worked upon our principle of expansion.” This was an old idea of Watt’s,
-which he had pursued while labouring upon his model at Kinneil. “It is
-fourteen years,” he said, “since I thought of the double-cylinder engine,
-and I think that I mentioned it to Mr. Smeaton, when I explained the
-expansion engine to him in your parlour, some years ago. Wm. Murdock
-and Mr. Henderson can testify to my having mentioned it to them; but
-this of the Horners seems to be a different thing, being hung on the
-same beam.”[224] As early as May, 1769, he had communicated to Dr.
-Small a clear and explicit description of his method of working steam
-expansively; and he adopted the principle in the Soho engine, in 1778, as
-well as in the Shadwell engine erected in the same year. He was, however,
-prevented carrying it out extensively in practice by the inexpertness
-of the workmen. “Though the effect of the steam,” he explained to a
-correspondent, “is thereby increased 50 per cent. (by theory 100 per
-cent.), it cannot be done without rendering the machine more complicated
-than we wish; and simplicity is a most essential point in mechanics.
-There are other contrivances known to us which would increase the effect
-in an inferior degree, say from one-fourth to one-sixth, but they are
-all attended with peculiar inconveniences which forbid their use until
-the illiterate and obstinate people who are intrusted with the care
-of the engines become more intelligent and better acquainted with the
-machine.”[225]
-
-    [223] Watt to Boulton, 13th November, 1781.
-
-    [224] Watt to Boulton, 19th November, 1781.
-
-    [225] Watt to Samuel Ewer, jun., 9th July, 1781. Boulton MSS.
-
-Though suffering much from his usual headaches, which frequently disabled
-him from thinking, Watt finished the drawings of the rotary engine in a
-week, and forwarded them to Boulton at Soho. “I believe,” he said in a
-later letter, “a well-regulated expansive-engine is the _ne plus ultra_
-of our art.” But he intimated that a new trouble had come upon him in the
-shape of another inventor of a steam-engine in which all the distinctive
-principles of his own invention were embodied. “If he be engine mad,”
-said Watt, “and if it be agreeable to you, he shall have my share of
-them, provided he will come to my price. I wish to retire, and eat my
-cake in peace, but will not go without the cake. All mankind seem to have
-resolved to rob us. Right or wrong, they _will_ pluck the meal from our
-mouths.”[226] Boulton, on his next journey to London, called upon the
-alleged inventor, a Mr. Ewer, and declared to Watt that the invention, so
-far as it was new, was not worth a farthing, and that all that was good in
-it was borrowed from their engine. “Though the white marks on your cow or
-your horse,” said he, “may be changed to black, the cow and horse are not
-the less your property.” He therefore counselled Watt to relieve himself
-of all anxiety on this account. Watt replied, “Ewer seems to have a genius
-more capable of inventing than of prudently examining the merits of his
-invention. Poets lose half the praise they would otherwise get did they
-but tell us what they discreetly blot. We must publish a book of blots.”
-
-    [226] Watt to Boulton, 30th August, 1781.
-
-[Illustration: OLD ENGINE-HOUSE AT DALCOATH.
-
-[By R. P. Leitch.]]
-
-Meanwhile Watt went on inventing, even while he was complaining of his
-inability to invent, and of the uselessness of inventing. Invention had
-grown into a habit with him, which he could not restrain. In the very
-letter in which he wrote “It is of no use inventing--everybody is seizing
-upon our schemes,” he communicated to Boulton that he had contrived a
-machine, then erecting at Dalcoath, for the purpose of stopping the engine
-when at full speed, when any accident happened to the rods or outside
-chains,--first taking away the power, and then holding the bob fast
-whenever it might be at the turn.[227] A few days later he communicated
-that he had contrived a new way of opening the regulators. He was also
-finishing his plan of the new equalising beam, and the double expansion
-engine, which he requested might be proceeded with at once. “I have shown
-the equalising beam,” said he, “to no person whatever. Please push it
-on. It is our _dernier ressort_, and may perhaps be all that villany will
-leave us, and that not long.”[228] Boulton wrote back, bidding his partner
-to be of good heart. “If our spirits don’t fail us,” said he, “I think
-our engine won’t.”
-
-    [227] Watt to Boulton, 30th August, 1781. In a subsequent letter
-      he explained the invention as follows:--“The method I propose
-      to stop an engine when the pump rods break is by means of an
-      air bellows or forcing pump of a good large diameter fixed in
-      the shaft and having a solid piston in it which is wrought
-      constantly by the engine and quite easily while it goes at
-      its ordinary speed, because there is a large valve open in
-      its bottom or rather top, which suffers the air to pass and
-      repass easily; but whenever the engine attempts to move quick,
-      that valve shuts and all exit from the air is cut off, and
-      it becomes a feather-bed to save the blow of the engine. This
-      is exemplified by turning the valve-hole of a common bellows
-      upwards and stopping the nozzle, then working the bellows
-      first slowly and then quickly. I think this contrivance will
-      be of great use and may prevent damage, especially those bangs
-      which occur in setting on an engine.”--Watt to Boulton, 27th
-      September, 1781.
-
-    [228] Boulton to Watt, 10th September, 1781. Boulton immediately
-      proceeded with the erection of the new engine as secretly as
-      possible. “The principles of the expansion engine,” said he
-      to Watt, “you had invented before Dr. Small died, as Mr. Keir
-      can testify as well as others. However, it is highly proper to
-      execute every kind of beam that can be devised for the purpose
-      of equalising the power. I have removed the little portions
-      into the wooden house next the smith’s shop, and have blinded
-      the window and barred the door. There is a convenient well
-      that can be filled from the back brook, and the engine may be
-      applied to the raising of water, which is the best sort of load
-      to calculate from.”
-
-At the same time Watt was inventing his new jointed top-working gear,
-which he reported answered exceedingly well with the Dalcoath engine; and,
-in pursuance of an idea thrown out by Boulton, he perfected the model
-of a horizontal-axled elliptical with one pulley, which he described
-as performing _à merveille_, being free from all untoward frictions. He
-was also busy inventing a new method of an equalising beam, by causing
-the gudgeon to change its place; and another by means of a roller acting
-upon a curve in the nature of the working gear. Besides his experiments
-in mechanics, he was prosecuting investigations as to the properties of
-nutgalls in combination with various chemical substances, for the purpose
-of obtaining the best kind of ink for use with his copying machines; and
-at another time we find him contriving various iron cements for joints,
-confessing that he had “lost all faith in putty;” the result of which was
-his discovery of the well-known metallic cement.
-
-In the correspondence between the partners on these various topics, we
-seem to see the ideas out of which so many inventions grew, in their
-various stages of birth, growth and development. They concealed nothing
-from each other, but wrote with the most perfect unreserve. Each improved
-on the other’s ideas,--Watt upon Boulton’s, and Boulton upon Watt’s; both
-experimenting on the same subject at the same time, and communicating
-the results in the most elaborate detail. The phrase often occurs in
-their letters: “I write thus fully _that you may see exactly what is
-passing in my mind_.” The letters were sometimes of extraordinary length,
-one of Boulton’s (dated 25th September, 1781) extending to eight pages
-folio, closely written, containing upwards of 4000 words. Scarcely a day
-passed without their spending several hours in writing to each other.
-Boulton also kept up a correspondence with Mrs. Watt, in addition to his
-elaborate letters to her husband. The lady entered into various matters
-of personal interest, describing her occupations and domestic pursuits,
-and communicating the state of her husband’s health, which was a matter
-of no less interest to Boulton than to herself.
-
-As the autumn set in with its fogs and rains, Watt’s headaches returned
-with increased severity, and he repeatedly complained to Boulton of being
-“stupid and ill, and scarcely able to think.” “I tremble,” said he, “at
-the thought of making a complete set of drawings. I wish you could find me
-out a draughtsman of abilities; as I cannot stand it much longer.”[229]
-Watt’s temper was also affected by the state of his health; and he
-confessed that he felt himself not at all cut out for the work he had
-to do, so far as related to business: “I am not philosopher enough,” he
-said, “to despise the ills of life; and when I suffer myself to get into
-a passion, I observe it hurts me more than it does anybody else. I never
-was cut out for business, and wish nothing so much as not to be obliged
-to do any; which perhaps will never fall to my lot; therefore I must drag
-on a miserable existence the best way I can.”[230]
-
-    [229] Watt to Boulton, 20th September, 1781.
-
-    [230] Watt to Boulton, 18th October, 1781.
-
-Watt was very busy at this time in preparing the specification and
-drawings of the circular motion, which he said he found an extremely
-difficult job owing to the distracted state of his head. The letters
-patent for the invention had been secured on the 25th October, 1781,
-and he had four months allowed him in which to prepare and lodge the
-full description. He laboured at his work late and early, his mind being
-for months in the throes of invention. In the beginning of November we
-find him writing to Boulton, sending him the “first three yards of the
-specification,” written out on folio sheets joined together. Watt’s
-letters to his partner at this time contain numerous rough sketches of
-his proposed methods for securing circular motion without using the crank,
-from which he conceived himself to be in a measure precluded by Pickard’s
-patent. He devised no fewer than five distinct methods by which this
-object might be accomplished, by means of wheels of various sorts rotating
-round an axis. The method eventually preferred was the one invented by
-Wm. Murdock, and commonly known as the sun and planet motion.[231] “It has
-the singular property,” said Watt, “of going twice round for each stroke
-of the engine, and may be made to go oftener round if required without
-additional machinery.”
-
-    [231] Watt, in a letter to Boulton, dated the 3rd July, 1782,
-      speaks of it as an old plan of his own “revived and executed
-      by William Murdock;” but we were informed by the late Mr.
-      Josiah Parkes, that at an interview which he had with Mr. Watt
-      at Heathfield, at which Murdock was present, Murdock spoke of
-      the Sun and Planet motion as his invention, which Watt did not
-      contradict. Boulton also attributed the invention to Murdock, as
-      appears from his letter to Henderson, dated 22nd January, 1782;
-      in which he says,--“Mr. Watt’s packet is not ready. I am to wait
-      till his drawings [of the rotatory motion] are completed, which
-      he is executing himself. There was some informality in those
-      sent from Soho. Besides, he has another rotative scheme to add,
-      which I could have told him of long ago, when first invented
-      by William Murdock, but I did not think it a matter of much
-      consequence.”
-
-[Illustration: SUN AND PLANET MOTION.]
-
-Rough sketches of these various methods were forwarded to Soho in order
-that the requisite careful drawings of them might be prepared in time to
-be lodged with the specification; but when they reached Watt in Cornwall,
-he declared them to be so clumsily executed that he could not for very
-shame send them in; and though greatly pressed by mining business, and
-suffering from “backache, headache, and lowness of spirits,” he set to
-work to copy them with his own hands. He worked up his spare time so
-diligently, that in ten days he had the plans finished and returned to
-Boulton, whom he wrote saying that he had improved the construction of
-several of the machines, and “got one copy of the specification drawing
-finished in an elegant manner upon vellum, being the neatest drawing he
-had ever made.”[232] The necessary measures being then taken to perfect
-the patent, it was duly enrolled on the 23rd February, 1782.
-
-During the time that Watt was busy completing the above specification
-and drawings, his mind was full of other projects, one of which was the
-perfecting of his new expansive engine.[233] It is curious to find him, in
-his letters to Boulton, anticipating the plan of superheating the steam
-before entering the cylinders, which has since been carried into effect
-with so much success.
-
-    [232] Watt to Boulton, 26th Jan., 1782.
-
-    [233] “I have some time ago thought,” wrote Watt, “of a new
-      expansive engine--a reciprocating engine with a heavy circular
-      fly moved by a pinion from the end of the beam, so as to
-      make three turns per down-stroke and as many contrariwise per
-      return; so that in the first half of the stroke it may acquire
-      a momentum which will carry it through the last half; and if a
-      weight equal to half the load be put upon the inner end of the
-      beam, and the engine be made to lift it during the return, by
-      making a vacuum above the piston and using a rack instead of
-      a chain, a cylinder of the present size may work to the same
-      depth by half the steam; and I believe the engine will work very
-      sweetly.”--Watt to Boulton, 16th January, 1782.
-
-By the middle of March he had sufficiently matured his ideas of a
-reciprocating expansive engine to enable him to take out letters patent,
-and the invention was enrolled on the 4th of July in the same year. It
-included the double engine and double-acting engine (steam pressing
-the piston upwards as well as downwards), the employment of steam on
-the expansive principle, various methods of equalising the power of
-the engine, the toothed rack and sector for guiding the piston-rod,
-and a rotative engine or steam-wheel. While perfecting these beautiful
-adaptations, Watt was often plunged in the depths of distress through
-many causes,--by sickness, headaches, and low spirits; by the pecuniary
-difficulties of the firm; by the repeated attempts of the Cornish miners
-to lower their dues; and by threatened invasions of his patent from all
-quarters. Another of his worries was the unsteadiness of his workmen.
-His letters to Boulton were full of complaints on this score. Excepting
-Wm. Murdock, who was in constant demand, there was scarcely one of them
-on whom he could place reliance. “We have very little credit, indeed,”
-said he, “in our Soho workmen. James Taylor has taken to dram-drinking
-at a most violent rate,--is obstinate, self-willed, and dissatisfied.”
-And again, “Cartwright’s engine has been a continued scene of botching
-and blunders. J. Smith and the rest are ignorant, and all of them must
-be looked at daily, or worse follows. Had I had any one man of common
-prudence and experience, who would have attended from morning till night,
-these things might have been avoided, and my life would have been more
-comfortable. As things are, it is much otherwise.”[234] Three months
-later, matters had not mended. J. Smith is pronounced “a very slow
-hand,” and “J. Taylor is sometimes three days together at the alehouse,
-except when he judged I should be going my rounds.... Dick Cartwright
-also continues too much devoted to beer.... I have read all our men
-lectures upon industry and good hours, though I fear it will not be to
-much purpose; idleness is ingrained in their constitution.”[235] Boulton
-wrote to him to “send home the most rascally of the Sohoites;” but this
-was impracticable, as better men to replace them were not at that time
-to be had. Things were quite as bad at Soho itself; for early in 1782 we
-find Boulton writing thus: “The forging-shop wants a total reformation;
-Peploe and others constantly drunk; spoke mildly to them at first,
-then threatened, and am now looking out for good hands, which are very
-scarce.”[236]
-
-    [234] Watt to Boulton, 20th September, 1781.
-
-    [235] Watt to Boulton, 20th December, 1781.
-
-    [236] Boulton to Watt, 26th March, 1782. The following was
-      Boulton’s method of dealing with a refractory and drunken
-      workman:--“I told you in my former letters how Jim Taylor had
-      gone on,--that I had talked to him in a friendly way but all
-      to no purpose. He came last Monday evening to the smith’s shop,
-      drank more ale, was sent for, and he became abusive to the men,
-      saying we had nobody could work well but himself, and that we
-      could not do without him. The next morning I went into the
-      shop predetermined to part with him. I stopped the noise of
-      bellows and hammers, and appealed to the jury of the shop for
-      the justice of my determination, and made the best use I could
-      of the example. I sent Taylor off with deserved contempt, and
-      to convince him that we really could do without him. However we
-      are very much behind hand in nozzles.”--Boulton to Watt, 19th
-      April, 1782.
-
-William Murdock was by far the ablest and most efficient of the Soho
-men, and won golden opinions in all quarters; so much so, that he was in
-constant request. We find him described as “flying from mine to mine,”
-putting the engines to rights. If anything went wrong, Murdock was
-immediately sent for. He was active, quick-sighted, shrewd, indefatigable,
-and an excellent workman. His wages, down to 1780, were only 20_s._ a
-week, and, thinking himself worth more, he asked for an advance to two
-guineas. Boulton, instead of refusing, adroitly managed to obtain a
-present of ten guineas from the owners of the United Mines, to which he
-added other ten, in acknowledgment of the admirable manner in which he
-had erected their new engine; Mr. Beauchamp, the Chairman of the Company,
-having publicly declared that “he regarded William as the most obliging
-and industrious workman he had ever known.” Though Murdock’s wages were
-not then raised, and though Bonze, the Cornish engineer--a man of means
-as well as of skill and experience--invited him to join in an engineering
-partnership, William remained loyal to the Boulton and Watt firm, and in
-due time he had his reward.
-
-Murdock’s popularity with the Cornishmen increased so much that Watt
-seems to have grown somewhat jealous of him, for when William was to
-be had, they preferred him to Watt himself.[237] At Wheal Virgin, the
-adventurers insisted upon having him all to themselves; but this was not
-practicable, as there were other engines in progress requiring constant
-attention,--Wheal Crenver, which Watt described as “in the enemy’s
-country, Pool hardly completed yet, and Dalcoath in its childhood.”
-
-    [237] “To-day was account day at Wheal Virgin, when there was
-      nothing remarkable, only that Mr. Phillips insisted upon William
-      Murdock being wholly at Wheal Virgin, which I told him could
-      not possibly be complied with, unless I went to Crenver in his
-      place, as I had nobody else to send thither; nevertheless, that
-      William should be here as much as possible. This did not satisfy
-      him, and I know not what to do, as Crenver will be ready to work
-      in three weeks and must not be delayed.... I think my personal
-      attendance should satisfy Wheal Virgin adventurers, but as they
-      seem to have more confidence in William, I will for peace’s sake
-      yield to their will, being satisfied that William will do the
-      business well.”--Watt to Boulton, 15th November, 1781.
-
-  “I cannot now leave Wheal Virgin a single day,” wrote Watt,
-  “without running the risk of some vile blunder, particularly as
-  the boilers are now setting. Wm. Murdock was at Wheal Virgin one
-  day this week, and that day was taken up with Mr. Wedgwood,[238]
-  so that it was partly lost. Yesterday he was taken away by Crenver
-  people and is not returned. I fear I cannot get much of his help,
-  and I assure you I need it much, for there cannot be a greater
-  plague than to have five engines making by ignorant men and no
-  helpmate to look after them. I have been tolerably well these few
-  days, but cannot get up my spirits, from having too much to think
-  upon.”
-
-    [238] One of the pleasantest events that occurred to Watt in the
-      course of his stay in Cornwall, was the visit of Wedgwood, who
-      had come to inspect some of the mines in which, on Boulton’s
-      recommendation, he had taken an interest, and at the same time
-      to search for clays for use in his earthenware and porcelain
-      manufacture at Etruria. “Mr. Wedgwood,” he wrote Boulton, “has
-      been in this country some days hunting clays and soap rocks,
-      cobalts, &c. I have had two visits of him at the expense of a
-      day and a half. Nevertheless I don’t grudge that, as I am glad
-      to see a Christian. He has just left me.”--Watt to Boulton, 18th
-      October, 1781.
-
-Combined with the troubles arising out of the perversities, blunderings,
-and bad conduct of his workmen, Watt had also to struggle against torment
-of mind and body, aggravated by bad news from home. Boulton was in the
-crisis of his troubles with his partner Fothergill, from which he was
-desperately struggling to shake himself free.[239]
-
-    [239] Fothergill died insolvent in 1782. Notwithstanding what
-      he had suffered by the connexion, Boulton acted with great
-      generosity towards Fothergill’s family, providing for his
-      widow and orphan children. “Whatever the conduct of any part
-      of that family towards me may have been,” said he, “their
-      present distresses turn every passion into tender pity. I waited
-      upon Mrs. Fothergill this morning, and administered all the
-      consolation that words could give, but I must do more, or their
-      distresses will be great indeed. I never wished for life and
-      health so fervently as at present; for I consider it my duty
-      to act as a father to that family to the best of my power, and
-      the addition of a widow and seven children is no small one.”
-      Boulton was as good as his promises; and he not only helped the
-      Fothergill family through their difficulties, but he undertook
-      to pay an annual sum (though under no obligation to do so)
-      to a Mrs. Swellingrebel--a widowed lady from whom Fothergill
-      had obtained money which he lost; and who, but for Boulton’s
-      generous help, must have been left destitute.
-
-Watt was made additionally miserable by the state of the bankers’ account,
-which was still overdrawn to a very large amount. The bankers were urgent
-for repayment, but neither of the partners saw where the money was to come
-from. Watt again thought of giving up altogether, and selling his share
-of the business as the only means of relief which presented itself.
-
-  “I am almost moved,” he wrote, “if Lowe, Vere, and Williams
-  will free me from any demands on my future industry, to give
-  up my present property altogether, and trust to Providence for
-  my support. I cannot live as I am with any degree of comfort.
-  The want of the superfluities of life is a trifle compared
-  with continual anxiety. I do not see how you can pay L. V. &
-  W. 1000_l._ per quarter; I am sure it cannot be from the engine
-  business, unless we can reduce the amount of our general expenses
-  to 0 and live upon air ourselves.... Though you and I should
-  entirely lose this business and all its profits, you will get
-  quit of a burdensome debt; and as both of us lived before it had
-  a being, so we may do afterwards. Therefore consider what can be
-  done, and do it without reluctance, or with as little as you can;
-  and depend upon it that I am sincerely your friend, and shall push
-  you to nothing that I do not think to be for your advantage.”[240]
-
-Two days later, while still in a heavily desponding humour, he wrote
-thus:--
-
-  “If matters were to come to the worst, many methods may be fallen
-  upon whereby we may preserve some consequence in the world. A
-  hundred hours of melancholy will not pay one farthing of debt.
-  Summon up your fortitude and try to turn your attention to
-  business, and to correct the abuses at Soho.... All the idlers
-  should be told that in case they persevere in want of attention,
-  then dismission must ensue.... The Soho part of the business has
-  been somehow a perpetual drain to us, and if it cannot be put on
-  a better footing, must be cut off altogether by giving out the
-  work to be done by others.”[241]
-
-    [240] Watt to Boulton, 16th March, 1782.
-
-    [241] Watt to Boulton, 18th March, 1782.
-
-To add to their troubles, a fire broke out in the house of Boulton and
-Watt’s London agent for the sale of their copying machines, and the
-building, with its contents, was burnt to the ground, thereby causing a
-loss to the firm of above a thousand pounds. The mining trade was also
-wretchedly bad in Cornwall, several of the more important mines being
-unproductive, while ore was selling at low prices. The adventurers were
-accordingly urging Watt to abate the agreed dues for the use of their
-engines, and in several cases threatened to close the mines unless he
-did so. The United Mines asked to be reduced 50_l._ a month. Watt having
-refused to make the abatement, the mine was ordered to be stopped, on
-which he consented to give up the dues altogether for a period of six
-months. “There seemed,” he wrote to Boulton, “to be no other course, if
-we would maintain our right, and at the same time do justice to the poor
-people, who must otherwise absolutely starve, and are already riotously
-disposed through the stopping of Wheal Virgin.”[242] “In short,” said he,
-“almost the whole county is against us, and look upon us as oppressors
-and tyrants, from whose power they believe the horned imps of Satan are
-to relieve them.” Watt was indeed thoroughly sick of Cornwall, and longed
-to get back to Birmingham. He confessed he did not see how, under the
-present state of things, he could be of any more use there. The weather
-was very tempestuous, and he felt the fatigue of travelling from mine
-to mine too much for him to endure. On the 4th of April he wrote,--“I
-returned from the coast to Cosgarne last night with an aching head, after
-a peregrination of two days in very stormy weather.” “Upon the whole,”
-he wrote to Boulton, “I look upon our present Cornish prospects as very
-bad, and would not have you build too much upon them nor upon the engine
-business, without some material change. I shall think it prudent to
-look out for some other way of livelihood, as I expect that this will
-be swallowed up in merely paying its burdens.”[243] Watt, accordingly,
-finding that he could do no more good in Cornwall, left it about the
-middle of April, and returned with an aching head and heavy heart to
-Birmingham.
-
-    [242] Watt to Boulton, 27th March, 1782.
-
-    [243] Watt to Boulton, 30th March, 1782.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XVI.
-
-MORE DIFFICULTIES AND MORE INVENTIONS--BOULTON AGAIN IN CORNWALL.
-
-
-The battle of the firm had hitherto been all up-hill. Nearly twenty years
-had passed since Watt had made his invention. His life since then had
-been a constant struggle, and it was a struggle still. Thirteen years had
-passed since the original patent had been taken out, and seven since the
-Act had been passed for its extension. But the engine had as yet yielded
-no profit, and the outlay of capital continued. Notwithstanding Boulton’s
-energy and resources, the partners were often in the greatest straits
-for money, and sometimes, as Saturday nights came round, they had to beat
-about among their friends for the means of paying the workmen’s wages.
-
-Though Watt continued to imagine himself on the brink of ruin, things
-were not really so gloomy as he supposed. We find Boulton stating
-in a confidential letter to Matthews, that the dues payable on the
-pumping-engines actually erected in 1782 amounted to 4320_l._ a year;
-and that when all the engines in progress had been finished, they would
-probably amount to about 9000_l._ It is true, the dues were paid with
-difficulty by the mining interest, still in a state of great depression,
-but Boulton looked forward with confidence to better days coming round.
-Indeed, he already saw his way through the difficulties of the firm, and
-encouraged his doleful partner to hope that in the course of a very few
-years more, they would be rid of their burdens.
-
-As Cornwall was, however, now becoming well supplied with pumping-engines,
-it became necessary to open up new branches of business to keep the
-Soho manufactory in full work. With this object, Boulton became more and
-more desirous of applying the engine to the various purposes of rotary
-motion. In one of his visits to Wales, in 1781, he had seen a powerful
-copper-rolling mill driven by water, and when told that its defect was
-that it was liable to be stopped in summer during drought, he immediately
-asked--“Why not use our engine? It goes night and day, summer and winter,
-and is altogether unaffected by drought.” Immediately on his return
-home, he made a model of a steam rolling-mill, with two cylinders and two
-beams, connecting the power by a horizontal axis; and by the end of the
-year he had a steam forge erected at Soho on this plan. “It answers very
-well,” he wrote to Matthews, “and astonishes all the ironmasters; for,
-although it is a small engine, it draws even more steel per day than a
-large rolling-mill in this neighbourhood draws by water.” Mr. Wilkinson
-was so much pleased with it that he ordered one to be made on a large
-scale for the Bradley ironworks; and another was shortly after ordered
-for Rotherham. But the number of iron mills was exceedingly limited,
-and Boulton did not anticipate any large extension of business in that
-quarter. If, however, he could once get the rotary engine introduced as
-the motive power for corn and flour mills, he perceived that the demand
-would be considerable. Writing to Watt on the subject, he said, “When
-Wheal Virgin is at work, and all the Cornish business is in good train,
-we must look out for orders, as all our treaties are seemingly at an end,
-having none now upon the tapis. There is no other Cornwall to be found,
-and the most likely line for increasing the consumption of our engines is
-the application of them to mills, which is certainly an extensive field.”
-
-Watt, on his return to Birmingham from Cornwall, proceeded to embody his
-plan for securing rotary motion in a working engine, so that he might be
-enabled to exhibit the thing in actual work. He was stimulated to action
-by the report which reached his ears that a person in Birmingham had
-set agoing a self-moving steam rotator, in imitation of his, on which he
-exclaimed, “Surely the Devil of Rotations is afoot! I hope he will whirl
-them into Bedlam or Newgate.”[244] Boulton, who had by this time gone
-to Cornwall for the winter, wrote to him from Cosgarne, “It is certainly
-expensive; but nevertheless I think, as we have so much at stake, that we
-should proceed to execute such rotatives as you have specified.... You
-should get a good workman or two to execute your ideas with despatch,
-lest they perish. The value of their wages for a year might be 100_l._,
-but it would be the means of our keeping the start that we now have of
-all others. But above all, there is nothing of more importance than
-the perfect completion of the double expansive reciprocating engine
-as soon as may be.”[245] Watt replied that he was busily occupied in
-getting the rotative motion applied to one of the Soho engines. “These
-rotatives,” said he, “have taken up all my time and attention for months,
-so that I can scarcely say that I have done anything which can be called
-business. Our accounts lie miserably confused. We are going on in a very
-considerable weekly expense at Soho, and I can see nothing likely to be
-produced from it which will be an equivalent.” Speaking of the prospect
-of further improvements, he added, “It is very possible that, excepting
-what can be done in improving the mechanics of the engine, nothing much
-better than we have already done will be allowed by Nature, who has fixed
-a _ne plus ultra_ in most things.”[246]
-
-    [244] Watt to Boulton, 19th September, 1782.
-
-    [245] Boulton to Watt, 28th September, 1782.
-
-    [246] Watt to Boulton, 3rd October, 1782.
-
-While thus hopelessly proceeding with the rotative engine, Watt was
-disquieted by the intelligence which reached him from Boulton, as to
-the untoward state of affairs in Cornwall. At some of the most important
-mines, in which Boulton and Watt held shares, the yield had considerably
-fallen off, and the price of the ores being still very low, they had
-in a great measure ceased to be remunerative. Hence appeals were made
-to Boulton on all sides for an abatement of the engine dues. Unwilling
-to concede this, the adventurers proceeded to threaten him with the
-Hornblowers, whose engine they declared their intention of adopting.
-As, however, Boulton and Watt’s engines were all going exceedingly well,
-and as the Hornblowers had not yet been able to get one of their boasted
-engines to work satisfactorily,[247] the adventurers hesitated for the
-present to take any overt steps in the matter.
-
-    [247] “On my road to this place (Cosgarne) I stayed two days at
-      Bristol in order to learn the particulars of Hornblower’s new
-      engine erected in that neighbourhood, and I had the satisfaction
-      to find that it is worse than a common engine, although made
-      upon our principles; but from the various evasions introduced it
-      is as bad as need be. Nevertheless I think we should stop it in
-      order to stop the effects of the numerous lies they propagate
-      in this county, and other mischiefs.”--Boulton to Watt, 30th
-      September, 1782.
-
-Boulton had a long and disagreeable battle to fight with the adventurers
-on this point, which lasted for many months, during which the Hornblowers
-continued to stimulate them with the agreeable prospect of getting rid
-of the dues payable in respect of the savings of fuel by the condensing
-engines. Boulton resisted them at every point single-handed; the battle
-being, as he said, “Boulton and Watt against all Cornwall.”[248] He kept
-Watt fully informed from day to day of all that passed, and longed for
-more rapid means of communication,--the postal service being then so
-defective that no less than thirteen days elapsed before Boulton, at
-Truro, could receive an answer from Watt at Birmingham. On one occasion
-we find Watt’s letter eleven days on the road between the two places.
-The partners even had fears that their letters were tampered with in
-transit; and, in order to carry on their correspondence confidentially,
-Watt proposed to employ a shorthand alphabet, which he had learnt from
-Dr. Priestley, in which to write at least the names of persons, “as our
-correspondence,” he observed, “ought to be managed with all possible
-secrecy, especially as to names.”
-
-    [248] “I don’t know a man in Cornwall amongst the adventurers,”
-      he wrote, “but what would think it patriotism to free the mines
-      from the tribute they pay to us, and thereby divide our rights
-      amongst their own dear selves. Nevertheless, let us keep our
-      tempers, and keep the firm hold we have got; let us do justice,
-      show mercy and walk humbly, and all, I hope, will be right at
-      last.”--Boulton to Watt, 2nd November, 1782.
-
-Boulton, as usual, led a very active life in Cornwall. Much of his time
-was occupied in riding from mine to mine, inspecting the engines at work,
-and superintending the erection of others. The season being far advanced,
-the weather was bad, and the roads miry; but, wet or dry, he went his
-rounds. In one of his letters he gives an account of a miserable journey
-home on horseback, on a certain rainy, windy, dark night in November, when
-he was “caught in water up to 12 hands.” “It is very disagreeable,” he
-adds, “that one cannot stay out till dark upon the most emergent business
-without risking one’s life.” But once at home he was happy. “The greatest
-comfort I find here,” he says, “is in being shut out from the world, and
-the world from me. At the same time I have quite as much visiting as I
-wish for.” One of his favourite amusements was collecting and arranging
-fossils, some for his friend Wedgwood, and others for his own “fossilry”
-at Soho. Boulton was well supported out of doors by William Murdock, now
-regarded as “the right hand” of the concern in Cornwall.
-
-  “Murdock hath been indefatigable,” he wrote Watt, “ever since
-  they began [at Wheal Virgin new Engine]. He has scarcely been in
-  bed or taken necessary food.... After slaving day and night on
-  Thursday and Friday, a letter came from Wheal Virgin that he must
-  go instantly to set their engine to work or they would let out
-  the fire. He went and set the engine to work: it worked well for
-  the five or six hours he remained. He left it and returned to the
-  Consolidated Mines about eleven at night, and was employed about
-  the engines till four this morning, and then went to bed. I found
-  him at ten this morning in Poldice Cistern, seeking for pins and
-  casters that had jumped out, when I insisted on his going home to
-  bed.”[249]
-
-    [249] Boulton to Watt, 30th September, 1782.
-
-On one occasion, when an engine superintended by Murdock stopped through
-some accident occurring to it, the water rose in the mine, and the miners
-were drowned out. Upon this occurring, they came “roaring at him” for
-having thrown them out of work, and threatened to tear him to pieces.
-Nothing daunted, he went through the midst of the men, and proceeded to
-the invalided engine, which he succeeded in very shortly repairing and
-setting to work again. The miners were so rejoiced that they were carried
-by their feelings into the opposite extreme; and when he came out of the
-engine-house they cheered him vociferously, and insisted upon carrying
-him home on their shoulders in triumph!
-
-About this time, Boulton became increasingly anxious to ascertain what
-the Hornblowers were doing. They continued to brag of the extraordinary
-powers of the engine erected by them at Radstoke, near Bristol, whither he
-proposed to go, to ascertain its construction and qualities, as well as to
-warn the persons who were employing them as to the consequences of their
-infringing the existing patent. But he was tied to Cornwall by urgent
-business, and could not leave his post for a day. “During the forking
-of these two great mines,” said he, “I dare not stir two miles from the
-spot, and it will yet be six weeks before I regain my liberty.”[250] He
-determined, therefore, to send over James Law, a Soho man on whom he could
-rely, to ascertain, if possible, the character of the new engine, and he
-also asked his partner Watt to wait upon the proprietors of Radstoke so
-soon as he could make it convenient to do so. Law accordingly proceeded to
-Radstoke, and soon found out where the engine was; but as the Horners were
-all in the neighbourhood, keeping watch and ward over it turn and turn
-about, he was unable to see it except through the engine-house window,
-when it was not working. He learnt, however, that there was something
-seriously wrong with it, and that the engineers were considerably
-crestfallen about its performances.
-
-    [250] Boulton to Watson of Bristol, 7th November, 1782.
-
-Watt proceeded to Bristol, as recommended by his partner, for the purpose
-of having a personal interview with Hornblower’s employers. On his
-arrival, he found that Major Tucker, the principal partner, was absent;
-and though he succeeded in seeing Mr. Hill, another of the partners, he
-could get no satisfactory reply from him as to the intentions of the firm
-with respect to the new engine. Having travelled a hundred miles on his
-special errand, Watt determined not to return to Birmingham until he had
-seen the principal partner. On inquiry he found that Major Tucker had gone
-to Bath, and thither Watt followed him. At Bath he found that the Major
-had gone to Melcompton. Watt took a chaise and followed him. The Major
-was out hunting; and Watt waited impatiently at a little alehouse in the
-village till three o’clock, when the Major returned--“a potato-faced,
-chuckle-headed fellow, with a scar on the pupil of one eye. In short,”
-said Watt, “I did not like his physiog.” After shortly informing the Major
-of the object of his visit, who promised to bring the subject under the
-notice of his partners at a meeting to be held in about three weeks’ time,
-Watt, finding that he could do no more, took his leave; but, before he
-left Bristol, he inserted in the local papers an advertisement, prepared
-by Boulton, cautioning the public against using the Hornblowers’ engine,
-as being a direct infringement of their patent. For the present, indeed,
-there seemed but little reason to apprehend danger from the Hornblowers,
-whose engine was still undergoing alterations in detail, if not in
-principle; and it appeared doubtful, from the trials which had been made
-of it, whether it would ever prove an economical working engine.
-
-Watt then returned to Birmingham, to proceed with the completion of his
-rotary motion. Boulton kept urging that the field for pumping-engines
-was limited, that their Cornish prospects were still gloomy, and that
-they must very soon look out for new fields. One of his schemes was the
-applying of the steam-engine to the winding of coals. “A hundred engines
-at 100_l._ a year each,” he said, “would be a better thing than all
-Cornwall.” But the best field of all, he still held, was mills. “Let us
-remember,” said he, “the Birmingham motto, to ‘strike while the iron is
-hot.’”
-
-Watt, as usual, was not so sanguine as his partner, and rather doubtful
-of the profit to be derived from this source. From a correspondence
-between him and Mr. William Wyatt, of London, on the subject, we find him
-discouraging the scheme of applying steam-engines to drive corn-mills; on
-which Boulton wrote to Wyatt,--
-
-  “You have had a correspondence with my friend Watt, but I know not
-  the particulars.... You must make allowance in what Mr. Watt says
-  ... he _under_ values the merits of his own works.... _I_ will
-  take all risks in erecting an engine for a corn-mill.... I think
-  I can safely say our engine will grind _four_ times the quantity
-  of corn per bushel of coal compared with any engine hitherto
-  erected.”[251]
-
-    [251] Boulton to Wyatt, 16th December, 1782.
-
-About the same time we find Boulton writing to Watt,--
-
-  “You seem to be fearful that mills will not answer, and that
-  you cannot make Reynolds’s amount to more than 20_l._ a year.
-  For my part, I think that mills, though trifles in comparison
-  with Cornish engines, present a field that is boundless, and
-  that will be more permanent than these transient mines, and
-  more satisfactory than these inveterate, ungenerous, and envious
-  miners and mine lords. As to the trouble of small engines, I would
-  curtail it by making a pattern card of them (which may be done
-  in the course of next year), and confine ourselves to those sorts
-  and sizes until our convenience admits of more.”[252]
-
-    [252] Boulton to Watt, 7th December, 1782.
-
-In the mean time Watt, notwithstanding his doubts, had been proceeding
-with the completion of his rotative machine, and by the end of the year
-applied it with success to a tilt-hammer, as well as to a corn-mill
-at Soho. Some difficulties presented themselves at first, but they
-were speedily surmounted. The number of strokes made by the hammer was
-increased from 18 per minute in the first experiment, to 25 in the second;
-and Watt contemplated increasing the speed to even 250 or 300 strokes a
-minute, by diminishing the height to which the hammer rose before making
-its descending blow. “There is now no doubt,” said he, “that fire-engines
-will drive mills; but I entertain some doubts whether anything is to
-be got by them, as by any computation I have yet made of the mill for
-Reynolds [recently ordered] I cannot make it come to more than 20_l._ per
-annum, which will do little more than pay trouble. Perhaps some others
-may do better.”[253]
-
-    [253] Watt to Boulton, 28th November, 1782.
-
-[Illustration: “OLD BESS.”[254]]
-
-    [254] The above illustration represents the first engine employed
-      at Soho, with the alterations subsequently introduced, for the
-      purpose of producing rotary motion. The old Kinneil engine,
-      “Beelzebub,” as Watt called her, was entirely removed, and
-      replaced by this engine, as explained by Watt in his MS. Memoir
-      of Boulton now before us, wherein he states,--“The first engine
-      of 18 inches cylinder, which was employed in returning the
-      water to Soho mill, was replaced about 1778 or 1779 by a larger
-      engine, the first on the expansive principle, which still
-      remains there.” The engine became known at Soho as “Old Bess,”
-      and she continued in regular work until within the last eight
-      years. The illustration shows the state in which the engine now
-      stands in South Kensington Museum.
-
-      A. steam cylinder; B. steam pipe; C. throttle valve; D. steam
-      valve; E. eduction valve; F. eduction pipe; G. valve gearing;
-      H. condenser; I. air pump; K. air pump rod; L. foot valve; M.
-      hand gear tappet rod; N. parallel motion; O. balance weight;
-      P. rocking beam; Q. connecting rod; R. feed pump rod; S. sun
-      wheel; T. planet wheel; U. fly wheel; W. governor; X. feedwater
-      cistern.
-
-The problem of producing rotary motion by steam-power was thus solved to
-the satisfaction even of Watt himself. But though a boundless field for
-the employment of the engine now presented itself, Watt was anything but
-elated at the prospect. For some time he doubted whether it would be worth
-the while of the Soho firm to accept orders for engines of this sort.
-When Boulton went to Dublin to endeavour to secure a patent for Ireland,
-Watt wrote to him thus:--“Some people at Burton are making application
-to us for an engine to work a cotton-mill; but from their letter and the
-man they have sent here, I have no great opinion of their abilities....
-If you come home by way of Manchester, please not to seek for orders for
-cotton-mill engines, because I hear that there are so many mills erecting
-on powerful streams in the north of England, that the trade must soon
-be overdone, and consequently our labour may be lost.” Boulton, however,
-had no such misgivings. He foresaw that before long the superior power,
-regularity, speed, and economy, of the steam-engine, must recommend it
-for adoption in all branches of manufacture in which rotative motion was
-employed; and he had no hesitation in applying for orders notwithstanding
-the opposition of his partner. The first rotary engine was made for Mr.
-Reynolds, of Ketley, towards the end of 1782, and was used to drive a
-corn-mill. It was some time before another order was received, though
-various inquiries were made about engines for the purpose of polishing
-glass, grinding malt, rolling iron, and such like.[255] The first engine
-of the kind erected in London was at Goodwyn and Co.’s brewery; and
-the second, still working, though in an altered form, at the Messrs.
-Whitbread’s. These were shortly followed by other engines of the same
-description, until there was scarcely a brewery in London that was not
-supplied with one.
-
-    [255] “We have had a visit to-day from a Mr. Cort of Gosport, who
-      says he has a forge there, and has found out some grand secret
-      in the making of iron, by which he can make double the quantity
-      at the same expense and in the same time as usual. He says he
-      wants some kind of engine, but could not tell what; wants some
-      of us to call on him, and says he had some correspondence with
-      you on the subject. He seems a simple goodnatured man, but not
-      very knowing. He says he has most of the smith-work for the
-      king’s yard, and has a forge, a rolling and slitting mill. I
-      think him a brother projector.”--Watt to Boulton, 14th December,
-      1782.
-
-In the mean time, the works at Soho continued to be fully employed in
-the manufacture of pumping-engines. But as the county of Cornwall was
-becoming well supplied,--no fewer than twenty-one having now been erected
-there, only one of the old Newcomen construction continuing in work,--it
-was probable that before long the demand from that quarter must slacken,
-if not come to an end. There were, however, other uses to which the
-pumping-engine might be applied; and one of the most promising was the
-drainage of the Fen lands. Some adventurers at Soham, near Cambridge,
-having made inquiries on the subject, Watt wrote to his partner, “I look
-upon these Fens as the only trump card we have left in our hand.”[256]
-The adventurers proposed that Boulton and Watt should take an interest
-in their scheme by subscribing part of the necessary capital. But Watt
-decidedly objected to this, as he did not wish to repeat his Cornish
-difficulties in the Fens. He was willing to supply engines on reasonable
-terms, but as for shares he would have none of them. The conclusion
-he eventually arrived at with respect to his proposed customers was
-this,--“Consider Fen men as Cornish men, only more cunning.”
-
-In the midst of his great labours, Boulton was reminded that he was human.
-He had for years been working at too high pressure, and the tear and wear
-began to tell upon his health. Watt expostulated with him, telling him
-that he was trying to do half-a-dozen men’s work; but in vain. He was
-committed to so many important enterprises--he had so much at stake--the
-liabilities he had to meet from day to day were so heavy--that he was in
-a measure forced to be active. To his friend Matthews he lamented that
-he was under the necessity of “slaving from morning till night, working
-fourteen hours a day, in the drudgery of a Birmingham manufacturer and
-hardware merchant.” But this could not last, and before long he was
-threatened with a break-down. His friends Drs. Withering and Darwin urged
-him at once to “knock off” and take a long holiday--to leave Soho and its
-business, its correspondence, and its visitors, and get as far away from
-it as possible.
-
-    [256] 4th December, 1782.
-
-Acting on their advice, he resolved on making a long-promised visit to
-Scotland, and he set out on his tour in the autumn of 1783. He went by
-Newcastle, where he visited the principal coal mines, and from thence
-to Edinburgh, where he had some pleasant intercourse with Dr. Black
-and Professor Robison. It is evident from his letters that he did not
-take much ease during his journey, for he carried about with him his
-steam-engine--at least in his head. “I talked with Dr. Black and another
-chemical friend,” he wrote, “respecting my plan for saving alkali at such
-bleach-grounds as our fire-engines are used at instead of water-wheels:
-the Doctor did not start any objections, but, on the contrary, much
-approved it.” From Edinburgh he proceeded to the celebrated ironworks
-at Carron, a place in which he naturally felt a peculiar interest. There
-his friend Roebuck had started his great enterprise, and there Watt had
-erected his first engine. His visit there, however, was not so much
-for curiosity or pleasure, but for business and experiment. “During
-my residence in Scotland,” said he, “one month of my time was closely
-employed at Carron Ironworks in settling accounts, but principally in
-making a great number of experiments on all their iron ores, and in
-putting them into the train of making good bar-iron, in which I succeeded
-to my wishes, although they had never made a single bar of tough iron
-at Carron before.”[257] In the course of his journey he made a large
-collection of fossils for his museum, and the weight of his bags sensibly
-increased almost daily. On his way through Ayrshire he called on Lord
-Dundonald, a kindred spirit in chemical and mechanical scheming, and
-examined his mineral tar works. He wrote to Mr. Gilbert, the Duke of
-Bridgewater’s manager at Worsley, that “the tar is better for the bottoms
-of vessels than the vegetable tar; and the coal-oil hath many uses.
-Query--if such a work might not be a useful appendage to your colliery
-and canal.”
-
-    [257] Letter to Thomas Knox, M.P.
-
-Boulton returned to Soho greatly improved in health, and was shortly
-immersed as before in the business of the factory. He found considerable
-arrears of correspondence requiring to be brought up. Several of the
-letters waiting for him were from schemers of new inventions connected
-with the steam-engine. Whenever an inventor thought he had discovered
-anything new, he at once rushed to Boulton with it. He was looked upon
-as the lord and leader of steam power. His reputation for enterprise
-and business aptitude, and the energetic manner in which he had pushed
-Watt’s invention, were now so widely known, that every new schemer saw a
-fortune within his reach could he but enlist Boulton on his side. Hence
-much of his time was occupied in replying to letters from schemers,--from
-inventors of perpetual motion, of flying-machines, of locomotion by
-steam, and of various kinds of rotary motion. In one of his letters we
-find him complaining of so much of his time being “taken up in answering
-great numbers of letters he had lately been plagued with from eccentric
-persons of no business;” for it was his practice never to leave a letter
-unanswered, no matter how insignificant or unreasonable his correspondent
-might be.[258]
-
-    [258] With an almost excess of politeness, Boulton wrote long
-      letters to unknown correspondents to set them right about
-      mechanical errors into which they seemed to him to have fallen.
-      Thus a Mr. Knipe of Chelsea, supposing he had discovered a
-      perpetual motion machine, wrote inviting Boulton to join him
-      as a partner. Though the man was without means and evidently
-      foolish, Boulton wrote him several long letters in the kindest
-      spirit, pointing out that his scheme was contrary to reason and
-      science. “It is impossible,” said he, “for inanimate mechanism
-      to _produce_ the least degree of power or to augment the sum
-      total of the _primum mobile_. Mechanism may communicate or
-      concentrate or economise power, but cannot create or augment
-      it.” Knipe replied at great length, vindicating his invention.
-      His enthusiasm pleased Boulton, who, in the generosity of his
-      nature, sent him a draft for ten guineas on his London bankers
-      to enable the poor inventor to secure his invention if there
-      was really anything in it. But nothing more was heard of Knipe’s
-      Perpetual Motion Machine.
-
-After a short visit to London, Boulton proceeded into Cornwall to look
-after the engines there, and watch the progress of the mining operations
-in which by this time he had become so largely interested. He found the
-adventurers in a state of general grumble at the badness of the times,
-the lowness of prices, the losses incurred in sinking for ore that could
-not be found, and the heaviness of the dues for engine-power payable to
-Boulton and Watt. At such times, the partners were usually beset with
-applications for abatement, to which they were under the necessity of
-submitting to prevent the mines being altogether closed. Thus the dues
-at Chacewater were reduced from 2500_l._ to 1000_l._ a year, and the
-adventurers were still pressing for further reductions.[259] What provoked
-Boulton most, however, was, not the loss of dues so much as the threats
-which were constantly held out to him that unless the demands of the
-adventurers were complied with, they would employ the Hornblowers.
-
-    [259] No wonder the miners were so urgent for reductions in
-      working expenses, as we find from a communication from Watt
-      to Boulton, of facts to be laid before Parliament against the
-      proposed tax on coal, that Chacewater had sunk 50,000_l._ in
-      setting the mine to work; Wheal Virgin 28,000_l._ in ten months,
-      and still unprosperous; Poldice a very large sum, and merely
-      paying expenses; Wheal Chance 35,000_l._, and only moderately
-      prosperous; Pool 14,000_l._, without much prospect of recovery;
-      Roskere languishing, and not paying expenses; United Mines,
-      which had been at death’s door, still in a tottering state;
-      Wheal Union stopped, after losing about 8000_l._; Dalcoath
-      500_l._ spent on timber per month, and a new kibble-rope, of
-      above a ton weight, worn out in a fortnight. [To draw a kibble
-      of ore then, weighing about 3 cwt., took fully fifteen minutes,
-      owing to the great depth of that mine, and two-thirds of the
-      stuff drawn was stones.] To which Watt added, “if we had not
-      furnished the miners with more effectual means of draining
-      the water, almost all the deep mines would have been abandoned
-      before now.”
-
-  “It is a disagreeable thing,” he wrote, “to live amongst one’s
-  enemies, and all the adventurers are so, except Phillips and the
-  Foxes, who are fair men although they would rather have engines
-  free. I have had many hints given me that the Trumpeters were
-  reviving their mischief, and many causes for uneasiness, but I did
-  not wish you to partake of them, and therefore have been silent;
-  but they are now striking at the root of us, and therefore we
-  must defend ourselves or fall.... I think if we could but keep
-  up our spirits and be active we might vanquish all the host. But
-  I must own that I have been low-spirited ever since I have been
-  here--have been indolent, and feel as if the springs of life were
-  let down.”
-
-It does not, however, appear from the letter to Watt in which this
-complaint occurs, that Boulton had been at all indolent, as he speaks
-of being in almost daily attendance at the miners’ meetings; one day at
-Poldice, the next at Consolidated Mines, and so on. Of the latter meeting
-he says,--
-
-  “There was a full attendance; Jethro looked impudent, but
-  mortified to see the new little engine drawing kibbles from
-  two pits exceedingly well and very manageable, and afterwards
-  it worked six stamps each 2½ = 14 cwt., lifted twice at each
-  revolution, or four times for every stroke of the engine. I
-  suppose there were a thousand people present to see the engine
-  work.”
-
-Watt was, on his part, rather opposed to making further concessions, which
-only seemed to have the effect of inviting demands for more.
-
-  “People,” said he, “do not employ us out of personal regard, but
-  to serve themselves; and why should not we look after ourselves in
-  like manner.... John Taylor died the other day worth 200,000_l._,
-  without ever doing one generous action. I do not mean that we
-  should follow _his_ example. I should not consent to oppression
-  or to take any unfair advantage of my neighbour’s necessity, but I
-  think it blameable to exercise generosity towards men who display
-  none towards us. It is playing an unfair game when the advantage
-  is wholly on their side. If Wheal Virgin threatened to stop unless
-  we abated one-half, they should stop for me; but if it appeared
-  that, according to the mode settled in making the agreement, we
-  had too high a premium, I should voluntarily reduce it to whatever
-  was just.”
-
-While Boulton was fighting for dues in Cornwall, and labouring as
-before to improve the business management of the mines in which he was
-interested as a shareholder, Watt was busily occupied at Soho in turning
-out new engines for various purposes, as well as in perfecting several
-long-contemplated inventions. The manufactory, which had for a time been
-unusually slack, was again in full work. Several engines were in hand for
-the London brewers. Wedgwood had ordered an engine to grind flints;[260]
-and orders were coming in for rotative engines for various purposes, such
-as driving saw-mills in America and sugar-mills in the West Indies. Work
-was, indeed, so plentiful that Watt was opposed to further orders for
-rotatives being taken, as the drawings for them occupied so much time, and
-they brought in but small profit. “I see plainly,” said he, “that every
-rotation engine will cost twice the trouble of one for raising water, and
-will in general pay only half the money. Therefore I beg you will not
-undertake any more rotatives until our hands are clear, which will not
-be before 1785. We have already more work in hand than we have people to
-execute it in the interval.”[261]
-
-    [260] The engine was of 40-horse power. It was erected at the
-      “Black Works,” Etruria, where it continues working with the
-      sun and planet motion,--one of the very few engines of the old
-      construction still remaining in existence.
-
-    [261] Watt to Boulton, 22nd June, 1784.
-
-One reason why Watt was more than usually economical of his time was,
-that he was then in the throes of the inventions patented by him in the
-course of this year. Though racked by headaches which, he complained,
-completely “dumfounded” him and perplexed his mind, he could not restrain
-his irrepressible instinct to invent; and the result was the series of
-inventions embodied in his patent of 1784, including, among other things,
-the application of the steam-engine to the working of a tilt-hammer for
-forging iron and steel, to driving wheel-carriages for carrying persons
-and goods, and for other purposes. The specification also included the
-beautiful invention of the parallel motion, of which Watt himself said,
-“Though I am not over anxious after fame, yet I am more proud of the
-parallel motion than of any other mechanical invention I have ever made.”
-Watt was led to meditate this contrivance by the practical inconvenience
-which he experienced in communicating the direct vertical motion of the
-piston-rod by means of racks and sectors, to the angular motion of the
-working beam. He was gradually led to entertain the opinion that some
-means might be contrived for accomplishing this object by motions turning
-upon centres; and, working upon this idea, he gradually elaborated his
-invention. So soon as he caught sight of the possible means of overcoming
-the difficulty, he wrote to Boulton in Cornwall,--
-
-  “I have started a new hare. I have got a glimpse of a method
-  of causing a piston-rod to move up and down perpendicularly by
-  only fixing it to a piece of iron upon the beam, without chains
-  or perpendicular guides or untowardly friction, arch heads, or
-  other pieces of clumsiness; by which contrivance it answers fully
-  to expectation. About 5 feet in the height of her house may be
-  saved in 8-feet strokes, which I look upon as a capital saving,
-  and it will answer for double engines as well as for single ones.
-  I have only tried it in a slight model yet, so cannot build
-  upon it, though I think it a very probable thing to succeed.
-  It is one of the most ingenious, simple pieces of mechanism I
-  have ever contrived, but I beg nothing may be said on it till I
-  specify.”[262]
-
-    [262] Watt to Boulton, 30th June, 1784. Boulton MSS.
-
-[Illustration: THE PARALLEL MOTION.]
-
-He immediately set to work to put his idea to the practical proof, and
-only eleven days later he wrote,--
-
-  “I have made a very large model of the new substitute for racks
-  and sectors, which seems to bid fair to answer. The rod goes up
-  and down quite in a perpendicular line without racks, chains, or
-  guides. It is a perpendicular motion derived from a combination of
-  motions about centres--very simple, has very little friction, has
-  nothing standing higher than the back of the beam, and requires
-  the centre of the beam to be only half the stroke of the engine
-  higher than the top of the piston-rod when at lowest, and has no
-  inclination to pull the piston-rod either one way or another, only
-  straight up and down.... However, don’t pride yourself on it--it
-  is not fairly tried yet, and may have unknown faults.”[263]
-
-    [263] The parallel motion was first put in practice in the
-      engine erected for Mr. Whitbread; Watt informing Boulton (27th
-      October, 1785) that “the parallel motion of Whitbread’s answers
-      admirably.”
-
-[Illustration: THE GOVERNOR.]
-
-Another of Watt’s beautiful inventions of the same period, was the
-Governor, contrived for the purpose of regulating the speed of the engine.
-This was a point of great importance in all cases where steam-power
-was employed in processes of manufacture. To modify the speed of the
-piston in the single-acting pumping-engine, Watt had been accustomed
-to use what is called a throttle valve, which was regulated by hand
-as occasion required. But he saw that to ensure perfect uniformity of
-speed, the action of the engine must be made automatic if possible,
-and with this object he contrived the Governor, which has received no
-improvement since it left his hand. Two balls are fixed to the ends of
-arms connected with the engine by a moveable socket, which plays up and
-down a vertical rod revolving by a band placed upon the axis or spindle
-of the fly-wheel. According to the centrifugal force with which the
-balls revolve, they diverge more or less from the central fixed point,
-and push up or draw down the moveable collar; which, being connected by
-a crank with the throttle-valve, thereby regulates with the most perfect
-precision the passage of the steam between the boiler and the cylinder.
-When the pressure of steam is great, and the tendency of the engine is
-to go faster, the governor shuts off the steam; and when it is less, the
-governor opens the throttle-valve and increases the supply. By this simple
-and elegant contrivance the engine is made to regulate its own speed with
-the most beautiful precision.
-
-Among the numerous proposed applications of the steam-engine about this
-time, was its employment as a locomotive in driving wheel-carriages. It
-will be remembered that Watt’s friend Robison had, at a very early period,
-directed his attention to the subject; and the idea had since been revived
-by Mr. Edgeworth, who laboured with great zeal to indoctrinate Watt with
-his views. The latter, though he had but little faith in the project,
-nevertheless included a plan of a locomotive engine in his patent of 1784;
-but he took no steps to put it in execution, being too much engrossed with
-other business at the time. His plan contemplated the employment of steam
-either in the form of high-pressure or low-pressure, working the pistons
-by the force of steam only, and discharging it into the atmosphere after
-it had performed its office, or discharging it into an air-tight condenser
-made of thin plates or pipes, with their outsides exposed to the wind or
-to an artificial current of air, thereby economising the water which would
-otherwise be lost.
-
-Watt did not carry his design into effect; and, so far as he was
-concerned, the question of steam locomotion would have gone no further.
-But the subject had already attracted the attention of William Murdock,
-who had for some time been occupied during his leisure hours in
-constructing an actual working model of a locomotive. When his model
-was finished, he proceeded to try it in the long avenue leading to the
-parsonage at Redruth, in the summer of 1784; and in so doing nearly
-frightened out of his wits the village pastor, who encountered the
-hissing, fiery little machine, while enjoying his evening walk.[264]
-
-    [264] ‘Lives of Engineers,’ iii. 77.
-
-When Watt heard of this experiment, he wrote to Boulton, advising that
-Murdock should be gently counselled to give up his scheme, which might
-have the effect of withdrawing him from the work of the firm, in which he
-had become increasingly useful.
-
-  “As to my own part,” wrote Watt, “I shall form no obstacle to
-  the scheme. My only reasons against it were that I feared it
-  would deprive us of a valuable man; that it would, if we were to
-  be concerned in it, divert us from more valuable business, and
-  perhaps prove a sinking fund; and lastly, that I did not like that
-  a scheme which I had revolved in my mind for years and hoped to be
-  able at some favourable time to bring to perfection, if capable of
-  it, should be wrested from me, or that I should be compelled to
-  go into it as a secondary person. But I have now made the latter
-  objection give way. And as to the first, I think it will take
-  place at any rate, so we must make the best of it.”[265]
-
-    [265] In a letter dated 28th August, 1784, Watt communicated his
-      views to his partner on the subject of locomotive engines at
-      great length. In the course of the letter he says,--
-
-        “My original ideas on this subject were prior to my
-        invention of the improved engines, or before the crank or
-        any other rotative motions were thought of. My plan then
-        was to have two inverted cylinders with toothed racks
-        instead of piston rods, which were to be applied to the
-        ratchet wheels on the axletree, and to act alternately;
-        and I am partly of opinion that this method might be
-        applied with advantage yet, because it needs no fly, and
-        has other conveniences.
-
-        “From what I have said, and from much more which a
-        little reflection will suggest to you, you will see that
-        without several circumstances turn out more favourable
-        than has been stated, the machine will be clumsy and
-        defective, and that it will cost much time to bring it
-        to any tolerable degree of perfection; and that for me to
-        attempt to interrupt the career of my business to bestow
-        any attention to it, would be imprudent. I even grudge
-        the time I have taken to write these comments on it.”
-
-Boulton was accordingly recommended in the first place to endeavour to
-dissuade Murdock from pursuing the subject further, but if he could not
-succeed in that, rather than lose him, he was to let him have an advance
-to the extent of 100_l._, to enable him to prosecute his experiments; and
-if within a year he succeeded in making an engine capable of drawing a
-postchaise carrying two ordinary persons and the driver, with 200 lbs. of
-luggage, fuel for four hours, and water for two hours, going at the rate
-of four miles an hour, then a partnership was to be entered into, in which
-Boulton and Watt were to find the capital, and Murdock was to conduct the
-business and take his share of the profits.
-
-Murdock, however, had so many urgent matters to attend to, that, sanguine
-though he continued to be as to the success of his scheme, he could not
-find time to pursue it. He was a man after Boulton’s own heart, unsparing
-of himself and indefatigable in whatsoever he undertook; nor was Boulton
-sparing of praises of him in his confidential letters to Watt.
-
-  “We want more Murdocks,” he wrote on one occasion, “for, of all
-  our men he is the most active. He is the best engine erector I
-  ever saw, and of his energy I had one of the best proofs this day.
-  They stopped Poldice lower engine last Monday and took her all
-  to pieces; took out the condenser, took up out of the shaft the
-  greatest part of the pumps, took the nozzles to pieces, cut out
-  the iron seatings and put in brass ones with new valves, mended
-  the eduction-pipe, and did a great number of repairs about the
-  beam and engine; put the pumps down into the new engine shaft,
-  did much work at the new engine; and this done, about noon both
-  the engines, new and old, were set to work again complete. When I
-  look at the work done it astonishes me, and is entirely owing to
-  the spirit and activity of Murdock, who hath not gone to bed for
-  three nights, and I expect the mine will be in full fork again by
-  Wednesday night. I have got him into good humour again without any
-  coaxing, have prevailed on him not to give up Wheal Virgin engine,
-  which he had been resolved to do from the ungenerous treatment he
-  received from the captains. I have also prevailed on him to put
-  off his determined journey to Scotland until North Downs engines
-  are got to work, and have quieted his mind about wheel carriages
-  till then.”[266]
-
-    [266] Boulton to Watt, 8th November, 1784. Though Murdock was
-      thus occupied, he did not abandon his idea of making a working
-      locomotive. Two years later we find Watt thus writing Boulton:--
-
-        “I am extremely sorry that W. Murdock still busies himself
-        with the steam carriages. In one of my specifications I
-        have secured it, as well as words could do, according
-        to my idea of it, and if to that you add Symington’s
-        and Sadler’s patents, it can scarcely be patentable,
-        even if free of the general specification in the Act of
-        Parliament; for even granting that what I have done cannot
-        secure it, yet it can act as a prior invention against
-        anybody else; and if it cannot be secured by patent, to
-        what purpose should anybody labour at it? I have still the
-        same opinions concerning it that I had, but to prevent
-        as much as possible more fruitless argument about it, I
-        have one of some size under hand, and am resolved to try
-        if God will work a miracle in favour of these carriages.
-        I shall in some future letter send you the words of my
-        specification on that subject. In the mean time I wish
-        William could be brought to do as we do, to mind the
-        business in hand, and let such as Symington and Sadler
-        throw away their time and money in hunting shadows.”--Watt
-        to Boulton, 12th Sept., 1786. In a subsequent letter, Watt
-        expresses himself as much gratified to learn “that William
-        applies to his business.”
-
-Notwithstanding Watt’s fears of a falling off, the engine business still
-continued to prosper in Cornwall. Although the mining interests were
-suffering from continued depression, new mines were being opened out,
-for which pumping-engines were wanted; and Boulton and Watt’s continued
-to maintain their superiority over all others. None of their threatened
-rivals had yet been able to exhibit an engine in successful work; and
-those of the old construction had been almost completely superseded. In
-1784, new engines were in course of erection at Poldice, New Poldory,
-Wheal Maid, Polgooth, and other mines. Almost the last of the Newcomen
-engines in Cornwall had been discarded at Polgooth in favour of one of
-Boulton and Watt’s 58-inch cylinder engines.
-
-[Illustration: POLGOOTH.
-
-[By R. P. Leitch.]]
-
-The dues paid yearly in respect of these and other engines previously
-erected were very considerable; Boulton estimating that, if duly paid,
-they would amount to about 12,000_l._ a year. There seemed, therefore,
-every reasonable prospect of the financial difficulties of the firm at
-last coming to an end.
-
-Boulton’s visit to Cornwall on this occasion was enlivened by the
-companionship of his wife, and her friend Miss Mynd. Towards midsummer
-he looked forward with anticipations of increased pleasure to the visit
-of his two children--his son Matt and his daughter Nancy--during their
-school holidays. It was a source of much regret to him, affectionate as
-his nature was, that the engrossing character of his business prevented
-him enjoying the society of his family so much as he desired. But he
-endeavoured to make up for it by maintaining a regular correspondence with
-them when absent. His letters to his children were full of playfulness,
-affection, and good advice. To his son at school he wrote telling him
-of his life in Cornwall, describing to him the house at Cosgarne, the
-garden and the trees he had planted in it, the pleasant rides in the
-neighbourhood, and the visit he had just been paying to the top of
-Pendennis Castle, from which he had seen about a hundred sail of ships
-at sea, and a boundless prospect of land and water. He proceeded to tell
-him of the quantity of work he did connected with the engine business,
-how he had no clerk to assist him, but did all the writing and drawing
-of plans himself: “When I have time,” said he, “I pick up curiosities
-in ores for the purpose of assays, for I have a laboratory here. There
-is nothing would so much add to my pleasure as having your assistance
-in making solutions, precipitates, evaporations, and crystallisations.”
-After giving his son some good advice as to the cultivation of his mind,
-as calculated to render him an intelligent and useful member of society,
-he proceeded to urge upon him the duty of cultivating polite manners, as
-a means of making himself agreeable to others, and at the same time of
-promoting his own comfort. “But remember,” he added, “I do not wish you
-to be polite at the expense of honour, truth, sincerity, and honesty;
-for these are the props of a manly character, and without them politeness
-is mean and deceitful. Therefore, be always tenacious of your honour. Be
-honest, just, and benevolent, even when it appears difficult to be so. I
-say, cherish those principles, and guard them as sacred treasures.”
-
-At length his son and daughter joined him and took part in his domestic
-and out-door enjoyments. They accompanied him in his drives and rides,
-and Matt took part in his chemical experiments. One of their great
-delights was the fabrication of an immense paper balloon, and the making
-of the hydrogen gas to fill it with. After great preparations the balloon
-was made and filled, and sent up in the field behind the house, to the
-delight of all concerned. To Mrs. Watt he wrote expressing to her how
-much pleasanter his residence in Cornwall had become since his son and
-daughter’s visit. “I shall be happier,” he said, “during the remainder of
-my residence here than in the former part of it; for I am ill calculated
-to live alone in an enemy’s country, and to contest lawsuits. Besides,
-the only source of happiness I look for in my future life is in my
-children. Matt behaves extremely well, is active and good-humoured; and
-my daughter, too, has, I think, good dispositions and sentiments, which
-I shall cherish, and prevent as much as possible from being sullied by
-narrow and illiberal-minded companions.” After a few months’ pleasant
-social intercourse with his family at Cosgarne, varied by occasional
-bickerings with the adventurers out of doors about dues, Boulton returned
-to Birmingham, to enter upon new duties and undertake new enterprises.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XVII.
-
-COMMERCIAL POLITICS--THE ALBION MILLS--RIOTS IN CORNWALL--PROSPERITY OF
-BOULTON AND WATT.
-
-
-When Boulton returned to Birmingham, he was urgently called upon to take
-part in a movement altogether foreign to his habits. He had heretofore
-been too much engrossed by business to admit of his taking any active
-part in political affairs. Being, however, of an active temperament,
-and mixing with men of all classes, he could not but feel an interest in
-the public movements of his time. Early in 1784, we find him taking the
-lead in getting up a loyal address to the King on the resignation of the
-Portland Administration and the appointment of Mr. Pitt as Prime Minister.
-It appears, however, that Pitt disappointed his expectations. One of his
-first projects was a scheme of taxation, which he introduced for the
-purpose of remedying the disordered state of the finances, but which,
-in Boulton’s opinion, would, if carried, have the effect of seriously
-damaging the national industry. The Minister proposed to tax coal, iron,
-copper, and other raw materials of manufacture, to the amount of about
-a million a year. Boulton immediately bestirred himself to oppose the
-adoption of the scheme. He held that for a manufacturing nation to tax the
-raw materials of wealth was a suicidal measure, calculated, if persevered
-in, to involve the producers of wealth in ruin. “Let taxes,” he said, “be
-laid upon luxuries, upon vices, and if you like upon property; tax riches
-when got, and the expenditure of them, but not the means of getting them;
-of all things, don’t cut open the hen that lays the golden eggs.”[267]
-
-    [267] Boulton to Wilson, 16th December, 1784. Boulton MSS.
-
-Petitions and memorials were forthwith got up in the midland counties,
-and presented against the measure; and Boulton being recognised as the
-leader of the movement in his district, was summoned by Mr. Pitt to London
-to an interview with him on the subject. He then took the opportunity
-of pressing upon the Minister the necessity of taking measures to secure
-reciprocity of trade with foreign nations, as being of vital importance
-to the trade of England. Writing to his partner Scale, he said, “Surely
-our Ministers must be bad politicians, to suffer the gates of nearly
-every commercial city in the world to be shut against us.” “There is no
-doubt,” he wrote to his friend Garbett, “but the edicts, prohibitions,
-and high duties laid upon our manufacturers by foreign powers will be
-severely felt, unless some new commercial treaties are entered into with
-such powers. I fear our young Minister is not sufficiently aware of the
-importance of the subject, and I likewise fear he will pledge himself
-before Parliament meets to carry other measures in the next session that
-will be as odious to the country as his late attempts.”
-
-As Boulton had anticipated, the Ministry introduced several important
-measures, calculated to have a highly injurious effect upon English
-industry, and he immediately bestirred himself, in conjunction with Josiah
-Wedgwood, of Etruria, to organise a movement in opposition to them.
-Wedgwood and Boulton met at Birmingham in February, 1785, and arranged
-to assemble a meeting of delegates from the manufacturing districts,
-who were to meet and sit in London “all the time the Irish commercial
-affairs were pending.” A printed statement of the objects of the movement
-was circulated, and Boulton and Wedgwood wrote to their friends in
-all quarters to meet and appoint delegates to the central committee in
-London. Boulton was unanimously appointed the delegate for Birmingham,
-and he proceeded to London furnished with a bundle of petitions from his
-neighbourhood. The delegates proceeded to form themselves into a Chamber
-of Manufacturers, over the deliberations of which Wedgwood, Boulton, or
-John Wilkinson usually presided.
-
-The principal object of these meetings and petitionings was to prevent,
-if possible, the imposition of the proposed taxes on coal, iron, and raw
-materials generally, as well as the proposed export duties on manufactured
-articles. At a time when foreign governments were seeking to exclude
-English manufactures from their dominions by heavy import duties, it was
-felt that this double burden was more than English industry could bear.
-The Irish Parliament were at the same time legislating in a hostile spirit
-towards English commerce; imposing taxes upon all manufactures imported
-into Ireland from England, while Irish manufactures were not only sent
-into England duty free, but their own parliament encouraged them by a
-bounty on exportation. The committee strongly expostulated against the
-partial and unjust spirit of this legislation, and petitioned for free
-interchange on equal terms. So long as such a state of things continued,
-the petitioners urged that “every idea of reciprocity in the interchange
-of manufactures between Britain and Ireland was a mere mockery of words.”
-
-Although Watt was naturally averse to taking any public part in politics,
-his services were enlisted in the cause, and he drew up for circulation
-“An answer to the Treasury Paper on the Iron Trade of England and
-Ireland.” The object of his statement was to show that the true way
-of encouraging manufactures in Ireland was, not by bounties, not by
-prohibitions, but by entire freedom of industry. It was asserted by the
-supporters of the propositions, that the natives of Ireland were ignorant,
-indolent, and poor. “If they be so,” said Watt, “the best method of giving
-them vigour is to have recourse to British manufacturers, possessed of
-capital, industry, and knowledge of trade.” The old covenanting spirit of
-his race fairly breaks out in the following passage:--
-
-  “It is contemptible nonsense to argue that because Ireland has
-  never had iron manufactories she cannot soon have them.... One
-  hundred years ago the Irish had no linen manufacture; they
-  imported linen; and now they sell to us to the amount of a
-  million annually. How came this about? The civil wars under
-  Charles I., and the tyranny of the Scotch Privy Council under
-  Charles II., chased the people out of Scotland, because they
-  were Presbyterians. Ireland received and protected them; they
-  peopled the northern provinces; many of them were weavers; they
-  followed their business in Ireland, and taught others. Philip II.
-  chased the inhabitants out of Flanders, on account of religion;
-  Queen Elizabeth received and protected them; and England learnt
-  to manufacture woollen cloth. The persecutions of Lewis XIV.
-  occasioned the establishment of a colony in Spitalfields. And the
-  Parliament of Britain, under the auspices of ---- and ----, and
-  others, imposed oppressive duties on glass; and ----’s Act gave
-  the Irish liberty to export it to our Colonies; the glass-makers
-  fled from the tyranny of the Excise; Ireland has now nine
-  glass-houses. Britain has lost the export trade of that article!
-  More examples of the migrations of manufactures could be adduced,
-  but it seems unnecessary; for it cannot be denied that men will
-  fly from tyranny to liberty, whether Philip’s Priests, Charles’s
-  Dragoons, or our Excisemen be the instruments of the tyranny.
-  And it must also be allowed that even the Inquisition itself is
-  not more formidable than our Excise Laws (as far as property is
-  concerned) to those who unhappily are subjected to them.”
-
-Towards the end of the statement he asks, “Would it not be more manly
-and proper at once to invite the Irish to come into a perfect union with
-Britain, and to pay the same duties and excises that we do? Then every
-distinction of country might with justice be done away with, and they
-would have a fair claim to all the advantages which we enjoy.”
-
-The result of the agitation was that most of the proposals to impose new
-taxes on the raw materials of manufacture were withdrawn by the Ministry,
-and the Irish resolutions were considerably modified. But the relations
-of British and Irish industry were by no means settled. The Irish
-Parliament might refuse to affirm the resolutions adopted by the British
-Parliament, in which case it might be necessary again to oppose the
-Ministerial measures; and to provide for this contingency, the delegates
-separated, with the resolution to maintain and extend their organisation
-in the manufacturing districts. Watt did not, however, like the idea of
-his partner becoming engrossed in political agitation, even in matters
-relating to commerce. He accordingly wrote to Boulton in London, “I find
-myself quite unequal to the various business now lying behind, and wish
-much you were at home, and that you would direct your attention solely to
-your own and to Boulton and Watt’s business until affairs can be brought
-into reasonable compass.”[268] Later he wrote,--“At Manchester they are
-busy making a collection for the Chamber of Manufacturers, which I fancy
-will be in vogue again next winter. But I hope that neither you nor I will
-be mad enough to be demagogues then. Let us leave that to those who can
-defy Ministers, and get our property secured, which may be done in the
-confusion.”
-
-    [268] Watt to Boulton, 31st March, 1785.
-
-Watt was at this time distressed by an adverse decision against the firm
-in one of the Scotch courts. “I have generally observed,” he wrote, “that
-there is a tide in our affairs. We have had peace for some time, but now
-cross accidents have begun, and more are to be feared.” His anxieties were
-increased by the rumour which reached his ears from several quarters of a
-grand combination of opulent manufacturers to make use of every beneficial
-patent that had been taken out, and cut them down by _scire facias_, as
-they had already cut down Arkwright’s. It was said that subscriptions
-had been obtained by the association amounting to 50,000_l._ Watt was
-requested to join a counter combination of patentees to resist the
-threatened proceedings. To this, however, he objected, on the ground that
-the association of men to support one another in lawsuits was illegal, and
-would preclude the members from giving evidence in support of each other’s
-rights. “Besides,” said he, “the greater number of patentees are such as
-we could not associate with, and if we did it would do us more harm than
-good.”[269]
-
-    [269] Watt to Boulton, 21st July, 1785. Writing to Boulton on a
-      later occasion on the subject of these threatened attacks on
-      all patents, he said, “A pursuance of such decisions as have
-      been given lately in several cases must at length drive men of
-      invention to take shelter in countries where their ingenuity
-      will be protected; and the other states of Europe know their
-      interest too well to neglect any opportunity of curbing the
-      insolence and humbling the pride of Britain. If the minister
-      should not think it right to amend and confirm the patent laws,
-      the next best thing would be to make a law totally taking
-      away the king’s power of granting them. I mean, this would
-      be the _honest_ part.”--Watt to Boulton, 19th March, 1786.
-      Boulton himself had equally strong views on the subject of
-      patents, believing that they tended to encourage industrious
-      and ingenious men to labour for the common good. Referring to
-      the decision against Argand’s lamp patent, he wrote De Luc in
-      1787,--“It was hard, unjust, and impolitic, as it hath (to my
-      knowledge) discouraged a very ingenious French chemist from
-      coming over and establishing in this country an invention of
-      the highest importance to one of our greatest manufactures.
-      Moreover, it tends to destroy the greatest of all stimulants to
-      invention, viz. the idea of enjoying the fruits of one’s own
-      labour. Some late decisions against the validity of certain
-      patents have raised the spirits of the illiberal, sordid,
-      unjust, ungenerous, and inventionless misers, who prey upon
-      the vitals of the ingenious, and make haste to seize upon what
-      their laborious and often costly application has produced. The
-      decisions to which I refer have encouraged a combination in
-      Cornwall to erect engines on Boulton and Watt’s principles,
-      contrary to the Law of Patents and the express provisions of an
-      Act of Parliament; and this they are setting about in order to
-      drive us into a court of law, flattering themselves that it is
-      the present disposition of the judges to set their faces against
-      all patents. Should such a disposition (so contrary to Lord
-      Mansfield’s decisions) continue to prevail, it will produce far
-      greater evils to the manufacturing industry of the kingdom than
-      the gentlemen of the law can have any idea of.”
-
-Towards the end of 1785 the engines which had been in hand were nearly
-finished, and work was getting slacker than usual at Soho. Though new
-orders gave Watt trouble, and occasioned him anxiety, still he would
-rather not be without them. “It will be well,” he wrote to his partner,
-“if we can get some orders now for engines worth while. What we have
-been doing lately has been very trifling, and if we don’t get orders
-soon, our men will be idle. As it happens at present, we have at least
-three engineers too few here, there being eight engines to be done in
-two or three months, and only three engineers.”[270] It was matter of
-gratification to Watt to be able to report that the engines last delivered
-had given great satisfaction. The mechanics were improving in skill,
-and their workmanship was becoming of a superior character. “Strood and
-Curtis’s engine,” said he, “has been at work some time, and does very
-well. Whitbread’s has also been tried, and performs exceedingly well.” The
-success of Whitbread’s engine was such that it had the honour of a visit
-from the King, who was greatly pleased with its performances. Not to be
-outdone, “Felix Calvert,” wrote Watt, “has bespoken one, which is to outdo
-Whitbread’s in magnificence.”
-
-    [270] Watt to Boulton, 27th August, 1785.
-
-The slackness of work at Soho was not of long continuance. Orders for
-rotative engines came in gradually; one from Harris, of Nottingham;
-another from Macclesfield, to drive a silk-mill; a third from Edinburgh,
-for the purposes of a distillery; and others from different quarters.
-The influx of orders had the effect at the same time of filling Soho
-with work, and plunging Watt into his usual labyrinth of perplexity and
-distress. In September we find him writing to Boulton,--
-
-  “My health, is so bad that I do not think I can hold out much
-  longer, at least as a man of business, and I wish to consolidate
-  something before I give over.” ... Again, “I cannot help being
-  dispirited, because I find my head fail me much, business an
-  excessive burden to me, and little prospect of my speedy release
-  from it. Were we both young and healthy, I should see no reason
-  to despair, but very much the contrary. However, we must do the
-  best we can, and hope for quiet in heaven when our weary bones
-  are laid to rest.”[271]
-
-    [271] Watt to Boulton, 24th September, 1785.
-
-A few months later, so many more orders had come in, that Watt described
-Soho as “fast for the next four months,” but the additional work only had
-the effect of increasing his headaches. “In the anguish of my mind,” he
-wrote, “amid the vexations occasioned by new and unsuccessful schemes,
-like Lovelace I ‘curse my inventions,’ and almost wish, if we could gather
-our money together, that somebody else should succeed in getting our trade
-from us. However, all may yet be well. Nature can be conquered if we can
-but find out her weak side.”
-
-We return to the affairs of the Cornish copper-miners, which were now in a
-very disheartening condition. The mines were badly and wastefully worked;
-and the competition of many small companies of poor adventurers kept the
-copper trade in a state of permanent depression. In this crisis of their
-affairs it was determined that a Copper Company should be formed, backed
-by ample capital, with the view of regulating this important branch of
-industry, and rescuing the mines and miners from ruin. Boulton took an
-active part in its formation, and induced many of his intimate friends
-in the north to subscribe largely for shares. An arrangement was entered
-into by the Company with the adventurers in the principal mines, to buy
-of them the whole of the ore raised, at remunerative prices, for a period
-of eleven years. At the first meeting, held in September, 1785, for the
-election of Governor, Deputy-Governor, and Directors, Boulton held in his
-hands the power of determining the appointments, representing, as he did
-by proxy, shares held by his northern friends to the amount of 86,000_l._
-The meeting took place in the Town-hall at Truro, and the proceedings
-passed off satisfactorily; Boulton using his power with due discretion.
-“We met again on Friday,” he wrote to Matthews, “and chose the assayers
-and other subordinate officers, after which we paid our subscriptions, and
-dined together, all in good humour; and thus this important revolution in
-the copper trade was finally settled for eleven years.”
-
-Matters were not yet, however, finally settled, as many arrangements
-had to be made for setting the Company to work, in which Boulton took
-the leading part; the Governor and Directors pressing him not to leave
-Cornwall until they were definitely settled. It happened to suit his
-convenience to remain until the Wheal Fortune engine was finished--one of
-the most formidable engines the firm had yet erected in Cornwall. In the
-mean time he entered into correspondence with various consumers of copper
-at home and abroad, with the object of finding a vend for the metal. He
-succeeded in obtaining a contract through Mr. Hope, of Amsterdam, for
-supplying the copper required for the new Dutch coinage; and he opened
-out new markets for the produce in other quarters. Being a large holder of
-mining shares, Boulton also tried to introduce new and economical methods
-of working the mines; but with comparatively little result. To Wilkinson
-he wrote,--“Poldice is in a desponding way, and must give up unless better
-managed. North Downs is managed as badly by incapable, ignorant, drunken
-captains, who hold their posts not by merit, but by their cousinship to
-some of the adventurers.... I should spend a great part of next year in
-Cornwall, and make myself master of the minutiæ. I think I could then
-accomplish many necessary regulations.”[272]
-
-    [272] Boulton to Wilkinson, 21st November, 1785.
-
-Though actively bestirring himself for the good of the mining interest,
-Boulton had but small thanks for his pains. The prominence of his position
-had this disadvantage, that if the price of the ore went down, or profits
-declined, or the yield fell off, or the mines were closed, or anything
-went wrong, the miners were but too ready to identify him in some way
-with the evil; and the services which he had rendered to the mining
-interest[273] were in a moment forgotten. On one occasion the discontent
-of the miners broke out into open revolt, and Boulton was even threatened
-with personal violence. The United Mines having proved unprofitable in
-the working, notice was given by the manager of an intended reduction
-of wages, this being the only condition on which the mines could be
-carried on. If this could not be arranged, the works must be closed,
-as the adventurers declined to go on at a loss. On the announcement of
-the intended lowering of wages being made, there was great excitement
-and discontent among the workpeople. Several hundreds of them hastily
-assembled at Redruth, and took the road for Truro, to pull down the
-offices of the Copper Mining Company, and burn the house of the manager.
-They were especially furious with Boulton, vowing vengeance on him, and
-declaring that they would pull down every pumping-engine he had set up
-in Cornwall. When the rioters reached Truro, they found a body of men,
-hastily armed with muskets taken from the arsenal, stationed in front of
-the Copper Mining Company’s premises, supported by six pieces of cannon.
-At sight of this formidable demonstration the miners drew back, and,
-muttering threats that they would repeat their visit, returned to Redruth
-as they had come. Two companies of soldiers and two of local militia were
-brought into the town immediately after; and the intended assault was not
-made. When Watt was informed of the violence with which his partner had
-been threatened, he wrote,--“In my opinion nothing can be more ungrateful
-than the behaviour of those people who endeavour to make you the object of
-the resentment of the mob, at a time when (setting aside former services)
-you are doing all that lies in your power to serve them.... If you still
-find the same spirit continue, for God’s sake leave them immediately. The
-law can reach the adventurers, if it cannot the miners.”
-
-    [273] Writing to M. De Luc, the Queen’s Librarian, of what he and
-      his partner had done for Cornwall, Boulton said,--“The copper
-      and tin mines of Cornwall are now sunk to so great a depth that
-      had not Mr. Watt and myself nearly expended our fortunes and
-      hazarded our ruin by neglecting our regular business, and by a
-      long series of expensive experiments in bringing our engine to
-      its present degree of perfection, those mines must inevitably
-      have stopped working, and Cornwall at this time would not have
-      existed as a mining county. The very article of extra coals
-      for common engines would have amounted to more than the entire
-      profits of their working.”--Boulton to De Luc, 31st March, 1787.
-
-This was, however, but the wild and unreasoning clamour of misguided and
-ignorant men. Boulton was personally much esteemed by all who were able
-to appreciate his character, and to understand the position of himself
-and his partner with reference to the engine patent. The larger mining
-owners invited him to their houses, and regarded him as their friend. The
-more intelligent of the managers were his strenuous supporters. First
-and foremost among these was Mr. Phillips, manager of the Chacewater
-mines, of whom he always spoke with the highest respect, as a man of the
-most scrupulous integrity and honour. Mr. Phillips was a member of the
-Society of Friends, and his wife Catherine was one of the most celebrated
-preachers of the body. Boulton and Watt occasionally resided with them
-before the house at Cosgarne was taken, and conceived for both the warmest
-friendship. If Watt was attracted by the Cornish Anabaptists, Boulton was
-equally so by the Cornish Quakers. We find him, in one of his letters to
-Mrs. Boulton, describing to her a great meeting of Friends at Truro which
-he had attended, “when,” he said, “I heard our friend Catherine Phillips
-preach with great energy and good sense for an hour and a half, although
-so weak in body that she was obliged to lie abed for several days before.”
-Boulton afterwards dined with the whole body of Friends at the principal
-inn, being the only person present who was not of the Society; and he
-confessed to have spent in their company a very pleasant evening.[274]
-
-    [274] Two days after this event, when about to set out for
-      Polgooth, a messenger arrived at Boulton’s lodgings, bringing
-      him the sad news of Mr. Phillips’s sudden death. He describes
-      the scene at the funeral, at which Catherine Phillips, though
-      strongly urged by him to stay away, insisted on being present.
-      “She was attended by a widow lady who had lost a good husband
-      last year, and though she had not been accustomed to speak in
-      the congregation of the righteous, yet on this occasion she
-      stood with her hand upon her husband’s coffin and spoke above
-      an hour, delivering one of the most pathetic discourses I ever
-      heard.” A large concourse of people attended the interment,
-      which took place in a garden near Redruth. Boulton, in writing
-      to Mrs. Boulton, said, “I wish I had time to give you the
-      history and character of my departed friend, as you know but
-      little of his excellences. I cannot say but that I feel a gloomy
-      pleasure in dwelling upon the life and death of a good man: it
-      incites to piety and elevates the mind above terrestrial things.
-      Now, let me ask you to hold a silent meeting in your heart for
-      half an hour and then return to your work.”
-
-We return to the progress of the engine business at Soho. The most
-important work in hand about this time was the double-acting engine
-intended for the Albion Mill, in Southwark.[275] This was the first
-rotative with a parallel motion erected in London; and as the more
-extended use of the engine would in a great measure depend upon its
-success, the firm naturally looked forward with very great interest to
-its performances. The Albion Mill scheme was started by Boulton as early
-as 1783. Orders for rotatives were then coming in very slowly, and it
-occurred to him that if he had but the opportunity of exhibiting the
-powers of the new engine in its best form, and in connexion with the
-best machinery, the results would be so satisfactory and conclusive as
-to induce manufacturers generally to follow the example. On applying to
-the London capitalists, Boulton found them averse to the undertaking; and
-at length Boulton and Watt became persuaded that if the concern was to
-be launched at all, they must themselves find the principal part of the
-capital. A sufficient number of shareholders was got together to make a
-start, and application was made for a charter of incorporation in 1784;
-but it was so strongly opposed by the millers and mealmen, on the ground
-that the application of steam-power to flour-grinding would throw wind and
-water mills out of work, take away employment from the labouring classes,
-and reduce the price of bread,[276] that the charter was refused; and the
-Albion Mill Company was accordingly constituted on the ordinary principles
-of partnership.
-
-    [275] The Albion Mill engine was set to work in 1786. The first
-      rotative with a parallel motion in Scotland, was erected for
-      Mr. Stein, of Kennet Pans near Alloa, in the following year.
-
-    [276] In a letter to Mr. Matthews (30th April, 1784) Boulton
-      wrote,--“It seems the millers are determined to be masters of
-      us and the public. Putting a stop to fire-engine mills because
-      they come into competition with water-mills, is as absurd as
-      stopping navigable canals would be because they interfere with
-      farmers and waggoners. The argument also applies to wind and
-      tide mills or any other means whereby corn can be ground. So
-      all machines should be stopped whereby men’s labour is saved,
-      because it might be argued that men were thereby deprived of
-      a livelihood. Carry out the argument, and we must annihilate
-      water-mills themselves, and thus go back again to the grinding
-      of corn by hand labour!”
-
-By the end of the year the Albion Mill engines, carefully designed by
-Watt, were put in hand at Soho; the building was in course of erection,
-after the designs of Mr. Wyatt, the architect; while John Rennie, the
-young Scotch engineer, was engaged to design and fit up the flour-grinding
-and dressing machinery. “I am glad,” wrote Boulton to Watt, “you have
-agreed with Rennie. Mills are a great field. Think of the crank--of
-Wolf, Trumpeter, Wasp, and all the ghosts we are haunted by.” The whole
-of the following year was occupied in the erection of the buildings and
-machinery; and it was not until the spring of 1786 that the mill was ready
-to start. Being the first enterprise of the kind, on an unprecedented
-scale, and comprising many novel combinations of machinery, there were
-many “hitches” before it could be got to work satisfactorily. After the
-first trial, at which Boulton was present, he wrote his partner expressing
-his dissatisfaction with the working of the double-acting engine,
-expressing the opinion that it would have been better if they had held
-by the single-acting one.[277] Watt was urged to run up to town himself
-and set matters to rights; but he was up to the ears in work at Soho, and
-could not leave for a day.
-
-    [277] Watt, however, continued to adhere to his own views as to
-      the superiority of the plan adopted:--“I am sorry to find,” he
-      observed in his reply to Boulton, “so many things are amiss at
-      Albion Mill, and that you have lost your good opinion of double
-      engines, while my opinion of them is mended. The smoothness
-      of their going depends on the steam regulators being opened
-      a little before the vacuum regulators, and not opened too
-      suddenly, as indeed the others ought not to be. Otherwise the
-      shock comes so violently in the opposite direction that no pins
-      or brasses will stand it. Malcolm has no notion how to make gear
-      work quietly, nor do I think he properly understands it. You
-      must therefore attend to it yourself, and not leave it until it
-      is more perfect.”--Watt to Boulton, 3rd March, 1786.
-
-[Illustration: DOUBLE-ACTING ENGINE, ALBION MILL.]
-
-  “I can by no means leave home at present,” he wrote, “otherwise we
-  shall suffer much greater losses than _can_ come from the Albion
-  Mill. The work for Cornwall which must be planned and put in train
-  is immense, and there will more come from that quarter. Besides,
-  I am pulled to pieces by demands for forwardness from every side.
-  I have lost ten days by William Murdock, Wilson, Wilkinson, and
-  headaches, and I have neither health nor spirits to make the
-  necessary exertions. If I went to London I should be in torment
-  all the while with the thoughts of what was lying behind here.”
-
-After pointing out what course should be taken to discover and remedy the
-faults of the engine, he proceeded:--
-
-  “Above all, patience must be exercised and things coolly examined
-  and put to rights, and care be taken not to blame innocent parts.
-  Everything must, as much as possible, be tried separately. Remind
-  those who begin to growl, that in new, complicated, and difficult
-  things, human foresight falls short--that time and money must be
-  given to perfect things and find out their defects, otherwise they
-  cannot be remedied.”[278]
-
-    [278] Watt to Boulton, 10th March, 1786.--Boulton MSS.
-
-Not being able to persuade Watt to come to his help, Boulton sent to
-Cornwall for Murdock, always ready to lend a hand on an emergency, and in
-the course of a few weeks he was in town at work upon the engines. The
-result is best told in Wyatt’s letter to Boulton, who had by this time
-returned to Birmingham:--
-
-  “Mr. Murdock has just set the engine to work. All the rods are
-  altered. I think he has done more good than all the doctors
-  we have had before; and his manner of doing it has been very
-  satisfactory--so different from what we have been used to. He
-  has been through all the flues himself, and really takes uncommon
-  pains. Pray write to him; thank him for his attention. He will not
-  have left town before he gets your letter, and press him to stay
-  as long as he can be essentially serviceable.”
-
-There was, however, so great a demand for Murdock’s presence in Cornwall,
-that he could not be spared for another day, and he hurried back again to
-his multifarious duties at the mines.
-
-The cost of erecting the mill proved to be considerably in excess of the
-original estimate, and Watt early feared that it would turn out a losing
-concern. He had no doubt about the engines or the machinery being able to
-do all that had been promised; but he feared that the absence of business
-capacity on the part of the managers would be fatal to its commercial
-success.[279] He was especially annoyed at finding the mill made a public
-show of, and that it was constantly crowded with curious and frivolous
-people, whose presence seriously interfered with the operations of the
-workmen. It reached his ears that the managers of the mill even intended
-to hold a masquerade in it, with the professed object of starting the
-concern with eclat! Watt denounced this as sheer humbug. “What have Dukes,
-Lords, and Ladies,” said he, “to do with masquerading in a flour-mill? You
-must take steps to curb the vanity of ----, else it will ruin him. As for
-ourselves, considering that we are much envied at any rate, everything
-which contributes to render us conspicuous ought to be avoided. Let us
-content ourselves with _doing_.”[280] It was also found that the mill
-was becoming a nest for schemers and speculators occupied in devising
-all manner of new projects. Boulton bestirred himself to put matters in
-a more business-like train. Steps were taken to close the mill against
-the crowd of idle visitors; and Boulton shortly after reported that “the
-manufacturing of Bubbles and new schemes is removed from the Mill to a
-private Lodging.”
-
-    [279] “The Albion Mill,” wrote Watt to Boulton, “requires your
-      close attention and exertions. I look upon it as a weight about
-      our necks that will sink us to the bottom, unless people of
-      real activity and knowledge of business are found to manage it.
-      I would willingly forfeit a considerable sum to be clear of
-      the concern. If anybody will take my share I will cheerfully
-      give him 500_l._ and reckon myself well quit. My reasons are
-      that none of the parties concerned are men of business, that no
-      attention has been hitherto paid to it by anybody except Mr. W.
-      and ourselves, and that if we go on as expensively in carrying
-      on the business as in the erection, it is impossible but that
-      we should be immense losers, and thus probably our least loss
-      will be to stop where we are. As to our reputation as engineers,
-      I have no doubt but the mill will perform its business, but
-      whether with the quantity of coals and labour is what I cannot
-      say.”--Watt to Boulton, 19th March, 1786.
-
-    [280] Watt to Boulton, 17th April, 1786.
-
-When the mill was at length set to work, it performed to the entire
-satisfaction of its projectors. The engine, on one occasion, ground as
-much as 3000 bushels of wheat in twenty-four hours. The usual rate of work
-per week of six days was 16,000 bushels of wheat, cleaned, ground, and
-dressed into fine flour (some of it being ground two or three times over);
-or sufficient, according to Boulton’s estimate, for the weekly consumption
-of 150,000 people. The important uses of the double rotative engine were
-thus exhibited in the most striking manner; and the fame of the Albion
-Mill extended far and wide. It so far answered the main purpose which
-Boulton and Watt had in view in originally embarking in the enterprise;
-but it must be added that the success was accomplished at a very serious
-sacrifice. The mill never succeeded commercially. It was too costly in its
-construction and its management, and though it did an immense business it
-was at a loss. The concern was, doubtless, capable of great improvement,
-and, had time been allowed, it would probably have come round. When its
-prospects seemed to be brightening,[281] it was set on fire in several
-places by incendiaries on the night of the 3rd of March, 1791. The
-villains had made their arrangements with deliberation and skill. They
-fastened the main cock of the water-cistern, and chose the hour of low
-tide for firing the building, so that water could not be got to play upon
-the flames, and the mill was burnt to the ground in a few hours. A reward
-was offered for the apprehension of the criminals, but they were never
-discovered. The loss sustained by the Company was about 10,000_l._ Boulton
-and Watt were the principal sufferers; the former holding 6000_l._, and
-the latter 3000_l._ interest in the undertaking.[282]
-
-    [281] Watt wrote Boulton from London, 1st October, 1789,--“I
-      called on Wyatt (the architect) last night. He says the mill
-      sold above 4000_l._ worth of flour last week and is doing well.”
-
-    [282] For further particulars as to the Albion Mill, see Life of
-      Rennie in ‘Lives of the Engineers,’ ii. 137.
-
-Meanwhile orders for rotative engines were coming in apace at
-Soho,--engines for paper-mills and cotton-mills, for flour-mills and
-iron-mills, and for sugar-mills in America and the West Indies. At the
-same time pumping-engines were in hand for France, Spain, and Italy.
-The steam-engine was becoming an established power, and its advantages
-were every day more clearly recognised. It was alike docile, regular,
-economical, and effective, at all times and seasons, by night as by day,
-in summer and in winter. While the wind-mills were stopped by calms and
-the water-mills by frosts, the steam-mill worked on with untiring power.
-“There is not a single water-mill now at work in Staffordshire,” wrote
-Boulton to Wyatt in December; “they are all frozen up, and were it not for
-Wilkinson’s steam-mill, the poor nailers must have perished; but his mill
-goes on rolling and slitting ten tons of iron a day, which is carried away
-as fast as it can be bundled up; and thus the employment and subsistence
-of these poor people are secured.”
-
-As the demand for rotative engines set in, Watt became more hopeful as
-to the prospects of this branch of manufacture. He even began to fear
-lest the firm should be unable to execute the orders, so fast did they
-follow each other. “I have no doubt,” he wrote to Boulton, “that we
-shall soon so methodize the rotative engines as to get on with them at
-a great pace. Indeed, that is already in some degree the case. But we
-must have more men, and these we can only have by the slow process of
-breeding them.”[283] A fortnight later he wrote, “Orders for rotative
-engines are coming in daily; but, if we part with any more men here, we
-must stop taking them in.” Want of skilled workmen continued to be one
-of Watt’s greatest difficulties. When the amount of work to be executed
-was comparatively small, and sufficient time was given to execute it,
-he was able to turn out very satisfactory workmanship;[284] but when the
-orders came pouring in, new hands were necessarily taken on, who proved
-a constant source of anxiety and trouble. Even the “old hands,” when
-sent to a distance to fit up engines, being left, in a great measure, to
-themselves, were apt to become careless and ill-conditioned. With some,
-self-conceit was the stumbling-block, with others temper, but with the
-greater number, drink. “I am very sorry to hear,” wrote Watt to Boulton,
-“that Malcolm Logan’s disease increases. I think you should talk to him
-roundly upon it, and endeavour to procure him to make a solemn resolution
-or oath against drinking for some given term.” Another foreman sent to
-erect an engine in Craven was afflicted with a distemper of a different
-sort. He was found to have put the engine very badly together, and,
-instead of attending to his work, had gone a-hunting in a pig-tail wig!
-“If the half of this be true,” wrote Watt, “as I fear it is, he will not
-do to be sent to New River Head [where an engine was about to be erected],
-and I have at present nobody else here.... I suppose I shall be obliged
-to send Joseph over, for we must not have a bad engine if it can be
-helped.... We seem to be getting into our old troubles again.”[285]
-
-    [283] Watt to Boulton, 23rd September, 1786.
-
-    [284] He spoke of Goodwyn’s Brewery engine, finished in 1784, as
-      the best that Soho had up to that time turned out--it “performed
-      wonderful well--not the smallest leak and scarce any noise....
-      The working gear and joints are the best I ever saw.”
-
-    [285] Watt to Boulton, 24th February, 1786.
-
-William Murdock continued, as before, an admirable exception. He was
-as indefatigable as ever, always ready with an expedient to remedy a
-defect, and willing to work at all hours. A great clamour had been raised
-in Cornwall during his stay in London while setting the Albion Mill to
-rights, as there was no other person there capable of supplying his place,
-and fulfilling his numerous and responsible duties. Boulton deplored that
-more men such as Murdock were not to be had;--“He is now flying from mine
-to mine,” he wrote, “and hath so many calls upon him that he is inclined
-to grow peevish; and if we take him from North Downs, Chacewater, and
-Towan (all of which engines he has the care of), they will run into
-disorder and ruin; they have not a man at North Downs that is better than
-a stoker.”
-
-Towards the end of 1786 the press of orders increased at Soho. A rotative
-engine of forty-horse power was ordered by the Plate Glass Company to
-grind glass. A powerful pumping-engine was in hand for the Oxford Canal
-Company. Two engines, one of twenty and the other of ten horse power, were
-ordered for Scotch distilleries, and another order was shortly expected
-from the same quarter. The engine supplied for the Hull paper-mill having
-been found to answer admirably, more orders for engines for the same
-purpose were promised. At the same time pumping-engines were in hand for
-the great French waterworks at Marli. “In short,” said Watt, “I foresee
-I shall be driven almost mad in finding men for the engines ordered
-here and coming in.” Watt was necessarily kept very full of work by
-these orders, and we gather from his letters that he was equally full of
-headaches. He continued to give his personal attention to the preparation
-of the drawings of the engines, even to the minutest detail. On an engine
-being ordered by Mr. Morris, of Bristol, for the purpose of driving a
-tilt-hammer, Boulton wrote to him,--“Mr. Watt can never be prevailed upon
-to begin any piece of machinery until the plan of the whole is settled,
-as it often happens that a change in one thing puts many others wrong.
-However, he has now settled the whole of yours, but waits answers to
-certain questions before the drawings for the founder can be issued.”[286]
-
-    [286] Boulton to Morris, 2nd November, 1786.
-
-At an early period his friend Wedgwood had strongly urged upon Watt
-that he should work less with his own head and hands, and more through
-the heads and hands of others.[287] Watt’s brain was too active for
-his body, and needed rest; but rest he would not take, and persisted in
-executing all the plans of the new engines himself. Thus in his fragile,
-nervous, dyspeptic state, every increase of business was to him increase
-of brain-work and increase of pain; until it seemed as if not only his
-health, but the very foundations of his reason must give way. At the very
-time when Soho was beginning to bask in the sunshine of prosperity, and
-the financial troubles of the firm seemed coming to an end, Watt wrote
-the following profoundly melancholy letter to a friend:--
-
-  “I have been effete and listless, neither daring to face business,
-  nor capable of it, my head and memory failing me much; my stable
-  of hobby-horses pulled down, and the horses given to the dogs for
-  carrion.... I have had serious thoughts of laying down the burden
-  I find myself unable to carry, and perhaps, if other sentiments
-  had not been stronger, should have thought of throwing off the
-  mortal coil; but, if matters do not grow worse, I may perhaps
-  stagger on. Solomon said that in the increase of knowledge there
-  is increase of sorrow; if he had substituted _business_ for
-  knowledge, it would have been perfectly true.”[288]
-
-    [287] “Your mind, my friend, is too active, too powerful for your
-      body, and harasses it beyond its bearing. If this was the case
-      with any other machine under your direction, except that in
-      whose regulation your friends take so much interest, you would
-      soon find out a remedy. For the present permit me to advise a
-      more ample use of _the oil of delegation_ through your whole
-      machinery, and I am persuaded you will soon find some salutary
-      effects from this application. Seriously, I shall conclude
-      in saying to you what Dr. Fothergill desired me to say to
-      Brindley--‘Spare your machine a little, or like others under
-      your direction, it will wear out the sooner by hard and constant
-      usage.’”--Josiah Wedgwood to Watt, December 10, 1782.
-
-    [288] Watt to his brother-in-law, Gilbert Hamilton, Glasgow, June
-      18, 1786.
-
-As might be expected, from the large number of engines sold by the firm
-to this time, and the increasing amounts yearly payable as dues, their
-income from the business was becoming considerable, and promised, before
-many years had passed, to be very large. Down to the year 1785, however,
-the outlay upon new foundries, workshops, and machinery had been so great,
-and the large increase of business had so completely absorbed the capital
-of the firm, that Watt continued to be paid his household expenses, at
-the rate of so much a year, out of the hardware business, and no division
-of profits upon the engines sold and at work had as yet been made,
-because none had accrued. After the lapse of two more years, matters had
-completely changed; and after long waiting, and indescribable distress of
-mind and body, Watt’s invention at length began to be productive to him.
-During the early part of his career, though his income had been small,
-his wants were few, and easily satisfied. Though Boulton had liberally
-provided for these from the time of his settling at Birmingham, Watt
-continued to feel oppressed by the thought of the debt to the bankers for
-which he and his partner were jointly liable. In his own little business
-he had been accustomed to deal with such small sums, that the idea of
-being responsible for the repayment of thousands of pounds appalled and
-unnerved him; and he had no peace of mind until the debt was discharged.
-Now at last he was free, and in the happy position of having a balance at
-his bankers. On the 7th of December, 1787, Boulton wrote to Matthews, the
-London agent,--“As Mr. Watt is now at Mr. Macgregor’s, in Glasgow, I wish
-you would write him a line to say that you have transferred 4000_l._ to
-his own account, that you have paid for him another 1000_l._ to the Albion
-Mill, and that about Christmas you suppose you shall transfer 2007_l._
-more to him, to balance.”
-
-But while Watt’s argosies were coming into port richly laden, Boulton’s
-were still at sea. Though the latter had risked, and often lost, capital
-in his various undertakings, he continued as venturesome, as enterprising
-as ever. When any project was started calculated to bring the steam-engine
-into notice, he was immediately ready with his subscription. Thus he
-embarked 6000_l._ in the Albion Mill, a luckless adventure in itself,
-though productive in other respects. But he sadly missed the money, and as
-late as 1789, feelingly said to Matthews, “Oh that I had my Albion Mill
-capital back again!” When any mining adventure was started in Cornwall
-for which a new engine was wanted, Boulton would write, “If you want a
-stopgap, put me down as an adventurer;” and too often the adventure proved
-a failure. Then, to encourage the Cornish Copper Mining Company, he bought
-large quantities of copper, and had it sent down to Birmingham, where it
-lay long on his hands without a purchaser. At the same time we find him
-expending 5000_l._ in building and rebuilding two mills and a warehouse
-at Soho, and an equal amount in “preparing for the coinage.” These large
-investments had the effect of crippling his resources for years to come;
-and when the commercial convulsion of 1788 occurred, he felt himself in
-a state of the most distressing embarrassment. The circumstances of the
-partners being thus in a measure reversed, Boulton fell back upon Watt
-for temporary help; but, more cautious than his partner, Watt had already
-invested his profits elsewhere, and could not help him.[289] He had got
-together his store of gains with too much difficulty to part with them
-easily; and he was unwilling to let them float away in what he regarded
-as an unknown sea of speculation.
-
-    [289] “Mr. Watt hath lately remitted _all_ his money to Scotland,
-      and I have lately purchased a considerable quantity of copper
-      at the request of Mr. Williams.... Besides which I have more
-      than 45 tons of copper by me, 20 of which was bought of the
-      Cornish Metal Company, and 20 of the Duke’s at 70_l._, and not
-      an ounce of either yet used. In short, I shall be in a very
-      few weeks in great want of money, and it is now impossible to
-      borrow in London or this neighbourhood as all confidence is
-      fled.”--Boulton to Wilson, 4th May, 1788.
-
-To add to his distresses, Boulton’s health began to fail him. To have
-seen the two men, no one would have thought that Boulton would have
-been the first to break down; but so it was. Though Watt’s sufferings
-from headaches, and afterwards from asthma, seem to have been almost
-continuous, he struggled on, and even grew in strength and spirits. His
-fragile frame bent before disease, as the reed bends to the storm, and
-rose erect again; but it was different with Boulton. He had toiled too
-unsparingly, and was now feeling the effects. The strain upon him had
-throughout been greater than upon Watt, whose headache had acted as a
-sort of safety-valve by disabling him from pursuing further study until
-it had gone off. Boulton, on the other hand, was kept in a state of
-constant anxiety by business that could not possibly be postponed. He
-had to provide the means for carrying on his many businesses, to sustain
-his partner against despondency, and to keep the whole organisation of
-the firm in working order. While engaged in bearing his gigantic burden,
-disease came upon him. In 1784 we find him writing to his wine-merchant,
-with a cheque in payment of his account,--“We have had a visit from a new
-acquaintance--the gout.” The visitor returned, and four years later we
-find him complaining of violent pain from gravel and stone, to which he
-continued a martyr to the close of his life. “I am very unwell indeed,”
-he wrote to Matthews in London; “I can get no sleep; and yet I have been
-obliged to wear a cheerful face, and attend all this week on M. l’Abbé de
-Callone and his friend Brunelle.”[290] He felt as if life was drawing to
-an end with him: he asked his friend for a continuance of his sympathy,
-and promised to exert himself, “otherwise,” said he, “I will lay me down
-and die.” He was distressed, above all things, at the prospect of leaving
-his family unprovided for, notwithstanding all the labours, anxieties,
-and risks he had undergone. “When I reflect,” he said, “that I have given
-up my extra advantage of one-third on all the engines we are now making
-and are likely to make,[291]--when I think of my children, now upon the
-verge of that time of life when they are naturally entitled to expect a
-portion of their patrimony,--when I feel the consciousness of being unable
-to restore to them the property which their mother intrusted to me,--when
-I see all whom I am connected with growing rich, whilst I am groaning
-under a load of debt and annuities that would sink me into the grave if
-my anxieties for my children did not sustain me,--I say, when I consider
-all these things, it behoves me to struggle through the small remaining
-fragment of my life (being now in my 60th year), and do my children all
-the justice in my power by wiping away as many of my incumbrances as
-possible.”
-
-It was seldom that Boulton wrote in so desponding a strain as this; but it
-was his “darkest hour,” and happily it proved the one “nearest the dawn.”
-Yet, we shortly after find him applying his energies, apparently unabated,
-in an entirely new direction--that of coining money--which, next to the
-introduction of the steam-engine, was the greatest enterprise of his life.
-
-    [290] Boulton to Matthews, 22nd December, 1788.
-
-    [291] Boulton acted with his usual open-handed generosity in
-      his partnership arrangements with Watt. Although the original
-      bargain between them provided that Boulton was to take
-      two-thirds, and Watt one-third profits, Boulton providing the
-      requisite capital and being at the risk and expense of all
-      experiments, he subsequently, at Watt’s request, agreed to the
-      profits being equally divided between them.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XVIII.
-
-FRIENDS OF BOULTON AND WATT--THE LUNAR SOCIETY.
-
-
-As men are known by the friends they make and the books they read, as well
-as by the recreations and pursuits of their leisure hours, it will help
-us to an appreciation of the characters of Boulton and Watt if we glance
-briefly at the social life of Soho during the period we have thus rapidly
-passed under review.
-
-Boulton was of a thoroughly social disposition, and made friends wherever
-he went. He was a favourite alike with children and philosophers, with
-princely visitors at Soho, and with quiet Quakers in Cornwall. When at
-home, he took pleasure in gathering about him persons of kindred tastes
-and pursuits, in order at the same time to enjoy their friendship, and to
-cultivate his nature by intercourse with minds of the highest culture.
-Hence the friendships which he early formed for Benjamin Franklin, Dr.
-Small, Dr. Darwin, Josiah Wedgwood, Thomas Day, Lovell Edgeworth, and
-others equally eminent; out of which eventually grew the famous Lunar
-Society.
-
-Towards the close of last century, there were many little clubs or
-coteries of scientific and literary men established in the provinces,
-the like of which do not now exist,--probably because the communication
-with the metropolis is so much easier, and because London more than ever
-absorbs the active intelligence of England, especially in the higher
-departments of science, art, and literature. The provincial coteries of
-which we speak, were usually centres of the best and most intelligent
-society of their neighbourhoods, and were for the most part distinguished
-by an active and liberal spirit of inquiry. Leading minds attracted
-others of like tastes and pursuits, and social circles were formed which
-proved in many instances the source of great intellectual activity as
-well as enjoyment. At Liverpool, Roscoe and Currie were the centres of
-one such group; at Warrington, Aikin, Enfield, and Priestley, of another;
-at Bristol, Dr. Beddoes and Humphry Davy of a third; and at Norwich, the
-Taylors and Martineaus of a fourth. But perhaps the most distinguished of
-these provincial societies was that at Birmingham, of which Boulton and
-Watt were among the most prominent members.
-
-From an early period, the idea of a society, meeting by turns at each
-other’s houses, seems to have been entertained by Boulton. It was probably
-suggested in the first place by his friend Dr. Small. The object of the
-proposed Society was to be at the same time friendly and scientific.
-The members were to exchange views with each other on topics relating to
-literature, art, and science; each contributing his quota of entertainment
-and instruction. The meetings were appointed to be held monthly at the
-full of the moon, to enable distant members to drive home by moonlight;
-and this was the more necessary as some of them--such as Darwin and
-Wedgwood--lived at a considerable distance from Birmingham.
-
-When Watt visited Soho in 1768, on his way home from London to Glasgow,
-some of the members of the Society--Dr. Small, Dr. Darwin, and Mr.
-Keir--were invited to meet him at _l’hôtel de l’amitié sur Handsworth
-Heath_, as Boulton styled his hospitable mansion. The Society must,
-however, have been in a somewhat undefined state at even a considerably
-later period, as we find Boulton writing to Watt in 1776, after the
-latter had settled in Birmingham, “Pray remember that the celebration of
-the third full moon will be on Saturday, March 3rd. Darwin and Keir will
-both be at Soho. I then propose to submit many motions to the members
-respecting new laws and regulations, such as will tend to prevent the
-decline of a Society which I hope will be lasting.” The principal members,
-besides those above named, were Thomas Day, R. Lovell Edgeworth, Samuel
-Galton, Dr. Withering, Baskerville the printer, Dr. Priestley, and James
-Watt. Each member was at liberty to bring a friend with him, and thus
-many visitors of distinction were present at the meetings of the Society,
-amongst whom may be named Mr. Smeaton, Dr. Parr, Sir Joseph Banks,
-Sir William Herschel, Dr. Solander, De Luc, Dr. Camper, and occasional
-scientific foreigners.
-
-Dr. Darwin was regarded as the patriarch of the Society. His fame as a
-doctor, philosopher, and poet, was great throughout the Midland Counties.
-He was extremely speculative in all directions, even in such matters as
-driving wheel-carriages by steam,--also a favourite subject of speculation
-with Mr. Edgeworth.[292] Dr. Darwin’s time, however, was so much engrossed
-by his practice at Lichfield, that he was not very regular in his
-attendance at the meetings, but would excuse himself for his absence by
-such a letter as the following:--
-
-  “DEAR BOULTON,--I am sorry the infernal divinities who visit
-  mankind with diseases, and are therefore at perpetual war with
-  Doctors, should have prevented my seeing all your great men at
-  Soho to-day. Lord! what inventions, what wit, what rhetoric,
-  metaphysical, mechanical, and pyrotechnical, will be on the wing,
-  bandied like a shuttlecock from one to another of your troop
-  of philosophers! while poor I, I by myself I, imprison’d in a
-  postchaise, am joggled, and jostled, and bump’d, and bruised
-  along the King’s high-road, to make war upon a stomach-ache or a
-  fever!”[293]
-
-    [292] As early as August, 1768, we find Dr. Small in one of
-      his letters describing Edgeworth to Watt as “a gentleman of
-      fortune, young, mechanical, and indefatigable, who has taken a
-      resolution to move land and water carriages by steam, and has
-      made considerable progress in the short space of time that he
-      has devoted to the study.”
-
-    [293] Dr. Darwin to Boulton, April 5, 1778. When the Doctor
-      removed to Derby in 1782, he wrote,--“I am here cut off from
-      the milk of science, which flows in such redundant streams
-      from your learned Lunatics, and which, I can assure you, is a
-      very great regret to me.” In another letter he said,--“I hope
-      philosophy and fire-engines continue to go on well. You heard
-      we sent your Society an air-balloon, which was calculated to
-      have fallen in your garden at Soho; but the wicked wind carried
-      it to Sir Edward Littleton’s. Pray give my compliments to
-      your learned Society.” In another letter he wrote,--“I hope
-      Behemoth has strength in his loins. Belial and Ashtaroth are
-      two other devils of consequence, and good names for engines of
-      Fire.” When he heard of the Albion Mill being burnt down, the
-      Doctor wrote,--“The conflagration of the Albion Mill grieved me
-      sincerely, both as it was a grand and successful effort of human
-      art, and also because I fear you were a considerable sufferer
-      by it. I well remember poor old Mr. Seward comparing the
-      Immortality of the Soul (in a devout sermon) to a fire-engine.
-      He might now have made it a type of the mortality of this world,
-      and the conflagration of all things.”
-
-While Dr. Darwin and Mr. Edgeworth were amongst the oldest members of the
-Society, Dr. Priestley, the discoverer of oxygen and other gases, was one
-of the most recent. We find Boulton corresponding with him in 1775,[294]
-principally on chemical subjects, and supplying him with parcels of
-fluor spar for purposes of experiment. Five years later, in 1780, he was
-appointed minister of the Presbyterian Congregation assembling in the New
-Meeting-house, Birmingham; and from that time forward he was one of the
-most active members of the Lunar Society, by whom he was regarded as a
-great acquisition.
-
-    [294] In a letter from Priestley to Boulton, dated London, 6th
-      November, 1775, he wrote,--“I shall not quarrel with you on
-      account of our different sentiments in politics. When I tell you
-      what is fact, that the Americans have constructed a cannon on
-      a new principle, by which they can hit a mark at a distance of
-      a mile, you will say their ingenuity has come in aid of their
-      cowardice! I would tell you the principle of it, but that I am
-      afraid it would set your superior ingenuity to improve upon it
-      for the use of their enemies.” From Boulton’s memoranda-books
-      we find that the subject of improved artillery had occupied his
-      attention some ten years before.
-
-Dr. Priestley was a man of extraordinary gifts and accomplishments. He
-had mastered many languages before he was twenty years old. He was well
-versed in mechanical philosophy and metaphysics, a skilled dialectician,
-and the most expert chemist of his time. Possessed by an irrepressible
-activity and untiring perseverance, he became an enthusiast on whatever
-subject he undertook, whether it was an inquiry into history, theology,
-or science. He himself likened experimental philosophy to hunting, and
-in his case it was the _pursuit_ of facts that mainly concerned him.
-He was cheerful, hopeful, and buoyant; possessed of a most juvenile
-temperament; happiest when fullest of work; ranging from subject to
-subject with extraordinary versatility; laying aside metaphysics to
-pursue experiments in electricity, next taking up history and politics,
-and resting from these to experiment on gases,--all the while carrying
-on some public controversy on a disputed point in religion or politics.
-For it is a curious fact; that gentle, affectionate, and amiable though
-Priestley was,--devout in temperament, and single-minded in the pursuit of
-truth,[295]--he was almost constantly involved in paper wars. He described
-himself, and truly, as “one of the happiest of men;” yet wherever he
-went, in England or America, he stirred up controversy and exasperated
-opponents, seeming to be the very Ishmael of polemics.
-
-[Illustration: DR. PRIESTLEY.]
-
-At the time when he settled at Birmingham, Priestley was actively engaged
-in prosecuting inquiries into the constitution of bodies. He had been
-occupied for several years before in making investigations as to the
-gases. The discovery of carbonic acid gas by Dr. Black of Edinburgh, had
-attracted his attention; and, living conveniently near to a brewery at
-Leeds, where he then was, he proceeded to make experiments on the fixed
-air or carbonic acid gas evolved during fermentation. From these he went
-on to other experiments, making use of the rudest apparatus,--phials,
-tobacco-pipes, kitchen utensils, a few glass tubes, and an old gun-barrel.
-The pursuit was a source of constant pleasure to him. He had entered
-upon an almost unexplored field of science. Then was the childhood of
-chemistry, and he gazed with large-eyed wonder at the marvels which his
-investigations brought to light. He had no teacher to guide him--nothing
-but experiment; and he experimented constantly, carefully noting the
-results. Observation of facts was his great object; the interpretation
-of the facts he left to others. Such was Priestley, and such were his
-pursuits, when he settled at Birmingham in 1780.
-
-    [295] Mrs. Schimmelpenninck, who had no sympathy for Dr.
-      Priestley’s religious views, nevertheless bears eloquent
-      testimony to the beauty of his character. She speaks of him as
-      “a man of admirable simplicity, gentleness, and kindness of
-      heart, united with great acuteness of intellect. I can never
-      forget,” she says, “the impression produced on me by the serene
-      expression of his countenance. He, indeed, seemed ever present
-      with God by recollection, and with man by cheerfulness....
-      A sharp and acute intellectual perception, often a pointed,
-      perhaps a playful expression, was combined in him with a most
-      loving heart.... Dr. Priestley always spent part of every
-      day in devotional exercises and contemplation; and unless the
-      railroad has spoilt it, there yet remains at Dawlish a deep and
-      beautiful cavern, since known by the name of “Dr. Priestley’s
-      cavern,” where he was wont to pass an hour every day in solitary
-      retirement.”--‘Life of Mary Ann Schimmelpenninck.’
-
-There can be little doubt that his enthusiasm as an experimenter in
-chemistry exercised a powerful influence on the minds of both Boulton and
-Watt, who, though both full of work, anxiety, and financial troubles, were
-nevertheless found taking an active interest from this time forward in
-the progress of chemical science. Chemistry became the chief subject of
-discussion at the meetings of the Lunar Society, and chemical experiments
-the principal recreation of their leisure hours.
-
-  “I dined yesterday at the Lunar Society (Keir’s house),” wrote
-  Boulton to Watt; “there was Blair, Priestley, Withering, Galton,
-  and an American ‘rebel,’ Mr. Collins. Nothing new except that
-  some of my white Spathos Iron ore was found to contain more air
-  than any ore Priestley had ever tried, and, what is singular,
-  it contains no common air, but is part fixable and part
-  inflammable.”[296]
-
-To Henderson, in Cornwall, Boulton wrote, two months later,--
-
-  “Chemistry has for some time been my hobby-horse, but I am
-  prevented from riding it by cursed business, except now and then
-  of a Sunday. However, I have made great progress since I saw
-  you, and am almost an adept in metallurgical moist chemistry. I
-  have got all _that_ part of Bergmann’s last volume translated,
-  and have learnt from it many new facts. I have annihilated Wm.
-  Murdock’s bedchamber, having taken away the floor, and made the
-  chicken kitchen into one high room covered over with shelves,
-  and these I have filled with chemical apparatus. I have likewise
-  set up a Priestleyan water-tub, and likewise a mercurial tub for
-  experiments on gases, vapours, &c., and next year I shall annex
-  to these a laboratory with furnaces of all sorts, and all other
-  utensils for dry chemistry.”[297]
-
-    [296] Boulton to Watt, 3rd July, 1781. Dr. Black denominated
-      carbonic acid gas “fixed air” because of his having first
-      discovered it in chalk, marble, &c., wherein it was _fixed_
-      until the furnace or other means extracted it from its fixture.
-
-    [297] Boulton to Henderson, 6th September, 1781.
-
-The “Priestleyan water-tub” and “mercurial tub,” here alluded to, were
-invented by Priestley in the course of his investigations, for the purpose
-of collecting and handling gases; and the pneumatic trough, with glass
-retorts and receivers, shortly became part of the furniture of every
-chemical laboratory.
-
-Josiah Wedgwood was another member of the Lunar Society who was infected
-by Dr. Priestley’s enthusiasm for chemistry; and, knowing that the
-Doctor’s income from his congregation was small, he and Boulton took
-private counsel together as to the best means of providing him with funds
-so as to place him in a position of comparative ease, and enable him
-freely to pursue his investigations. The correspondence which took place
-on the subject is creditable to all parties concerned; and the more so to
-Boulton, as he was embarrassed at the time by financial difficulties of
-the most distressing kind, as has been already explained in a preceding
-chapter. Wedgwood had undertaken to sound Dr. Priestley, and he thus
-communicated the result to Boulton:--
-
-  “The Doctor says he never did intend or think of making any
-  pecuniary advantage from any of his experiments, but gave them to
-  the public with their results, just as they happened, and so he
-  should continue to do, without ever attempting to make any private
-  emolument from them to himself.
-
-  “I mentioned this business to our good friend, Dr. Darwin, who
-  agrees with us in sentiment, that it would be a pity that Dr.
-  Priestley should have any cares or cramps to interrupt him in the
-  fine vein of experiments he is in the midst of, and is willing
-  to devote his time to the pursuit of, for the public good. The
-  Doctor will subscribe, and has thought of some friends who, he is
-  persuaded, will gladly do the same....
-
-  “You will see by the enclosed list that one cannot decently exceed
-  ten guineas unless it be under the cover of a friend’s name, which
-  method I shall take if I think it necessary to write more than
-  ten; but that is the subscription I shall begin with, and for
-  three years certain.
-
-  “Dr. Darwin will be very cautious who he mentions this affair
-  to, for reasons of delicacy which will have equal weight with us
-  all. I mentioned _your_ generous intention to Dr. P., and that we
-  thought of 20_l._ each; but that, you will perceive, cannot be,
-  and the Doctor says much less will suffice, as he can go on very
-  well with 100_l._ per annum.”[298]
-
-    [298] Wedgwood to Boulton, Etruria, 10th March, 1781.
-
-Boulton wrote Wedgwood in reply, requesting that the money subscribed
-should be collected and paid to Dr. Priestley in such a way as not to
-wound his sensitive feelings. He suggested that in order to avoid this, it
-might be better if, instead of an annual subscription, a dozen gentlemen
-were found willing to give a hundred pounds each for the purpose of buying
-an annuity, or investing the amount in stock for the Doctor’s benefit.
-
-  “I have never yet spoken to him on the subject,” he added; “I
-  wish to avoid it, and so doth my neighbour Galton. Therefore
-  I beg you will manage the affair so that we may contribute our
-  mites to so laudable a plan, without the Doctor knowing anything
-  of the matter, and favour us with a line on the subject at your
-  leisure.”[299]
-
-    [299] Boulton to Wedgwood, 30th March, 1781.
-
-In a subsequent part of the same letter he indicated the subject of
-Priestley’s experiments at the time:--
-
-  “We have long talked,” said he, “of Phlogiston without knowing
-  what we talked about; but now that Dr. Priestley hath brought the
-  matter to light, we can pour that element out of one vessel into
-  another, can take it out of one metal and put it into another,
-  can tell how much of it, by accurate measurement, is necessary
-  to reduce a calx to a metal, which is easily done, and without
-  putting that calx into contact with any visible thing. In short,
-  this goddess of levity can be measured and weighed like other
-  matter. For the rest, I refer you to the Doctor himself.”
-
-The discussions at the Lunar Society were not, however, exclusively
-chemical, but were varied according to the visitors who from time to time
-honoured the members with their presence. Thus, in the autumn of 1782,
-the venerable Smeaton, having occasion to be in Birmingham upon canal
-business, was invited to attend a meeting of the Society held in Watt’s
-house at Harper’s Hill. Watt thus described the evening’s proceedings in
-a letter to Boulton, then in London:--
-
-  “He [Smeaton] grows old, and is rather more talkative than he was,
-  but retains in perfection his perspicuity of expression and good
-  sense. He came to the Philosophers’ Meeting at my house on Monday,
-  and we were receiving an account of his experiments on rotatives
-  and some new ones he has made, when unluckily his facts did not
-  agree with Dr. Moyes the blind philosopher’s theories, which made
-  Moyes contradict Smeaton, and brought on a dispute which lost us
-  the information we hoped for, and took away all the pleasure of
-  the meeting, as it lasted two hours without coming half an inch
-  nearer to the point.”[300]
-
-A few days later, we find De Luc paying his first visit to Watt at
-Birmingham, accompanied by Baron Reden, who desired to inspect the
-Soho works. “M. De Luc,” wrote Watt, “is a modest ingenious man. On
-Wednesday, Wilkinson, Reden, and he sent for me to ‘The Castle’ after
-dinner, and kept me to supper. On the following day De Luc came to
-breakfast, and spent the whole forenoon, insensing[301] himself with
-steam and steam-engines. He is making a book, and will mention us in it.
-Dr. Priestley came also to dinner, and we were all good company till six
-o’clock, when Wilkinson set off for Broseley, and they for London.”
-
-    [300] Watt to Boulton, 26th October, 1782.
-
-    [301] A common word in the north,--meaning literally _putting
-      sense into_ one.
-
-Meanwhile Priestley continued to pursue his investigations with
-indefatigable zeal, discovering one gas after another,[302] and
-immediately proclaiming the facts which he brought to light, so that other
-minds might be employed on them besides his own. He kept nothing secret.
-Perhaps, indeed, he was too hasty in publishing the results of experiments
-still unfinished, as it occasionally led him into contradictions which
-a more cautious method of procedure would have enabled him to avoid.
-But he was thoroughly honest, ingenuous, and single-minded in all his
-proceedings, entertaining the conviction that in the end truth would
-vindicate itself, and that all that was necessary was to inquire ardently,
-to experiment incessantly, and to publish freely.
-
-    [302] He discovered, in the course of his inquiries at different
-      periods, no fewer than nine new gases,--oxygen, nitrogen (a
-      discovery also claimed by Cavendish and Rutherford), nitric
-      oxide, nitrous oxide, sulphurous acid, muriatic acid (chlorine),
-      volatile ammonia, fluo-silicic acid, and carbonic oxide,--“a
-      tribute to science,” as is truly observed by Dr. Henry, “greatly
-      exceeding in richness and extent that of any contemporary.”
-
-One of the most interesting speculations to which Priestley’s experiments
-gave rise was the composition of water. The merit of discovering the
-true theory has been variously attributed to Watt, to Cavendish, and
-to Lavoisier; and perhaps no scientific question has been the subject
-of more protracted controversy. It had been known for some years that
-a certain mixture of inflammable and dephlogisticated air (hydrogen and
-oxygen), or common air and hydrogen, could be fired by the electric spark.
-The experiment had been made by Volta and Macquer in 1776–7; and in the
-spring of 1781 Priestley made what he called a “random experiment” of
-the same kind, to entertain some philosophical friends. He exploded a
-mixture of common air and hydrogen in a glass globe by sending an electric
-spark through it, and when the explosion had taken place it was observed
-that the sides of the glass were bedewed with moisture. Mr. Warltire,
-a lecturer on Natural Philosophy at Birmingham,[303] was present at the
-experiment, and afterwards repeated it in a copper flask for the purpose
-of trying “whether heat is heavy or not.” In the mean time, Mr. Cavendish,
-who had for some years been occupied in the special study of pneumatic
-chemistry, and satisfactorily solved the question of the true composition
-of atmospheric air, having had his attention directed to Mr. Warltire’s
-experiment, repeated it in London, in the summer of 1781, employing a
-glass vessel instead of a copper one; and again the deposit of dew was
-observed on the sides of the glass. This phenomenon, which Priestley
-had disregarded, appeared to him to be of considerable importance, and
-“likely to throw great light” upon the subject of the disappearance of
-oxygen during combustion, which he had been pursuing experimentally by
-means of his well-known eudiometer. “The liquid which resulted from the
-detonations was very carefully analysed, and proved in all the experiments
-with hydrogen and air, and in some of those with hydrogen and oxygen,
-to be pure water; but in certain of the latter it contained a sensible
-quantity of nitric acid. Till the source of this was ascertained, it would
-have been premature to conclude that hydrogen and oxygen could be turned
-into pure water.”[304] These experiments, however, were not published,
-being still regarded as inconclusive. But with the communicativeness
-which distinguishes the true man of science, Cavendish made them known to
-Priestley, and, through his friend Dr. Blagden, to Lavoisier. It was not
-until January, 1784, that he communicated the results of his long series
-of experiments on the subject to the Royal Society.
-
-    [303] We find among the Boulton MSS., a letter from Priestley,
-      dated Calne, 28th September, 1776, introducing Warltire to
-      Boulton as follows:--“As I know you will take pleasure in
-      everything in which the advancement of science is concerned, I
-      take the liberty to recommend to you Mr. Warltire, who has been
-      some time in this part of the country, and who is going to read
-      lectures on the subject of Air at Birmingham. I think him an
-      excellent philosopher, as well as a modest and agreeable man.
-      He is perfectly acquainted with his subject, and has prepared a
-      set of experiments which have given the greatest satisfaction
-      wherever he has been. He has been so obliging as to spend
-      some time with me, and has given me much assistance in my late
-      experiments, of which he can give you some account.”
-
-    [304] Wilson’s ‘Life of Cavendish,’ p. 60. In this work, the
-      claims of Cavendish are strongly advocated. The case in favour
-      of Watt is alike strongly and ably stated by Mr. Muirhead in
-      his ‘Correspondence of the late James Watt on his Discovery of
-      the Theory of the Composition of Water.’
-
-In the mean time Watt’s attention had been directed to the same subject
-by the experiments of Priestley, and he was led to the same conclusions
-as Cavendish, though altogether independent of him, and by means of a
-different class of experiments. We find him writing to Boulton, then at
-Cosgarne, as follows, in 1782:--
-
-  “You may remember that I have often said that if water could be
-  heated red hot, or something more, it would probably be converted
-  into some kind of air, because steam would in that case have
-  lost all its latent heat, and that it would have been turned
-  wholly into sensible heat, and probably a total change of the
-  nature of the fluid would ensue. Dr. Priestley has proved this by
-  experiment. He took lime and chased out all the fixed air, and
-  made it exceedingly caustic by long-continued and violent heat.
-  He then added to it two ounces of water, and as expeditiously as
-  possible subjected it again to a strong heat, and he obtained
-  two ounces’ _weight_ of air; and, what is most surprising, a
-  balloon which he interposed between the retort and receiver was
-  not sensibly moistened, nor at all heated that could be observed.
-  The air produced was but very little more than common air, and
-  contained scarce any fixed air. So here is a plain account of
-  where the atmospheric air comes from. The Doctor does me justice
-  as to the theory.”[305]
-
-    [305] Watt to Boulton, 10th December, 1782.
-
-The results of this experiment were by no means conclusive. That water
-was composed, at least in part, of air or gas of some kind was obvious;
-but what the gas was, and whether it existed in combination with other
-gases, was still a matter of conjecture. But Priestley, having proceeded
-to repeat Cavendish’s experiment[306] of exploding a mixture of oxygen
-and hydrogen in a glass vessel, which was followed by the usual deposit
-of water, communicated the fact to Watt, and this at once put him on
-the track of the true theory. In a letter to Dr. Black, he communicated
-the result of Dr. Priestley’s experiments, stating that “when quite dry
-pure inflammable air (hydrogen) and quite dry pure dephlogisticated air
-(oxygen) are fired by the electric spark in a close vessel, he finds,
-after the vessel is cold, a quantity of water adhering to the vessel
-equal, or very nearly equal, to the weight of the whole air.... Are we not
-then authorised to conclude, that water is composed of dephlogisticated
-and inflammable air or phlogiston deprived of part of their latent heat;
-and that dephlogisticated or pure air is composed of water deprived
-of its phlogiston and united to heat and light; and if light be only
-a modification of heat, or a component part of phlogiston, then pure
-air consists of water deprived of its phlogiston or latent heat?”[307]
-At the same time Watt wrote to Priestley,--who did not himself see
-the force of the experiments as establishing the true composition of
-water,--demonstrating the conclusions which they warranted, and which were
-identical with those already drawn by Cavendish.
-
-    [306] De Luc, Watt’s “ami zélé,” as he described himself,
-      confirms the fact of Cavendish having, in 1782, communicated
-      to Priestley the nature of his experiments as well as
-      his theory of the composition of water, in the following
-      passage:--“Vers la fin de l’année 1782, j’allai à Birmingham,
-      où le Dr. Priestley s’étoit établi depuis quelques années. Il
-      me communiqua alors que M. Cavendish, d’après une rémarque de
-      M. Warltire, qui avoit toujours trouvé de l’eau dans les vases
-      où il avoit brúlé un mélange de _l’air inflammable_ et _d’air
-      atmosphérique_, s’étoit appliqué à découvrir la source de cette
-      eau, et qu’il avoit trouvé qu’un mélange _d’air inflammable_
-      et _d’air déphlogistique_ en proportion convenable, étant
-      allumé par l’étincelle électrique, se convertissoit _tout
-      entier en eau_.--Je fus frappé au plus haut degré de cette
-      découverte.”--‘Idées sur la Météorologie,’ tome 2, 1787, pp.
-      206–7.
-
-    [307] Watt to Black, 21st April, 1783.
-
-Whether Priestley had communicated to Watt the theory of Cavendish does
-not appear; but it is probable that both arrived at the same conclusions
-independently of each other; Cavendish from the result of his own
-experiments, and Watt from those of Priestley. Each was quite competent
-to have made the discovery; nor is it necessary for the fame of either
-to strip a leaf of laurel from the brow of the other. Moreover, we are as
-unwilling to believe that Cavendish would have knowingly appropriated to
-himself the idea of Watt, as that Watt would have knowingly appropriated
-the idea of Cavendish. As it was, however, Cavendish and Watt both claimed
-priority in the discovery; the advocates of Watt’s claim resting their
-case mainly on the fact of his having first stated his views on the
-subject in writing, in a letter which he wrote to Dr. Priestley for the
-purpose of being read to the Royal Society in April, 1783. Before that
-letter was read, Watt asked that it should be withheld until the results
-of some new experiments of Dr. Priestley could be ascertained. These
-proving delusive, Watt sent a revised edition of the letter to his friend
-De Luc, in November, but the reading of it was delayed until the 29th
-April, 1784, before which time, on the 15th January, Cavendish’s paper
-on the same subject had been communicated to the Society. Watt was much
-annoyed at the circumstance, and alleged that Cavendish had been guilty of
-“plagiarism.”[308] At a late period of his life, when all bitter feelings
-on the subject had subsided, Watt declared himself indifferent to the
-subject of controversy: “After all,” said he, “it matters little whether
-Cavendish or I discovered the composition of water; the great thing is,
-that it _is_ discovered.”
-
-    [308] That Watt felt keenly on the subject, is obvious from
-      his letter to Mr. Fry of Bristol (15th May, 1784), wherein he
-      says,--“I have had the honour, like other great men, to have
-      had my ideas pirated. Soon after I wrote my first paper on the
-      subject, Dr. Blagden explained my theory to M. Lavoisier at
-      Paris; and soon after that, M. Lavoisier invented it himself,
-      and read a paper on the subject to the Royal Academy of
-      Sciences. Since that, Mr. Cavendish has read a paper to the
-      Royal Society on the same idea, without making the least mention
-      of me. The one is a French financier; and the other a member of
-      the illustrious house of Cavendish, worth above 100,000_l._, and
-      does not spend 1000_l._ a year. Rich men may do mean actions.
-      May you and I always persevere in our integrity, and despise
-      such doings.”
-
-Pneumatic chemistry continued to form the principal subject of discussion
-at the Lunar Society, as we find from numerous references in Boulton
-and Watt’s letters. “The Lunar Society,” wrote Watt to his partner,
-“was held yesterday at Mr. Galton’s at Barr. It was rather dull, there
-having been no philosophical news lately except Mr. Kirwan’s discovery
-of an air from phosphorus, which takes fire of itself on being mixed
-with common or dephlogisticated air.”[309] Among Watt’s numerous
-scientific correspondents was M. Berthollet, the eminent French chemist,
-who communicated to him the process he had discovered of bleaching by
-chlorine. Watt proceeded to test the value of the discovery by experiment,
-after which he recommended his father-in-law, Mr. Macgregor, of Glasgow,
-to make trial of it on a larger scale. This, however, was postponed until
-Watt himself could find time to superintend it in person. At the end
-of 1787, we find him on a visit to Glasgow for the purpose, and writing
-Boulton that he is making ready for the trial. “I mean,” he writes, “to
-try it to-morrow, though I am somewhat afraid to attack so fierce and
-strong a beast. There is almost no bearing the fumes of it. After all,
-it does not appear that it will prove a _cheap_ way of bleaching, and it
-weakens the goods more than could be wished, whatever good it may do in
-the way of expedition.”[310] The experiment succeeded, and we find Mr.
-Macgregor, in the following February, “engaged in whitening 1500 yards
-of linen by the process.” The discovery, not being protected by a patent,
-was immediately made use of by other firms; but the offensive odour of the
-chlorine was found exceedingly objectionable, until it was discovered that
-chlorine could be absorbed by slaked lime, the solution of which possessed
-great bleaching power, and this process in course of time superseded all
-the old methods of bleaching by chlorine.
-
-    [309] Watt to Boulton, 20th September, 1785.
-
-    [310] Watt to Boulton, 30th December, 1787. Boulton MSS.
-
-It has been recently surmised that the action of light upon nitrate of
-silver formed the subject of discussion at the Lunar Society, and of
-experiments by Boulton and Watt; but we find no indications of this
-in their correspondence. They were so unreserved with each other on
-all matters of business as well as science that, had any phenomena
-of so remarkable a character as those which have issued in the art of
-photography become known to either Boulton or Watt, we feel confident that
-they must have formed the subject of much personal discussion, and of many
-written communications. But both correspondents are alike entirely silent
-on the subject; and we infer that no such experiments were made by them,
-or, if made, that they led to no results![311]
-
-    [311] Mr. W. P. Smith, of the Patent Museum, raised this question
-      at a meeting of the Photographic Society held on the 3rd
-      November, 1863. Certain photographic pictures on metal plates
-      were found in Mr. Boulton’s library at Soho, which, it was
-      supposed, had not been opened for about fifty years: and it was
-      accordingly inferred that these photographs had been the work
-      of Mr. Boulton, or some member of the Lunar Society, about the
-      year 1791. One of them was supposed to be a view of Soho House
-      “before the alterations, which were made previous to 1791.”
-      But the evidence is very defective, as has been clearly shown
-      by M. P. W. Boulton, Esq., the grandson of Mr. Boulton, in his
-      ‘Remarks concerning certain Photographs supposed to be of early
-      Date’ (Bradbury and Evans, 1864). Instead of having been closed
-      for fifty years, the room in which the pictures were found,
-      was in constant use, and the books were freely accessible. It
-      is also very doubtful whether the house represented in one of
-      the pictures is old Soho House; the strong probability being
-      that it is not, but a house still standing at Winson Green.
-      The explanation given by Mr. M. P. W. Boulton seems to be the
-      true one--that the room in question having been used by a Miss
-      Wilkinson, an experimenter in photography after its invention
-      by Niepce, these photographs were merely the results of her
-      first amateur experiments in the art. The late Mr. Murdock,
-      son of William Murdock of Soho, who lived in the immediate
-      neighbourhood, was also a very good photographist, and was
-      accustomed to meet Miss Wilkinson to make experiments in the
-      new art.
-
-    There can be no doubt that the Wedgwoods of Etruria, more
-      particularly Josiah’s son Thomas, as well as Humphry Davy,
-      were early engaged in experimenting on the action of light
-      upon nitrate of silver, but they wholly failed in fixing the
-      pictures. A letter, dated “January, 1799,” is quoted in the
-      ‘Photographic Journal’ for Jan. 15, 1864, as from James Watt
-      to Josiah Wedgwood (which must be an error, as Josiah died in
-      1795), in which the following words occur:--“I thank you for
-      your instructions respecting the silver pictures, about which,
-      when at home, I will make some experiments.” If such experiments
-      were really made, we have been unable to find any record of
-      them.
-
-Among the many foreigners who were attracted by this distinguished circle
-of scientific men, we find M. Faujas-Saint-Fond, who visited Birmingham
-in the course of his tour in England in 1785, while the circle was as yet
-unbroken, and Watt, Boulton, Priestley, and the rest, were in the full
-tide of business, invention, and inquiry. Saint-Fond had the pleasure of
-dining one day with Watt when Dr. Priestley was present, and describes in
-glowing terms the interest of their conversation. “Watt,” he says, “joins
-to the frankness of a Scotchman the amiability and kindness of a man of
-the world. Surrounded by charming children, well educated and full of
-talent, he enjoys in their midst the happiness of regarding them as his
-friends, while he is almost worshipped by them as the best of fathers.”
-A subsequent visit which he paid to Dr. Priestley in company with Dr.
-Withering, leads him to describe the philosopher’s house at Fairhill, then
-about a mile and a half from Birmingham. “It is,” he says, “a charming
-residence, with a fine meadow on one side, and a beautiful garden on the
-other. There was an air of perfect neatness about the place within and
-without.” He describes the Doctor’s laboratory, in which he conducted his
-experiments, as “situated at the extremity of a court, and detached from
-the house to avoid the danger of fire.”
-
-  “It consists of several apartments on the ground floor. On
-  entering it, I was struck with the sight of a simple and ingenious
-  apparatus for making experiments on inflammable gas extracted
-  from iron and water reduced to vapour. It consisted of a tube,
-  tolerably long and thick, made out of one piece of copper to avoid
-  soldering. The part exposed to the fire was thicker than the
-  rest. He introduced into the tube cuttings or filings of iron,
-  and instead of letting the water fall into it drop by drop, he
-  preferred introducing it as vapour. The furnace was fired by coke
-  instead of coal, this being the best of combustibles for intensity
-  and equality of heat.... Dr. Priestley kindly allowed me to make
-  a drawing of his apparatus for the purpose of communicating it to
-  the French chemists who are engaged in the same investigations as
-  himself.... The Doctor has embellished his rural retreat with a
-  philosophical cabinet, containing all the instruments necessary
-  for his scientific labours; as well as a library, containing a
-  store of the most valuable books. He employs his time in a variety
-  of studies. History, moral philosophy, and religion, occupy his
-  attention by turns. An active, intelligent mind, and a natural
-  avidity for knowledge, draw him towards the physical sciences;
-  but a soft and impressible heart again leads him to religious and
-  philanthropic inquiries.... I had indeed the greatest pleasure
-  in seeing this amiable savant in the midst of his books, his
-  furnaces, and his philosophical instruments; at his side an
-  educated wife, a lovely daughter, and in a charming residence,
-  where everything bespoke industry, peace, and happiness.”[312]
-
-    [312] ‘Voyage en Angleterre, en Ecosse, et aux Iles Hébrides.’
-      Par B. Faujas-Saint-Fond. 2 vols. Paris, 1797.
-
-Only a few years after the date of this visit, while Priestley was still
-busied with his chemical investigations, his house at Fairhill, thus
-described by Saint-Fond, was invaded by a brutal mob, who ruthlessly
-destroyed his library, his apparatus, and his furniture, and forced him
-to fly from Birmingham, glad to escape with his life.
-
-The Lunar Society continued to exist for some years longer. But one by
-one the members dropped off. Dr. Priestley emigrated to America; Dr.
-Withering, Josiah Wedgwood, and Dr. Darwin, died before the close of the
-century; and, without them, a meeting of the Lunar Society was no longer
-what it used to be. Instead of an assembly of active, inquiring men, it
-was more like a meeting of spectres with a Death’s head in the chair.
-The associations connected with the meeting--reminding the few lingering
-survivors of the losses of friends--became of too painful a character to
-be kept alive; and the Lunar Society, like the members of which it was
-composed, gradually expired. Its spirit, however, did not die. The Society
-had stimulated inquiry, and quickened the zeal for knowledge of all who
-had come within the reach of its influence; and this spirit diffused
-and propagated itself in all directions. Leonard Horner, who visited
-Soho in 1809, thus referred to the continued moral influence of the
-association:--“The remnant of the Lunar Society,” he says, “and the fresh
-remembrance in others of the remarkable men who composed it, are very
-interesting. The impression which they made is not yet worn out, but shows
-itself, to the second and third generation, in a spirit of scientific
-curiosity and free inquiry, which even yet makes some stand against the
-combined forces of Methodism, Toryism, and the love of gain.”[313]
-
-    [313] Horner’s ‘Memoirs and Correspondence,’ ii. 2.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XIX.
-
-BOULTON’S APPLICATION OF THE STEAM-ENGINE TO COINING.
-
-
-The manufacture of counterfeit money was very common at Birmingham about
-the middle of last century,--so common, indeed, that it had become an
-almost recognised branch of trade. The machinery which was capable of
-making a button with a device and letters stamped upon one side of a piece
-of metal, was capable, with a few modifications, of making a coin with a
-device and letters stamped upon both sides. It was as easy to counterfeit
-one kind of coin as another--gold and silver, as well as copper; the
-former only requiring a little extra skill in manipulation, to which the
-button-makers were found fully equal.
-
-The profits of this illegal trade were of course very large; and so long
-as the coiners could find a vend for their productions, they went on
-producing. But at length the public, smarting from many losses, acquired
-sufficient experience to detect the spurious issues of the Birmingham
-mints; and when an unusually bright shilling or guinea was offered, they
-had little difficulty in pronouncing upon its “Brummagem”[314] origin.
-But though profitable, the prosecution of this branch of business was
-by no means unattended with risks. While some who pursued it on a large
-scale contrived to elevate themselves among the moneyed class, others,
-less fortunate, secured an elevation of a very different kind,--one of
-the grimmest sights of those days being the skeletons of convicted coiners
-dangling from gibbets on Handsworth Heath.[315]
-
-    [314] The word “Brummagem” doubtless originated in the numerous
-      issues of counterfeit money from the Birmingham mints.
-
-    [315] The punishment for this crime was sometimes of a very brutal
-      character. In March, 1789, _a woman_, convicted of coining in
-      London, was first strangled by the stool being taken from under
-      her, and then fixed to a stake and _burnt_ before the debtor’s
-      door at Newgate!
-
-The production of counterfeit gold and silver coins came to be avoided
-as too dangerous; but the production of counterfeit copper money
-continued active at Birmingham down to the middle of last century,
-when numerous illegal mints were found in active operation. A Royal
-proclamation was issued on the 12th July, 1751, warning the coiners
-against the consequences of their illegal proceedings; and shortly after,
-the Solicitor for the Mint went down to Birmingham, and had many of
-the more noted offenders tried, convicted, and sentenced to two years’
-imprisonment. The principal manufacturers and traders of the town met and
-passed strong resolutions, condemning the practice of illegal coining;
-but the evil still continued; and in 1753 it was estimated that not less
-than half the copper coin in circulation was counterfeit. This disgraceful
-state of the coinage suggested, and partly justified, companies, firms,
-and local bodies, in circulating copper coinages of their own. These were
-followed by provincial pence and halfpence, which were, in their turn,
-counterfeited by pieces of baser metal. Most of the new copper coins of
-all sorts, good and bad, were executed at Birmingham; and thus coining
-shortly became one of the leading branches of business there.
-
-Boulton, as the owner of the largest and best-equipped manufactory in the
-neighbourhood, might have done any amount of coining that he desired; but
-the disreputable character of the business deterred him from entering
-upon it, and he refused all orders for counterfeit money, whether for
-home or abroad.[316] He took an active part in the measures adopted by the
-leading manufacturers to prevent illegal coining; and the interest which
-he felt in commercial questions generally continued to keep his attention
-directed to the subject. One of the greatest evils of debased coinage,
-in his opinion, consisted in the serious losses that it occasioned to the
-labouring people; many of the lower classes of traders and manufacturers
-buying counterfeit money from the coiners at half its current value, and
-paying it in wages at full value, thereby wronging and defrauding the
-workmen of their hire. He came to the conclusion that the public interest
-imperatively required that the whole of the so-called copper coinage
-in circulation should be swept away and superseded by the issue of new
-coins, the intrinsic value and superior workmanship of which should be so
-palpable as effectually to suppress counterfeiting and its numerous evils.
-He had many interviews with the ministers of state on the subject; and we
-find him alleging in one of his letters to a friend that “his principal
-reason for turning coiner was to gratify Mr. Pitt in his wishes to put an
-end to the counterfeiting of money.”[317]
-
-    [316] “I lately received a letter from a Jew about making for him
-      a large quantity of base money, but I should be sorry ever to
-      become so base as to execute such orders. On the contrary I have
-      taken some measures to put a stop to the execution of them by
-      others, and if Mr. Butcher hath any plan of that sort he would
-      do well to guard against me; as I certainly shall endeavour all
-      in my power to prevent the counterfeiting of British or other
-      money--that being the principle on which I am acting.”--Boulton
-      to Matthews, December, 1787.
-
-    [317] Boulton to Woodman, 13th November, 1789.
-
-Other circumstances, doubtless, concurred in keeping his attention
-directed to the subject. Thus, he had become largely interested in the
-copper-trade of Cornwall through the shares he held in the mines as well
-as in the Copper Mining Company; and he was himself a large holder of
-copper, which he had purchased from that Company at a time when they could
-not dispose of it elsewhere. It was also one of his favourite ideas to
-apply the power of the steam-engine to the stamping of money,--an idea
-of which he has the exclusive merit. As early as 1774, Watt says Boulton
-had many conversations with him on the subject; but it was not until the
-year 1786 that he successfully applied the engine for the first time in
-executing his contract with the East India Company for above a hundred
-tons of copper coin. James Watt, in his MS. memoir of his friend Boulton,
-gives the following account of the origin of his connexion with the
-coining business:--
-
-  “When the new coinage of gold took place in 178–, Mr. Boulton
-  was employed to receive and exchange the old coin, which served
-  to revive his ideas on the subject of coinage, which he had long
-  considered to be capable of great improvement. Among other things,
-  he conceived that the coin should all be struck in collars, to
-  make it exactly round and of one size, which was by no means the
-  case with the ordinary gold pieces; and that, if thus made, and of
-  one thickness, the purity of the gold might be tested by passing
-  it through a gauge or slit in a piece of steel made exactly to
-  fit a properly made coin. He had accordingly a proof guinea made,
-  with a raised border, and the letters _en creux_, somewhat similar
-  to the penny pieces he afterwards coined for Government. This
-  completely answered his intention, as any piece of baser metal
-  which filled the gauge was found to be considerably lighter;
-  or, if made to the proper weight, then it would not go through
-  the gauge. Such money was also less liable to wear in the pocket
-  than the common coin, where all the impression was prominent. The
-  proposals on this head were not however approved by those who then
-  had the management of His Majesty’s Mint, and there the matter
-  rested for the time.
-
-  “In 1786 Mr. Boulton and I were in France, where we saw a very
-  fine crown-piece executed by Mr. P. Droz in a new manner. It was
-  coined in a collar split into six parts, which came together when
-  the dies were brought in contact with the blank, and formed the
-  edge and the inscription upon it. Mr. Droz had also made several
-  improvements in the coining-press, and pretended to others in the
-  art of multiplying the dies. As, to his mechanical abilities, Droz
-  joined that of being a good die-sinker, Mr. Boulton contracted
-  with him to come over to England at a high salary and work at
-  Soho, Mr. B. having then the prospect of an extensive copper
-  coinage for the East India Company as well as a probability of
-  one from Government. In anticipation of this contract, a number of
-  coining-presses were constructed, and a steam-engine was applied
-  to work them.
-
-  “Mr. Droz was found to be of a very troublesome disposition.
-  Several of his contrivances, being found not to answer, were
-  obliged to be better contrived or totally changed by Mr. Boulton
-  and his assistants. The split collar was found to be difficult of
-  execution, and being subject to wear very soon when in use, it
-  was consequently unfit for an extensive coinage. Other methods
-  were therefore invented and applied by Mr. Boulton, and the use
-  of Droz’s collar was entirely given up.”[318]
-
-    [318] Watt says Droz “did not know so much on the subject as
-      Boulton himself did,” and being found incompetent, a pretender,
-      and disposed to be quarrelsome and litigious, he was shortly
-      after dismissed with liberal payment.
-
-Although the machinery of the “Hôtel de Monnaie,” which Boulton erected
-at Soho, was found sufficient for the execution of his contract with
-the East India Company, its action was “violent and noisy,” and did not
-work to his satisfaction. He accordingly, with his usual determination
-to reach the highest degree of mechanical perfection, proceeded to
-remodel the whole of his coining machinery, in the course of which he
-introduced many entirely new contrivances and adaptations. In this he
-was ably assisted by William Murdock, Peter Ewart, James Lawson, and John
-Southern; but he himself was throughout the leading spirit, and took the
-principal part of the work. He originated numerous essential improvements
-in the rolling, annealing, and cleaning of the metal,--in the forging,
-multiplying, and tempering of the dies,--and in the construction of the
-milling and cutting-out machines,--which were worked out in detail by his
-assistants, after various trials, examined and tested by himself; while
-the arrangement and methodising of the system of coining--in a word, the
-organisation of the mint--was entirely his own work. “To his indefatigable
-energy and perseverance,” wrote Murdock many years later, “in pursuit of
-this, the favourite and nearly the sole object of the last twenty years
-of the active part of Mr. Boulton’s life, is, in a great measure, to
-be attributed the perfection to which the art of coining has ultimately
-attained.”[319]
-
-    [319] In a letter written by James Lawson to Matthew Robinson
-      Boulton shortly after his father’s death, he observed,--“God
-      only knows the anxiety and unremitting perseverance of your
-      father to accomplish the end; and we all aided and assisted
-      to the best of our powers, without ever considering by whose
-      contrivance anything was brought to bear. Indeed the bringing
-      of everything to bear was by your father’s perseverance, and
-      by his hints and personal attendance; for often he attended and
-      persevered in the experiments till we were all tired.”--Lawson
-      to M. R. Boulton, January 10, 1810. Boulton MSS.
-
-While thus labouring at the improvement of his presses, dies, and the
-application of the steam-engine to the process of coining, Boulton was
-actively engaged in stirring up public opinion on the subject of an
-improved copper coinage. Six presses were fitted and ready for work at
-Soho by the end of 1788;[320] but the only considerable orders which had
-as yet been executed were the copper coinage of the East India Company,
-another for the American Colonies, and a silver coinage for the Sierra
-Leone Company; so that the Soho mint, notwithstanding the capital,
-skill, and labour bestowed upon it, remained comparatively idle. Boulton
-continued to stir up the Government through his influential friends;[321]
-and he was at length called before the Privy Council and examined as to
-the best means of preventing the issue of counterfeit money. He stated
-his views to them at great length; and the members were so much impressed
-by his statements that they authorised him to prepare and submit to them
-a model penny, halfpenny, and farthing. This he at once proceeded to
-do, and forwarded them to the Privy Council, accompanied by an elaborate
-report, setting forth the superiority of the new coins over those then
-issued from the Mint; demonstrating that their adoption would effectually
-prevent counterfeiting of base copper money, and offering to guarantee
-the execution of a contract for a new coinage, at “not exceeding half the
-expense which the common copper coin hath always cost at his Majesty’s
-Mint.”[322]
-
-    [320] We find numerous letters from Boulton to Joseph Harrison
-      relative to the execution of the presses, and the manner in
-      which the various details of the work were to be carried out.
-      On the 16th of January, 1788, he wrote,--“Push forward with the
-      utmost expedition six of the cutting-out presses and one of the
-      coining presses. I have engaged to have six of each kind at work
-      by this day four months.... I shall be obliged to work after
-      the rate of 1500 tons a year. I fear I must have eight presses
-      [eight were eventually erected] in which case I must lengthen
-      the building next the Gate road. Pray push forward, and be
-      silent.” Various details as to the working of the presses and
-      the execution of the coin were given in succeeding letters.
-
-    [321] To Lord Hawkesbury he wrote (14th April, 1789),--“In the
-      course of my journeys I observe that I receive upon an average
-      two-thirds counterfeit halfpence for change at toll-gates,
-      &c.; and I believe the evil is daily increasing, as the
-      spurious money is carried into circulation by the lowest class
-      of manufacturers, who pay with it the principal part of the
-      wages of the poor people they employ. They purchase from the
-      subterraneous coiners 36 shillings’-worth of copper (in nominal
-      value) for 20 shillings, so that the profit derived from the
-      cheating is very large. The trade is carried on to so great
-      an extent that at a public meeting at Stockport in Cheshire,
-      in January last, the magistrates and inhabitants came to a
-      resolution to take no other halfpence in future than those of
-      the Anglesey Company [also an illegal coinage, though of full
-      weight and value of copper], and this resolution they have
-      published in their newspapers.”
-
-    [322] Boulton to the Lords of the Privy Council for Trade, 16th
-      December, 1787.
-
-Although the specimens submitted by Boulton to the Privy Council were
-approved and eventually adopted, the officials of the Mint were enabled,
-by mere passive resistance, to delay the adoption of the new copper
-coinage for more than ten years. With their lumbering machinery they could
-not execute one-third part of the copper coin required for the ordinary
-purposes of currency; but they could not brook the idea of inviting a
-private individual to do that which they were found unable to do with all
-the powers of the State at their back. Rather than thus publicly confess
-their incompetency, they were satisfied to execute only one-third of the
-copper coinage, leaving it to the forgers and private coiners to supply
-the rest.
-
-Boulton began to fear that the coining presses which he had erected with
-so much labour, contrivance, and expenditure of money, in anticipation
-of the expected Government contract, would remain comparatively idle
-after all. But he did not readily give up the idea of executing the new
-coinage. “Of all the mechanical subjects I ever entered upon,” he wrote
-Mr. Garbett, “there is none in which I ever engaged with so much ardour
-as that of bringing to perfection the art of coining in the reign of
-George III., as well as of checking the injurious and fatal crime of
-counterfeiting.” It occurred to him that it might be possible to overcome
-the obstructiveness of officialism by means of public opinion; and he
-proceeded with his usual vigour to rouse the trading interests throughout
-the country on the subject. He had a statement printed and extensively
-circulated among the leading merchants and manufacturers, to whom he also
-sent specimens of his model penny and halfpenny, the superiority of which
-to the rubbishy government and counterfeit coin then in circulation, was
-made apparent at a glance. He also endeavoured to act upon the Ministry
-through the influence of the King, to whom he presented copies of his
-model gold, silver, and copper coins; but though his Majesty expressed
-himself highly pleased with them, the question of their adoption still
-remained as much in suspense as ever. The appeals to the public were
-followed by numerous petitions to Parliament and memorials to the Privy
-Council against counterfeit money, and in favour of the proposed Boulton
-coinage.[323]
-
-    [323] In 1787, and again in 1789, we find the merchants, traders,
-      and others in Southwark urgently memorialising the Lords of the
-      Treasury on the subject. The Memorial addressed to them in the
-      latter year was signed by 800 of the principal inhabitants of
-      the Borough, and presented to Mr. Pitt by a deputation, headed
-      by Mr. Barclay, of Thrale’s Brewery. It set forth that the
-      counterfeits of copper coin had become a very serious burden
-      and loss, more especially to poor manufacturers, labourers, and
-      others, many of whom were compelled to take counterfeit copper
-      coin in payment of their commodities and wages; and concluded by
-      stating that, having seen specimens of a new copper coinage made
-      by Mr. Boulton of Birmingham (under order of the Lords of the
-      Privy Council) the Memorialists take leave to represent, that
-      such a coinage, from its greater weight and superior execution,
-      would in their opinion afford to themselves and the public
-      at large a certain remedy for the present grievance, and they
-      therefore strongly recommended its adoption.
-
-In the mean time, to find employment for the coining presses he had set
-up, Boulton sought for orders from foreign and colonial governments. In
-1790 and 1792 he executed a large quantity of beautiful copper coin[324]
-for the revolutionary government of France while we remained at peace
-with that country. The coin was afterwards suppressed when the government
-was overturned, to the great loss of the French contractors, who,
-nevertheless, honourably fulfilled their engagement with Mr. Boulton. In
-1791 he executed for the colony of Bermuda a penny coinage; about the same
-time he turned out a large number of provincial halfpenny tokens;[325]
-and in 1794 he supplied the Madras Presidency with its four-faluce and
-two-faluce coinage. By way of exhibiting the artistic skill of Soho, and
-its ability to turn out first-class medal work, Boulton took advantage of
-the King’s recovery in 1789, to execute a very fine medal commemorative of
-the event. He sent the first specimen to his friend M. De Luc, the Queen’s
-Librarian at Windsor, for presentation to her Majesty, who expressed
-herself much pleased with the medal. In his letter to De Luc, Boulton
-stated that he had been the more desirous of turning out a creditable
-piece of workmanship, as the art of medalling was one of the most backward
-in England, and had made the least progress of any during the reign of
-his present Majesty. In preparing this medal, he had the co-operation of
-Benjamin West, President of the Royal Academy, who rendered him valuable
-assistance in supplying the best models and portraits of the King from
-which a satisfactory likeness could be made, and he also inspected and
-corrected the engraving of the dies.
-
-    [324] The coins were: in 1790, a five-sous piece, “Pacte
-      Fédératif;” in 1792, a four sous “Hercule;” and a two sous
-      “Liberté.” Boulton’s reputation as a coiner abroad, brought
-      upon him while at Paris, a host of foreign schemers, one of
-      whom pretended that he had discovered an infallible method of
-      converting copper into gold! The schemer and his wife followed
-      Boulton to Soho, accompanied by a letter of introduction from
-      his friend Baumgarten. After taking measure of the schemer,
-      Boulton replied to Baumgarten as follows:--
-
-        “DEAR SIR,--Who the devil have you sent me? Is he
-        the angel or the demon Gabriel? Is he a seraphim or a
-        swindler? His propositions appear in such a questionable
-        form, that I know not whether to pronounce him F. or
-        R. or S., which are favourite letters amongst English
-        philosophers.
-
-        “Doth he mean to make gold by Alchemy, or after the family
-        receipt by which his mother and brother extracted two
-        hundred guineas from my simplicity when at Paris?
-
-        “I am content with the copper coinage, and shall leave
-        the golden one to you and Gabriel. The science of alchemy
-        soars so much above common sense that I never could
-        obtain so much as a peep into its lower regions. This
-        said Gabriel and his angel have, however, condescended to
-        adopt common sense so far as to take up their lodgings in
-        my cottage!
-
-        “The worst of all is, I am at this juncture extremely busy
-        and can’t bear interruption; but all that is a trifle
-        when compared with the magnitude of his project, viz.
-        converting 1500_l._ into 60,000_l._! But he says a small
-        experiment may be made in three days and three nights in
-        my laboratory. I must, however, own that I had rather be
-        in Jonah’s situation during that time.
-
-        “I wish not to offend this angelic couple, but I should
-        prefer that you had them back again, with all the favours
-        and profits intended for me. However, I cannot help
-        wishing you a better thing; for in spite of your last
-        favour I sincerely desire for you and all that are dear
-        to you, many many happy and prosperous years,
-
-        “Ever your faithful and affectionate friend,
-
-                                                      “M. BOULTON.”
-
-    [325] The following were the principal provincial halfpenny tokens
-      executed at Soho:--1789, Cronebane and Dundee; 1791, Anglesey,
-      Cornwall, Glasgow, Hornchurch, Southampton; 1793, Leeds, London,
-      Penryn, John Wilkinson’s; 1794, Inverness, Lancaster; 1795,
-      Bishops Stortford; 1800, Enniscorthy.
-
-The success of the medal commemorative of the King’s preservation was
-such as to induce Boulton to prosecute this department of business,--not
-that it was attended with profit, for some of his most costly medals were
-produced for presentation to individuals, and not for sale,--but that it
-increased the reputation of Soho, and reflected new credit upon the art
-manufacture of England.
-
-In preparing the dies for his various coins and medals, we find Boulton
-seeking and obtaining the assistance of Nollekens, Flaxman, Bacon, and
-Wilton (sculptors); Mayer (King’s miniature painter); Gossett (modeller);
-but above all, he was mostly indebted for friendly help to Benjamin West,
-who cordially entered into his views of “establishing elegant records
-of the medallic arts in the reign of George III.” Boulton also executed
-a series of medals commemorative of the great events of the French
-Revolution, for which there must have been a considerable demand, as we
-find him sending at one time not less than twenty tons of historical
-medals to Messrs. Monneron his Paris agents. Amongst these, we may
-mention his medals of the following subjects:--The Emperor of Russia;
-Assassination of the King of Sweden; Restoration of the King of Naples;
-Final Interview of the King of France; Execution of the King of France;
-Execution of the Queen of France; Serment du Roi; Lafayette; J. J.
-Rousseau; and Respublica Gallica.[326]
-
-    [326] The following medals were also struck by Mr. Boulton at
-      Soho:--Prince and Princess of Wales on their marriage; Marquis
-      Cornwallis on the peace with Tippoo; Earl Howe on his victory of
-      the First of June; Hudson’s Bay Company; Slave Trade abolished;
-      Chareville Forest; General Suwarrow on his successes in Italy;
-      the Empress Catherine of Russia; in commemoration of British
-      Victories; Union with Ireland; on the peace of 1802; Battle of
-      Trafalgar; Manchester and Salford Volunteers; Frogmore Medal;
-      Prince Regent of Portugal; and the Emperor Alexander of Russia.
-      The execution of the Trafalgar Medal furnishes a remarkable
-      illustration of Boulton’s princely munificence. It was struck
-      on the occasion of Lord Nelson’s last victory, and presented
-      by him, with the sanction of government, to every officer and
-      man engaged in the action. He gave an additional value to the
-      present by confining the medal to this purpose only.
-
-The Boulton MS. contains a brief description, in Mr. Boulton’s
-handwriting, of the Soho Mint in 1792, from which we make the following
-extract:--
-
-  “This Mint consists of eight large coining-machines, which are
-  sufficiently strong to coin the largest money in current use, or
-  even medals; and each machine is capable of being adjusted in a
-  few minutes, so as to strike any number of pieces of money from
-  fifty to one hundred and twenty per minute, in proportion to
-  their diameter and degree of relief; and each piece being struck
-  in a steel collar, the whole number are perfectly round and of
-  equal diameter. Each machine requires the attendance of one boy
-  of only twelve years of age, and he has no labour to perform. He
-  can stop his press one instant, and set it going again the next.
-  The whole of the eight presses are capable of coining, at the same
-  time, eight different sizes of money, such as English crowns,
-  6-livre pieces, 24-sous pieces, 12-sous, or the very smallest
-  money that is used in France. The number of blows at each press
-  is proportioned to the size of the pieces, say from fifty to
-  one hundred and twenty blows per minute, and if greater speed is
-  wanted, he has smaller machines that will strike 200 per minute.
-
-  “As the blows given by Mr. B.’s machinery are much more uniform
-  than what are given by the strength of men’s arms when applied
-  to the working of the common press, the dies are not so liable to
-  break, nor the spirit of the engraving to be so soon injured; yet
-  nevertheless, from the natural imperfections of steel, and other
-  unavoidable causes, some time will be lost in changing the dies
-  and other interruptions. However, it is decided by experience that
-  Mr. Boulton’s new machinery works with less friction, less wear,
-  less noise, is less liable to be out of order, and can strike
-  very much more than any apparatus ever before invented; for it is
-  capable of striking at the rate of 26,000 écus or English crowns,
-  or 50,000 of half their diameter, in one hour, and of working
-  night and day without fatigue to the boys, provided two sets of
-  them work alternately for ten hours each.”
-
-When Boulton’s eight presses were in full work, the quantity of copper
-coin they turned out was very large. They could work off with ease twelve
-hundred tons of coin annually. The quantity of copper thus consumed was so
-great that a difficulty began to be experienced in keeping up the supply.
-Instead of being glutted with the metal, as Boulton had been before
-the Mint was started, he had now considerable difficulty in obtaining
-sufficient for his purposes. He seems to have been, in some measure, the
-victim of a combination to keep him out of a supply; for when the holders
-of copper found out that his contract with the East India Company required
-him to deliver the coin within a given time, and that he must have the
-metal, they raised the prices upon him, and copper went up about 6_l._ a
-ton. On this, the Birmingham white metal button-makers lowered the wages
-of their workmen, alleging as the cause the rise in the price of copper,
-“for which they must thank Mr. Boulton.” The usual strikes followed, with
-meetings of trades delegates and street commotions. Though Boulton had
-confidence in the Birmingham workmen generally, among whom he had the
-reputation of being a good master, he feared that, in their excited state,
-malice might stir them to mischief; and he apprehended an attack upon
-his manufactory. For this he accordingly made due preparation, placing
-a strong armed guard of his own workmen upon Soho, having the fullest
-confidence in their fidelity. Writing to his friend Wilson in Cornwall,
-he said,--
-
-  ... “From the misrepresentations that have been made by the
-  delegates, this town has been greatly misguided, and I expect
-  every hour riots of a serious nature.
-
-  “Workmen are parading the streets with cockades in their hats.
-  They are assembled by beat of drum, and headed by Ignorance and
-  Envy, with their eyes turned towards Soho.
-
-  “Yet I am no competitor with the Birmingham trades. I follow no
-  business but what I have been myself the father of, and I have
-  done much more for the Birmingham manufactures than any other
-  individual. I have declined the trade of White Metal Buttons,
-  which is the article so much affected by the rise of metals, and
-  that in which the rioters are employed.
-
-  “I mix with no clubs, attend no public meetings, am of no party,
-  nor am I a zealot in religion; I do not hold any conversation with
-  any Birmingham persons; and therefore I know no grounds but what
-  may be suggested by wicked and envious hearts for supposing me to
-  be the cause of the late rise of copper.
-
-  “However, I am well guarded by justice, by law, by men, and by
-  arms.”[327]
-
-    [327] Boulton to Wilson, 26th February, 1792. Boulton MSS.
-
-The danger, however, shortly passed, and the threatened attack was not
-made.
-
-It was not until the year 1797 that Boulton was employed to execute a
-copper coinage for Britain. Ten years before, encouraged by the Lords
-of the Treasury, he had fitted up the Mint machinery at a heavy cost,
-in anticipation of this very order; and now, after executing coinages
-for many foreign governments, the order came at last. The new coins
-consisted of twopenny, penny, halfpenny, and farthing pieces. Altogether,
-about 4200 tons of these coins were issued from the Soho Mint between
-1797 and 1806. So sensible were the authorities at the Royal Mint of
-the advantages of Mr. Boulton’s improvements in coining machinery, that
-they employed him to erect the new Mint on Tower Hill, one of the most
-complete establishments of the kind until then in existence. The plans
-of the new Mint, as regarded the distribution of the buildings connected
-with the mechanical department, were arranged by him; and the coining
-machinery and steam-engines were executed at Soho under his immediate
-direction, though he was at the time labouring under the infirmities
-of age as well as suffering under the pressure of a painful disease. He
-had also the honour of supplying Royal Mints for the Russian, Spanish,
-and Danish governments; and at a later period for Mexico, Calcutta, and
-Bombay. “In short,” said Mr. Watt, in the MS. memoir from which we have
-already quoted, “had Mr. Boulton done nothing more in the world than he
-has accomplished in improving the coinage, his name would deserve to be
-immortalised; and if it be considered that this was done in the midst of
-various other important avocations, and at enormous expense,--for which,
-at the time, he could have had no certainty of an adequate return,--we
-shall be at a loss whether most to admire his ingenuity, his perseverance,
-or his munificence. He has conducted the whole more like a sovereign than
-a private manufacturer; and the love of fame has always been to him a
-greater stimulus than the love of gain. Yet it is to be hoped that, even
-in the latter point of view, the enterprise answered its purpose.”
-
-[Illustration: SITE OF THE SOHO MINT, NOW REMOVED.]
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XX.
-
-PROSPERITY OF SOHO--YOUNG BOULTON AND WATT--THE RIOTS--WILLIAM MURDOCK.
-
-
-The steam-engine had now become firmly established as a working power.
-Beginning as a water pumper for miners, it had gradually been applied
-to drive corn and cotton mills, to roll and hammer iron, to coin money,
-to work machinery, and to perform the various labour in which the power
-of men and horses, of wind and water, had before been employed. The
-numerous orders for new engines which came in at Soho kept the works
-increasingly busy. Many skilled workmen had by this time been trained into
-expertness and dexterity; and, being kept to their special departments
-of work,--fathers training their sons to work with them at the same
-benches,--a degree of accuracy and finish was reached which contributed
-to establish and maintain the prestige of the manufactory. The prosperity
-of the firm was also materially promoted by the able assistants who had
-been trained at Soho, and were in due time promoted to superintend special
-departments of the business. Among these were Murdock, Walker, Southern,
-Ewart, and Lawson, who enjoyed the fullest confidence of their chiefs,
-and repaid it with unswerving loyalty.
-
-When the concern had become thoroughly organised under these able heads
-of departments, Boulton and Watt began to breathe more freely. Their
-financial difficulties had now disappeared, and instead of laying out
-capital, they had begun to accumulate it. They had laboured hard for their
-reward and richly earned it; and after their long up-hill struggle, they
-well deserved rest and peace at last. They now began to take occasional
-journeys of recreation, with which they varied their journeys of business.
-Thus, in the autumn of 1789, we find Boulton making a tour in Derbyshire,
-during which he was overtaken at Buxton by a letter from the Lords of
-the Privy Council on coining business, giving him “marching orders for
-London;” but a party having been formed to visit the Peak Cavern, he
-decided “to obey the Ladies rather than the Lords.” Three days later,
-however, we find him in London, “writing in a full chattering coffee-house
-at Charing Cross,” and desiring his friend Mr. Barrow to pay his respects
-to the ladies whom he had so hurriedly left. While in London, he received
-a letter inviting him to pay a visit to Holland and stand godfather to his
-friend Mr. Hoofletter’s son; to which he replied, that he would be glad
-to stand godfather to the boy and have the name of Boulton associated with
-an honest race, but was sorry that he could not assist at the christening
-or at the dinner. “But pray act for me,” he added; “do everything that’s
-proper (as is the custom in the country); give the nurse five guineas
-from me, and I will repay you. My best respects to Mrs. Hoofletter, and
-my blessing on the young Christian.”
-
-Watt’s troubles and anxieties also were in course of gradual abatement.
-Though still suffering from headaches, asthma, and low spirits, he seems
-on the whole to have become more satisfied with his lot. Prosperity agreed
-with him as it does with most people. It is a condition easy to bear, and
-Watt took to it kindly. As years passed over his head, he became placid,
-contented, and even cheerful. His health improved, and he enjoyed life in
-his old age as he had never done in his youth. He ceased longing for the
-rest of the grave, and gave over “cursing his inventions.” On the other
-hand, he took pleasure in looking back over the long and difficult road
-he had traversed, and in recounting the various steps by which he had
-perfected his great inventions. Nor did he cease to invent; for he went on
-inventing new things to the close of his life; but he followed the pursuit
-as a recreation and delight, and not as a business and a drudgery.
-
-Watt too, like his partner, began to make tours of pleasure, for the
-purpose at the same time of gathering health and seeing the beauties of
-nature. In August, 1789, he wrote Boulton from Cheltenham, that he had
-been making a delightful journey through the Western Counties, by way of
-Worcester, Malvern, Hereford, and Chepstow, and that he felt in better
-health and spirits than he had been for a very long time. Occasional
-letters reached him from Birmingham about orders received for engines,
-nothing being done without first consulting him. That the concern was
-thriving, may be inferred from the comparative indifference with which
-he now regarded such orders. An engine having been ordered by a doubtful
-person, Watt wrote--“I look upon such orders as of little value. They are
-so precarious in their duration, and in this case there is risk of bad
-payment or swindling. Whatever care we take, he is like a shaved pig with
-a soaped tail.” On a demand being made upon him for abatement of dues,
-he wrote--“We have never made concessions to anybody but they have been
-attended with loss to us and half a dozen more; and it would appear that,
-if our patent lasted long enough, the power of a horse would grow to that
-of an elephant.”[328]
-
-    [328] There was a great deal of graphic vigour in Watt’s
-      correspondence about engines. Thus, in the case of an engine
-      supplied to F. Scott and Co. to drive a hammer, it appears that
-      instead of applying it to the hammer only, they applied it also
-      to blow the bellows. The consequence was, that it worked both
-      badly. They had also increased the weight of the hammer. Watt
-      wrote,--“It was easy to foresee all this; and the only adequate
-      remedy is to have another engine to blow the bellows. It is
-      impossible that a regular blast can be had while the engine
-      works the hammer and bellows, _without a regulating belly as
-      big as a church_.... They have been for _having a pocket bible
-      in large print_. If they mean to carry on their work regular,
-      they must have a blowing engine; otherwise they will lose the
-      price of one in a few months.”
-
-In the course of the following summer, Watt visited the pleasantest spots
-in the neighbourhood of London, and amongst other places took Windsor
-in his way, where he had the honour of an interview with the King. He
-had already met his Majesty at Whitbread’s brewery in the early part of
-1787, for the purpose of explaining to him the action of the new rotary
-engine; and the King had expressed the desire to see him again when in
-the neighbourhood of Windsor. The following is Watt’s brief account of
-the visit:--
-
-  “At Windsor I had a short conversation with the King. He never
-  mentioned you nor the coinage, nor anything that led to it;
-  therefore I could not bring it on; nor do I believe it could
-  have been of any service. He asked about engines, and how the
-  Albion mill was going on?--_Answer_: Very well in respect to
-  grinding, but not so well in regard to the trade. _Asked_: Who
-  was the manager?--_Answer_: Mr. J. Wyatt, who made the wooden
-  hospitals. He observed, that Wyatt was not bred to the milling
-  business; how had he learnt it?--_Answer_: That he was a man
-  of ability and observation. _Asked_: What sort of engines were
-  we making?--_Answer_: For almost everything, but at present
-  principally for brewers, distillers, cotton-spinners, iron-men,
-  &c.--_Asked_: How we were paid for them?--_Answer_: By horses
-  power, 5_l._ a year in the country, and that we made none under
-  four-horses power.--_Asked_: If these premiums afforded sufficient
-  profit?--_Answer_: That they did in large engines, but not in
-  small.”[329]
-
-    [329] Watt to Boulton, 27th June, 1790.
-
-As Boulton and Watt advanced in years they looked forward with pleasure
-to the prospect of their two eldest sons--Matthew Robinson Boulton and
-James Watt, junior--joining them in the business they had established,
-and relieving them of the greater part of their anxieties and labours
-in connexion with it. Both were young men of intelligence and character,
-carefully educated, good linguists, and well versed in practical science.
-We find many references to the education of the two young men in the
-letters of Boulton; few or none in those of Watt. The former alike
-attracted young people and was attracted by them, entering heartily into
-their pursuits; the latter was too much absorbed by study, by inventions,
-and by business, to spare time for the purpose. Besides, he was, like his
-countrymen generally, reserved and undemonstrative in all matters relating
-to the feelings and affections.
-
-Both boys were trained and educated so as to follow in their fathers’
-steps. Every pain was taken to give them the best culture, and to imbue
-them with the soundest principles. The two boys usually spent their
-holidays together at Soho; and, growing up together, they learnt to think,
-and feel, and work together.
-
-  “Jim returns to school this evening,” wrote Boulton, to Watt in
-  Cornwall; “he has behaved exceedingly well, and not a single bill
-  of indictment has been found against him. He had got it into his
-  head that he would not be an engineer, which I did not contradict,
-  but I gave him and Matt the small wooden water-wheel, which they
-  proceeded to erect below my duck-pond, and there worked a forge;
-  but not having water enough, necessity has put them upon erecting
-  a Savery’s engine, which is not yet finished, though they are
-  both exceedingly keen upon it. We have killed many poor robins
-  by pouring fixable air upon them, and had some amusement in our
-  electrical and chemical hobby-horsery, which the young ones like
-  much better than dry Latin. Jim desires me to ask you to give him
-  leave to learn French.”
-
-At the same time Boulton’s own son was making good progress under the Rev.
-Mr. Stretch, to whom Boulton wrote,--
-
-  “Baron Reden has gone to the North. On his return, he will leave
-  his son with you for a year or two, and then invites Matt to
-  return with him to Germany. Youth is the time to learn languages,
-  and the Baron’s offer is certainly a great temptation ... let him
-  [Matt] not neglect the present, but apply himself so as to become
-  well grounded in Grammar and Latin ... he is capable, but not of
-  close application, to which he must be inured, as no proficiency
-  of any kind can be acquired without it.”
-
-The Baron’s offer was not, however, accepted; but desirous that his son
-should acquire proficiency in French, Boulton took him over to Paris,
-towards the end of 1786, and placed him under a competent master. Many
-kindly letters passed between father and son during the latter’s stay at
-Paris. The young man spent rather more money than his father thought could
-do him good. He therefore asked him to keep an account of his personal
-expenses, which “must balance exactly,” and implored him above all things
-to “keep out of bad company.”
-
-  “The future reputation and happiness of your life,” wrote
-  the anxious father, “depend upon your present conduct. I must
-  therefore insist that you do not go strolling about Sodom and
-  Gomorrah under any pretence whatever.... It will not be pleasant
-  to you to read this, but I must do my duty to you or I shall not
-  satisfy my own conscience. I therefore hope you will do your duty
-  to yourself, or you cannot do it to me. There is nothing on earth
-  I so much wish for as to make you _a man_, a good man, a useful
-  man, and consequently a happy man.”[330]
-
-The father’s anxieties abated with time; the son applied himself
-assiduously to French and German, and gave promise of becoming a man of
-ability and character. Writing to his friend Matthews, Boulton said--“Matt
-is a tolerable good chemist.... He hath behaved very well, and I shall be
-glad when the time arrives for him to assist me in the business.” In the
-summer of 1788, young Boulton paid his father a holiday visit at Soho,
-returning again to Paris to finish his studies. Writing of his departure,
-to Matthews in London, the father said--“I hope that my son is set off
-for Dover: my heart overflows with blessings and love to him.”[331]
-
-    [330] Boulton to his son, 19th December, 1787.
-
-    [331] Boulton to Matthews, 25th August, 1788. In a letter dated
-      the preceding day, he wrote--“I have been exceedingly harassed
-      last week, have many letters before me unanswered. I cannot
-      sleep at nights, and the room I write in is so hot by the
-      fire-engine chimney as to relax me, and my head is distracted by
-      the noise of the engine, by the making and riveting of boilers,
-      and by a constant knocking at my door by somebody or other;
-      but I believe and suspect that the separation of my son from me
-      contributes more to the oppression of my spirits than anything
-      else.”
-
-The education of young Watt was equally well cared for. After leaving
-school at Birmingham, his father sent him for a year to Mr. Wilkinson’s
-ironworks at Bersham, to learn carpentry in the pattern shop.[332] He
-then returned to his father’s, from whence he was sent to school at
-Geneva, where he remained for three years perfecting himself in the modern
-languages. On his return to England in 1788, we find Boulton writing
-to Mr. Barrow of Manchester, asking him to obtain a position for young
-Watt in some respectable counting-house, with a view to his acquiring
-a thorough commercial training. He was eventually placed in the house
-of Messrs. Taylor and Maxwell, where he remained for about two years,
-improving himself in his knowledge of business affairs. His father’s
-reputation and standing, as well as his own education and accomplishments,
-served to introduce the young gentleman to many friends in Manchester;
-and, although far from extravagant in his habits, he shortly found that
-the annual sum allowed him by his father was insufficient to pay for his
-board, clothing, and lodging, and at the same time enable him to keep
-clear of debt. Knowing Boulton’s always open hand and heart, and his
-sympathy for young people, the embarrassed youth at once applied to him
-for help. Why he did not apply to his father will be best understood from
-his own letter:--
-
-    [332] “I have sent my son to Mr. Wilkinson’s ironworks at Bersham,
-      in Wales, where he is to study practical book-keeping, geometry,
-      and algebra, at his leisure hours; and three hours in the day
-      he works in a carpenter’s shop. I intend he should stay there a
-      year; what I shall do with him next I know not, but I intend to
-      fit him for some employment not so precarious as my own.”--Watt
-      to Mrs. Campbell, 30th May, 1784.
-
-  “I am at this moment,” he explained, “on the best footing possible
-  with my father, but were I to inform him of my necessities, I
-  do not know what would be the consequence. Not that I suppose
-  the money in itself would be an object to him, but because he
-  would look upon it in the light of encouraging what he would call
-  my extravagances. Never having been a young man himself, he is
-  unacquainted with the inevitable expenses which attend my time
-  of life, when one is obliged to keep good company, and does not
-  wish to act totally different from other young men. My father’s
-  reputation, and his and my own station in life, require that I
-  should live at least on a decent footing. I am not conscious of
-  having committed any foolish extravagances, and I have avoided
-  company as much as possible; but I have also constantly avoided
-  the reputation of avarice, or of acting meanly on any occasion.
-  My father, unfortunately for me, measures the present times and
-  circumstances by those when he was of my age, without making the
-  proper allowances for their immense disparity; consequently it is
-  in vain for me to endeavour to convince him of the necessity of
-  my conduct.”[333]
-
-    [333] Watt, jun., to Boulton, 4th December, 1789.
-
-He concluded by expressing his sense of Mr. Boulton’s many friendly acts
-towards him, and confessing that there was no other person on whom he
-could so confidently rely for help in his emergency. The reply of Boulton
-was all that he could desire. With sound fatherly advice,[334] such as he
-would have given to his own son under similar circumstances, he sent him
-a draft for 50_l._, the amount required by young Watt to clear him of his
-debts.
-
-    [334] Mr. Boulton having been absent at Bath, some time elapsed
-      before young Watt’s letter reached him. Receiving no reply, the
-      youth became apprehensive that his letter had fallen into his
-      father’s hands, and wrote a second letter expressing his fears.
-      Thus Boulton replied to both letters at the same time, informing
-      his correspondent for his satisfaction that they had reached
-      him “unopened.” He proceeded--
-
-        “I now send agreeably to your request, my draft for
-        50_l._--payable to myself, that I might thereby conceal
-        your name from all persons; and you may tranquillise
-        yourself in respect to your father, as I promise you he
-        shall not know aught of the transaction.
-
-        “Although I would not willingly give you pain, yet I must
-        honestly tell you that I am not very sorry you experienced
-        some pain and anxiety by my delay; that you may not only
-        feel how uncomfortable it is to be in debt, but that you
-        may experience ere long how pleasant and how cheerful
-        is independence, which no man can possess who is in that
-        condition.
-
-        “It is possible your father’s ideas may be too limited in
-        regard to the _quantum_ necessary for your expenses; but
-        I think it equally probable that yours may be too diffuse,
-        and therefore can’t help wishing it in my power to expand
-        the one and contract the other.
-
-        “I know and speak from experience, that the principal
-        articles of expenditure in the generality of young men
-        who live in large towns are such as produce the least
-        additions to their happiness or reputation; for which as
-        well as for some others I know of, I cannot help urging
-        you to _cut your coat according to your cloth_, as the
-        sure means of preserving the good opinion of your father,
-        and as the most likely to induce him to open his hand more
-        liberally to you.
-
-        “It’s a subject I can’t speak to him upon without raising
-        his suspicions, but you may state to him such arguments
-        as may seem meet to yourself in favour of a further
-        allowance, and if he speaks to me upon the subject, I will
-        do the best I can for you.
-
-        “I wish you to keep in view that all our great Cornish
-        profits have died away till now they are very small,--that
-        your father is building an expensive house,--and that he
-        is married. For these and other reasons, I wish you to
-        alter the scale of your expenses, as the surest means
-        of securing your credit and your happiness, which I am
-        desirous of promoting or I should not have expressed
-        myself so freely and so unreservedly....
-
-                                              “I remain, dear Watt,
-                            “Your faithful and affectionate friend,
-                                                 “MATTHEW BOULTON.”
-
-        --Boulton to Watt, junr., 26th December, 1789. Boulton
-        MSS.
-
-Among the friendships which he formed at Manchester, was one of an
-intimate character with Mr. Cooper, a gentleman engaged in an extensive
-business, fond of books, and a good practical chemist. We find young
-Watt requesting Boulton to recommend to Mr. Cooper “a person to keep
-his library in order and to make experiments for him, he not having time
-enough to attend to the details of them himself.”[335] Cooper was besides
-a keen politician, and took an active interest in the discussion of the
-important questions then agitating the public mind. Watt was inflamed by
-the enthusiasm of his friend, and with the ardour of youth entered warmly
-into his views as to the regeneration of man and the reconstruction of
-society.
-
-    [335] Watt, junr. to Boulton, 26th March, 1789.
-
-Mrs. Schimmelpenninck has, in her autobiography, given a vivid picture
-of the interest excited in the circle of friends amongst whom she moved,
-by the thrilling events then occurring in France, and which extended
-even to the comparatively passionless philosophers of the Lunar Society.
-At one of the meetings held at her father’s house in the summer of 1788
-“Mr. Boulton,” she says, “presented to the company his son, just returned
-from a long sojourn at Paris. I well remember my astonishment at his
-full dress in the highest adornment of Parisian fashion; but I noticed,
-as a remarkable thing, that the company (which consisted of some of the
-first men in Europe) all with one accord gathered round him, and asked
-innumerable questions, the drift of which I did not fully understand.
-It was wonderful to me to see Dr. Priestley, Dr. Withering, Mr. Watt,
-Mr. Boulton himself, and Mr. Keir, manifest the most intense interest,
-each according to his prevailing characteristics, as they almost hung
-upon his words; and it was impossible to mistake the indications of deep
-anxiety, hope, fear, curiosity, ardent zeal, or thoughtful gravity, which
-alternately marked their countenances, as well as those of my own parents.
-My ears caught the words ‘Marie Antoinette,’ ‘The Cardinal de Rohan,’
-‘diamond necklace,’ ‘famine,’ ‘discontent among the people,’ ‘sullen
-silence instead of shouts of “Vive le Roi!”’ All present seemed to give
-a fearful attention. Why, I did not then well know, and, in a day or two,
-these things were almost forgotten by me; but the rest of the party heard,
-no doubt, in this young man’s narrative, the distant, though as yet faint
-rising of the storm which, a year later, was to burst upon France and,
-in its course, to desolate Europe.”[336] A few short months passed, and
-the reign of brotherhood began. “One evening, towards the end of July,”
-continues Mrs. Schimmelpenninck, “we saw at a distance a vehicle (usually
-employed to carry servants to town or church) returning at more than its
-usual speed. After some minutes the door of the drawing-room opened, and
-in burst Harry Priestley, a youth of sixteen or seventeen, waving his hat,
-and crying out, ‘Hurrah! Liberty, Reason, brotherly love for ever! Down
-with kingcraft and priestcraft. The majesty of the people for ever! France
-is free, the Bastille is taken!’”[337] “I have seen,” she adds, “the
-reception of the victory of Waterloo and of the carrying of the Reform
-Bill; but I never saw joy comparable in its intensity and universality to
-that occasioned by the early promise of the French Revolution.”
-
-    [336] ‘Life of Mary Ann Schimmelpenninck,’ 3rd ed., 1859, pp.
-      125–6.
-
-    [337] Ibid., p. 181.
-
-The impressionable mind of Dr. Priestley was moved in an extraordinary
-degree by the pregnant events which followed each other in quick
-succession at Paris; and he entered with zeal into the advocacy of the
-doctrines of liberty, equality, and fraternity, so vehemently promulgated
-by the French “friends of man.” His chemical pursuits were for a time
-forgotten, and he wrote and preached like one possessed, of human
-brotherhood, and of the downfall of tyranny and priestcraft. He hailed
-with delight the successive acts of the National Assembly abolishing
-monarchy, nobility, church, corporations, and other long established
-institutions. He had already been long and hotly engaged in polemical
-discussions with the local clergy on disputed points of faith; and now he
-addressed a larger audience in a work which he published in answer to Mr.
-Burke’s famous attack on the ‘French Revolution.’ Burke, in consequence,
-attacked him in the House of Commons; while the French Revolutionists on
-the other hand hailed him as a brother, and admitted him to the rights of
-French citizenship.[338]
-
-    [338] “The address of the Société des Amis de la Constitution
-      de Bourdeaux” to the Revolutionary Society in London, dated
-      the 21st May, 1791, contains the following passage:--“Le jour
-      consacré à porter le deuil de M. Price [the Rev. Dr. Price
-      recently dead,--an ardent admirer of the French Revolution in
-      its early stages], nous avons entendu la lecture du Discours de
-      M. l’Evêque d’Autun sur la Liberté des Cultes: on nous a fait
-      ensuite le rapport des ouvrages de MM. Priestley et Payne qui
-      ont vengé M. Price des ouvrages de M. Burke; et c’est ainsi
-      que nous avons fait son oraison funèbre. Peut-être, Messieurs,
-      apprendrez vous avec quelque intérêt, que nous avons inscrit
-      dans la liste de nos Membres les noms de MM. Payne et Priestley;
-      c’est l’hommage de notre estime, et l’estime d’hommes libres a
-      toujours son prix.”
-
-[Illustration: BURNING OF DR. PRIESTLEY’S HOUSE AT FAIRHILL.[339]]
-
-These proceedings concentrated on Dr. Priestley an amount of local
-exasperation that shortly after burst forth in open outrage. On the
-14th of July, 1791, a public dinner was held at the principal hotel to
-celebrate the second anniversary of the French Revolution. About eighty
-gentlemen were present, but Priestley was not of the number. A mob
-collected outside, and after shouting “Church and King,” they proceeded to
-demolish the inn windows. The magistrates shut their eyes to the riotous
-proceedings, if they did not actually connive at them. A cry was raised,
-“To the New Meeting-house,” the chapel in which Priestley ministered; and
-thither the mob surged. The door was at once burst open, and the place set
-on fire. They next gutted the old Meeting-house, and made a bonfire of the
-pews and bibles in the burying-ground. It was growing dusk, but the fury
-of the mob had not abated. They made at once for Dr. Priestley’s house
-at Fairhill, about a mile and a half distant. The Doctor and his family
-had escaped about half an hour before their arrival; and the house was
-at their mercy. They broke in at once, emptied the cellars, smashed the
-furniture, tore up the books in the library, destroyed the philosophical
-and chemical apparatus in the laboratory, and ended by setting fire to
-the house. The roads for miles round were afterwards found strewed with
-shreds of the valuable manuscripts in which were recorded the results of
-twenty years labour and study,--a loss which Priestley continued bitterly
-to lament until the close of his life.
-
-    [339] The representation given above of Dr. Priestley’s house is
-      taken from a rare book, entitled ‘Views of the Ruins of the
-      principal Houses destroyed during the Riots at Birmingham,
-      1791.’ London, 1792.
-
-Thus an utter wreck was made of the philosopher’s dwelling at Fairhill.
-The damage done was estimated at upwards of 4000_l._, of which the
-victim recovered little more than one-half from the county. The next
-day, and the next, and the next, the mob continued to run riot, burning
-and destroying. On the second day, about noon, they marched to Easyhill
-and attacked and demolished the mansion of Mr. Ryland, one of the most
-munificent benefactors of the town. Bordesley Hall, the mansion of Mr.
-Taylor, the banker, was next sacked and fired. The shop of the estimable
-William Hutton, the well-known bookseller and author, was next broken
-open and stripped of everything that could be carried away; and from his
-shop in the town they proceeded to his dwelling-house at Bennett’s Hill
-in the country, and burnt it to the ground.[340] On the third day, six
-other houses were sacked and destroyed; three of them were blazing at the
-same time. On the fourth day, which was a Sunday, the rioters dispersed in
-bands over the neighbourhood, levying contributions in money and drink;
-one body of them burning on their way the Dissenting chapel-house and
-minister’s dwelling-house at Kingswood, seven miles off. Other Dissenters,
-of various persuasions, farmers, shopkeepers, and others, had their houses
-broken into and robbed in open day. It was not until the Sunday evening
-that three troops of the Fifteenth Light Dragoons entered Birmingham
-amidst the acclamations of the inhabitants, who welcomed them as
-deliverers. At the instant of their arrival, the mob had broken into Dr.
-Withering’s house at Edgbaston Hall, and were rioting in his wine-cellars,
-but when they heard that “the soldiers” had come at last, they slunk away
-in various directions.
-
-    [340] “At midnight,” says Hutton, “I could see from my house the
-      flames of Bordesley Hall rise with dreadful aspect. I learned
-      that after I quitted Birmingham the mob attacked my house
-      there three times. My son bought them off repeatedly; but in
-      the fourth, which began about nine at night, they laboured
-      till eight the next morning, when they had so completely
-      ravaged my dwelling that I write this narrative in a house
-      without furniture, without roof, door, chimneypiece, window,
-      or window-frame.”--‘The Life of William Hutton,’ written by
-      himself. London, 1816.
-
-The members of the Lunar Society, or “the Lunatics,” as they were
-popularly called, were especially marked for attack during the riots. A
-common cry among the mob was “No philosophers--Church and King for ever!”
-and some persons, to escape their fury, even painted “No philosophers”
-on the fronts of their houses! There could be no doubt as to the meaning
-of this handwriting on the wall. Priestley’s house had been sacked, and
-Withering’s plundered. Boulton and Watt were not without apprehensions
-that an attack would be made upon them, as the head and front of the
-“Philosophers” of Birmingham. They accordingly prepared for the worst;
-called their workmen together, pointed out to them the criminality of the
-rioters’ proceedings, and placed arms in their hands on their promising
-to do their utmost to defend the premises if attacked. In the mean time
-everything portable was packed up and ready to be removed at a moment’s
-notice. Thus four days of terror passed, but the mob came not; Watt
-attributing the safety of Soho to the fact that most of the Dissenters
-lived in another direction.[341]
-
-    [341] “Though our principles, which are well known, as friends to
-      the established government and enemies of republican principles,
-      should have been our protection from a mob whose watchword was
-      Church and King, yet our safety was principally owing to most
-      of the Dissenters living south of the town; for after the first
-      moments they did not seem over nice in their discrimination
-      of religion and principles. I, among others, was pointed out
-      as a Presbyterian, though I never was in a meeting-house in
-      Birmingham, and Mr. Boulton is well known as a Churchman. We had
-      everything most portable packed up, fearing the worst. However,
-      all is well with us.”--Watt to De Luc, 19th July, 1791.
-
-Many of the rioters were subsequently apprehended, and several of
-them were hanged; but the damage inflicted on those whose houses had
-been sacked was irreparable, and could not be compensated. As for Dr.
-Priestley, he shook the dust of Birmingham from his feet, and fled to
-London; from thence emigrating to America, where he died in 1804.
-
-While such was the blind fury of the populace of Birmingham, the
-principles of the French Revolution found adherents in all parts of
-England. Clubs were formed in London and the principal provincial
-towns, and a brisk correspondence was carried on between them and the
-Revolutionary leaders of France. Among those invested with the rights
-of French citizenship were Dr. Priestley, Mr. Wilberforce, Thomas Tooke,
-and Mr. (afterwards Sir) James Mackintosh. Thomas Paine and Dr. Priestley
-were chosen members of the National Convention; and though the former took
-his seat for Calais, the latter declined, on the ground of his inability
-to speak the language sufficiently. Among those carried away by the
-political epidemic of the time, were young James Watt and his friend Mr.
-Cooper of Manchester. In 1792 they were deputed, by the “Constitutional
-Society” of that town, to proceed to Paris and present an address of
-congratulation to the Jacobin Club, then known as the “Société des Amis
-de la Constitution.”[342] While at Paris, young Watt seems to have taken
-an active part in the fiery agitation of the time. He was on intimate
-terms with the Jacobin leaders. Southey says that he was even the means
-of preventing a duel between Danton and Robespierre, to the former of whom
-he acted as second.[343] Robespierre afterwards took occasion to denounce
-both Cooper and Watt as secret emissaries of Pitt, on which young Watt
-sprang into the tribune, pushing Robespierre aside, and defended himself
-in a strain of vehement eloquence, which completely carried the assembly
-with him. From that moment, however, he felt his life to be unsafe, and
-he fled from Paris without a passport, never resting until he had passed
-the frontier and found refuge in Italy.
-
-    [342] The ‘Discours’ delivered by the MM. Cooper and Watt (1792)
-      may be seen at the British Museum.
-
-    [343] ‘Life of Southey,’ vi. 209.
-
-The public part he had taken in French Revolutionary politics could
-not fail to direct attention to him on this side of the channel. His
-appearance at a public procession, in which he carried the British
-colours, to celebrate the delivery of some soldiers released from
-the galleys, was vehemently denounced by Mr. Burke in the House of
-Commons. The notoriety which he had thus achieved, gave his father great
-anxiety; and after young James’s return to England in 1794, he was under
-considerable apprehensions for his safety. Several members of the London
-political Societies had been apprehended and lodged in the Tower, and Watt
-feared lest his son might in some way be compromised by his correspondence
-with those societies. Boulton, then in London, informed him of the severe
-measures of the Government, and of the intended suspension of the Habeas
-Corpus Act; to which Watt replied,--
-
-  “I thank you for your intelligence, which I have communicated
-  with due caution to Mr. S. and my son. The former says he has
-  had no correspondence whatever with any of these societies, nor
-  has frequented any here,--that he may have uttered unguarded or
-  foolish words in private companies, but that he knows nothing of,
-  nor is he concerned in, any plot or political scheme whatsoever.
-  The latter says he never corresponded with any of them at any
-  time, though he once executed a commission for one of them, and
-  sent his answer to Mr. Tr.,--that for these two years he has had
-  no sort of connexion with any of them, and for more than a year
-  all his correspondence has been recommending his friends not
-  to intermeddle with public affairs. As he proposes to see you
-  to-morrow, he will explain himself, and I need not bid you council
-  him for the best.”[344]
-
-A few days later, his apprehensions of danger to his son not being
-removed, he wrote Boulton again as follows:--
-
-  “I am made very uneasy on account of James by this Bastille
-  Act[345] now (I fancy) passed, and which I cannot help thinking
-  _un peu trop_. I submit whether it might not be best for you to
-  endeavour to make his peace with M[inist]ry by a candid avowal
-  of his errors, and of his subsequent change of sentiment and
-  renunciation of all correspondence with these traitors. In
-  the mean time he had better make the best of his way to here,
-  Liverpool, or Scotland; from either of the latter he might find
-  his way to America if necessary. In any case let him not go in
-  company with any of the persons who have laid themselves open to
-  suspicion. I would not, however, have him rashly run out of the
-  country. M[inist]ry must know who have been the active abettors
-  of the plot, and, if they act wisely, will not molest those who
-  have seen their error or have had the good sense to resist all
-  temptations of engaging in plots against the peace of the country,
-  whatever their opinions about parliamentary representation might
-  be.... Query, whether Denmark, Hamburg, or Norway, might not be
-  preferable to America, lest we go to war with the latter. If you
-  find he is obnoxious, his letters to me should be directed by
-  another hand, and not signed.”[346]
-
-    [344] Watt to Boulton, 16th May, 1794. Boulton MSS.
-
-    [345] The Habeas Corpus Act was suspended on the 23rd May, 1794.
-
-    [346] Watt to Boulton, 19th May, 1794. Boulton MSS.
-
-Four days later, Watt’s alarm was not abated by the appearance in
-Birmingham of king’s messengers making seizures of persons concerned in
-seditious correspondence. “They have taken up,” he wrote, “one Pare, who
-kept a reforming club at his house, and one or two others. The soldiers
-were ordered under arms to prevent tumult. I hear also that Wilkinson has
-been threatened with a mob at Bradley, and has prepared to defend himself
-with cannon, pikes, &c., but that matters are now quiet there. In respect
-to James, _you_ must advise him, I cannot; but I think he would be better
-at home, following his business, than elsewhere.”[347] James eventually
-returned to Birmingham, where we find him from this time forward taking
-an increasingly active part in the affairs of the concern. He took entire
-charge of the manufacture of the letter-copying machines, now become a
-considerable branch of the business; and he shortly after entered the
-engine firm as a partner, in conjunction with Mr. Boulton’s eldest son,
-Matthew Robinson.
-
-    [347] Watt to Boulton, 23rd May, 1794. Young Watt continued
-      to sympathise with his political friends; as we find him,
-      some months later, writing Matthew R. Boulton from London as
-      follows:--“The citizens here are all in very high spirits since
-      the late trials; and I had the honour of dining with two of
-      the _acquitted felons_ on Sunday last.” Watt, junr., having
-      remained for some time in London on business connected with the
-      prosecution of Bull and others for infringement of his father’s
-      patent, Boulton, junr., kept up an active correspondence with
-      him on the affairs of the firm. In one letter (19th February,
-      1795), after discussing various matters of detail relating to
-      the letter-copying machine and engine business, Boulton entreats
-      his friend to send him down a supply of hair-powder. “I have to
-      intrust to your care,” he says, “the execution of an important
-      commission on the part of the ladies and myself. The report
-      of a scarcity of hair-powder has caused great consternation
-      amongst the beaux and belles here, and we beg of you to preserve
-      for us 1 cwt. of that necessary article.” To which Watt, jun.
-      replied,--“Your new order is in train, so that I hope (whatever
-      the poor may suffer by the destruction of so scarce an article
-      of nourishment) your aristocratical vanity will be gratified,
-      with only the additional sacrifice of one guinea per annum to
-      your immaculate friend Mr. Pitt, for the purpose of carrying on
-      this ‘just and necessary war!’ Under the existing circumstances,
-      I am doubtful whether I shall not sacrifice my aristocratical
-      appendage [queues being then the appendages of gentlemen],
-      as it goes much against my inclination to throw away my money
-      at this moment of personal poverty, or to contribute any sum,
-      however small, to the support of measures which I reprobate _in
-      toto_. On the other hand, however, I do say that, of all the
-      taxes which have ever been imposed within my memory, this is
-      the most politic and the least likely to be burdensome to the
-      poor.”--Boulton MSS.
-
-The infusion of young blood had the effect of imparting new vigour to all
-the branches of manufacture at Soho, and at the same time of relieving
-the senior partners from a considerable amount of labour and anxiety. The
-business was now in a very thriving state; there was abundance of orders
-for engines coming in; and the principal difficulty of the firm was in
-finding skilled workmen enough to execute them. Thus we find Watt junior
-writing to Boulton junior in January, 1795,--“We must have additional men,
-rather too many than too few, until we have got the start of our orders,
-for without that we shall always feel ourselves embarrassed and clogged.
-I shall therefore desire Rennie to renew his applications at Lancaster,
-which appear as yet to have been unsuccessful.”
-
-The junior members of the firm were also useful in protecting the engine
-patent right, the infringement of which had become general all over the
-country. This was a disagreeable part of their business; but, if not
-attended to, the patent must be given up as worthless. The steam-engine
-was now regarded as an indispensable power in manufacturing operations.
-It had become employed in all important branches of industry; and it
-was, of course, the interest of the manufacturers to avoid the payment
-of dues wherever they could. An instance of this evasion was detected at
-the Bowling Ironworks near Bradford, and notice was given of proceedings
-against the Company for recovery of dues. On this the Bowling Company
-offered to treat, and young Watt went down to Leeds for the purpose of
-meeting the representatives of the Bowling Company on the subject. On
-the 24th February, 1796, he wrote his friend Matthew Robinson Boulton as
-follows:--
-
-  “Inclosed you have a copy of the treaty of peace, not amity,
-  concluded at Leeds, on Saturday last, between me, Minister
-  Plenipotentiary to your Highnesses on the one part, and the
-  Bowling Pirates in person on the other part. I hope you will
-  ratify the terms, as you will see they are founded entirely upon
-  the principle of indemnity for the past and security for the
-  future. The diameter and length of stroke of their different
-  engines, four in number, I have; the times of their commencing
-  to work will be sent you by Mr. Paley; and the amounts of the
-  premiums may be definitively calculated upon my arrival, which
-  will be about the latter end of this week.”
-
-Another engine constructed after Watt’s patent was discovered working
-at a mill at Carke, in Cartmel, Lancashire. Mr. Stockdale, son of the
-proprietor, tells the following story of its detection. He states that the
-first engine employed at the works was one on Newcomen’s construction,
-which was used to pump water into the reservoir which supplied the
-water-power by which the mill was driven. It was then determined to apply
-the steam-power direct to the machinery, and a new engine was ordered from
-Manchester, without communicating with the patentees. The mill was in full
-work when a stranger called, representing that he belonged to the concern
-of Boulton and Watt, and requesting to inspect the engine. The request was
-complied with, and Mr. Stockdale afterwards invited him to stay to dinner;
-but it was the dearest dinner he ever gave, as only a few weeks later a
-claim for 1800_l._ was made by Boulton and Watt for dues upon the engine,
-which was, however, eventually compromised by the payment of 400_l._
-
-The most unscrupulous pirates, however, were the Cornishmen who,
-emboldened by the long quiescence of Boulton and Watt, and knowing that
-the patent had only five or six more years to run, believed that they
-might set the patentees at open defiance, which they proceeded to do.
-Notwithstanding the agreements entered into and ratified on both sides,
-they refused point blank to pay further dues; and Boulton and Watt were
-thus at last driven to have recourse to the powers of the law. Had they
-remained passive, it might have been construed into a tacit admission
-that the patent right had from the first been indefensible, and that the
-sums which they had up to that time levied for the use of their engine
-had been wrongfully paid to them. But neither had ceased to have perfect
-faith in the validity of their patent, and both determined, even at this
-late stage, to defend it. “The rascals,” wrote Watt to Boulton, “seem to
-have been going on as if the patent were their own.... We have tried every
-lenient means with them in vain; and since the fear of God has no effect
-upon them, we must try what the fear of the devil can do.”[348] Legal
-proceedings were begun accordingly. The two actions on which the issues
-were tried were those of Boulton and Watt _v._ Bull, and Boulton and Watt
-_v._ Hornblower and Maberley; and they were fought on both sides with
-great determination. The proceedings extended over several years, being
-carried from court to court; but the result was decisive in both cases in
-favour of Boulton and Watt. It was not until January, 1799, that the final
-decision of the judges was given;[349] almost on the very eve of expiry
-of the patent, which had not then a full year to run. It was not, however,
-with a view to the future that these costly, anxious, and protracted legal
-proceedings had been carried on, but mainly for the recovery of dues under
-existing agreements, and for dues on engines erected in various quarters
-in infringement of the patent. Most of the Cornish adventurers had paid
-nothing for years. Thus Poldice had paid nothing since October, 1793, and
-was in arrear 2330_l._ Wheal Gons had paid nothing since May, 1793, and
-was in arrear 4290_l._ The Wheal Treasure adventurers, and many others,
-had set Boulton and Watt at open defiance, and paid nothing at all.
-
-    [348] Watt to Boulton, 20th March, 1796.
-
-    [349] “We have WON THE CAUSE hollow,” Watt wrote from London. “All
-      the Judges have given their opinions carefully in our favour,
-      and have passed judgment. Some of them made better arguments
-      in our favour than our own counsel, for Rous’s speech was too
-      long and too divergent. I most sincerely give you joy.”--Watt
-      to Boulton, 25th January, 1799.
-
-On the issue of the proceedings against Bull, Boulton and Watt called
-upon the Mining Companies to “cash up,” and arrears were shortly
-collected, though with considerable difficulty, to the amount of about
-30,000_l._ Young Boulton went into Cornwall for the purpose of arranging
-the settlements, and managed the business with great ability. “I am now
-to congratulate you,” Watt wrote to his partner from Glasgow, whither
-he had gone on a visit, “on the success of Mr. R. Boulton’s very able
-transactions in Cornwall; and I hope that at last we may be freed from the
-anxiety of the issue of law which has so long attended us, and enjoy in
-peace the fruits of our labours. When you write to Mr. B. I beg you will
-present my best wishes and best respects to him, expressing my warmest
-approbation of his exertions.” On another occasion, while the cause was
-in progress before the courts of law, Watt wrote,--“In the whole affair,
-nothing was so grateful to me as the zeal of our friends and the activity
-of our young men, which was unremitting.”
-
-The senior members of the firm had for some time been gradually
-withdrawing from the active management of the concern. We find Watt
-writing to Dr. Black in 1798,--“In regard to the engine business, I
-now take little part in it, but it goes on successfully.” Four years
-later he wrote,--“Our engine trade thrives; the profits per cent. are,
-however, very, very moderate; it is by the great capital and expensive
-establishment of engineers, &c., that we keep it up; without our tools and
-men very little could be done, as we have many competitors, some of whom
-are men of abilities.” But the business was now safe in the hands of the
-young and active partners, who continued to carry it on for many years,
-with even greater success than their fathers had done. They reaped the
-harvest of which the others had sown the seed. The patent right expired in
-1800; but the business of the firm, nevertheless, became larger and more
-remunerative than it had ever been before. The superior plant which they
-had accumulated, their large and increasing capital, the skilled workmen
-whom they had trained, and the first-class character of the work which
-they turned out, gave the establishment of Boulton and Watt a prestige
-which they long continued to maintain.
-
-[Illustration: WILLIAM MURDOCK.]
-
-The young partners had also the great advantage of the skilled heads
-of the different departments, who had been trained by long and valuable
-experience. For many years William Murdock was the Mentor of the firm.
-Though tempting offers of partnerships were made to him, he remained loyal
-to Boulton and Watt to the last. They treated him generously, and he was
-satisfied to spend his life in their service. He had gradually worked
-his way to the foremost place in their establishment, besides achieving
-reputation as an inventor and a man of practical science. His model
-locomotive of 1784 was the first machine of the kind made in this country;
-and it is to be regretted that he did not pursue the subject. But Murdock
-was a very modest, unambitious man, content to keep in the background, and
-not possessed by that “pushing” quality which helps so many on to fortune.
-We have already stated that he invented the sun and planet motion, which
-was eventually adopted by Watt in preference to his own method of securing
-rotary motion. His daily familiarity with pumping-engines in Cornwall also
-led him to suggest and introduce many improvements in their details, which
-Boulton and Watt were always ready to adopt. He was a great favourite in
-Cornwall, and not less esteemed for his estimable and manly qualities than
-for his mechanical skill. When the adventurers heard of his intention to
-return to Soho, in 1798, they offered him 1000_l._ a year to continue at
-the mines, but he could not be tempted to remain.
-
-Returned to Soho, Murdock was invested with the general supervision
-and management of the mechanical department, in which he proved of
-essential value. He was regarded as “the right hand” of Boulton and
-Watt. He proceeded to introduce great improvements in the manufacture of
-the engines, contriving numerous machines for casting, boring, turning,
-and fitting the various parts together with greater precision. His plan
-of boring cylinders by means of an endless screw (turned by the moving
-power) working into a toothed wheel, whose axis carried the cutter head,
-instead of by spur gear, was found very useful in practice, and produced
-a much more smooth and steady motion of the machine. As early as 1785, he
-invented the first oscillating engine,[350] which still continues in use
-in various improved forms. His invention of the double D slide valve, in
-place of the four poppet valves in Watt’s double engine,[351] was also
-found of great value; saving steam, and ensuring greater simplicity in
-the construction and working of the engine. In his oscillating engine the
-motion is given to the slide valve by the oscillation of the cylinder, and
-engines of small power still continue to be worked in this manner. Another
-of his improvements in engine construction was his method of casting the
-steam cases for cylinders in one piece, instead of in separate segments
-bolted together, according to the previous practice. He also invented a
-rotary engine of an ingenious construction; but though he had one erected
-to drive the machines in his private workshop, where it continued employed
-for about thirty years, it never came into general use.[352] Murdock had a
-good deal of the temperament of Watt: he was always scheming improvements,
-and was most assiduous in carrying them out. In such cases he would
-not trust to subordinates, but executed his designs himself wherever
-practicable; and he sometimes carried his labours so far into the night
-that the rising sun found him at his anvil or his turning lathe.
-
-    [350] The model was carefully preserved and exhibited with pride
-      by his son, in whose house at Handsworth we saw it in 1857.
-
-    [351] Watt said to Robert Hart, “When Mr. Murdock introduced
-      the slide valve, I was very much against it, as I did not
-      think it so good as the poppet valve, but I gave in from its
-      simplicity.”--Hart, ‘Reminiscences,’ &c.
-
-    [352] These several inventions were embodied by him in a patent
-      taken out in 1799.
-
-Murdock is also entitled to the merit of inventing lighting by gas. The
-inflammable qualities of the air obtained by distillation of coal had
-long been known,[353] but Murdock was the first to apply the knowledge
-to practical uses. The subject engaged much of his attention in the year
-1792, when he resided at Redruth. As his days were fully occupied in
-attending to his employers’ engine business, it was only in the evenings,
-after the day’s work was over, that he could pursue the subject. It is
-not improbable that he was led to undertake the investigation by Mr.
-Boulton’s chemical enthusiasm, which communicated itself to all with whom
-he came in contact. It will be remembered that the latter occupied much
-of his leisure at Cosgarne in analysing earths, minerals, and vegetable
-substances, trying to find out the gases they contained; and Murdock
-was his zealous assistant on these occasions. In the paper which he
-communicated to the Royal Society on the subject of lighting by coal-gas
-in 1808, for which they awarded him their large Rumford Gold Medal, he
-observed,--
-
-    [353] Burning springs, though by no means common in Europe, were
-      not unknown. They were kept burning by natural and spontaneous
-      supplies of carburetted hydrogen gas issuing from fissures in
-      the earth overlying beds of asphalte or coal. The inflammable
-      character of fire-damp and the explosions which it occasioned
-      in coal mines were also familiar to most persons living in
-      the coal-mining districts. In 1658 Mr. Thomas Shirley first
-      communicated to the Royal Society the result of some experiments
-      which he had made on the inflammable gas issuing from a well
-      near Wigan in Lancashire. Some time before 1691 the Rev. Dr.
-      Clayton, Dean of Kildare, made some experiments on what he
-      called the spirit of coal: he distilled some coal in a retort,
-      and, confining the gas produced thereby in a bladder, he amused
-      his friends by burning it as it issued from a pin-hole. In 1721
-      Dr. Stephen Hales found it was practicable to produce elastic
-      inflammable air from coal and other substances, and that nearly
-      one-third of Newcastle coal was drawn off in vapour, gas, &c.,
-      by the action of heat. In 1733 Sir James Lowther communicated
-      to the Royal Society a paper on the subject of the fire-damp
-      issuing from the shaft of a coal mine near Whitehaven, which
-      had been accidentally set fire to and continued to burn for
-      two years. Dr. Watson, Bishop of Landaff, and Dr. Priestley
-      of Birmingham, examined the properties of coal-gas, and made
-      experiments on its inflammable qualities, but pursued the
-      subject no further. Lord Dundonald also had been accustomed, for
-      the amusement of his friends, to set fire to the gas disengaged
-      by the burning of coal in the process of coke-making. The same
-      phenomena must have been observed on a large scale wherever
-      coke was made. Each chamber in which coal was distilled was in
-      point of fact a gas retort. Oil and gas were the products of the
-      distillation; but strange to say, although the oil was collected
-      and used, no heed was taken of the gas. Nor was it until Mr.
-      Murdock’s attention was called to the subject that lighting by
-      gas was proved to be practicable.
-
-  “It is now nearly sixteen years since (1792), in the course
-  of experiments I was making at Redruth, in Cornwall, upon the
-  quantities and qualities of the gas produced by distillation from
-  different mineral and vegetable substances, that I was induced
-  by some observations I had previously made upon the burning of
-  coal, to try the combustible property of the gases produced from
-  it, as well as from peat, wood, and other inflammable substances;
-  and being struck with the great quantities of gas which they
-  afforded, as well as the brilliancy of the light, and the facility
-  of its production, I instituted several experiments with a view of
-  ascertaining the cost at which it might be obtained, compared with
-  that of equal quantities of light yielded by oils and tallow. My
-  apparatus consisted of an iron retort, with tinned iron and copper
-  tubes, through which the gas was conducted to a considerable
-  distance; and there, as well as at intermediate points, was
-  burnt through apertures of various forms and dimensions. The
-  experiments were made upon coal of different qualities, which I
-  procured from different parts of the kingdom for the purpose of
-  ascertaining which would give the most economical results. The
-  gas was also washed with water, and other means were employed to
-  purify it.”[354]
-
-    [354] ‘Philosophical Transactions,’ 1808, pp. 124–132.
-
-Murdock put his discovery to the best practical test by lighting up
-his house and offices at Redruth with gas; and he had a gas lantern
-constructed, with a jet attached to the bottom of the lantern and
-a bladder of gas underneath, with which he lighted himself home at
-night across the moors when returning from his work to his house at
-Redruth.[355] On the occasion of a visit which he made to Soho in 1794,
-he took the opportunity of mentioning to Mr. Watt the experiments he
-had made, and their results; expressing his conviction of the superior
-economy, safety, and illuminating qualities of coal-gas, compared with
-oils and tallow. He then suggested that a patent should be taken out for
-the application, and at various subsequent periods he urged the subject
-upon the attention of his principals. But they were at the time so
-harassed by litigation in connexion with their own steam-engine patent,
-that they were unwilling to enter upon any new enterprise which might
-possibly lead them into fresh embroilments; and nothing was done to
-protect the invention.
-
-    [355] Many years later (in 1818), when Murdock was at Manchester
-      for the purpose of starting one of Boulton and Watt’s engines,
-      he was invited, with Mr. William Fairbairn, to dine at Medlock
-      Bank, then at some distance from the lighted part of the town.
-      “It was a dark winter’s night,” writes Mr. Fairbairn, our
-      informant, “and how to reach the house over such bad roads was
-      a question not easily solved. Mr. Murdock, however, fruitful
-      in resources, went to the Gas Works, (then established in
-      Manchester), where he filled a bladder which he had with him,
-      and placing it under his arm like a bagpipe, he discharged
-      through the stem of an old tobacco-pipe a stream of gas which
-      enabled us to walk in safety to Medlock Bank.”
-
-On Murdock’s return to Soho in 1798, he proceeded with his investigations,
-and contrived an apparatus for making, purifying, and storing the
-gas on a large scale; and several of the offices in the building were
-regularly lighted by its means. On the general illumination which took
-place in celebration of the Peace of Amiens in 1802, the front of Soho
-Manufactory was brilliantly illuminated with gas, to the astonishment and
-admiration of the public. The manageableness, the safety, the economy,
-and the brilliancy of the new light being thus proved, Boulton and Watt
-in 1803 authorised Murdock to proceed with the general fitting up of the
-manufactory with pipes and burners, and, from that date, it continued
-to be regularly lit up with coal-gas. Several large firms followed
-their example; amongst others Phillips and Lee, Burley, and Kennedy, at
-Manchester, and Gott and Sons, at Leeds; and the manufacture of gas-making
-apparatus became one of the regular branches of business at Soho. Several
-years later, in 1805, when Watt went down to Glasgow, he found gas in
-pretty general use.
-
-  “The new lights,” he wrote to Boulton, “are much in vogue here;
-  many have attempted them, and some have succeeded tolerably in
-  lighting their shops with them. I also hear that a cotton-mill in
-  this neighbourhood is lighted up with gas. A long account of the
-  new lights was published in the newspapers some time ago, in which
-  they had the candour to ascribe the invention to Mr. Murdock. From
-  what I have heard respecting these attempts, I think there is full
-  room for the Soho improvements,[356] though, when once they see
-  one properly executed, it will have numerous imitations.”
-
-    [356] Watt here alluded to the new machinery and plant erected
-      at Soho under Murdock’s directions, at a cost of about 5000_l._
-      for the purpose of manufacturing gas apparatus.
-
-Several years after the introduction of the new light, a German, named
-Wintzer or Winsor, brought out (in 1809) a scheme similar to one projected
-in Paris by Le Bon, for lighting the streets by gas. He proposed a
-Joint Stock Company, with a capital of 300,000_l._, and held forth to
-subscribers the prospect of a profit of ten thousand per cent.![357]
-He applied to Parliament for a Bill, against which Murdock petitioned,
-and was examined before the Committee. Though they were staggered by
-the crudities of Winsor, they had some difficulty even in accepting the
-more modest averments of Murdock as to the uses of coal-gas for lighting
-purposes. “Do you mean to tell us,” asked one member, “that it will be
-possible to have a light _without a wick_?” “Yes, I do, indeed,” answered
-Murdock. “Ah, my friend,” said the legislator, “you are trying to prove
-too much.” It was as surprising and inconceivable to the honourable
-member as George Stephenson’s subsequent evidence before a Parliamentary
-Committee to the effect that a carriage might be drawn upon a railway at
-the rate of twelve miles an hour _without a horse_.
-
-    [357] The invention of lighting by gas has by some writers been
-      erroneously attributed to Winsor. It will be observed, from
-      the statement in the text, that coal-gas had been in regular
-      use long before the appearance of his scheme, which was one
-      of the most crude and inflated ever brought before the public.
-      “The Patriotic Imperial and National Light and Heat Company,”
-      proposed amongst other things to aid and assist Government with
-      funds in times of emergency, to increase the Sinking-fund for
-      reducing the National Debt, to reward meritorious discoverers,
-      &c. &c. Some idea of the character of the project may be
-      formed from Mr. [Lord] Brougham’s speech in opening the
-      case against the Bill:--“‘The neat annual profits,’ says Mr.
-      Winsor, ‘agreeable to the _official experiments_’ (that is, the
-      experiments of Mr. Accum....) ‘amount to 229,353,627_l._’ ...
-      now Mr. Winsor says, that he will allow there may be an error
-      here, for the sake of arguing with those who still have their
-      doubts; and he will admit that the sum should be taken at only
-      one half, or 114,845,294_l._; and then giving up, to meet all
-      possible objections, nine-tenths of that sum, still there will
-      remain, to be paid to the subscribers of this Company, a yearly
-      profit of 570_l._ for every 5_l._ of deposit! So that upon
-      paying 5_l._ every subscriber is to receive 570_l._ a year for
-      ever, and this to the last farthing; it may increase but less it
-      can never be; the clear profit is always to be above 10,000_l._
-      per cent. upon the capital! This is pretty well, sir, one would
-      think. There is here estimate and statement enough to captivate
-      the public; but this is not all; for Mr. Winsor has taken out
-      a patent (of which, indeed, he has, according to his custom,
-      enrolled no specification, but, on the contrary, has enrolled
-      a surrender) for the invention of several things, and, among
-      others, one for rendering this gas respirable. It is not enough
-      that this gas (which everybody knows to be not respirable, but
-      as poisonous to the lungs as fixed air) should be capable of
-      giving light; but he thinks it also necessary to prove that it
-      may easily be rendered respirable; in short, that there is no
-      way in which it may not be used, and nothing which may not be
-      made of it.... In another pamphlet.... Mr. Winsor endeavours to
-      prove that this gas is the vital principle; that in which life
-      itself consists. If I had taken the trouble to go through his
-      publications, which I certainly have not done, it is hard to
-      say what I might not have discovered; but I should think the
-      difficulty would rather be, to find one quality which the gas
-      is not stated to possess.”
-
-No wonder that strange notions were entertained about gas in those early
-days. It seemed so incredible a contrivance, to make air that could be
-sent along pipes for miles from the place at which it was made to the
-place at which it issued as jets of fire, that it ran entirely counter to
-all preconceived notions on the subject of illumination. Even Sir Humphry
-Davy ridiculed the idea of lighting towns with gas, and asked one of
-the projectors if it were intended to take the dome of St. Paul’s for a
-gasometer; and Sir Walter Scott made many clever jokes about the absurdity
-of lighting London with smoke, though he shortly after adopted the said
-“smoke” for lighting up his own house at Abbotsford. It was popularly
-supposed that the gas was carried along the pipes on fire, and that
-hence the pipes must be intensely hot. Thus, when the House of Commons
-was first lighted up with gas, the architect insisted on the pipes being
-placed several inches from the wall for fear of fire, and members might be
-seen applying their gloved hands to them to ascertain their temperature,
-expressing the greatest surprise on their being found as cool as the
-adjoining walls.[358]
-
-    [358] The first application of the “Gas-light and Coke Company”
-      to Parliament in 1809 for an Act proved unsuccessful, but the
-      “London and Westminster Chartered Gas-light and Coke Company”
-      succeeded in the following year. The Company, however, did
-      not succeed commercially, and was on the point of dissolution,
-      when Mr. Clegg, a pupil of Murdock, bred at Soho, undertook the
-      management and introduced new and improved apparatus. Mr. Clegg
-      first lighted with gas Mr. Ackerman’s shop in the Strand in
-      1810, and it was regarded as a great novelty. One lady of rank
-      was so much delighted with the brilliancy of the gas-lamp fixed
-      on the shop counter, that she asked to be allowed to carry it
-      home in her carriage, and offered any sum for a similar one.
-      Mr. Winsor by his persistent advocacy of gas-lighting, did
-      much to bring it into further notice; but it was Mr. Clegg’s
-      practical ability that mainly led to its general adoption.
-      When Westminster Bridge was first lit up with gas in 1812, the
-      lamplighters were so disgusted with it that they struck work,
-      and Mr. Clegg himself had to act as lamplighter.
-
-The advantages of the new light, however, soon became generally
-recognised; and gas companies were established in most of the large towns.
-Had Murdock patented the invention, it must have proved exceedingly
-remunerative to him; but he derived no advantage from the extended use
-of the new system of lighting except the honour of having initiated
-it,--though of this more than one attempt was made to deprive him. As
-he himself modestly said, in his paper read before the Royal Society,
-“I believe I may, without presuming too much, claim both the first idea
-of applying, and the first actual application of this gas to economical
-purposes.”
-
-Murdock’s attention was, however, diverted from prosecuting his discovery
-of the uses of gas to a profitable issue by his daily business, which
-was of a very engrossing character. He continued, nevertheless, an almost
-incessant contriver, improver, and inventor; following, like his master
-Watt, the strong bent of his inclinations. One of his most cherished
-schemes was the employment of compressed air as a motive power. He
-contrived to work a little engine of 12-inch cylinder and 18-inch stroke,
-which drove the lathe in the pattern-shop, by means of the compressed air
-of the blast-engine employed in blowing the cupolas at the Soho Foundry;
-and this arrangement continued in use for a period of about thirty-five
-years. He also constructed a lift worked by compressed air, which raised
-and lowered the castings from the Boring-mill to the level of the Foundry
-and the Canal Bank.[359] He used the same kind of power to ring the bells
-in his house at Sycamore Hill; and the contrivance was afterwards adopted
-by Sir Walter Scott at Abbotsford.[360] He experimented on the power
-of high-pressure steam in impelling shot, and contrived a steam-engine
-in 1803, with which he made many trials at Soho, in anticipation of
-Perkins’s apparatus. He was the inventor of the well-known cast-iron
-cement so extensively used in engine and machine work; and the manner in
-which he was led to it affords a striking illustration of his quickness
-of observation. Finding that some iron-borings and sal-ammoniac had got
-accidentally mixed together in his tool-chest and rusted his saw-blade
-nearly through, he took note of the circumstance, mixed the articles
-in various proportions, and at last arrived at the famous cement, which
-eventually became an article of extensive manufacture at the Soho works,
-completely superseding the cement invented by Watt. In 1810 he took out a
-patent for boring stone pipes for water, and cutting columns out of solid
-blocks by one operation. In 1815 he invented an apparatus for heating the
-water for the Baths at Leamington by the circulation of water through
-pipes from a boiler,--a method since extensively adopted for heating
-buildings and garden-houses. While occupied in erecting the apparatus at
-Leamington, a heavy cast-iron plate fell upon his leg and severely crushed
-it, laying him up for many months.
-
-    [359] “It consisted,” says Mr. Buckle, “of a piston working in a
-      cylinder 10 feet diameter in water, with a lift of 12 feet, and
-      raised by forcing in air from a small blowing cylinder 12 inches
-      diameter, 18 inches stroke, which was worked by the gearing in
-      the boring-mill.” Paper read by the late William Buckle at the
-      Institution of Mechanical Engineers at Birmingham, 23rd October,
-      1850.
-
-    [360] Lockhart’s ‘Life of Scott,’ one vol. edition, p. 500.
-
-His ingenuity was constantly at work, even upon matters which lay entirely
-outside his special calling. Mr. Fairbairn informs us that he contrived a
-variety of curious machines for consolidating peat moss, finely ground and
-pulverised, under immense pressure, and moulding it into beautiful medals,
-armlets, and necklaces, which took the most brilliant polish, and had the
-appearance of the finest jet. Observing that fish-skins might be used as
-an economical substitute for isinglass, he went up to London to explain
-to the brewers the best method of preparing and using them.[361] While in
-town on this errand, it occurred to him that there was an enormous waste
-of power in the feet of men and animals treading the streets of London,
-which might be economised and made productive; and he conceived the idea
-of using the streets as a grand treadmill, under which the waste power
-was to be stored up by mechanical methods, and turned to account! Another
-of his ingenious schemes--though then thought equally impracticable with
-that last mentioned--was his proposed method of transmitting letters and
-packages through a tube exhausted by an air-pump. This idea seems to have
-led to the projection of the Atmospheric Railway, the success of which, so
-far as it went, was again due to the practical ability of Murdock’s pupil
-Samuel Clegg. Though the atmospheric railway was eventually abandoned,
-it is remarkable that Murdock’s original idea has since been revived, and
-practised with success, by the London Pneumatic Despatch Company.
-
-    [361] Mr. Buckle, in the memoir above cited, says,--“So completely
-      was he absorbed at all times with the subject he had in hand,
-      that he was quite regardless of everything else. When in London
-      explaining to the brewers the nature of his substitute for
-      isinglass, he occupied handsome apartments. He, however, little
-      respected the splendour of his drawing-room, and, fancying
-      himself in his laboratory at Soho, he proceeded with his
-      experiments quite careless and unconscious of the mischief he
-      was doing. One morning his landlady calling in to receive his
-      orders, was horrified to see her magnificent paper-hangings
-      covered with wet fish-skins hung up to dry; and he was caught
-      in the act of pinning up a cod’s skin to undergo the same
-      process. Whether the lady fainted or not is not on record, but
-      the immediate ejectment of the gentleman and his fish was the
-      consequence.”
-
-Such is a brief sketch of the life and works of this estimable and
-ingenious mechanic, for so many years the mainstay of the Soho works.
-Mr. Fairbairn, who first made his friendship at Manchester in 1816,
-speaks of him as one of the most distinguished veterans in mechanical
-engineering then living,--“tall and well-proportioned in figure, with a
-most intelligent and benevolent expression of countenance.” He was a man
-of robust constitution, and though he sorely taxed it, he lived to an old
-age, surviving the elder Boulton and Watt by many years.[362]
-
-    [362] The young partners regarded him with a degree of
-      affection and veneration, which often shows itself in their
-      correspondence. Towards the later years of his life Mr.
-      Murdock’s faculties gradually decayed, and he wholly retired
-      from the business of Soho, dying at his house at Sycamore Hill,
-      Handsworth, on the 15th Nov., 1839, in his 85th year.
-
-[Illustration: MURDOCK’S HOUSE, SYCAMORE HILL, HANDSWORTH.[363]]
-
-    [363] The first piece of iron-toothed gearing ever cast is
-      placed on the lawn in front of Murdock’s villa. The teeth are
-      of somewhat unequal form, and the casting is rough--perhaps
-      it has been exposed to rough usage. It bears the following
-      inscription:--“This Pinton was cast at Carron Ironworks for John
-      Murdock, of Bellow Mill, Ayrshire, A.D. 1760, being the first
-      tooth-gearing ever used in millwork in Great Britain.”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXI.
-
-APPLICATION OF STEAM-POWER TO NAVIGATION--MILLER AND SYMINGTON--BOULTON
-AND WATT’S ENGINE ADOPTED BY FULTON.
-
-
-It will be remembered that one of the early speculations of Roger Bacon
-related to the employment of engines of navigation without oarsmen, “so
-that the greatest river and sea ships, with only one man to steer them,
-may sail swifter than if they were fully manned,”--that one of the uses
-to which Papin proposed to apply the steam-engine was to “propel ships
-against the wind and tide,” in illustration of which he constructed his
-model steamboat,--and that, shortly after Newcomen’s engine had become
-generally introduced as a pumping power, Jonathan Hulls took out a patent
-with the object of applying it to tow ships into and out of harbours.
-Hulls was followed, after a long interval, by Jouffroy in France and by
-Fitch in America, but none of their experiments proved successful; and
-it was not until Watt invented the condensing engine that it was found
-practicable to employ steam as a regular propelling power in navigation.
-
-It was natural that the extraordinary success of Watt’s invention should
-direct attention anew to the subject. The engine, in the powerful,
-compact, economical, and manageable form, into which he had brought
-it, was found able to effect rotary motion in the various processes of
-manufacture; and, in a maritime country like England, the thought that
-would naturally occur to many minds would be this: If the steam-engine
-can drive mill-wheels, why may it not in like manner be employed to drive
-the wheels of carriages by land and the paddle-wheels of vessels by sea?
-The subject was, indeed, often brought under the notice of both Boulton
-and Watt; but the anxiety, annoyance and expense to which they had been
-subjected in defending their original patent, deterred them from venturing
-on this new field of enterprise. Watt never made his proposed locomotive
-engine for running on common roads; and the model constructed by Murdock
-at Redruth in 1784, remained a model still.
-
-The subject was, however, shortly after taken up by William Symington, at
-Wanlockhead, in Scotland, where his father was employed as engineman in
-superintending the working of one of Boulton and Watt’s pumping-engines.
-The sight of this engine, and his father’s employment upon it, had
-probably the effect of first directing his attention to steam-power and
-its extended uses; and having heard of Murdock’s ingenious design from
-Boulton and Watt’s men, who were constantly visiting and inspecting
-the pumping-engine,[364] it occurred to him to try whether he could not
-himself construct the model of a steam-carriage for use on common roads.
-He succeeded in making his model, and when it was finished, Mr. Meason,
-the manager of the Wanlockhead Lead Mines, was so much pleased with it
-that he asked the young man to accompany him to Edinburgh, to show it
-to the leading men of science in that city. Mr. Meason allowed it to
-be exhibited at his own house, Symington being in attendance to give
-explanations. Some of the Edinburgh professors, who came to see the model,
-were so much pleased with the youthful inventor (then only about twenty
-years of age), and the indications of mechanical genius which his machine
-displayed, that they strongly recommended Mr. Meason to enter him as a
-student at the University, which he readily assented to, and Symington
-accordingly matriculated at Edinburgh College in 1786, and, amongst
-other lectures, attended those of Dr. Black on Chemistry in the following
-session.
-
-    [364] The Symingtons, father and son, began at an early period
-      to design improvements on Watt’s pumping-engine, and took out a
-      patent for a fire-engine on a new principle as early as the year
-      1785. Watt heard of its progress from time to time; but he had
-      no great opinion of the Symingtons, and treated their alleged
-      invention with indifference. On the 28th September, 1787, he
-      wrote Boulton,--“Isaac Perrins [a fitter] is returned from
-      Scotland. He says Symington has invented a new engine, which
-      is to work under 12½ lbs. on the inch and has got a patent for
-      it, which Mr. M[eason] has paid for. By his account it seems
-      to be on the same principle as the Trumpeters. As soon as they
-      can rely fully on the new engine, the old one is to be pulled
-      down, and Symington is to put up one of his in the house, and,
-      on that answering, ours is to be stopped!”
-
-The Scotch roads were in too bad a condition at the time to admit of
-their being run over by a locomotive, and Symington eventually abandoned
-his proposed scheme. But he had also an idea that the steam-engine might
-be economically applied to the working of boats on canals, or ships at
-sea; and with that object he invented an engine specially adapted for
-the purpose. This clearly appears from his correspondence with Thomas
-Gilbert, M.P., brother to the Duke of Bridgewater’s land steward. Mr.
-Gilbert had inspected the model of the steam-carriage while on a visit to
-Edinburgh, and at the same time had some conversation with Symington as to
-the employment of the steam-engine in hauling canal-boats, the result of
-which was that Symington promised to write him more fully on both topics.
-He proceeded to do so in a letter dated Wanlockhead, 24th September, 1786;
-in which, after describing the dimensions, power, mode of working, and the
-probable price (about 70_l._) of a full-sized locomotive, he proceeded--
-
-  “But an engine of the same power and apparatus for working boats
-  on canals, will only coast about fifty pounds, and will only
-  weight 110 st. Each strock of the engine will have a force equall
-  to 160 st. weight when applied, which undoubtedly will be able
-  to drag a great weight upon water, when we run the proportion
-  between it and what a man can do in a boat with common oars,
-  whose exertion does not exceed more than 7 stones; but of this
-  you will be a better judge than me. The engine we propose for
-  working the land-carriage is Mr. Watt’s, with some very material
-  alterations; and before we can use it we must make an agreement
-  with him, which we intend to propose immediately. But the engine
-  we propose to work boats or ships with is an engine intirely
-  of our own invention, and more powerful and better adapted for
-  the purpose than Mr. Watt’s engine. This engine of our own we
-  have presently at worke here is a large moddle, by which we have
-  properly ascertained its power, and found it exceed Mr. Watt’s
-  engine nearly two pounds upon each square inch on the piston,
-  without any greater consumpt of coals. Another advantage attending
-  our engine is its being little more complicated than the old
-  engine that works with an atmospheric pressure. We are to use our
-  endeavours immediately for a patent for this engine as well as our
-  carriage; your assistance, when we get application made, will be
-  of great service to us, and thankfully received by, Sir, &c. &c.,
-  WILLIAM SYMINGTON.”[365]
-
-About the same time that Symington was exhibiting his model carriage in
-Edinburgh, Mr. Miller of Dalswinton was trying experiments at Leith in
-propelling boats by paddle-wheels worked by men at a capstan. He had a
-triple vessel built, with wheels placed inside, on turning which the
-vessel was impelled forward. It will be observed that this was but a
-repetition of the old experiment of Blasco Garay at Barcelona, and of
-Savery on the Thames. The experiments were on the whole successful, but
-the power employed in propelling the vessel was felt to be defective, and
-the turning of the capstan was very hard work, at which men could not be
-brought to work continuously for any long period.
-
-[Illustration: MILLER’S TRIPLE VESSEL.]
-
-    [365] This interesting letter, so important as regards the
-      early history of the invention of the steamboat, appeared for
-      the first time in the supplementary volume to the ‘Official
-      Description and Illustrated Catalogue of the Great Exhibition
-      of 1851,’ to which it was contributed by Mr. W. C. Aitkin of
-      Birmingham.
-
-Mr. Miller, being curious as to all mechanical novelties, went, amongst
-others, to see Symington’s model locomotive; and in the course of
-conversation with the inventor informed him of his own project, describing
-the difficulty he had experienced in getting his paddles turned for
-lack of power. The immediate remark of Symington was, “Why don’t you
-use the steam-engine?” He proceeded to show how easily the engine
-might be connected with the wheels of the boat, using the model of the
-steam-carriage before him to explain his meaning. Mr. Miller appeared to
-have been struck by the suggestion, and in the pamphlet which he shortly
-after published describing his new vessel, he referred to the probable
-employment of steam-power for the purpose of driving the paddles. “I
-have reason to believe,” he said, “that the power of the steam-engine may
-be applied to work the wheels, so as to give them a quicker motion, and
-consequently to increase that of the ship. In the course of this summer,
-I intend to make the experiment; and the result, if favourable, shall be
-communicated to the public.”[366]
-
-    [366] ‘The Elevation, Section, Plans, and Views, of a Triple
-      Vessel, and of Wheels, with Explanations of the Figures in the
-      Engraving, and a short Account of the Properties and Advantages
-      of the Invention.’ By Patrick Miller, Esq., of Dalswinton,
-      Edinburgh, 1787.
-
-Mr. Miller subsequently contrived and constructed a double vessel, 60
-feet in length, worked by a paddle-wheel placed amidships between the
-two halves of the ship, with a clear waterway in the middle in which
-the paddle was worked, propelling the vessel. An experiment with this
-new ship was tried in June, 1787, which was considered successful. “The
-vessel being put in motion by the water-wheel, wrought by five men at
-the capstern, was steered so as to keep the wind right ahead, and her
-rate of going was found by the log to be three and a half miles in the
-hour.”[367] A sailing-match was arranged by Mr. Miller, in which he was
-to run his vessel from Inchcolm (a small island in the Frith of Forth) to
-Leith, against a Custom-house wherry which was reckoned a fast sailer.
-In this race the double vessel beat by a few minutes. A young man named
-James Taylor, who officiated in Mr. Miller’s family as tutor to his two
-younger sons, was on board the vessel, and took his turn in working the
-wheels, which he found to be “very severe exercise.” In consequence of
-this trial and its results, Taylor became persuaded that unless a more
-commanding power than that of men could be applied, the invention of the
-paddle-ship would prove of little use; and on turning the matter over in
-his mind, he suggested to Mr. Miller the use of the steam-engine. This,
-however, was no new idea, as, from what we have already stated, it is
-clear that it had already occurred to Symington, who had even contrived an
-engine for the express purpose of propelling ships. As Taylor was intimate
-with Symington, and a fellow-student with him at Edinburgh College in the
-session of 1786–7, it is probable that Taylor obtained from him his first
-idea of the application of the steam-engine to Mr. Miller’s paddle-boat.
-
-
-    [367] Mr. Miller’s statement to the Royal Society, 20th December,
-      1787.
-
-The result of Symington’s and Taylor’s suggestion was, that Mr. Miller
-resolved to make a further experiment; and he ordered a double boat to be
-built and fitted with a steam-engine for trial on Dalswinton Loch, near
-his country-seat in Dumfriesshire, in the course of the following summer.
-Symington prepared the plans of the engine, the castings of which were
-executed by George Watt, an Edinburgh founder; and when the parts were
-ready, Symington and Taylor went together to Wanlockhead, in the summer
-of 1788, to have the engine erected and placed in the boat in readiness
-for the proposed trial.
-
-In the mean time, other projects of a similar kind were afoot; and Boulton
-and Watt continued to be solicited from different quarters on the subject
-of engines for sailing ships. To these they continued to turn a deaf
-ear. They were willing to execute engines to order, but they declined to
-undertake them as speculations. Thus, in the spring of 1788, we find Sir
-John Dalrymple, one of the barons of the Court of Exchequer at Edinburgh,
-addressing Boulton on the subject of the proposed application of the
-steam-engine to the propulsion of ships, and the reply of the latter
-clearly shows what were then the views of the Soho firm on the subject:--
-
-  “SIR,--I have just received the honour of your letter of the 23rd
-  inst., by which I observe you are intent upon applying the power
-  of steam to the navigation of ships, boats, &c.
-
-  “It is one of the applications of our engine which Mr. Watt and
-  I have often talked of, but we were deterred from the prosecution
-  of it more from political than mechanical difficulties, as well as
-  from some prudential reasons; besides which, we thought we could
-  be more useful to the public and to ourselves by confining our
-  attention to such subjects as were within the limits of our own
-  powers and our own country. We still continue of that opinion, and
-  are persuaded that it would be folly in us (who have our hands and
-  heads full of solid and important business) to engage in any set
-  of new experiments, or, like Charles XII., go in quest of conquest
-  in foreign kingdoms, and leave our own to be conquered.
-
-  “If you or your friends want any of our steam-engines for any
-  purpose you may think proper to apply them to, we shall be very
-  glad to serve you upon the usual terms; although I must confess
-  that I should be sorry to see them applied to _one_ purpose which
-  perhaps may be of as much importance to this country some time or
-  other as Admiral Drake’s fire-ship was on a former emergency.
-
-  “I beg the favour of you not to consider me or Mr. Watt as
-  schemers or projectors, but as men who are following their regular
-  established trade and manufactures of great extent,--amongst
-  others that of steam-engines,--and engineers, in which capacity
-  we shall always be found attentive to your commands.”[368]
-
-    [368] Boulton to Sir John Dalrymple, 26th March, 1788. The “one
-      purpose” alluded to by Boulton is supposed to have been the
-      Torpedo, then a favourite scheme with French inventors for
-      blowing up English ships.
-
-Symington had many difficulties to encounter in erecting his engine at
-Leadhills. Though it was of very small size, being of only about two
-horses power, with a four-inch cylinder, it required as much skill to
-construct as a much larger engine would have done. The arrangement of
-the power was new, as well as the application; and, as in the case of
-every new machine, where unforeseen defects were brought to light, new
-expedients had to be contrived for the purpose of overcoming them. Mr.
-Miller became impatient for its completion, and repeatedly wrote from
-Edinburgh urging despatch, fearing lest some other projector should get
-the start of him in applying the steam-engine to the driving of ships.
-Taylor, who managed the corresponding part of the enterprise, replied,
-“You need be under very little apprehension as to any person getting
-before you in this. It is easy in conversation, but very different in
-execution. However, as such a circumstance would be equally unpleasant
-to us, to prevent it you may depend upon the greatest expedition being
-used.”[369]
-
-    [369] Taylor to Miller, 20th August, 1788. ‘Supplementary Vol. to
-      Official Description and Illustrated Catalogue of the Exhibition
-      of 1851,’ p. 1473.
-
-[Illustration: SYMINGTON’S FIRST STEAMBOAT ENGINE.]
-
-Taylor being further urged by his employer, again wrote from Leadhills
-on the 12th September, 1788,--“Mr. Symington and I are as busy here as we
-possibly can be. We work from six o’clock in the morning till dark in the
-evening, without losing a moment; also, to forward us the more, we have
-called in the aid of a watchmaker here, who works along with us. We are
-now in great forwardness, and will not be long of finishing. I could not
-ascertain to a day when it will happen, but believe we shall have it at
-Dalswinton some time before the end of the month.”[370]
-
-    [370] Taylor to Miller, 20th August, 1788. ‘Supplementary Vol. to
-      Official Description and Illustrated Catalogue of the Exhibition
-      of 1851,’ p. 1473.
-
-The engine was shortly after finished, mounted in a strong oak frame,
-and taken to Dalswinton. It was then placed on the deck of Mr. Miller’s
-double pleasure-boat, twenty-four feet long and seven broad, which had
-been prepared for its reception.
-
-[Illustration: MR. MILLER’S EXPERIMENTAL STEAMBOAT.]
-
-The engine was placed on one side of the boat, the boiler on the other
-side to balance it, and the paddle-wheels in the middle; the rotary
-motion being obtained from the engine by chains, ratchet-wheels, and
-catches. The first experiment was tried on the 14th of October, 1788, and
-proved successful, the engine being propelled at the rate of five miles
-an hour.[371] Among the persons present on the occasion, besides Miller,
-Symington, and Taylor, were Alexander Nasmyth, the landscape painter, and
-Robert Burns, the poet, then a tenant of Mr. Miller on the neighbouring
-farm of Ellisland. After a few further experiments the engine was taken
-out of the boat and carried into Mr. Miller’s house, where it remained
-for many years, and was eventually deposited in the Museum of Patents at
-Kensington, where it is now to be seen.
-
-    [371] The following contemporary account of the trial appeared
-      in the ‘Scots Magazine’ for November, 1788:--“On October 14th,
-      a boat was put in motion by a steam-engine upon Mr. Miller of
-      Dalswinton’s piece of water at that place. That gentleman’s
-      improvements in naval affairs are well known to the public.
-      For some time past his attention has been turned to the
-      application of the steam-engine to the purposes of navigation.
-      He has now accomplished, and evidently shown to the world, the
-      practicability of this, by executing it upon a small scale.
-      A vessel, 25 feet long and 7 broad, was, on the above date,
-      driven with two wheels by a small engine. It answered Mr.
-      Miller’s expectations fully, and afforded great pleasure to the
-      spectators. The success of this experiment is no small accession
-      to the public. Its utility in canals, and all inland navigation,
-      points it out to be of the greatest advantage, not only to this
-      island, but to many other nations of the world. The engine used
-      is Mr. Symington’s new patent engine.”
-
-The experiments made with this first steamboat were so satisfactory that
-Mr. Miller resolved to try one upon a larger scale. By this time Messrs.
-Allen and Stewart, of Leith, had built for him another double vessel,
-ninety feet in length; and he wrote to Symington, requesting his estimate
-of the cost of fitting it with a suitable steam-engine. Symington’s reply
-was to the effect that a proper-sized engine for such a vessel would, in
-his opinion, be about 250_l._, including the float-wheels. The necessary
-order was given, and Symington proceeded to the Carron Ironworks for the
-purpose of constructing it. The vessel arrived at Carron on the 24th June,
-and by the month of November following the engine was finished and put
-on board ready for trial.[372] The result was not so satisfactory as in
-the case of the experiment on Dalswinton Loch. The paddle-wheels were too
-weak; first one float and then another broke off; and the trial had to be
-suspended until the defects were remedied. The next trial was, however,
-more satisfactory. The vessel reached a speed of seven miles an hour;
-and this was repeated with the same result. There must, however, have
-been some defect in the engine performances; for, in a letter written by
-Miller to Taylor, who was present throughout, he expressed the opinion
-that Symington’s engine was altogether unsuitable for giving motion to a
-vessel.[373] He accordingly ordered the engine to be taken out and placed
-in the Carron Works, and the vessel itself to be laid up at Bruce Haven.
-
-
-    [372] From a memorandum found amongst Mr. Boulton’s papers,
-      we learn that the following were the details of Symington’s
-      engine:--“Engine hath two cylinders of 18 inches diameter each
-      and 2 feet stroke. The rods of each piston are connected to a
-      circular barrel of cast iron by means of chains, so that whilst
-      one piston moves down the other ascends, and so gives the barrel
-      a reciprocating motion. Upon the axis of the barrel is an arm
-      or lever which works the plug and working gear. Each of the
-      cylinders hath 2 pistons, one at top and the other at bottom;
-      the 2 bottom pistons have their rods moving in stuffing-boxes
-      and are connected together by a beam. The steam is admitted
-      into the cylinder at its side, between the 2 pistons, and moves
-      the one up and the other down; but the motion of the upper is
-      greater than the under. When the upper piston is got to the top
-      and the under one to the bottom, the steam valve is shut and the
-      exhaustion one opened; by which the steam is admitted into the
-      bottom of the cylinder, and is in its way met by a jet of cold
-      water, which condenses it, and then it is squeezed out by the
-      under piston, which in fact makes the bottom of the cylinder
-      an air-pump. Whilst this condensation is going forward in the
-      one cylinder, the steam is operating in the other, and _vice
-      versâ_.”
-
-    [373] “I am now satisfied,” he said, “that Mr. Symington’s
-      steam-engine is the most improper of all steam-engines for
-      giving motion to a vessel, and that he does not know how to
-      calculate frictions or mechanical powers. By means of a new
-      well-constructed valve-wheel, and the pinion being doubled in
-      diameter, I doubt not that the velocity of the vessel’s motion
-      will be increased; but, do as you will, a great deal of power
-      of the engine must be lost in friction. I remember well that
-      when the small engine was wrought in the boat at Dalswinton, I
-      had formed the same idea, and that I told you so; but not having
-      studied the subject, I gave up my own common sense. This is now
-      past remedy. As the engine cannot be of use to me now, I hope,
-      with the aid of Mr. Tibbets and Mr. Stainton, you will get it
-      sold before you leave Carron.”--Miller to Taylor, 7th December,
-      1789.
-
-Thus matters remained until the spring of the following year, when Mr.
-Miller decided on applying to Boulton and Watt for an engine of a proper
-construction, offering at the same time to associate them with him in his
-enterprise. The negotiation was opened by Robert, afterwards Lord Cullen,
-who addressed Watt on the subject; but his reply was not encouraging. Like
-his partner, Watt was averse to new speculations; and he had had too much
-anxiety and worry in connexion with his original enterprise to enter upon
-any new one. It will also be observed that he entertained doubts as to
-the eventual success of ocean navigation by steam. The following was his
-reply:--
-
-  “DEAR SIR,--We have heard of Mr. Miller’s ingenious experiments
-  on double ships from Sir John Dalrymple, and also some vague
-  accounts of the experiments with the steam-engine, from which we
-  could gather nothing conclusive, except that the vessel did move
-  with a considerable velocity.
-
-  “From what we heard of Mr. Symington’s engines, we were disposed
-  to consider them as attempts to evade our exclusive privilege; but
-  as we thought them so defective in mechanical contrivance as not
-  to be likely to do us immediate hurt, we thought it best to leave
-  them to be judged by Dame Nature first before we brought them to
-  any earthly court.
-
-  “We are much obliged to Mr. Miller for his favourable opinion of
-  us and of our engines, which we hope experience would more and
-  more justify. We are also fully sensible of his kind intentions
-  in offering to associate us with him in his scheme; but the time
-  of life we have both arrived at, and the multiplicity of business
-  we are at present engaged in, must plead our excuse for entering
-  into any new concern whatever as partners; but as engineers
-  and engine-makers we are ready to serve him to the best of our
-  abilities, at our customary prices, for rotative engines, and to
-  assist in anything we can do to bring the scheme to perfection.
-
-  “We conceive that there may be considerable difficulty in making
-  a steam-engine to work regularly in the open sea, on account of
-  the undulating motion of the vessel affecting the _vis inertiæ_
-  of the matter; however, this we should endeavour to obviate as
-  far as we could.
-
-  “It may not be improper to mention that Earl Stanhope has lately
-  taken a patent for moving a vessel by steam, but not by wheels.
-  His Lordship has also applied to us for engines; but we believe
-  we are not likely to agree with him, as he lays too much stress
-  upon his own ingenuity.
-
-  “We cannot conclude without observing, that were we disposed to
-  enter into any new concern whatever, there is no person we should
-  prefer to Mr. Miller as an associate, being fully apprised of his
-  worth and honour, and admirers of the ingenuity and industry with
-  which he has pursued this scheme.
-
-  “Permit me now, Sir, to return you my thanks for your obliging
-  attention to me, and for the trouble you have taken in this
-  affair, and to ask the favour of your presenting Boulton and
-  Watt’s respectful compliments to Mr. Miller.--I remain, dear Sir,
-  &c. &c.,
-                                                   “JAMES WATT.”[374]
-
-    [374] J. Watt to R. Cullen, 24th April, 1790, ‘Supplementary
-      Volume to Official Descriptive and Illustrated Catalogue of the
-      Exhibition of 1851,’ p. 1475.
-
-Mr. Miller proceeded no further with his experiments, on which he had
-already expended a large sum of money. He seems to have lost faith in the
-applicability of the steam-engine to the propulsion of ships, and reverted
-to his original idea, as we find him taking out a patent in 1796 for a
-new kind of flat-bottomed ship, which he proposed to impel during calms
-by means of wheels worked by capstans; but he makes no mention whatever
-of the use of the steam-engine.
-
-Symington was greatly disappointed with the result of his experiments.
-Being without the means of carrying the steamboat further, he feared that
-all his past labours would prove in vain, and that some more fortunate
-speculator would carry off the prize that seemed almost within his grasp.
-The subject was not, however, allowed to sleep. Fitch and Evans were
-pursuing the invention in America; Rumsey, another American, came over to
-England in 1788, with a scheme for propelling boats by steam; and Fourness
-and Earl Stanhope were making experiments in the same direction; but none
-of them had yet succeeded in constructing a practicable working steamboat.
-Thus ten more years passed, during which other inventors came forward,
-took out patents, made their trials, failed, and disappeared.
-
-In the year 1801 Symington had another chance. Lord Dundas, Governor of
-the Forth and Clyde Canal Company, had been revolving in his mind whether
-some more expeditious and economical method than horse-power might not be
-contrived for hauling the boats along the canal; and, being aware of the
-experiments made by Miller and Symington ten years before, he determined
-to give Symington’s engine another trial. A boat was accordingly built for
-the purpose of the experiment, and named the ‘Charlotte Dundas,’ after his
-Lordship’s daughter. For this vessel Symington contrived a steam-engine
-of a greatly improved character. It was a direct-acting engine, the steam
-acting on each side of the piston, after the method invented by Watt,
-whose patent had now expired; the rotary motion of the paddle-wheels being
-secured by means of a connecting-rod and crank, instead of by chains and
-ratchet-wheels, as in the first two boats.
-
-[Illustration: MACHINERY OF THE ‘CHARLOTTE DUNDAS.’]
-
-The first trial of the vessel was perfectly satisfactory. After making a
-trip to Glasgow, she was employed in towing vessels along the canal. She
-was also occasionally sent down the Frith to bring up ships detained by
-contrary winds to the canal entrance at Grangemouth.[375]
-
-    [375] One day in March, 1802, on the occasion of a strong west
-      wind blowing, when the canal-boats could with difficulty be
-      moved to windward, the steamer took in tow two laden sloops, the
-      ‘Active’ and ‘Euphemia,’ of seventy tons each, from Lock 20 to
-      Port Dundas, Glasgow, a distance of 19½ miles, in six hours.
-
-Fortune at length seemed to smile on poor Symington, and his spirits were
-proportionately elated at the result of these important experiments. He
-had, in fact, achieved a decided success in the ‘Charlotte Dundas,’--in
-which he combined together, for the first time, those improvements which
-constitute the present system of Steam Navigation. Indeed Mr. Woodcroft,
-a competent judge, says that “the vessel might, from the simplicity of
-its machinery, have been at work at this day with such ordinary repairs
-as are now occasionally required to all steamboats.”[376]
-
-    [376] ‘A sketch of the Origin and Progress of Steam Navigation.’
-      By Bennet Woodcroft. London, 1848.
-
-Lord Dundas was so well satisfied with the performances of the vessel
-that he proposed to introduce the inventor to the Duke of Bridgewater,
-the great canal proprietor, who had expressed to him his wish to employ
-some method of hauling his boats more effective than horse-power. His
-Lordship accordingly directed Symington to have a model of his steamboat
-constructed for the purpose of showing it to the Duke. Symington went
-up to London himself to explain its mechanical arrangements, and the
-Duke was so much pleased with it that he ordered eight boats of the same
-construction to be made as speedily as possible for use upon his canal.
-Symington returned to Scotland to proceed with the execution of this
-important order.
-
-But in the moment of his apparent triumph fate again proved hostile to the
-inventor. Though Lord Dundas was fully satisfied with the performances of
-the ‘Charlotte Dundas,’ and hailed the use of steam as the beginning of
-a new era in navigation, the proprietors of the canal became seriously
-alarmed lest the banks should be washed away by the waves which the
-steamboat raised in its wake, and they came to the resolution of
-prohibiting all further experiments. To add to Symington’s vexation, the
-very same day on which this adverse decision of the canal managers reached
-him, he received intelligence of the death of the Duke of Bridgewater,
-and an order to suspend the erection of the eight steamboats until fresh
-instructions had been given. By this time Lord Dundas had expended about
-7000_l._ on his experiments, and was not disposed to proceed any further
-with them. The ‘Charlotte Dundas,’ the first successful steamboat, was
-accordingly laid up at Bainsford, in a creek of the canal; and the attempt
-to introduce steam navigation on canals was from that time suspended.[377]
-
-
-    [377] Symington continued to struggle for many years under the
-      burden of debt which he had incurred by his experiments; and
-      though a sum of 100_l._ was granted him from the Privy Purse
-      in 1824, and 50_l._ a year or two afterwards, he remained in
-      a state of poverty during the rest of his life. He died on
-      the 22nd March, 1831, and was buried in the churchyard of St.
-      Botolph, Aldgate, London.
-
-Symington’s experiments, though they proved most unfortunate as respected
-himself, nevertheless led to the adoption of the system of navigation by
-steam both in America and Scotland. Among the many visitors who inspected
-the ‘Charlotte Dundas’ were Fulton the American artist, and Andrew Bell
-the engineer, of Glasgow. Fulton was on board the first vessel in the
-month of July, 1801, when she made a run of eight miles on the Forth
-and Clyde Canal in an hour and twenty minutes; on which occasion he
-narrowly inquired into the action of the engine and paddle-wheels, and
-made careful sketches of the vessel and her machinery.[378] Andrew Bell
-also made frequent visits to the ‘Charlotte Dundas,’ as well as to the
-pattern shop where the models of the machinery were kept; and there is
-little doubt that, like Fulton, he obtained his ideas of steam navigation
-principally from what Symington had accomplished. Fulton and Bell were
-well acquainted with each other,[379] and kept up a correspondence on the
-subject of steamboats. Bell, according to his own account, supplied Fulton
-with information and drawings of steamboat machinery; and it was by his
-recommendation that Fulton ordered the engine for his first successful
-steamboat from Boulton and Watt.
-
-    [378] The following deposition was made on oath by Robert Weir of
-      Kincardine, before Robert Dundas J. P. for the county of Perth,
-      at Blair Castle, on the 23rd October, 1824:--“That, in the
-      year 1801, he remembers of Mr. Symington erecting a boat, and
-      fitting a steam-engine into it, and dragging two vessels along
-      the Forth and Clyde Canal by means of the said steamboat. That
-      the deponent was employed as engine-fireman on board of the said
-      boat. Deposes that the following persons, now living, were also
-      on board, viz., Alexander Hart and John Allen, ship-builders,
-      Grangemouth, and John Esplin and William Gow, shipmasters there.
-      That some time after the first experiment, while the boat was
-      lying upon the canal at Lock 16, it was visited by a stranger,
-      who requested to see the boat worked. That the said William
-      Symington desired the deponent to light the furnace, which was
-      done, and the stranger was carried about four miles along the
-      canal, and brought back. That this stranger made inquiries both
-      as to the mode of constructing and of working the boat, and
-      took notes of the information given him by the said William
-      Symington. That the deponent heard the stranger say his name
-      was Fulton, and that he was a native of the United States of
-      America. That the deponent remembers Mr. Symington remarking
-      that the progress of the boat was much impeded by the narrowness
-      of the canal, to which Mr. Fulton answered that the objection
-      would not apply to the large rivers of North America, where he
-      thought the boat might be used to great advantage.”--From copies
-      of affidavits in the ‘Biography of William Symington.’ By J.
-      and W. R. Rankin, Engineers, Falkirk, 1862.
-
-    [379] In one of his letters, Bell says--“Fulton came at different
-      times to the country and stopped with me for some time.”--‘Life
-      of Henry Bell,’ p. 74.
-
-With the information obtained at Grangemouth, Fulton proceeded to Paris,
-where we shortly find him in communication with Mr. Livingstone, the
-United States’ envoy, who, like Fulton, took much interest in the subject
-of steam navigation. They had a model steamboat built for trial on the
-Seine; but when on the point of making the first experiment, the weight
-of the machinery broke the boat in two, and the whole went down together.
-Fulton’s greatest difficulty, as was to be expected, consisted in finding
-a suitable engine to propel his proposed boat, and he wrote to his friends
-in England on the subject. In March, 1802, we find him addressing Dr.
-Cartwright, who had invented an improvement in the steam-engine, which
-he thought would render it more suitable for driving vessels, requesting
-to be informed of the cost of one of six horse power, with particulars
-of its size and weight. Fulton communicated to his correspondent that,
-besides his proposed steamboat, he was experimenting on his ‘Nautilus’
-or diving-boat for navigating under water; the object of this invention
-being to blow up the English ships of war which were then blockading the
-French ports. The experiments with the ‘Nautilus’ under water were said
-to have proved tolerably successful, though it had not yet succeeded in
-blowing up any of the English ships.
-
-Not being able to obtain any satisfactory information from Dr. Cartwright,
-Fulton addressed a letter to James Watt, jun., of Soho, requesting to
-be informed of the price of a light and compact engine for his proposed
-vessel. “The object of my investigation,” he said, “is to find whether
-it is possible to apply the engine to working boats up our long rivers
-in America. The persons who have made such attempts have commenced by
-what they call improving Watt’s engine, but without having an idea of the
-physics which lie hid in it from common observers; but such improvements
-have appeared to me like the improvements of the preceptor of Alcibiades,
-who corrected Homer for the use of his scholars. Their ill success, and
-their never having found a good mode of taking a purchase in the water,
-are the reasons why they have all failed. Having, during the course of my
-experiments on submersive navigation, found an excellent mode of taking
-a purchase on the water, I wish to apply the engine to the movement.
-The only thing wanting is to arrange the engine as light and compact as
-possible.”[380]
-
-    [380] Cited in Muirhead’s ‘Life of James Watt,’ 2nd ed. p. 426.
-
-The information asked for was duly communicated to Fulton, and a few
-months later he sent Boulton and Watt the drawings of parts of an
-engine which he requested them to make for him. By this time the rumour
-had gone abroad of the destructive powers of the ‘Nautilus,’ and Lord
-Stanhope publicly called attention to the subject in the House of Lords,
-representing the dangerous character of the invention. On Fulton’s order
-reaching Soho, Boulton suspected that it might really be intended for the
-‘Nautilus,’ and he at once communicated with Government on the subject.
-To Lord Hawkesbury he wrote,--
-
-  “I presume your Lordship is not unacquainted with the name of
-  Fulton. I mean Fulton the engineer and pretended inventor of an
-  infernal machine for destroying the British Navy. He is the same
-  person whom Lord Stanhope alluded to in some of his speeches in
-  the House of Peers.
-
-  “I never had any transaction or acquaintance with him. However,
-  he has written to my house (Boulton and Watt) from Paris, and
-  has transmitted drawings of sundry parts of a steam-engine. The
-  remainder, he says, is to be executed under his own directions,
-  and though he orders them to be shipped for America, it is not
-  impossible but they may be transhipped before they reach there.
-
-  “The drawings and letter were delivered to my house in
-  London-street by a Mr. Barlow; and as he refers to Sir Francis
-  Baring for payment, I directed my agent (Mr. John Woodward) to
-  call upon Sir Francis, and in consequence thereof he wrote to my
-  house a letter, of which I enclose a correct copy as well as of
-  Mr. Fulton’s.
-
-  “Whatever doubts we may have of his project, we have none
-  respecting the propriety of acquainting your Lordship with every
-  particular as to this matter that has come to our knowledge.”[381]
-
-Boulton concluded by requesting instructions how to act; but all necessity
-for further caution was shortly after removed by Fulton coming over to
-England and imparting his secret to the British Government. An old Danish
-brig was placed at his disposal in Walmer Roads, and after two days’
-effort, during which he was assisted by Sir Home Popham, he eventually
-succeeded in blowing up the vessel; but he accomplished his purpose with
-so much difficulty, that from that time no further fears were entertained
-of the much dreaded ‘Nautilus.’
-
-    [381] Boulton to Lord Hawkesbury, 22nd August, 1803. Boulton MSS.
-
-In the following year the steam-engine ordered by Fulton for his proposed
-boat was proceeded with at Soho. It was of about nineteen horse power.
-The cylinder was 24 inches in diameter, and the stroke four feet. The
-dimensions were as nearly as possible the same as those of Symington’s
-‘Charlotte Dundas’ engine; and Mr. Woodcroft pertinently remarks that
-“such similarity in the dimensions cannot easily be imagined to have been
-accidental.” The engine, when finished, was sent to America early in
-1805. She was there fitted on board the vessel which had been prepared
-for her reception; and the first voyage of Fulton and Livingstone’s
-‘Clermont’ was made in August, 1807, when a speed of nearly four miles
-an hour was attained. This was the first vessel that ran regularly for
-commercial purposes and for the benefit of her owners; and though Fulton
-neither invented the ship, nor the engine by which she was driven,
-nor the combination of the two, he was entitled to every merit for the
-perseverance and ability with which he carried his important enterprise
-to a successful issue.
-
-A few years later Henry Bell, in like manner, introduced steam navigation
-on the Clyde. He had at an early period pressed the subject on the
-consideration of the Government, but failed to induce them to take up
-the scheme.[382] He then resolved himself to start a steamboat, as the
-best and most practical method of exhibiting its powers; and the ‘Comet,’
-of thirty tons burthen, was built to his order by Messrs. John Wood
-and Company, of Port Glasgow. The vessel began to ply regularly between
-Glasgow and Greenock in August, 1812;[383] and before long Clyde steamers
-were known all over the world.
-
-    [382] It is stated in the ‘Life of Henry Bell,’ that he applied
-      to Mr. Watt in the year 1801, for his advice as to a suitable
-      engine for a steamboat; but Watt gave him no encouragement
-      to proceed with his design. “How many noblemen, gentlemen,
-      and engineers,” he wrote to Bell, “have puzzled their brains,
-      and spent their thousands of pounds, and none of these,
-      nor yourself, have been able to bring the power of steam in
-      navigation to a successful issue.”--‘Life of Bell.’ By E.
-      Morris, Glasgow, 1844, p. 30.
-
-    [383] The starting of the ‘Comet’ naturally excited great interest
-      along the Clyde. In the evenings, thousands of spectators lined
-      the banks as far as Govan to see her pass up from Greenock. The
-      masters of the old sailing craft, however, regarded the ‘Comet’
-      with apprehension and dismay. The old Highland gabert men were
-      especially hostile, denouncing the new vessel as being impelled
-      by the “teevil’s wun” (devil’s wind). The story is told of
-      the steamer one day coming up with a fly boat tacking against
-      the tide, when the crew began to jeer the skipper of the fly,
-      calling upon him to come along with his lazy craft. “Get oot o’
-      my sight,” he cried, in reply, “I’m just gaun as it pleases the
-      breath o’ the Almichty, and I’ll ne’er fash my thumb how fast
-      ye gang wi’ your blasted deevil’s reek.”
-
-[Illustration: THE ‘COMET’ PASSING DUMBARTON.
-
-[By R. P. Leitch.]]
-
-It will thus be observed how very gradual has been the invention of the
-steamboat. It has been made step by step, by many men living in many
-ages. First, we have Blasco Garay making experiments with paddle-wheels
-in the harbour of Barcelona three hundred years ago, the revival probably
-of some old and half-forgotten method of propelling ships; then the
-repetition of the experiment by Prince Rupert and Savery in the Thames
-more than a hundred and fifty years later; next Savery’s invention of
-his steam-engine, followed by Papin’s idea of combining the engine
-with the paddles, and his construction of a model to illustrate its
-practicability. Later, we have Jonathan Hulls’s patent for his steamboat,
-in which the engine was worked by atmospheric pressure, followed by
-numerous experiments with a like object, in England, France, and America.
-The invention of the condensing engine of Watt, and its application
-to rotary motions, was the next great step. Miller’s revival of the
-experiments with paddle-wheels led to the application by Symington of
-Papin’s idea of combining the steam-engine with the paddles, which he at
-length successfully worked out in the ‘Charlotte Dundas.’ And finally the
-invention was applied to practical purposes by Fulton and Livingstone in
-America, and by Bell in Scotland.
-
-And thus became established, in the eloquent words of George Canning, “the
-new and mighty power, new at least in the application of its might, which
-walks the waters like a giant rejoicing in its course, stemming alike the
-tempest and the tide, accelerating intercourse, shortening distances,
-creating, as it were, unexpected neighbourhoods, and new combinations
-of social and commercial relations, and giving to the fickleness of
-winds and the faithlessness of waves the certainty and steadiness of
-a highway upon the land.” But it is a noteworthy fact, that it was not
-until the invention of James Watt was applied to the purposes of steam
-navigation that its practicability was established and its success
-secured. Until then, all the experiments which had been made were regarded
-as comparatively fruitless, though they were leading step by step to
-the great result; and to this day the engines constructed after Watt’s
-principle continue to be the great motive power alike of river and ocean
-navigation.
-
-
-
-
-[Illustration: WATT’S HOUSE, HEATHFIELD.
-
-[By Percival Skelton.]]
-
-CHAPTER XXII.
-
-DECLINING YEARS OF BOULTON AND WATT--BEREAVEMENTS--GREGORY WATT--DEATH OF
-BOULTON.
-
-
-On the dissolution of the original partnership between Boulton and Watt at
-the expiry of the patent in 1800, Boulton was seventy-two years old, and
-Watt sixty-four. The great work of their life had been done, and the time
-was approaching when they must needs resign into other hands the great
-branches of industry which they had created. Watt, though the younger of
-the two, was the first to withdraw from an active share in the concerns
-of Soho. He could scarcely be said to taste the happiness of life until
-he had cast business altogether behind him.
-
-It was far different with Boulton, to whom active occupation had become
-a second nature. For several years, indeed, his constitution had been
-showing signs of giving way, and nature was repeating her warnings,
-at shorter recurring intervals, that it was time to retire. But in the
-case of men such as Boulton, with whom business has become a habit and
-necessity, as well as a pleasure and recreation, to retire is often
-to die. He himself was accustomed to say that he must either “rub or
-rust;” and as the latter was contrary to his nature, he rubbed on to the
-end, continuing to take an active interest in the working of the great
-manufactory which it had been the ambition of his life to build up.
-
-The department of business that most interested him in his later years was
-the coinage. His chief pleasure consisted in seeing his new and beautiful
-pieces following each other in quick succession from the Soho Mint. Nor
-did he cease occupying himself with new inventions; for we find him as
-late as 1797 taking out a patent for raising water by impulse, somewhat
-after the manner of Montgolier’s Hydraulic Ram, to which he added many
-ingenious improvements. His house at Soho continued to be the resort of
-distinguished visitors; and his splendid hospitality never failed. But,
-as years advanced and his infirmities increased, we find him occasionally
-expressing a desire for quiet. He would then retire to Cheltenham for the
-benefit of the waters, requesting his young partners to keep him advised
-from time to time of the proceedings at Soho. Thus we find young Watt
-writing him during his absence on one occasion,--“Everything is going on
-well here: the Mint works six presses at present with ease; but, unless
-you have secured a supply of copper, I fear they will soon work out the
-present stock.” In the same letter his young friend advised him that he
-had duly despatched the chemical apparatus; for even at Cheltenham Boulton
-could not be idle, but undertook a careful analysis of all the waters
-of the place, the results of which he entered, in minute detail, in his
-memorandum-books.
-
-An alarming incident occurred at Soho towards the end of 1800, which is
-worthy of passing notice, as illustrative of Boultons vigour and courage
-even at this advanced period of his life. A large gang of Birmingham
-housebreakers, knowing the treasures accumulated in the silver-plate
-house, determined to break into it and carry off the silver, as well as
-the large sum of money usually accumulated in the counting-house for the
-purpose of paying the wages of the workmen, upwards of 600 in number, on
-Christmas Eve. They had provided false keys for most of the doors, and
-bribed the watchman, who communicated the plot to Boulton, to admit them
-within the gates. He took his steps accordingly, arming a number of men,
-and stationing them in different parts of the building.
-
-The robbers made the attempt on three several occasions. On the first
-night they tried their keys on the counting-house door, but failed to
-open it, on which they shut their dark lantern and retired. Boulton sent
-an account of the proceedings each night to his daughter in London. On
-the first attempt being made, he wrote,--“The best news I can send you is
-that we are all alive; but I have lost my voice and found a troublesome
-cough by the agreeable employment of thief-watching.” Two nights after,
-the burglars came again, with altered keys, but still they could not open
-the counting-house door. The third night they determined to waive art, and
-break in by force. They were allowed to break in and seize their booty,
-and were making off with 150 guineas and a load of silver, when Boulton
-gave the word to seize them. A quantity of tow soaked with turpentine was
-instantly set fire to, numerous lights were turned on, and the robbers
-found themselves surrounded on all sides by armed men. Four of them were
-taken after a desperate struggle; but the fifth, though severely wounded,
-contrived to escape over the tops of the houses in Brook-row.
-
-Writing to his friend Dumergue, in London, of the exploit, Boulton
-said,--“You know I seldom do things by halves; so I have sent the four
-desperate wolves to Stafford Gaol, and I believe the fifth is much
-wounded. If I had made my attack with a less powerful army than I did,
-we should probably have had a greater list of killed and wounded.”[384]
-It was in allusion to this exploit that Sir Walter Scott said of Boulton
-to Allan Cunningham, “I like Boulton; he is a brave man, and who can
-dislike the brave?”[385] The incident, when communicated to Scott
-during one of his visits to Soho, is said to have suggested the scene
-in ‘Guy Mannering,’ in which the attack is made on Dirk Hatterick in the
-smuggler’s cave.
-
-    [384] Boulton to Dumergue, 25th December, 1800.
-
-    [385] Lockhart’s ‘Life of Scott.’ 8vo. ed. p. 457. One of Scott’s
-      visits to Soho was made in company with his wife in the spring
-      of 1803. Boulton was so pleased with the visit, that he urged
-      Scott, or at least his wife, to repeat it, which produced the
-      following letter, dated London, 13th May, 1803:--
-
-        “My dear Sir,--He was a wise man who said ‘Trust not thy
-        wife with a man of fair tongue.’ Now as I have very little
-        wisdom of my own, I am content to gather all I can get
-        at second hand, and therefore, upon the faith of the sage
-        whom I have quoted, I should be guilty of great imprudence
-        were I to permit Charlotte to wait upon you on her return,
-        or even to answer your kind letter to Mr. Dumergue. That
-        task I therefore take upon myself, and you must receive my
-        thanks along with hers, for your very kind and flattering
-        invitation to Soho. But independent of my just suspicion
-        of a beau who writes such flattering love-letters to my
-        wife, our time here (owing to the sitting of our Courts
-        of Justice, which I must necessarily attend), lays us
-        under an indispensable necessity of returning to Scotland
-        as speedily as possible, and by the nearest road. We
-        can therefore only express our joint and most sincere
-        regret that we cannot upon this occasion have the honour
-        and satisfaction of visiting Soho and its hospitable
-        inhabitants. Mrs. Nicolson, Mr. and Miss Dumergue join
-        Charlotte and me in the most sincere good wishes to Miss
-        Boulton, to you, and to all your friends; and I suspect
-        so foolish a letter will make you believe you have escaped
-        a very idle visitor in,
-
-                                                         “Dear Sir,
-                                       “Your very faithful servant,
-                                                    “WALTER SCOTT.”
-
-With Watt, occupation in business was not the necessity that it was to
-Boulton; and he was only too glad to get rid of it and engage in those
-quiet pursuits in which he found most pleasure. In the year 1790, he
-removed from the house he had so long occupied on Harper’s Hill, to a
-new and comfortable house which he had built for himself at Heathfield
-in the parish of Handsworth, where he continued to live until the close
-of his life. The land surrounding the place was, until then, common, and
-he continued to purchase the lots as they were offered for sale, until,
-by the year 1794, he had enclosed about forty acres. He took pleasure in
-laying out the grounds, planting many of the trees with his own hands;
-and in course of time, as the trees reached maturity, the formerly barren
-heath became converted into a retreat of great rural beauty.
-
-Annexed to the house, in the back yard, he built a forge, and upstairs,
-in his “Garret,” he fitted up a workshop, in which he continued to pursue
-his mechanical studies and experiments for many years. While Watt was
-settling himself for the remainder of his life in the house at Heathfield,
-Boulton was erecting his large new Mint at Soho, which was completed and
-ready for use in 1791.
-
-When the lawsuits, which had given Watt so much anxiety, were
-satisfactorily disposed of, an immense load was removed from his mind;
-and he indulged in the anticipation of at last enjoying the fruits of
-his labour in peace. Being of frugal habits, he had already begun to save
-money, and indeed accumulated as much as he desired. But when the heavy
-arrears of Cornish dues were collected, about the period of expiry of the
-patent, a considerable sum of money necessarily fell to Watt’s share; and
-then he began to occupy himself in the pleasant recreation of looking out
-for an investment of it in land. He was, however, hard to please, and made
-many journeys before he succeeded in buying his estate.
-
-  “I have yet met with nothing to my mind,” he wrote from Somerton;
-  “Lord Oxford has some very considerable estates to sell near
-  Abergavenny, but the roads to them are execrable, and it seemed
-  that it would be a sort of banishment to live at them, though the
-  parts I saw are in themselves pleasant. I am to-day informed of
-  one with a house near Dorchester, which I have sent to inquire
-  about, though I have my doubts that it will prove like the rest.
-  I propose, if nothing hinders, to be at Taunton to-morrow night,
-  and shall then visit the Wedgwoods, who at present live at Upcot,
-  near that place. Afterwards, I propose making a tour through the
-  eastern part of Devonshire, and returning by Dorsetshire to Bath;
-  but my resolves may be altered by the attractions of various
-  magnets, so that I cannot tell you where to write to me till I
-  get some fixed residence.”[386]
-
-A fortnight later he was at Exmouth, but still undecided.
-
-  “In respect to estates,” he writes,--“I have seen nothing
-  that pleases me. Most of them, as you know by experience, are
-  surrounded with bad roads, beggarly villages, or some other
-  nuisance, and one need not purchase plagues. On the whole,
-  something nearer home seems more suitable to me than anything in
-  these western counties, which, though they have more luxuriant
-  vegetation, and perhaps a milder climate, are not exempt from
-  cold, as I experience here colder weather than we had last autumn
-  in Scotland. But the greatest drawback is the absence of such
-  society as one is used to, and their abominably hilly roads, as
-  they never flinch, but go straight up any hill which comes in
-  their way, and Nature has bestowed plenty upon them.”[387]
-
-Eventually Watt made several purchases of land at Doldowlod, on the hanks
-of the Wye, between Rhayader and Newbridge, in Radnorshire. There was a
-pleasant farmhouse on the property, in which he occasionally spent some
-pleasant months in summer time amidst beautiful scenery; but he had by
-this time grown too old to root himself kindly in a new place; and his
-affections speedily drew him back again to the neighbourhood of Soho, and
-to his comfortable home at Heathfield.
-
-    [386] Watt to M. Robinson Boulton, 9th September, 1799.
-
-    [387] Watt to M. Robinson Boulton, 26th September, 1799.
-
-During the short peace of Amiens in the following year, he made the
-longest journey in his life. Accompanied by Mrs. Watt, he travelled
-through Belgium, up the banks of the Rhine to Frankfort, and home by
-Strasburg and Paris. While absent, Boulton wrote him many pleasant
-letters, telling him of what was going on at Soho. The brave old man was
-still at the helm there, and wrote in as enthusiastic terms as ever of the
-coins and medals he was striking at his Mint. Though strong in mind, he
-was, however, growing feebler in body, and suffered much from attacks of
-his old disease. “It is necessary for me,” he wrote, “to pass a great part
-of my time in or upon the bed; nevertheless, I go down to the manufactory
-or the Mint once or twice a day, without injuring myself as heretofore,
-but not without some fatigue. However, as I am now taking bark twice a
-day, I find a daily increase of strength, and flatter myself with the
-pleasure of taking a journey to Paris in April or May next.”[388]
-
-    [388] Boulton to Watt, 10th October, 1802. One of Boulton’s
-      objects in making his contemplated journey to Paris, was to
-      undertake the erection of coining machinery for the French
-      Government, who were about to recoin the whole of their gold,
-      silver, and copper money. With their imperfect machinery,
-      he calculated that it would take them nearly twenty years
-      to accomplish this; whereas with his new machinery he could
-      undertake to turn out a thousand million of pieces in three
-      years. He communicated to Watt, that he had been making
-      experiments as to the maximum speed of his coining machines,
-      worked by the steam-engine, and found that he could regularly
-      strike fifty-three of his copper pieces or fifty-six English
-      crown-pieces per minute, while he could with one press in
-      collars also regularly strike India copper pieces of half the
-      diameter at the rate of 106 to 112 per minute, or from 6360 to
-      6720 pieces per hour; but when pieces of half an inch diameter
-      were wanted he had recourse to his new small press, with which
-      he could strike from 150 to 200 pieces per minute! “My presses,”
-      said he, “are far more exact and more durable, and my means of
-      working them are now infinitely beyond anything they (the French
-      coiners) have ever thought of, and my mint is now in far better
-      order than ever.”
-
-On Watt’s arrival in London, a letter of hearty welcome from Boulton met
-him; but it conveyed, at the same time, the sad intelligence of the death
-of Mrs. Keir, a lady beloved by all who knew her, and a frequent inmate at
-Soho and Heathfield. One by one the members of the circle were departing,
-leaving wide gaps, which new friends could never fill up. The pleasant
-associations which are the charm of old friendships, were becoming mingled
-with sadness and regret. The grave was closing over one after another of
-the Soho group; and the survivors were beginning to live for the most part
-upon the memories of the past. But it is one of the penalties of old age
-to suffer a continuous succession of such bereavements; and that state
-would be intolerable but for the comparative deadening of the feelings
-which mercifully accompanies the advance of years. “We cannot help feeling
-with deep regret,” wrote Watt, “the circle of our old friends gradually
-diminishing, while our ability to increase it by new ones is equally
-diminished; but perhaps it is a wise dispensation of Providence so to
-diminish our enjoyments in this world that when our turn comes we may
-leave it without regret.”[389]
-
-    [389] Watt to Boulton, 23rd November, 1802.
-
-One of the deaths most lamented by Watt was that of Dr. Black of
-Edinburgh, which occurred in 1799. Black had watched to the last with
-tender interest the advancing reputation and prosperity of his early
-protégé. They had kept up a continuous and confidential correspondence
-on subjects of mutual interest for a period of about thirty years.
-Watt, though reserved to others, never feared unbosoming himself to his
-old friend, telling him of the new schemes he had on foot, and freely
-imparting to him his hopes and fears, his failures and successes. When
-Watt visited Scotland he rarely failed to take Edinburgh on his way, for
-the purpose of spending a few days with Black and Robison. The latter
-went express to London, for the purpose of giving evidence in the suit
-of Watt against the Hornblowers, and his testimony proved of essential
-service. “Our friend Robison,” Watt wrote to Black, “exerted himself
-much; and, considering his situation, did wonders.” When Robison returned
-to Edinburgh, his Natural Philosophy class received him with three
-cheers. He proceeded to give them a short account of the trial, which he
-characterised as “not more the cause of Watt _versus_ Hornblower, than of
-science against ignorance.” “When I had finished,” said he, “I got another
-plaudit, that Mrs. Siddons would have relished.”[390]
-
-    [390] Robison to Watt, 3rd February, 1797.
-
-No one was more gratified at the issue of the trial than Dr. Black,
-who, when Robison told him of it, was moved even to tears. “It’s very
-foolish,” he said, “but I can’t help it when I hear of anything good to
-Jamie Watt.” The Doctor had long been in declining health, but was still
-able to work. He was busy writing another large volume, and had engaged
-the engraver to come to him for orders on the day after that on which he
-died. His departure was singularly peaceful. His servant had delivered to
-him a basin of milk, which was to serve for his dinner, and retired from
-the room. In less than a minute he returned, and found his master sitting
-where he had left him, but dead, with the basin of milk unspilled in his
-hand. Without a struggle, the spirit had fled. As the servant expressed
-it, “his poor master had given over living.” He had twice before said to
-his doctor that “he had caught himself forgetting to breathe.” On hearing
-of the good old man’s death, Watt wrote to Robison,--“I may say that
-to him I owe, in a great measure, what I am; he taught me to reason and
-experiment in natural philosophy, and was a true friend and philosopher,
-whose loss will always be lamented while I live. We may all pray that our
-latter end may be like his; he has truly gone to sleep in the arms of his
-Creator, and been spared all the regrets attendant on a more lingering
-exit. I could dwell longer on this subject; but regrets are unavailing,
-and only tend to enfeeble our own minds, and make them less able to bear
-the ills we cannot avoid. Let us cherish the friends we have left, and do
-as much good as we can in our day!”[391]
-
-Lord Cockburn, in his ‘Memorials,’ gives the following graphic portrait of
-the father of modern chemistry:--“Dr. Black was a striking and beautiful
-person; tall, very thin, and cadaverously pale; his hair carefully
-powdered, though there was little of it except what was collected into a
-long thin queue; his eyes dark, clear, and large, like deep pools of pure
-water. He wore black speckless clothes, silk stockings, silver buckles,
-and either a slim green silk umbrella, or a genteel brown cane. His
-general frame and air was feeble and slender. The wildest boy respected
-Black. No lad could be irreverent towards a man so pale, so gentle, so
-elegant, and so illustrious. So he glided, like a spirit, through our
-rather mischievous sportiveness, unharmed.”[392]
-
-    [391] Cited in Muirhead’s ‘Origin and Progress of the Mechanical
-      Inventions of James Watt,’ ii. 264
-
-    [392] Lord Cockburn’s ‘Memorials,’ 51.
-
-Of the famous Lunar Society, Boulton and Watt now remained almost the
-only surviving members. Day was killed by a fall from his horse in
-1789. Josiah Wedgwood closed his noble career at Etruria in 1795, in the
-sixty-fifth year of his age. Dr. Withering, distinguished alike in botany
-and medicine, died in 1799, of a lingering consumption. Dr. Darwin was
-seized by his last attack of angina pectoris in 1802, and, being unable
-to bleed himself, as he had done before, he called upon his daughter to
-apply the lancet to his arm; but, before she could do so, he fell back
-in his chair and expired. Dr. Priestley, driven forth into exile,[393]
-closed his long and illustrious career at Northumberland in Pennsylvania
-in 1803. The Lunar Society was thus all but extinguished by death; the
-vacant seats remained unfilled; and the meetings were no longer held.
-
-    [393] It is a remarkable fact that Dr. Priestley was regarded with
-      as much suspicion in America as he had been in England. The
-      American government looked upon him as a spy in the interest
-      of France; and he had great difficulty in forming a Unitarian
-      congregation. The horror of the French Revolution, which had
-      extended to America, was the cause of the hostile feeling
-      displayed towards him. “The change that has taken place,” he
-      said, in a letter dated 6th September, 1798, “is indeed hardly
-      credible, as I have done nothing to provoke resentment; but,
-      being a citizen of France, and a friend to the Revolution,
-      is sufficient. I asked one of the more moderate of the party
-      whether he thought, if Dr. Price, the great friend of their own
-      Revolution, were alive, he would now be allowed to come into
-      this country. He said, he believed he would not!”--In 1801 Dr.
-      Priestley, by deed of trust, appointed Matthew Boulton, Samuel
-      Galton, and Wm. Vaughan, Esqrs., trustees for Mrs. Finch (his
-      daughter) and her children, in respect of 1200_l._ invested for
-      their benefit in public securities.
-
-But the bereavements which Watt naturally felt the most, were the deaths
-of his own children. He had two by his second wife, a son and a daughter,
-both full of promise, who had nearly grown up to adult age, when they
-died. Jessie was of a fragile constitution from her childhood, but her
-health seemed to become re-established as she grew in years. But before
-she had entered womanhood, the symptoms of an old pulmonary affection made
-their appearance, and she was carried off by consumption. Mr. Watt was
-much distressed by the event, confessing that he felt as if one of the
-strongest ties that bound him to life was broken, and that the acquisition
-of riches availed him nothing when unable to give them to those he loved.
-In a letter to a friend, he thus touchingly alluded to one of the most
-sorrowful associations connected with the deaths of children:--“Mrs. Watt
-continues to be much affected whenever anything recalls to her mind the
-amiable child we have parted with; and these remembrances occur but too
-frequently,--her little works of ingenuity, her books and other objects
-of study, serve as mementoes of her who was always to the best of her
-power usefully employed even to the last day of her life. With me, whom
-age has rendered incapable of the _passion_ of grief, the feeling is a
-deep regret; and, did nature permit, my tears would flow as fast as her
-mother’s.”
-
-To divert and relieve his mind, as was his wont, he betook himself to
-fresh studies and new inquiries. It is not improbable that the disease of
-which his daughter had died, as well as his own occasional sufferings from
-asthma, gave a direction to his thoughts, which turned on the inhalation
-of gas as a remedial agent in pulmonary and other diseases. Dr. Beddoes
-of Bristol had started the idea, which Watt now took up and prosecuted
-with his usual zeal. He contrived an apparatus for extracting, washing,
-and collecting gases, as well as for administering them by inhalation.
-He professed that he had taken up the subject not because he understood
-it, but because nobody else did, and that he could not withhold anything
-which might be of use in prompting others to do better. The result of his
-investigations was published at Bristol under the title of ‘Considerations
-on the Medicinal use of Fictitious Airs,’ the first part of which was
-written by Dr. Beddoes, and the second part by Watt.
-
-But a still heavier blow than the loss of his only daughter, was the death
-of his son Gregory a few years later. He was a young man of the highest
-promise, and resembled Watt himself in many respects--in mind, character,
-and temperament. Those who knew him while a student at Glasgow College,
-spoke of him long after in terms of the most glowing enthusiasm. Among
-his fellow-students were Francis, afterwards Lord Jeffrey, and the poet
-Campbell. Both were captivated not less by the brilliancy of his talents
-than by the charming graces of his person. Campbell spoke of him as “a
-splendid stripling--literally the most beautiful youth I ever saw. When
-he was only twenty-two, an eminent English artist--Howard, I think--made
-his head the model of a picture of Adam.” Campbell, Thomson, and Gregory
-Watt, were class-fellows in Greek, and avowed rivals; but the rivalry
-only served to cement their friendship. In the session of 1793–4, after
-a brilliant competition which excited unusual interest, the prize was
-awarded to Thomson; but, with the exception of the victor himself, Gregory
-was the most delighted student in the class. “He was,” says the biographer
-of Campbell, “a generous, liberal, and open-hearted youth; so attached
-to his friend, and so sensible of his merit, that the honours conferred
-on Thomson obliterated all recollections of personal failure.”[394]
-Francis Jeffrey was present at the commemoration of the first of May,
-two years later, and was especially struck with the eloquence of young
-Watt, “who obtained by far the greatest number of prizes, and degraded the
-prize-readers most inhumanly by reading a short composition of his own,
-a translation of the Chorus of the Medea, with so much energy and grace,
-that the verses seemed to me better perhaps than they were in reality. He
-is a young man of very eminent capacity, and seems to have all the genius
-of his father, with a great deal of animation and ardour which is all his
-own.”[395]
-
-    [394] Beattie’s ‘Life of Campbell,’ i. 112.
-
-    [395] Letter to M. R. Morehead, 7th May, 1796.
-
-Campbell thought him born to be a great orator, and anticipated for
-him the greatest success in Parliament or at the Bar. His father had,
-however, already destined him to follow his own business. Indeed, Gregory
-was introduced a partner into the Soho concern about the same time as
-Mr. Boulton, jun., and his elder brother James. But he never gave much
-attention to the business. Scarcely had he left college, before symptoms
-of pulmonary affection showed themselves; and, a physician having been
-consulted, Mr. Watt was recommended to send his son to reside in the
-south of England. He accordingly went to Penzance for the benefit of
-its mild climate, and, by a curious coincidence, he took up his abode as
-boarder and lodger in the house of Humphry Davy’s mother. The afterwards
-brilliant chemist was then a boy some years younger than Gregory. He had
-already made experiments in chemistry, with sundry phials and kitchen
-utensils, assisted by an old glyster apparatus presented to him by
-the surgeon of a French vessel wrecked on the coast. Although Gregory
-possessed great warmth of heart, there was a degree of coldness in his
-manner to strangers, which repelled any approach to familiarity. When
-his landlady’s son, therefore, began talking to him of metaphysics and
-poetry, he was rather disposed to turn a deaf ear; but when Davy touched
-upon the subject of chemistry, and made the rather daring boast for a boy,
-that he would undertake to demolish the French theory in half an hour,
-Gregory’s curiosity was roused. The barrier of ice between them was at
-once removed; and from thenceforward they became attached friends.[396]
-Young Davy was encouraged to prosecute his experiments, which the
-other watched with daily increasing interest; and in the course of the
-following year, Gregory communicated to Dr. Beddoes, of Bristol, then
-engaged in establishing his Pneumatic Institution, an account of Davy’s
-experiments on light and heat, the result of which was his appointment as
-superintendent of the experiments at the Institution, and the subsequent
-direction of his studies and investigations.
-
-    [396] Paris’s ‘Life of Davy,’ i. 48–9.
-
-Gregory’s health having been partially re-established by his residence at
-Penzance, he shortly after returned to his father’s house at Birmingham,
-whither Davy frequently went, and kept up the flame of his ambition by
-intercourse with congenial minds. Gregory heartily co-operated with his
-father in his investigations on air, besides inquiring and experimenting
-on original subjects of his own selection. Among these may be mentioned
-his inquiries into the gradual refrigeration of basalt, his paper on
-which, read before the Royal Society, would alone entitle him to a
-distinguished rank among experimentalists.[397]
-
-    [397] ‘Philosophical Transactions,’ xcix. 279.
-
-By the kindness of his elder brother James, Gregory Watt was relieved of
-his share of the work at Soho, and was thereby enabled to spend much of
-his time in travelling about for the benefit of his health. Early in 1801,
-we find him making excursions in the western counties in company with Mr.
-Murdock, jun.; and looking forward with still greater anticipations of
-pleasure to the tour which he subsequently made through France, Germany,
-and Austria. We find him afterwards writing his father from Freiburg,
-to the effect that he was gradually growing stronger, and was free from
-pulmonary affection. From Leipzig he sent an equally favourable account of
-himself, and gave his father every hope that on his return he would find
-him strong and sound.
-
-These anticipations, however, proved delusive, for the canker was already
-gnawing at poor Gregory’s vitals. Returned home, he busied himself with
-his books, his experiments, and his speculations; assisting his father in
-recording observations on the effects of nitrous oxide and other gases.
-But it was shortly found necessary to send him again to the south of
-England for the benefit of a milder climate. In the beginning of 1804,
-his father and mother went with him to Clifton, where he had an attack of
-intermittent fever, which left him very weak. From thence they removed to
-Bath, and remained there for about a month, the invalid being carefully
-attended by Dr. Beddoes. During their stay at Bath, Gregory’s brother paid
-him a visit, and was struck by his altered appearance. The fever had left
-him, but his cough and difficulty of breathing were very distressing to
-witness. As usual in such complaints, his mind was altogether unaffected.
-“Indeed,” wrote his brother, “he is as bright, clear, and vigorous, upon
-every subject as I ever knew him to be. His voice, too, is firm and good,
-and when he enters into conversation I should lose the recollection of
-his complaint if his appearance did not so forcibly remind me of it. It
-is fortunate that he does not suffer much bodily pain, or, so far as I can
-discover, any mental anxiety as to the issue of his complaint.”[398]
-
-    [398] J. Watt, jun., to M. R. Boulton, 8th June, 1804.
-
-When Gregory was sufficiently recovered from the debilitating effects of
-his fever, he was moved to Sidmouth, where he appeared to improve; but
-he himself believed the sea air to be injurious to him, and insisted on
-being again removed inland. During all this time his father’s anxiety may
-be imagined, though he bore up with as much equanimity as was practicable
-under circumstances so distressing. “Ever since we left Bath,” he wrote
-to Mr. Boulton at Soho, “ours has been a state of anxiety very distressing
-to us, and the communication of which would not have been pleasing to our
-friends. To add to this, I have myself been exceedingly unwell, though I
-am now much better. Gregory suffered very much from the journey, which
-was augmented by his own impatience; and though he seemed to recover a
-little from his fatigue during the first week, his breath became daily
-worse, until we were obliged to remove him, on Thursday last, to the
-neighbourhood of Exeter, where he now is with his aunt.”[399] The invalid
-became rapidly worse, and survived his removal only a few days. “This
-day,” wrote the sorrowing father to Boulton, “the remains of poor Gregory
-were deposited in a decent, though private manner, in the north aisle
-of the cathedral here, near the transept.... I mean to erect a tablet to
-his memory on the adjoining wall; but his virtues and merits will be best
-recorded in the breasts of his friends.... As soon as we can settle our
-accounts, we shall all return homewards, with heavy hearts.”[400]
-
-    [399] Watt to Boulton, Sidmouth, 14th October, 1804.
-
-    [400] Watt to Boulton, Exeter, 22nd October, 1804.
-
-Davy was deeply affected by Gregory Watt’s death; and in the freshness of
-his grief he thus unbosomed himself to his friend Clayfield:--
-
-  “Poor Watt! He ought not to have died. I could not persuade myself
-  that he would die; and until the very moment when I was assured of
-  his fate, I would not believe he was in any danger. His letters
-  to me, only three or four months ago, were full of spirit, and
-  spoke not of any infirmity of body, but of an increased strength
-  of mind. Why is this in the order of Nature,--that there is such
-  a difference in the duration and destruction of his works? If
-  the mere stone decays it is to produce a soil which is capable of
-  nourishing the moss and the lichen; when the moss and the lichen
-  die and decompose, they produce a mould which becomes the bed
-  of life to grass, and to a more exalted species of vegetables.
-  Vegetables are the food of animals,--the less perfect animals of
-  the more perfect; but in man, the faculties and intellect are
-  perfected,--he rises, exists for a little while in disease and
-  misery, and then would seem to disappear, without an end, and
-  without producing any effect.
-
-  “We are deceived, my dear Clayfield, if we suppose that the human
-  being who has formed himself for action, but who has been unable
-  to act, is lost in the mass of being; there is some arrangement of
-  things which we can never comprehend, but in which his faculties
-  will be applied.... We know very little; but, in my opinion,
-  we know enough to hope for the immortality, the individual
-  immortality of the better part of man. I have been led into all
-  this speculation, which you may well think wild, in reflecting
-  upon the fate of Gregory! My feeling has given wings to my mind.
-  He was a noble fellow, and would have been a great man. Oh! there
-  was no reason for his dying--he ought not to have died.”[401]
-
-    [401] Paris’s ‘Life of Davy,’ i. 198–200.
-
-More deaths! A few years later, and Watt lost his oldest friend, Professor
-Robison of Edinburgh, his companion and fellow-worker at Glasgow College
-nearly fifty years before. Since then, their friendship had remained
-unchanged, though their respective pursuits kept them apart. Robison
-continued busily and usefully occupied to the last. He had finished
-the editing of his friend Black’s lectures, and was occupied in writing
-his own ‘Elements of Mechanical Philosophy,’ when death came and kindly
-released him from a lingering disorder which had long oppressed his body,
-though it did not enervate his mind. A few years before his death he
-wrote Watt, informing him that he had got an addition to his family in
-a fine little boy, a grandchild, healthy and cheerful, who promised to
-be a source of much amusement to him. “I find this a great acquisition,”
-said he, “notwithstanding a serious thought sometimes stealing into my
-mind. I am infinitely delighted with observing the growth of its little
-soul, and particularly with the numberless instincts, which formerly
-passed unheeded. I thank the French theorists for more forcibly directing
-my attention to the finger of God, which I discover in every awkward
-movement and every wayward whim. They are all guardians of his life, and
-growth, and powers. I regret that I have not time to make infancy, and
-the development of its powers, my sole study.”[402] In 1805 he was taken
-from his little playfellow, and from the pursuit of his many ingenious
-speculations.[403] Watt said of him, “he was a man of the clearest head
-and the most science of anybody I have ever known, and his friendship
-to me ended only with his life, after having continued for nearly
-half a century.... His religion and piety, which made him patiently
-submit without even a fretful or repining word in nineteen years of
-unremitting pain,--his humility, in his modest opinion of himself,--his
-kindness, in labouring with such industry for his family during all this
-affliction,--his moderation for himself, while indulging an unbounded
-generosity to all about him,--joined to his talents, form a character so
-uncommon and so noble, as can with difficulty be conceived by those who
-have not, like me, had the contemplation of it.”
-
-    [402] Cited in Muirhead’s ‘Mechanical Inventions of James
-      Watt,--Correspondence,’ ii. 269.
-
-    [403] One of these, thrown out in a letter to Watt, may be
-      mentioned--a speculation since revived by the late Dr. S. Brown
-      of Edinburgh,--the transmutation of bodies. “These are wonderful
-      steps,” said he, “which are every day making in chemical
-      analysis. The analysis of the alkalis and alkaline earths by
-      Guyton, by Henry, and others, will presently lead, I think,
-      to the doctrine of _a reciprocal convertibility of all things
-      into all_. It brings to mind a minister lecturing on the first
-      chapter of one of the Gospels, when, after reading, ‘Adam begat
-      Abel, and Abel begat,’ &c.,--to save himself the trouble of so
-      many cramp names, he said, ‘and so they all begat one another
-      to the 15th verse.’ I expect to see alchemy revive, and be as
-      universally studied as ever.”
-
-Little more remains to be recorded of the business life of Boulton and
-Watt. The former, notwithstanding his declining health and the frequent
-return of his malady, continued to take an active interest in the Soho
-coinage. Watt often expostulated with him, but in vain, urging that it
-was time for him to retire wholly from the anxieties of business. On
-Boulton bringing out his Bank of England silver dollar, with which he was
-himself greatly pleased, he sent some specimens to Watt, then staying at
-Clifton, for his inspection. Watt replied,--“Your dollar is universally
-admired by all to whom we have shown it, though your friends fear much
-that your necessary attention to the operation of the coinage may injure
-your health.”[404] And again he wrote from Sidmouth,--“We are all glad to
-hear of your amendment, which we hope will be progressive, and possibly it
-might be better if you could summon up resolution enough to rid yourself
-of some of those plagues you complain of; but while you suffer yourself
-to be intruded upon in the manner you do, you can never enjoy that quiet
-which is now so necessary to your health and comfort.”[405] Mrs. Watt
-joined her entreaties to those of her husband, expressing the wish that,
-for Mr. Boulton’s sake, it might rain every day, to prevent his fatiguing
-himself by walking to and from the works, and there occupying himself with
-the turmoils of business. Why should he not do as Mr. Watt had done, and
-give up Soho altogether, leaving business and its anxieties to younger and
-stronger men? But business, as we have already explained, was Boulton’s
-habit, and pleasure, and necessity. Moreover, occupation of some sort
-served to divert his attention from the ever-present pain within him; and,
-so long as his limbs were able to support him, he tottered down the hill
-to see what was going forward at Soho.
-
-    [404] Watt to Boulton, 13th May, 1804.
-
-    [405] Watt to Boulton, 14th October, 1804.
-
-As for Watt, we find that he had at last learnt the art of taking things
-easy, and that he was trying to make life as agreeable as possible in his
-old age. Thus at Cheltenham, from which place Mrs. Watt addressed Boulton
-in the letter of advice above referred to, we find the aged pair making
-pleasant excursions in the neighbourhood during the day, and reading
-novels and going to the theatre occasionally in the evening. “As it is the
-fashion,” wrote Mrs. Watt,--“and wishing to be very fashionable people,
-we subscribe to the library. Our first book was Mrs. Opie’s ‘Mother and
-Daughter,’ a tale so mournful as to make both Mr. Watt and myself cry
-like schoolboys that had been whipped; ... and to dispel the gloom that
-poor Adeline hung over us, we went to the theatre last night to see the
-‘Honeymoon,’ and were highly pleased.”
-
-Towards the end of 1807 Boulton had a serious attack of his old disease,
-which fairly confined him to his bed; and his friends feared lest it
-should prove his last illness. He was verging upon his eightieth year,
-and his constitution, though originally strong, was gradually succumbing
-to confinement and pain. He nevertheless rallied once more, and was again
-able to make occasional visits to the works as before. He had promised to
-send a box of medals to the Queen, and went down to the Mint to see them
-packed. The box duly reached Windsor Castle, and De Luc acknowledged its
-reception:--
-
-  “As no words of mine,” he said, “could have conveyed your
-  sentiments to Her Majesty so well as those addressed to me in
-  your name, I contented myself with putting the letter into her
-  hands. Her Majesty expressed her sensibility for the sufferings
-  you had undergone during the period of your silence, and at your
-  plentiful gift, for which she has charged me to thank you; and
-  as, at the same time that you have placed the whole at her own
-  disposal, you have mentioned the Princesses, Her Majesty will make
-  them partakers in the present.”
-
-De Luc concluded by urging Mr. Boulton to abstain from further work and
-anxiety, and reminded him that after a life of such activity as his had
-been, both body and mind required complete rest.
-
-  “Life,” said he, “in this world is a state of trial, and as
-  long as God gives us strength we are not to shun even painful
-  employments which are duties. But in the decline of life, when
-  the strength fails, we ought to drop all thought of objects to
-  which we are no longer equal, in order to preserve the serenity
-  and liberty of mind with which we are to consider our exit from
-  this world to a better. May God prolong your life without pain
-  for the good you do constantly, is the sincere wish of your very
-  affectionate friends (father and daughter),
-                                                       “DE LUC.”[406]
-
-    [406] De Luc to Boulton, Windsor Castle, 25th January, 1807.
-      It had been arranged that George III., the Queen, and the
-      Princesses, should pay a visit to Soho in 1805, though the King
-      had by that time become quite blind. When told of Boulton’s
-      illness, and that he was confined to bed, his Majesty replied,
-      “Then I will visit Mr. Boulton in his sick-chamber” (MS. Memoir
-      by Mr. Keir). The royal visit was eventually put off, the
-      Council advising that the King should go direct to Weymouth and
-      nowhere else.
-
-Boulton’s life was, indeed, drawing to a close. He had for many years been
-suffering from an agonising and incurable disease--stone in the kidneys
-and bladder--and waited for death as for a friend. The strong man was
-laid low; and the night had at length come when he could work no more.
-The last letter which he wrote was to his daughter, in March, 1809; but
-the characters are so flickering and indistinct as to be scarcely legible.
-“If you wish to see me living,” he wrote, “pray come soon, for I am very
-ill.” Nevertheless, he suffered on for several months longer. At last he
-was released from his pain, and peacefully expired on the 17th of August,
-1809, at the age of eighty-one. Though he fell like a shock of corn in
-full season, his death was lamented by a wide circle of relatives and
-friends. A man of strong affections, with an almost insatiable appetite
-for love and sympathy, he inspired others with like feelings towards
-himself; and when he died, they felt as if a brother had gone. He was
-alike admired and beloved by his workmen; and when he was carried to his
-last resting-place in Handsworth Church, six hundred of them followed the
-hearse, and there was scarcely a dry eye among them.[407]
-
-    [407] The following is the inscription on the mural monument
-      erected to his memory in the side aisle of Handsworth Church,
-      in the composition of which James Watt assisted:--
-
-                          Sacred to the Memory of
-                          MATTHEW BOULTON, F.R.S.
-   By the skilful exertion of a mind turned to Philosophy and Mechanics,
-              The application of a taste correct and refined,
-                    And an ardent spirit of enterprize,
-                  he improved, embellished, and extended
-                 The Arts and Manufactures of his country,
-         Leaving his Establishment of Soho a noble monument of his
-                      Genius, industry, and success.
-  The character his talents had raised, his virtues adorned and exalted.
-         Active to discern merit, and prompt to relieve distress,
-         His encouragement was liberal, his benevolence unwearied.
-                 Honoured and admired at home and abroad,
-   He closed a life eminently useful, the 17th of August, 1809, Aged 81,
-                      Esteemed, loved, and lamented.
-
-
-Matthew Boulton was, indeed, a man of truly noble nature. Watt, than whom
-none knew him better, was accustomed to speak of him as “the princely
-Boulton.” He was generous and high-souled, a lover of truth, honour, and
-uprightness. His graces were embodied in a manly and noble person. We
-are informed through Dr. Guest that on one occasion, when Mr. Boulton’s
-name was mentioned in his father’s presence, he observed, “_the ablest
-man_ I ever knew.” On the remark being repeated to Dr. Edward Johnson,
-a courtly man, he said,--“As to his ability, other persons can better
-judge. But I can say that he was _the best mannered man_ I ever knew.”
-The appreciation of both was alike just and characteristic, and has since
-been confirmed by Mrs. Schimmelpenninck. She describes with admiration his
-genial manner, his fine radiant countenance, and his superb munificence:
-“He was in person tall, and of a noble appearance; his temperament was
-sanguine, with that slight mixture of the phlegmatic which gives calmness
-and dignity; his manners were eminently open and cordial; he took the lead
-in conversation; and, with a social heart, had a grandiose manner, like
-that arising from position, wealth, and habitual command. He went about
-among his people like a monarch bestowing largesse.”
-
-[Illustration: BOULTON’S MONUMENT IN HANDSWORTH CHURCH.[408]]
-
-    [408] The monument to Boulton is on the left hand of the altar in
-      the above illustration; that of Murdock is opposite to it, on
-      the right.
-
-Boswell was equally struck by Boulton’s personal qualities when he visited
-Soho in 1776, shortly after the manufacture of steam-engines had been
-begun there. “I shall never forget,” he says, “Mr. Boulton’s expression to
-me when surveying the works. ‘I sell here, sir, what all the world desires
-to have, POWER.’ He had,” continues Boswell, “about seven hundred people
-at work. I contemplated him as an iron chieftain, and he seemed to be a
-father of his tribe. One of the men came to him complaining grievously of
-his landlord for having distrained his goods. “Your landlord is in the
-right, Smith,” said Boulton; “but I’ll tell you what--find a friend who
-will lay down one half of your rent, and I’ll lay down the other, and you
-shall have your goods again.””
-
-It would be a mistake to suppose that there was any affectation in
-Boulton’s manner, or that his dignified bearing in society was anything
-but natural to him. He was frank, cheerful, and affectionate, as his
-letters to his wife, his children, and his friends, amply demonstrate.
-None knew better than he how to win hearts, whether of workmen, mining
-adventurers, or philosophers. “I have thought it but respectful,” he
-wrote Watt from Cornwall, “to give our folks a dinner at a public-house
-near Wheal Virgin to-day. There were present William Murdock, Lawson,
-Pearson, Perkins, Malcolm, Robert Muir, all Scotchmen, and John Bull, with
-self and Wilson,--for the engines are all now finished, and the men have
-behaved well, and are attached to us.” At Soho he gave an entertainment
-on a much larger scale upon his son coming of age in 1791, when seven
-hundred persons sat down to dinner. Boswell’s description of him as the
-father of his tribe is peculiarly appropriate. No well-behaved workman was
-ever turned adrift. On the contrary, fathers introduced their sons into
-the factory, and brought them up under their own eye, watching over their
-conduct and their mechanical training. Thus generation after generation
-of workmen followed in each other’s footsteps at Soho.
-
-There was, no doubt, good business policy in this; for Boulton knew
-that by attaching the workmen to him, and inspiring them with pride in
-the concern, he was maintaining that prestige which, before the days
-of machine tools, would not have been possible without the aid of a
-staff of carefully-trained and highly-skilled mechanics. Yet he had many
-scapegraces amongst them--hard drinkers, pugilists,[409] cock-fighters,
-and scamps. Watt often got wholly out of patience with them, and urged
-their dismissal, whatever might be the consequence. But though none knew
-so well as Watt how to manage machines, none knew so ill how to manage
-men. Boulton’s practical wisdom usually came to the rescue. He would
-tolerate any moral shortcoming save treachery and dishonesty. But he
-knew that most of the men had been brought up in a bad school, often in
-no school at all. “Have pity on them, bear with them, give them another
-trial,” he would say; “our works must not be brought to a standstill
-because perfect men are not yet to be had.” “True wisdom,” he observed on
-another occasion, “directs us, when we can, to turn even evils into good.
-We must take men as we find them, and try to make the best of them.”
-
-    [409] Isaac Perrins was one of the most noted among the fighters
-      of Soho. Mr. Scale, a partner in the hardware business, wrote to
-      Mr. Boulton, then at Cosgarne (15th October, 1782),--“Perrins
-      has had a battle with the famous Jemmy Sargent for a hundred
-      guineas, in which Perrins came off conqueror without a fall
-      or hurt: in 13 rounds he knocked down his antagonist 13 times.
-      They had it out at Colemore on our Wake Monday. The Sohoites all
-      returned with blue cockades.” Mrs. Watt, in a gossipy letter to
-      Mr. Boulton of the same date, says “1500_l._ was betted against
-      Perrins at Birmingham, and lost.” Perrins’s success led him to
-      turn “professional bruiser” for a time, and he left his place in
-      the smith’s shop. But either not succeeding in his new business,
-      or finding the work harder than that of the smithy, he came back
-      to Soho, and, being a good workman, he was taken on again and
-      remained in Boulton’s employment till the close of his life,
-      leaving sons to succeed him in the same department.
-
-Still further to increase the attachment of the workmen to Soho, and
-keep together his school of skilled industry, as he called it, Boulton
-instituted a Mutual Assurance Society in connexion with the works; the
-first of the kind, so far as we are aware, established by any large
-manufacturer for the benefit of his workmen. Every person employed in the
-manufactory, in whatsoever condition, was required to be a member. Boys
-receiving 2_s._ 6_d._ a week paid a halfpenny weekly to the box; those
-receiving 5_s._ paid a penny a week, and so on, up to men receiving 20_s._
-a week, who contributed 4_d._; payments being made to them out of the fund
-during sickness and disablement, in proportion to their contributions
-during health. The effects of the Society were most salutary; it
-cultivated habits of providence and thoughtfulness amongst the men; bound
-them together by ties of common interest; and it was only in the cases
-of irreclaimable drunkards that any members of the Soho Friendly Society
-ever came upon the parish.
-
-But this was only a small item in the constitution of the Soho
-manufactory. Before its establishment, comparatively little attention
-had been given to the organisation of labour on a large scale. Workshops
-were so small that everything went on immediately under the master’s eye,
-and workmen got accustomed to ply at their work diligently, being well
-watched. But when manufacturing was carried on upon so large a scale as
-at Soho, and separate processes were conducted in different rooms and
-workshops, it was impossible that the master’s eye should be over all his
-workers, or over even any considerable portion of them at the same time.
-It was therefore necessary to introduce a new system. Hence the practice
-of inspection by deputy, and the appointment of skilled and trustworthy
-foremen for the purpose of enforcing strict discipline in the various
-shops, and at the same time economising labour and ensuring excellence of
-workmanship. In carrying out this arrangement, Boulton proved remarkably
-successful: and Soho came to be regarded as a model establishment.
-Men came from all parts to see and admire its organisation; and when
-Wedgwood proceeded to erect his great pottery works at Etruria, he paid
-many preliminary visits to Soho for the purpose of ascertaining how the
-difficulties occasioned by the irregular habits of the workpeople had been
-so successfully overcome by his friend, and applying the results of his
-experience in the organisation of his own manufactory.
-
-Though Boulton could not keep his eye directly on the proceedings in
-the shops, he was quick to discern when anything was going wrong. While
-sitting in the midst of his factory, surrounded by the clang of hammers
-and the noise of engines, he could usually detect when any stoppage
-occurred, or when the machinery was going too fast or too slow, and issue
-his orders accordingly. The sound of the tools going, and the hammers
-clanging, which to strangers was merely an intolerable noise, was an
-intelligible music in his ears; and, like the leader of an orchestra,
-who casts his eye at once in the direction of the player of a wrong
-note, so Boulton was at once conscious of the slightest dissonance in the
-performances of his manufactory, and took the necessary steps immediately
-to correct it.
-
-From what we have already said, it will be sufficiently clear that
-Boulton was a first-rate man of business. He had a hearty enthusiasm
-for his calling, and took a just pride in it. In conducting it, he was
-guided by fine tact, great knowledge of character, and sound practical
-wisdom. When fully satisfied as to the course he should pursue, he
-acted with remarkable vigour and promptitude, bending his whole mind
-to the enterprise which he had taken in hand. It was natural that he
-should admire in others the qualities he himself desired to possess. “I
-can’t say,” he wrote to Watt, “but that I admire John Wilkinson for his
-decisive, clear, and distinct character, which is, I think, a first-rate
-one of its kind.” Like Wilkinson, Boulton was also distinguished for his
-indomitable pluck; and in no respect was this more strikingly displayed
-than in his prosecution of the steam-engine enterprise.
-
-Playfair has truly said, that had Watt searched all Europe over, he could
-not have found another person so fitted to bring his invention before the
-public in a manner worthy of its merits and importance. Yet Boulton was
-by no means eager to engage in the scheme. Watt could with difficulty
-persuade him to take it up; and it was only in exchange for a bad debt
-that he at length became a partner in it. But when once fairly committed,
-he threw himself into the enterprise with an extraordinary degree of
-vigour. He clearly recognised in the steam-engine a power destined to
-revolutionise the industrial operations of the world. To M. Argand, the
-famous French lamp inventor, he described it as “the most certain, the
-most regular, the most durable, and the most effective machine in Nature,
-so far as her powers have yet been revealed to mortal knowledge;” and he
-declared to him that, finding he could be of more use to manufactures and
-to mankind in general by employing all his powers in the capacity of an
-engineer, than in fabricating any kind of clincaillerie whatsoever, he
-would thenceforward devote himself wholly to his new enterprise.
-
-But it was no easy work he had undertaken. He had to struggle against
-prejudices, opposition, detraction, and difficulties of all kinds.
-Not the least difficulty he had to strive against was the timidity and
-faint-heartedness of his partner. For years Watt was on the brink of
-despair. He kept imploring Boulton to relieve him from his troubles; he
-wished to die and be at rest; he “cursed his inventions;” indeed he was
-the most miserable of men. But Boulton never lost heart. He was hopeful,
-courageous, and strong--Watt’s very backbone. He felt convinced that the
-invention must eventually succeed, and he never for a moment lost faith
-in it. He braved and risked everything to “carry the thing through.”
-He mortgaged his lands to the last farthing; borrowed from his personal
-friends; raised money by annuities; obtained advances from bankers; and
-had invested upwards of 40,000_l._ in the enterprise before it began to
-pay.
-
-During this terrible struggle he was more than once on the brink of
-insolvency, but continued as before to cheer and encourage his fainting
-partner. “Keep your mind and your heart pleasant if possible,” he wrote
-to Watt, “for the way to go through life sweetly is not to regard rubs.”
-To those about Watt he wrote, “Do not disturb Mr. Watt, but keep him
-as free from anxiety as you can.” He himself took the main share of the
-burden,--pushing the engine amongst the Cornish miners, bringing it under
-the notice of London brewers and water companies, and finding money to
-meet the heavy liabilities of the firm.
-
-So much honest endeavour could not fail. And at last the tide seemed to
-turn. The engine became recognised as a grand working power, and there
-was almost a run upon Soho for engines. Then pirates sprang up in all
-directions, and started new schemes with the object of evading Watt’s
-patent. And now a new battle had to be fought against “the illiberal,
-sordid, unjust, ungenerous, and inventionless misers, who prey upon the
-vitals of the ingenious, and make haste to seize upon what their laborious
-and often costly application has produced.”[410] At length this struggle,
-too, was conclusively settled in Boulton and Watt’s favour, and they were
-left at last to enjoy the fruits of their labour in peace.
-
-    [410] Boulton to De Luc, 20th October, 1787.
-
-Watt never could have fought such a series of battles alone. He would
-have been a thousand times crushed; and, but for Boulton’s unswerving
-courage and resolute determination, he could neither have brought his
-engine into general use, nor derived any adequate reward for his great
-invention. Though his specification lodged in the Patent Office might
-clearly establish his extraordinary mechanical genius, it is most probable
-that he himself would have broken his heart over his scheme, and added
-only another to the long list of great martyr inventors.
-
-None was more ready to acknowledge the immense services of Boulton in
-introducing the steam-engine to general use as a working power, than Watt
-himself. In the MS. memoir of his lately deceased friend deposited among
-the Soho papers, dated Glasgow, 17th September, 1809, Watt says,--“Through
-the whole of this business Mr. Boulton’s active and sanguine disposition
-served to counterbalance the despondency and diffidence which were natural
-to me; and every assistance which Soho or Birmingham could afford was
-procured. Mr. Boulton’s amiable and friendly character, together with
-his fame as an engineer and active manufacturer, procured us many and
-very active friends in both Houses of Parliament.... Suffice it to say,
-that to his generous patronage, the active part he took in the management
-of the business, his judicious advice, and his assistance in contriving
-and arranging many of the applications of the steam-engine to various
-machines, the public are indebted for great part of the benefits they now
-derive from that machine. Without him, or some similar partner (could such
-a one have been found), the invention could never have been carried by me
-to the length that it has been.
-
-“Mr. Boulton was not only an ingenious mechanic, well skilled in all the
-arts of the Birmingham manufacturers, but he possessed in a high degree
-the faculty of rendering any new invention of his own or of others useful
-to the public, by organising and arranging the processes by which it could
-be carried on, as well as of promoting the sale by his own exertions
-and those of his numerous friends and correspondents. His conception
-of the nature of any invention was quick, and he was not less quick in
-perceiving the uses to which it might be applied, and the profits which
-might accrue from it. When he took any scheme in hand, he was rapid in
-executing it, and on those occasions spared neither trouble nor expense.
-He was a liberal encourager of merit in others, and to him the country is
-indebted for various improvements which have been brought forward under
-his auspices....
-
-“In respect to myself, I can with great sincerity say that he was a most
-affectionate and steady friend and patron, with whom, during a close
-connexion of thirty-five years, I have never had any serious difference.
-
-“As to his improvements and erections at Soho--his turning a barren heath
-into a delightful garden, and the population and riches he has introduced
-into the parish of Handsworth, I must leave such subjects to those whose
-pens are better adapted to the purpose, and whose ideas are less benumbed
-with age than mine now are.”[411]
-
-    [411] The MS. memoir is dated Glasgow the 17th September, 1809, at
-      which period Watt was in his 73rd year. It had evidently been
-      written at the request of M. Robinson Boulton, Esq., shortly
-      after his father’s death. We find various testimony to the same
-      effect as the above in the Soho papers. Thus Mr. Peter Ewart,
-      C.E., speaks of Mr. Boulton’s remarkable quickness in selecting
-      objects to which machinery might be applied with advantage,
-      and of his great promptitude and determination in carrying his
-      plans into effect. He also describes the contagiousness of his
-      example, which strengthened the weak and inspired the timid. “He
-      possessed,” says Mr. Ewart, “above all other men I have ever
-      known, the faculty of inspiring others with a portion of that
-      ardent zeal with which he himself pursued every important object
-      he had in view; and it was impossible to be near him without
-      becoming warmly interested in the success of his enterprises.
-      The urbanity of his manners, and his great kindness to young
-      people in particular, never failed to leave the most agreeable
-      impression on the minds of all around him; and most truly may
-      it be said that he reigned in the hearts of those that were in
-      his employment.”--Boulton MSS.
-
-We have spoken of Boulton’s generosity, which was in keeping with his
-whole character. At a time when he was himself threatened with bankruptcy,
-we have seen him concerting a scheme with his friend Wedgwood to enable
-Dr. Priestley to pursue his chemical investigations free from pecuniary
-anxiety. To Watt he was most liberal, voluntarily conceding to him at
-different times profits derived from certain parts of the steam-engine
-business, beyond the proportions stipulated in the deed of partnership.
-In the course of his correspondence we find numerous illustrations of
-his generosity to partners as well as to workmen; making up the losses
-they had sustained, and which at the time perhaps he could ill afford.
-His conduct to Widow Swellengrebel illustrates this fine feature in his
-character. She had lent money to Fothergill, his partner in the hardware
-business, and the money was never repaid. The consequence was, that the
-widow and her family were seriously impoverished, and on their return to
-their friends in Holland, Boulton, though under no obligation to do so,
-remitted her an annuity of fifty pounds a year, which he continued to the
-close of her life. “I must own,” he wrote, “I am impelled to act as I do
-from pity, as well as from something in my own disposition that I cannot
-resist.”[412]
-
-In fine, Matthew Boulton was a noble, manly man, and a true leader of men.
-Lofty-minded, intelligent, energetic, and liberal, he was one of those who
-constitute the life blood of a nation, and give force and dignity to the
-national character. Working in conjunction with Watt, he was in no small
-degree instrumental in introducing and establishing the great new working
-power of steam which has exercised so extraordinary an influence upon all
-the operations of industry.
-
-    [412] Boulton to M. Vanlinder, Rotterdam, 24th April, 1788.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXIII.
-
-CLOSING YEARS OF JAMES WATT--HIS DEATH--CONCLUSION.
-
-
-The fragile and sickly Watt outlived the most robust of his
-contemporaries. He was residing at Glenarbach, near Dumbarton, with
-relatives, when the intelligence reached him of the death of his partner.
-To his son James he wrote at once, expressing his deep sorrow at the
-loss of his “very worthy and beloved friend.”[413] To Mr. Boulton’s son
-and successor he wrote,--“However we may lament our own loss, we must
-consider, on the other side, the torturing pain he has so long endured,
-and console ourselves with the remembrance of his virtues and eminent
-qualifications. Few men have possessed his abilities, and still fewer
-have exerted them as he has done; and if to these we add his urbanity, his
-generosity, and his affection to his friends, we shall make up a character
-rarely to be equalled. Such was the friend we have lost, and of whose
-affection we have reason to be proud, as you have to be the son of such
-a father.”[414]
-
-    [413] “Though I was in some measure prepared,” he wrote, “yet I
-      had hoped that he might have recovered from this fit, as he has
-      done from other severe ones. Such wishes, however, were selfish;
-      for in respect to himself, none of his friends could rationally
-      have desired the prolongation of a life which has long been
-      passed in torture, without hope of relief. May he therefore rest
-      in peace; and when our end approaches, may we have as little to
-      reproach us and as much to console us as he had.”--Mr. Watt to
-      his son, 22nd August, 1809. Boulton MSS.
-
-    [414] Watt to M. Robinson Boulton, 23rd August, 1809.
-
-The deaths of his friends, one by one, reminded Watt of his own mortality,
-and frequent references to the subject occur in his letters about this
-time. He felt as if he were in danger of being left in the world alone.
-But he did not give himself up to melancholy, as he had been prone to do
-at the earlier periods of his life. Shortly after his son Gregory died, he
-wrote to a relative,--“I know that all men must die, and I submit to the
-decrees of Nature, I hope with due reverence to the Disposer of events.
-Yet one stimulus to exertion is taken away, and, somehow or other, I have
-lost my relish for my usual occupations. Perhaps time may remedy that in
-some measure; meanwhile I do not neglect the means of amusement which are
-in my power.”
-
-Watt was at no loss for occupation to relieve the tedium of old age.
-He possessed ample resources in himself, and found pleasure alike in
-quiet meditation and in active work. His thirst for knowledge was still
-unslaked, and he sought to allay it by reading. His love of investigation
-was as keen as ever, and he gratified it by proceeding with experiments
-on air, on light, and on electricity. His inventive faculty was still
-potent, and he occasionally varied his occupation by labouring to produce
-a new machine or to improve an old one. At other times, when the weather
-allowed, he would take a turn at planting in his grounds and gardens; and
-occasionally vary his pleasure by a visit to Scotland, to London, or to
-his estate in Wales. Strange to say, his health improved with advancing
-age, and though occasionally dyspeptic, he was now comparatively free from
-the racking headaches which had been the torment of his earlier years.
-Unlike Boulton, who found pleasure in the active pursuit of business,
-Watt had always regarded it as a worry, and he was now glad to have cast
-it altogether behind him. His mind was free from harassing cares; his
-ambition in life was satisfied; he was no more distressed by fears of
-Cornish pirates; and he was content to enjoy at last the fruits of his
-labour in peace. And thus it was that Watt’s later years may be pronounced
-to have been the happiest of his life.
-
-He had, indeed, lost nearly all his old friends, and often thought of
-them with a melancholy regret, not, however, unmingled with pleasure. But
-other young friends gathered about him, sat at his feet, and looked up to
-him with an almost reverential admiration. Among these we find Rennie and
-Telford the engineers, Campbell the poet, Humphry Davy, Henry Brougham,
-Francis Horner, and other rising men of the new generation. Lord Brougham
-bears testimony to Watt’s habitual cheerfulness, and his enjoyment of the
-pleasures of society during the later years of his life. “I can speak on
-the point,” he says, “with absolute certainty, for my own acquaintance
-with him commenced after my friend Gregory’s decease. A few months after
-that event, he calmly and with his wonted acuteness discussed with me the
-composition of an epitaph to be inscribed on his son’s tomb. In the autumn
-and winter of 1805 he was a constant attendant at our Friday Club, and in
-all our private circles, and was the life of them all.”[415]
-
-    [415] Lord Brougham’s ‘Lives of Philosophers of the Time of George
-      III.’ The Friday Club of Edinburgh was so called because of the
-      evening of the week on which it met and supped. It numbered
-      amongst its members Professor Playfair, Walter Scott, Henry
-      Brougham, Francis Jeffrey, Leonard Horner, Lord Corehouse,
-      Sir W. Drummond, and others known to fame. Watt was a regular
-      attender of the Club during his Edinburgh visits.
-
-To the close of his life Watt continued to take great pleasure in
-inventing. It had been the pursuit of his life, and in old age it became
-his hobby. “Without a hobby-horse,” said he, “what is life?” He proceeded
-to verify his old experiments, and to live over again the history of his
-inventions. When Mr. Kennedy of Manchester asked him, at one of his last
-visits to Heathfield, if he had been able, since his retirement from
-business, to discover anything new in the steam-engine, he replied, “No;
-I am devoting the remainder of my life to perfect its details, and to
-ascertain whether in any respect I have been wrong.”
-
-But he did not merely confine himself to verifying his old inventions. He
-also contrived new ones. One of the machines that occupied his leisure
-hours for many years, was his machine for copying statuary. We find him
-busy with it in 1810, and he was still working upon it in the year of his
-death, nearly ten years later. The principle of the machine was to make a
-cutting tool or drill travel over the work to be executed, in like ratio
-with the motion of a guide-point placed upon the bust to be copied. It
-worked, as it were, with two hands; the one feeling the pattern, the other
-cutting the material into the required form. The object could be copied
-either of the full size, or reduced with the most perfect accuracy to any
-less size that might be required.[416] In preparing the necessary tools,
-Watt had the able assistance of his friend Murdock, who was always ready
-with his kindly suggestions and criticisms. In January, 1813, Watt wrote
-him,--“I have done a little figure of a boy lying down and holding out one
-arm, very successfully; and another boy, about six inches high, naked, and
-holding out both his hands, his legs also being separate. But I have been
-principally employed in making drawings for a complete machine, all in
-iron, which has been a very serious job, as invention goes on very slowly
-with me now. When you come home, I shall thank you for your criticisms
-and assistance.”[417]
-
-    [416] In March, 1811, he wrote Dr. P. Wilson as follows:--“For
-      want of other news I must now say a little upon my late
-      invention, with which Dr. Herschel seemed much pleased. It
-      continues to succeed, and I have realised some more of my
-      ideas on the subject. I have executed several small busts in
-      alabaster, not being strong enough to work in marble. I had
-      a difficulty in getting the several segments which form the
-      surface of the bust to meet, but have now accomplished it. It
-      requires a very accurate construction of the machine, and a
-      very accurate adjustment of the tools, so that their axes may
-      be always equally distant from each other, as the axes of the
-      pattern and that of the stone to be cut are. I have also made
-      some improvements in the tools for cutting marble and other
-      hard stones. The things you saw were done by the tool and the
-      guide-point, moving in parallel lines, straight or circular, and
-      very near one another; (an illustration of Euclid’s position,
-      that the motion of a point generates a line, and the motion of
-      a line generates a surface). I have now contrived, though not
-      executed, that the two points, the guide and the cutting point,
-      may move in any line, whether straight or crooked, square or
-      diagonal, so that an inscription might be cut in stone from a
-      drawing on paper.”--Cited in Muirhead’s ‘Mechanical Inventions
-      of James Watt,’ ii. 329–30.
-
-    [417] Cited in Muirhead’s ‘Mechanical Inventions,’ &c., ii. 340–1.
-      These drawings must be in existence, and of great interest,
-      as showing the vigour of Watt’s inventive faculty at this late
-      period of his life.
-
-The material in which Watt executed his copies of statuary were
-various,--marble, jet, alabaster, ivory, plaster of Paris, and mahogany.
-Some of the specimens we have seen at Heathfield are of exquisite accuracy
-and finish, and show that he must have brought his copying-machine to a
-remarkable degree of perfection before he died. There are numerous copies
-of medallions of his friends,--of Dr. Black, De Luc, and Dr. Priestley;
-but the finest of all is a reduced bust of himself, being an exact copy
-of Chantrey’s original plaster-cast. The head and neck are beautifully
-finished, but there the work has stopped, for the upper part of the chest
-is still in the rough. Another exquisite work, than which Watt never
-executed a finer, is a medallion of Locke in ivory, marked “January,
-1812.” There are numerous other busts, statuettes, medallions,--some
-finished, others half executed, and apparently thrown aside, as if the
-workman had been dissatisfied with his work, and waited, perhaps, until
-he had introduced some new improvement in his machine.
-
-Watt took out no patent for the invention, which he pursued, as he said,
-merely as “a mental and bodily exercise.” Neither did he publish it,--but
-went on working at it for several years before his intentions to construct
-such a machine had become known. When he had made considerable progress
-with it, he learned, to his surprise, that a Mr. Hawkins, an ingenious
-person in his neighbourhood, had been long occupied in the same pursuit.
-The proposal was then made to him that the two inventors should combine
-their talents and secure the invention by taking out a joint patent. But
-Watt had already been too much worried by patents to venture on taking out
-another at his advanced age. He preferred prosecuting the invention at his
-leisure merely as an amusement; and the project of taking out a patent
-for it was accordingly abandoned. It may not be generally known that
-this ingenious invention of Watt has since been revived and applied with
-sundry modifications by our cousins across the Atlantic, in fashioning
-wood and iron in various forms; and powerful copying-machines are now in
-regular use in the Government works at Enfield, where they are employed
-in rapidly, accurately, and cheaply manufacturing gun-stocks!
-
-Watt carried on the operations connected with this invention for the most
-part in his Garret, a room immediately under the roof at the kitchen end
-of the house at Heathfield, and approached by a narrow staircase. It is a
-small room, low in the ceiling, and lighted by a low broad window, looking
-into the shrubbery. The ceiling, though low, inclines with the slope of
-the roof on three sides of the room, and, being close to the slates, the
-place must necessarily have been very hot in summer, and very cold in
-winter. A stove was placed close to the door, for the purpose of warming
-the apartment, as well as enabling the occupant to pursue his experiments,
-being fitted with a sand-bath and other conveniences. But the stove must
-have been insufficient for heating the garret in very cold weather, and
-hence we find him occasionally informing his correspondents that he could
-not proceed further with his machine until the weather had become milder.
-
-[Illustration: WATT’S GARRET AT HEATHFIELD.
-
-[By Percival Skelton.]]
-
-His foot-lathe was fixed close to the window, fitted with all the
-appliances for turning in wood and metal fifty years since; while a case
-of drawers fitted into the recess on the left-hand side of the room,
-contained a large assortment of screws, punches, cutters, taps, and
-dies. Here were neatly arranged and stowed away many of the tools with
-which he worked in the early part of his life, one of the drawers being
-devoted to his old “flute tools.” In other divisions were placed his
-compasses, dividers, scales, decimal weights, quadrant glasses, and a
-large assortment of instrument-making tools. A ladle for melting lead,
-and a soldering-iron were hung ready for use near the stove.
-
-Crucibles of metal and stone were ranged on the shelves along the opposite
-side of the room, which also contained a large assortment of bottles
-filled with chemicals, boxes of fossils and minerals, jars, gallipots,
-blowpipes, retorts, and the various articles used in chemical analysis. In
-one corner of the room was a potter’s lathe. A writing-desk was placed as
-close to the window, for the sake of the light, as the turning-lathe would
-allow; and in the corner was the letter-copying machine, conveniently at
-hand.
-
-In this garret Watt spent much of his time during the later period of
-his life, only retiring from it when it was too hot in summer, or too
-cold in winter to enable him to prosecute his work. For days together he
-would confine himself here, without even descending to his meals. He had
-accordingly provided himself, in addition to his various other tools,
-with sundry kitchen utensils,--amongst others, with a frying-pan and
-Dutch oven--with which he cooked his meals. For it must be explained that
-Mrs. Watt was a thorough martinet in household affairs, and, above all
-things, detested “dirt.” Mrs. Schimmelpenninck says she taught her two
-pug-dogs never to cross the hall without first wiping their feet on the
-mat. She hated the sight of her husband’s leather apron and soiled hands
-while he was engaged in his garret-work, so he kept himself out of her
-sight at such times as much as possible. Some notion of the rigidity of
-her rule may be inferred from the fact of her having had a window made in
-the kitchen wall, through which she could watch the servants, and observe
-how they were getting on with their work. Her passion for cleanliness was
-carried to a pitch which often fretted those about her by the restraints
-it imposed; but her husband, like a wise man, gently submitted to her
-rule. He was fond of a pinch of snuff, which Mrs. Watt detested, regarding
-it only as so much “dirt;” and Mr. Muirhead says she would seize and lock
-up the offending snuff-box whenever she could lay hands upon it. He adds
-that at night, when she retired from the dining-room, if Mr. Watt did
-not follow at the time fixed by her, a servant would enter and put out
-the lights, even when a friend was present, on which he would slowly rise
-and meekly say, “We must go.” One can easily understand how, under such
-circumstances, Watt would enjoy the perfect liberty of his garret, where
-he was king, and could enjoy his pinch of snuff in peace, and make as much
-“dirt” with his turning-lathe, his crucibles, and his chemicals, as he
-chose, without dread of interruption.
-
-One of the fears which haunted Watt as old age advanced upon him was, that
-his mental faculties, in the exercise of which he took so much pleasure,
-were deserting him. To Dr. Darwin he said, many years before,--“Of all
-the evils of age, the loss of the few mental faculties one possessed in
-youth is most grievous.” To test his memory, he again began the study of
-German, which he had allowed himself to forget; and he speedily acquired
-such proficiency as enabled him to read the language with comparative
-ease. But he gave still stronger evidence of the integrity of his powers.
-When in his seventy-fifth year, he was consulted by the Glasgow Waterworks
-Company as to the best mode of conveying water from a peninsula across
-the Clyde to the Company’s engines at Dalmarnock,--a difficulty which
-appeared to them almost insurmountable; for it was necessary to fit the
-pipes, through which the water passed, to the uneven and shifting bed of
-the river. Watt, on turning over the subject in his mind, shortly hit upon
-a plan, which showed that his inventive powers were unimpaired by age.
-Taking the tail of the lobster for his model, he devised a tube of iron
-similarly articulated, of which he forwarded a drawing to the Waterworks
-Company; and, acting upon his recommendation, they had the tube forthwith
-executed and laid down with complete success. Watt declined to be paid for
-the essential service he had thus rendered to the Waterworks Company; but
-the directors made handsome acknowledgment of it by presenting him with
-a piece of plate of the value of a hundred guineas, accompanied by the
-cordial expression of their thanks and esteem.
-
-[Illustration: WATER-PIPE IN THE BED OF THE CLYDE.]
-
-Watt did not, however, confine himself to mechanical recreations at home.
-In summer-time he would proceed to Cheltenham, the air of which agreed
-with him, and make a short stay there; or he would visit his friends
-in London, Glasgow, or Edinburgh. While in London, his great delight
-was in looking in at the shop-windows,--the best of all industrial
-exhibitions,--for there he saw the progress of manufacture in all articles
-in common use amongst the people. To a country person, the sight of the
-streets and shop-windows of London alone, with their display of objects
-of art and articles of utility, is always worth a visit. To Watt it was
-more interesting than passing along the finest gallery of pictures.
-
-At Glasgow, where he stayed with his relatives the Macgregors, he
-took pleasure in revisiting his old haunts, dined with the College
-Professors,[418] and noted with lively interest the industrial progress
-of the place. The growth of Glasgow in the course of his lifetime had,
-indeed, been extraordinary, and it was in no small degree the result
-of his own industrial labours. The steam-engine was everywhere at work;
-factories had sprung up in all directions; the Broomielaw was silent no
-longer; the Clyde was navigable from thence to the sea, and its waters
-were plashed by the paddles of a thousand steamers. The old city of the
-tobacco lords had become a great centre of manufacturing industry; it
-was rich, busy, and prosperous; and the main source of its prosperity
-was the steam-engine. A long time had passed since Watt had first taken
-in hand the repair of the little Newcomen engine in Glasgow College, and
-afterwards laboured in the throes of his invention in his shop in the back
-court in King Street. There were no skilled mechanics in Glasgow then, and
-the death of the “old white-iron man” who helped him had been one of his
-sorest vexations. Things were entirely changed now. Glasgow had already
-become famous for its engine-work, and its factories contained among the
-most skilled mechanics in the kingdom. Watt’s early notion that Scotchmen
-were incapable of becoming first-rate mechanics, like Englishmen, was
-confuted by the experience of hundreds of workshops; and to none did
-the practical contradiction of his theory give greater pleasure than to
-himself. He delighted to visit the artisans at their work, and to see with
-his own eyes the improvements that were going forward; and when he heard
-of any new and ingenious arrangement of engine-power, he would hasten to
-call upon the mechanic who had contrived it, and make his acquaintance.
-
-    [418] In 1808 Mr. Watt made over 300_l._ to the College by Deed
-      of Gift, for the purpose of founding a prize for students in
-      Natural Science, as some acknowledgment of “the many favours”
-      which the College had conferred upon him.--In 1816 he gave to
-      the Town of Greenock 100_l._ for the purpose of purchasing books
-      for the Mathematical School. “My intention in this donation,” he
-      observed in his letter to Mr. Anderson of Greenock, “is to form
-      the beginning of a scientific library, for the instruction of
-      the youth of Greenock; and I hope it will prompt others to add
-      to it, and to render my townsmen as eminent for their knowledge
-      as they are for their spirit of enterprise.” Watt’s idea has
-      since been carried out by his townsmen, and the Watt Library
-      is now one of the most valuable institutions of Greenock. It
-      ought to be added, that the erection of the building was mainly
-      due to the munificence of Mr. Watt’s son, the late James Watt,
-      Esq., of Aston Hall, near Birmingham. A marble statue of Watt,
-      by Chantrey, is placed in the Library, with an inscription from
-      the pen of Lord Jeffrey.
-
-One of such calls, which Watt made during a visit to Glasgow, in 1814, has
-been pleasantly related by Mr. Robert Hart, who, with his brother, then
-carried on a small steam-engine factory in the town. “One forenoon,” he
-says, “while we were at work, Miss Macgregor and a tall elderly gentleman
-came into the shop. She, without saying who he was, asked if we would
-show the gentleman our small engine. It was not going at the time, and
-was covered up. My brother uncovered it. The gentleman examined it very
-minutely, and put a few pointed questions, asking the reason for making
-her in that form. My brother, seeing he understood the subject, said
-that she had been so made to try what we thought was an improvement;
-and for this experiment we required another cistern and air-pump. He was
-beginning to show what was properly Mr. Watt’s engine, and what was not;
-when, at this observation, Miss Macgregor stopped him, saying,--‘Oh, he
-understands it; _this is Mr. Watt_.’ I never at any time saw my brother
-so much excited as he was at that moment. He called on me to join them,
-saying,--‘This is Mr. Watt!’ Up to this time I had continued to work at
-what I was doing when they came; and, although I had heard all that was
-said, I had not joined the party till I learned who he was. Our supposed
-improvement was to save condensing water, and was on the principle
-introduced by Sir John Leslie, to produce cold by evaporation in a vacuum.
-Mr. Watt took much interest in this experiment, and said he had tried the
-same thing on a larger scale, but without the vacuum, as that invention
-of Professor Leslie’s was not known at the time. He tried it exposed to
-the air, and also kept wet; and at one of the large porter-breweries
-in London he had fitted up an apparatus of the same nature. The pipes
-forming his condenser were laid in the water of the Thames, but he
-could not keep them tight, from the expansion and contraction of the
-metal, as they were exposed to various temperatures.” The conversation
-then diverged to the subject of his early experiments with the Newcomen
-engine, the difficulties he had encountered in finding a proper material
-for steam-pipes, the best method of making steam-joints, and the various
-means of overcoming obstacles which occur in the prosecution of mechanical
-experiments, in the course of which he reverted to the many temporary
-expedients which he had himself adopted in his early days.
-
-Watt was so much pleased with the intelligence of the brothers Hart, that
-he invited them to call upon him that evening at Miss Macgregor’s, where
-they found him alone with the ladies. “In the course of conversation,”
-continues Mr. Hart, “which embraced all that was new at the time, the
-expansion and the slow contraction of metals were touched on. This led
-to a discussion on iron in engine-making,” in which Watt explained
-the practice which experience had led him to adopt as the best. The
-conversation then turned upon the early scene of his inventions, the room
-in the College, the shop in King Street, the place on Glasgow Green near
-the Herd’s house where the first idea of a separate condenser flashed upon
-his mind, and the various steps by which he had worked out his invention.
-He went on to speak of his experience at Kinneil and Boroughstoness,
-of the Newcomen engine he had erected and worked there for the purpose
-of gaining experience, and incidentally referred to many of the other
-interesting events in his past career. At a late hour the brothers took
-their leave, delighted, as they well might be, with the affability and
-conversableness of “the great Mr. Watt.”
-
-But it was not mechanics alone that Watt fascinated by his powers of
-conversation and his stores of knowledge relating to the special business
-of his life: he was equally at home amongst philosophers, women, and
-children. When close upon his eighty-second year, he formed one of a
-distinguished party assembled in Edinburgh, at which Sir Walter Scott,
-Francis Jeffrey, and others were present. He delighted the northern
-literati with his kindly cheerfulness, not less than he astonished them
-by the extent and profundity of his information. “This potent commander
-of the elements,” says Scott,--“this abridger of time and space, this
-magician, whose cloudy machinery has produced a change in the world,
-the effects of which, extraordinary as they are, are perhaps only now
-beginning to be felt,--was not only the most profound man of science,
-the most successful combiner of powers, and combiner of numbers, as
-adapted to practical purposes,--was not only one of the most generally
-well-informed, but one of the best and kindest of human beings. There he
-stood, surrounded by the little band of Northern literati, men not less
-tenacious, generally speaking, of their own opinions, than the national
-regiments are supposed to be jealous of the high character they have
-won upon service. Methinks I yet see and hear what I shall never see or
-hear again. The alert, kind, benevolent old man had his attention alive
-to every one’s question, his information at every one’s command. His
-talents and fancy overflowed on every subject. One gentleman was a deep
-philologist, he talked with him on the origin of the alphabet as if he
-had been coeval with Cadmus; another, a celebrated critic, you would have
-said the old man had studied political economy and belles-lettres all his
-life; of science it is unnecessary to speak, it was his own distinguished
-walk.”[419]
-
-    [419] Answer by the author of ‘Waverley’ to the Epistle Dedicatory
-      of ‘The Monastery.’
-
-Indeed, the extent of his knowledge was the wonder of all who came in
-contact with him. “It seemed,” said Jeffrey, “as if every subject that was
-casually started had been that which he had been occupied in studying.”
-Yet, though no man was more ready to communicate knowledge, none could be
-less ambitious of displaying it. In company, when not spoken to, he sat as
-if tranquilly pursuing his own meditations, with his head bent forward or
-leaning on his hand. But as he could not fail to be a prominent feature in
-any society that he entered, it was seldom that he was left outside the
-circle of social talk. Men of letters, men of science, artists, ladies
-and children, thronged about him. Once when on a visit to his friend
-Rennie in London, he accompanied him to an evening party at Sir George
-Warrender’s. At first he sat by himself, quiet and abstracted, until some
-young ladies engaged him in conversation, which gradually turned upon
-the mystery of the fabrics they wore, the insignificant materials out
-of which they were formed, and the beauty and value given to them by the
-industry and ingenuity of man; and, other auditors being attracted by his
-descriptions, he shortly found himself the centre of a group of fair and
-admiring listeners.
-
-He seemed to be alike at home on all subjects, the most recondite
-and the most common, the most special and the most general. Mrs.
-Schimmelpenninck[420] relates how he took her upon his knee when a little
-girl, and explained to her the principles of the hurdy-gurdy, the piano,
-the Pan’s-pipe, and the organ; teaching her how to make a dulcimer and
-improve a Jew’s-harp. To a Swedish artist he communicated the information
-that the most pliant and elastic painting-brush was to be made out of
-rats’ whiskers. He advised ladies how to cure smoky chimneys, how to
-warm and ventilate dwellings, and how to obtain fast colours, while he
-would willingly instruct a maid-servant as to the best way of cleaning a
-grate.[421] A lady still living, who remembers Watt, informs us that he
-used to carry a carpenter’s foot-rule in the side pocket of his breeches,
-and would occasionally bring it out in after-dinner conversation or
-elsewhere, to illustrate the subject under discussion.
-
-    [420] ‘Autobiography of Mrs. Schimmelpenninck,’ 3rd ed. 35.
-
-    [421] The following anecdote is told by Mrs.
-      Schimmelpenninck:--“During the peace of Amiens, Mr. Watt visited
-      Paris. It so happened that while going through one of the
-      palaces, I believe the Tuileries, a French housemaid appeared
-      much perplexed concerning some bright English stoves which had
-      just been received, and which she did not know how to clean.
-      An English gentleman was standing by, to whom she appealed for
-      information. This was Charles James Fox. He could give no help;
-      “But,” said he, “here is a fellow-countryman of mine who will
-      tell you all about it.” This was Mr. Watt, to whom he was at
-      the moment talking; and who proceeded to give the housemaid
-      full instructions as to the best mode of cleaning her grate.
-      This anecdote I have often heard Mrs. Watt tell with great
-      diversion.”
-
-He was full of anecdotes relating to all manner of subjects, which he
-was accustomed to tell in a very effective way.[422] He spoke in a low
-grave tone, with a broad Scottish accent. The late Mr. Murdock mentioned
-to us one of his favourite stories relating to two smugglers pursued by
-excisemen. The two smugglers had reached the mouth of a coal-pit and got
-into the corve-cage with their apparatus, the excisemen only coming up in
-time to see them descending the shaft, where they were soon out of sight.
-On the ascending corves coming up to the settle-board, the excisemen asked
-to be sent down after the smugglers, and they were sent down accordingly.
-Halfway down the shaft they met the smugglers in the other cage _coming
-up_! And so the relator kept them ascending and descending, passing and
-repassing each other,--his auditors being in convulsions of laughter,
-while he himself seemed wholly unmoved. Campbell, the poet, who paid Watt
-a visit in February, 1819, only six months before his death, describes him
-as so full of anecdote that he spent one of the most amusing days he had
-ever enjoyed with a man of science and a stranger to his own pursuits. To
-the last he was a great reader of novels; and Mrs. Watt and he had many
-a hearty cry over the imaginary woes of love-lorn heroes and heroines.
-Scott says no novel of the least celebrity escaped his perusal, and that
-this gifted man of science was as much addicted to productions of this
-sort as if he had been a very milliner’s apprentice of eighteen. A lady,
-still living,[423] informs us that she remembers the admiration which Watt
-expressed for the Waverley novels, then making their appearance in rapid
-succession, and used to quote his opinion as a great authority for her own
-devotion to such works,--forgetting that, as the old frame requires the
-arm-chair after the heat and burden of the day, so the taxed mind needs
-rest and recreation after long years of study, anxiety, and labour.
-
-    [422] Lord Brougham says, “His voice was deep and low, and if
-      somewhat monotonous, it yet seemed in harmony with the weight
-      and the beauty of his discourse, through which, however, there
-      also ran a current of a lighter kind; for he was mirthful,
-      temperately jocular, nor could anything to more advantage set
-      off the living anecdotes of men and things, with which the
-      grave texture of his talk was interwoven, than his sly and quiet
-      humour, both of mind and look, in recounting them.”--‘Lives of
-      Philosophers of the Time of George III.’
-
-    [423] “I remember, as a young girl,” she says, “the pleasant
-      dinners and people I have seen at Soho. I remember being present
-      one day when Bertrand de Moleville, the exiled minister of Louis
-      XVI., left the dinner-table to make an omelette, which was, of
-      course, pronounced ‘excellent.’ That man then gave me a lifelong
-      lesson,--of the power of enjoyment and of giving pleasure by
-      his cheerful bright manner and conversation, under such sad
-      circumstances as exile and poverty. I looked at him with great
-      admiration, and I have his face distinct before me now, though
-      I saw him only that once.”
-
-Mr. Stockdale, of Carke, gives the following account of a visit which his
-sister, a cousin of Mr. Boulton’s, paid to Heathfield in 1818, shortly
-before Mr. Watt’s death:--“When tea was announced to Mr. Watt, he came
-from his ‘garret,’ and on being told who my sister was, he asked after
-her relations in the kindest way, and then sat down in his arm-chair. A
-cup of tea was handed to him, and alongside of it was placed a small cup
-containing a yellow powder, of which he took a spoonful and put it into
-his tea, observing that he had long been plagued with a stomach complaint,
-for which he had found this powder of mastich a sovereign remedy. He
-talked more than my sister expected. Sometimes he fell into a reverie,
-appearing absorbed in thought, his eyes fixed on space, and his head
-leaning over his chest. After a while, he retired to his study, and my
-sister returned to Soho.” Mr. Hollins, of Birmingham, sculptor, supplies
-the following further reminiscence. When a youth in a local architect’s
-office, he was sent out to Heathfield one afternoon, to submit to Mr.
-Watt the plans of certain proposed alterations in the parish church of
-Handsworth. The church stood a few fields off, and its spire rose above
-the trees within sight of the drawing-room windows. It was his parish
-church, in which his friend Boulton had been buried, and where he himself
-was to lie. When the young man mentioned his errand, Mr. Watt said he was
-just about to take his afternoon’s nap. “But you can sit down there and
-read that newspaper, and when I have got my nap I will look at the plans.”
-So saying he composed himself to rest in his arm-chair; the youth scarce
-daring to turn the page for fear of disturbing him. At length, after a
-short sleep, he woke full up and said, “Now let me see them.” He looked
-over the plans, examined them in detail, and criticised them keenly. He
-thought the proposed alterations of a paltry character, unworthy of the
-wealth and importance of the parish; “Why,” said he, “if these plans be
-carried out, preaching at Handsworth will be like pitching the word of God
-out of a keyhole!” When Mr. Watt’s decided views as to the insufficiency
-of the design was reported to the committee, steps were taken greatly to
-enlarge it, and Handsworth Church was thus indebted to his suggestions
-for much of its present beauty.
-
-He proceeded with the completion of his sculpture-copying machine until
-nearly the close of his life. When the weather was suitable, he would go
-up stairs to his garret, don his woollen surtout and leather apron, and
-proceed with his work. He was as fastidious as ever, and was constantly
-introducing new improvements. It was a hobby and a pursuit, and served
-him as well as any other. To M. Berthollet he wrote,--“Whatever may be
-its success, it has at least had the good effect of making me avoid many
-hours of ennui, by employing my hands when I could not employ my head, and
-given me some exercise when I could not go out.” It also pleased him to
-see the invention growing under his hands as of old, though it is possible
-that during his later years he added but little to the machine. Indeed,
-it seems to have been as nearly as possible complete by the year 1817, if
-we may judge by the numerous exquisitely-finished specimens of reduced
-sculpture--busts, medallions, and statuary--laid away in the drawers of
-the garret at Heathfield. He took pleasure in presenting copies to his
-more intimate friends, jocularly describing them as “the productions of
-a young artist just entering his eighty-third year.” Shortly after, the
-hand of the cunning workman was stopped by death. The machine remained
-unfinished, according to its author’s intentions; and it is a singular
-testimony to the skill and perseverance of a man who had accomplished so
-much, that it is almost his only unfinished work.
-
-In the autumn of 1819 he was seized by his last illness. It could scarcely
-be called a seizure, for he suffered little, and continued calm and
-tranquil, in the full possession of his faculties, almost to the last. He
-was conscious of his approaching end, and expressed from time to time his
-sincere gratitude to Divine Providence for the worldly blessings he had
-been permitted to enjoy, for his length of days, and his exemption from
-the infirmities of age. “I am very sensible,” said he to the mourning
-friends who assembled round his deathbed, “of the attachment you show
-me, and I hasten to thank you for it, as I feel that I am now come to my
-last illness.” He parted with life quietly and peacefully, on the 19th of
-August, 1819, in the eighty-third year of his age. He was buried near his
-deceased friend and partner Mr. Boulton, in Handsworth Church. Over his
-remains, which lie in a side aisle, was placed a monument by Chantrey,
-perhaps his finest work, justifying the compliment paid to the sculptor
-that he “cut breath;” for when first uncovered before the old servants
-assembled round it at Soho, it so powerfully reminded them of their old
-master, that they “lifted up their voices and wept.”
-
-Watt has been fortunate in his monumental honours. The colossal statue of
-him in Westminster Abbey, also from the chisel of Chantrey, bears upon it
-an epitaph from the pen of Lord Brougham, which is beyond comparison the
-finest lapidary inscription in the English language; and among its other
-signal merits, it has one which appertains rather to its subject than
-its author, that, lofty as is the eulogy, every word of it is true.[424]
-The monument was raised by public subscriptions, initiated at a meeting
-in London presided over by the Prime Minister, and attended by the most
-illustrious statesmen, men of science, men of letters, and men of art,
-of the time, who met for the purpose of commemorating in some suitable
-manner the genius of Watt. “It has ever been reckoned one of the chief
-honours of my life,” says Lord Brougham, “that I was called upon to pen
-the inscription upon the noble monument thus nobly reared.”
-
-    [424] The following is the inscription:--
-
-                         NOT TO PERPETUATE A NAME
-            WHICH MUST ENDURE WHILE THE PEACEFUL ARTS FLOURISH,
-                                BUT TO SHOW
-                 THAT MANKIND HAVE LEARNED TO HONOUR THOSE
-                     WHO BEST DESERVE THEIR GRATITUDE,
-                                 THE KING,
-                   HIS MINISTERS, AND MANY OF THE NOBLES
-                        AND COMMONERS OF THE REALM,
-                          RAISED THIS MONUMENT TO
-                                JAMES WATT,
-               WHO DIRECTING THE FORCE OF AN ORIGINAL GENIUS
-                  EARLY EXERCISED IN PHILOSOPHIC RESEARCH
-                           TO THE IMPROVEMENT OF
-                             THE STEAM-ENGINE,
-                  ENLARGED THE RESOURCES OF HIS COUNTRY,
-                        INCREASED THE POWER OF MAN,
-                       AND ROSE TO AN EMINENT PLACE
-             AMONG THE MOST ILLUSTRIOUS FOLLOWERS OF SCIENCE,
-                  AND THE REAL BENEFACTORS OF THE WORLD.
-                          BORN AT GREENOCK, 1736.
-                DIED AT HEATHFIELD, IN STAFFORDSHIRE, 1819.
-
-[Illustration: WATT’S STATUE IN HANDSWORTH CHURCH.]
-
-Watt was also honoured during his lifetime. Learned Societies were
-proud to enrol him amongst their members. He was a Fellow of the Royal
-Societies of London and Edinburgh, a Foreign Associate of the Institute of
-France, and a Member of the Batavian Society. The University of Glasgow
-conferred on him the degree of Doctor of Law. Lord Liverpool offered him
-a baronetcy; but, consistent with the simplicity of his character, he
-declined the honour. He was invited to serve as Sheriff on two occasions,
-for Staffordshire and for Radnorshire; but he strongly pleaded to be
-excused undertaking the office. He was “a timid old man,” and hoped that
-he “should not have a duty imposed upon him that he was totally unfit for,
-nor have his grey hairs weighed down with a load of vexatious cares. My
-inventions,” he said, “are giving employment to the best part of a million
-of people, and having added many millions to the national riches, I have
-a natural right to rest in my extreme age.” His pleas were in both cases
-regarded as sufficient, and he was excused the office.
-
-       *       *       *       *       *
-
-It is altogether unnecessary to pronounce a panegyric on the character
-and achievements of James Watt. This has already been done by Lord Jeffrey
-in language that cannot be surpassed. Sir James Macintosh placed him “at
-the head of all inventors in all ages and nations;” and Wordsworth the
-poet, twenty years after his death, said, “I look upon him, considering
-both the magnitude and the universality of his genius, as perhaps the
-most extraordinary man that this country ever produced: he never sought
-display, but was content to work in that quietness and humility, both
-of spirit and of outward circumstances, in which alone all that is truly
-great and good was ever done.”
-
-Watt was himself accustomed to speak of his inventions with the modesty
-of true genius. To a nobleman who expressed to him his wonder at the
-greatness of his achievements, he said, “the public only look at my
-success, and not on the intermediate failures and uncouth constructions
-which have served as steps to enable me to climb to the top of the
-ladder.” Watt looked back upon his twenty long years of anxiety and labour
-before the engine succeeded, and heaved a sigh. “Without affecting any
-maidenly coyness,” he wrote to Dr. Darwin, who proposed to eulogise him
-in his ‘Botanic Garden,’ “you really make me appear contemptible in my
-own eyes by considering how far short my pretensions, or those of the
-invention, were of the climax of human intellect,--I that know myself to
-be inferior to the greatest part of enlightened men in most things. If I
-have excelled, I think now it has been by chance, and by the neglects of
-others. Preserve the dignity of a philosopher and historian; relate the
-facts, and leave posterity to judge. If I merit it, some of my countrymen,
-inspired by the _amor patriæ_, may say, ‘Hoc a Scoto factum fuit.’”
-
-Although the true inventor, like the true poet, is born, not made,--and
-although Watt pursued his inventions because he found his highest
-pleasure in inventing,--yet his greatest achievements were accomplished
-by unremitting application and industry. He was a keen observer and
-an incessant experimenter. “Observare” was the motto he deliberately
-adopted; and it expresses the principle and success of his life. He was
-always on the watch for facts, noting and comparing them. He took nothing
-for granted; and accepted no conclusions save on experimental evidence.
-“Nature can be conquered,” he said, “if we can but find out her weak
-side.” His patience was inexhaustible. He was never baffled by failure,
-from which he declared that he learnt more than from success. “It is a
-great thing,” he once observed to Murdock, “to find out what will _not_
-do: it leads to one finding out what _will_ do.”
-
-“Give me facts,” he once said to Boulton, “I am sick of theory: give me
-actual facts.” Yet, indispensable though facts are, theory is scarcely
-less so in invention; and it was probably because Watt was a great
-theorist, that he was a great inventor. His invention of the separate
-condenser was itself the result of a theory, the soundness of which he
-proved by experiment. So with the composition of water, the theory of
-which he at once divined from the experiments of Priestley. He continued
-theorising during the whole progress of his invention of the steam-engine.
-New facts suggested new arrangements and the application of entirely
-new principles, until in course of time the engine of Newcomen became
-completely transformed.
-
-Watt’s engine was not an invention merely--it might almost be called a
-creation. “The part which he played,” says M. Bataille, “in the mechanical
-application of the force of steam, can only be compared to that of Newton
-in astronomy, and of Shakspeare in poetry. And is not invention the poetry
-of science? It is only when we compare Watt with other mechanicians
-that we are struck by his immense superiority,--when we compare him,
-for example, with Smeaton, who was, perhaps, after him, the man who had
-advanced the farthest in industrial mechanism. Smeaton began, about the
-same time as Watt, his inquiries as to the best means of improving the
-steam-engine. He worked long and patiently, but in an entirely technical
-spirit. While he was working out his improvements, Watt had drawn forth
-from his fertile imagination all those brilliant inventions to which we
-owe the effective working steam-engine. In a word, Smeaton knew how to
-improve, but Watt knew how to create.”[425]
-
-    [425] E. M. Bataille, ‘Traité des Machines à Vapeur.’ Paris,
-      1847–9.
-
-As for the uses of the steam-engine, they are too widely known to stand in
-need of illustration. Had Watt, at the outset of his career, announced to
-mankind that he would invent a power that should drain their mines, blow
-their furnaces, roll and hammer their metals, thrash and grind their corn,
-saw their timber, drive their looms and spindles, print their books, impel
-ships across the ocean, and perform the thousand offices in which steam
-is now regularly employed, he would have been regarded as an enthusiast,
-if not as a madman. Yet all this the steam-engine has done and is now
-doing. It has widely extended the dominion of man over inanimate nature,
-and given him an almost unbounded supremacy over the materials which
-enter into his daily use. It has increased his power, his resources, and
-his enjoyments. It is the most universal and untiring of labourers,--the
-steam-power of Great Britain alone being estimated as equal to the manual
-labour of upwards of four hundred millions of men, or more than double
-the number of males supposed to inhabit the globe.[426] It is, indeed, no
-exaggeration to say that the steam-engine of Watt is, without exception,
-the greatest invention of modern times; and that it has been instrumental
-in effecting the most remarkable revolution in all departments of industry
-that the world has ever seen.
-
-    [426] What the steam-engine has done for the West is well known.
-      What is yet expected from it in the East may be gathered from
-      the few pregnant words lately uttered by Hassan Ali Khan,
-      Persian Ambassador at the Court of France, at the recent
-      celebration in Paris of a national festival instituted nineteen
-      centuries before the birth of Christ. Having recalled the minds
-      of his hearers to the early fire worship of his country, which
-      sprang from the primeval idolatry, he proceeded to say that it
-      was still to Fire that he fondly looked for the regeneration
-      of Persia. Fire had changed the face of Europe. In the
-      steam-engine, the railroad, the electric spark, the screw or
-      paddle ship, far more than in gunpowder or rifled cannon, fire
-      was the great benefactor that would bless one day the land of
-      his forefathers, who had instinctively worshipped that element
-      in secret anticipation of what was to come.
-
-       *       *       *       *       *
-
-Some months since, we visited the little garret at Heathfield in which
-Watt pursued the investigations of his later years. The room had been
-carefully locked up since his death, and had only once been swept out.
-Everything lay very much as he left it. The piece of iron he was last
-employed in turning lay on the lathe. The ashes of the last fire were
-in the grate, the last bit of coal was in the scuttle. The Dutch oven
-was in its place over the stove, and the frying-pan in which he cooked
-his meal was hanging by its accustomed nail. Many objects lay about
-or in the drawers, indicating the pursuits which had been interrupted
-by death,--busts, medallions, and figures, waiting to be copied by
-the sculpture-machine,--many medallion moulds, a store of plaster of
-Paris, and a box of plaster casts from London, the contents of which
-do not seem to have been disturbed. Here are Watt’s ladles for melting
-lead, his foot-rule, his glue-pot, his hammer. Reflecting mirrors, an
-extemporised camera with the lenses mounted on pasteboard, and many
-camera-glasses laid about, indicate interrupted experiments in optics.
-There are quadrant-glasses, compasses, scales, weights, and sundry boxes
-of mathematical instruments, once doubtless highly prized. In one place a
-model of the governor, in another of the parallel motion, and in a little
-box, fitted with wooden cylinders mounted with paper and covered with
-figures, is what we suppose to be a model of his proposed calculating
-machine. On the shelves are minerals and chemicals in pots and jars, on
-which the dust of nearly half a century has settled. The moist substances
-have long since dried up, the putty has been turned to stone, and the
-paste to dust. On one shelf we come upon a dish in which lies a withered
-bunch of grapes. On the floor, in a corner, near to where Watt sat and
-worked, is a hair-trunk--a touching memorial of a long past love and a
-long dead sorrow. It contains all poor Gregory’s school-books,--his first
-attempts at writing, his boy’s drawings of battles, his first school
-exercises down to his College themes, his delectuses, his grammars,
-his dictionaries, and his class books,--brought into this retired
-room, where the father’s eye could rest upon them. Near at hand is the
-sculpture-machine, on which he continued working to the last. Its wooden
-framing is worm-eaten and dropping into dust, like the hands which made
-it. But though the great workman has gone to rest, with all his griefs
-and cares, and his handiwork is fast crumbling to decay, the spirit of
-his work, the thought which he put into his inventions, still survives,
-and will probably continue to influence the destinies of his race for all
-time to come.
-
-[Illustration: HANDSWORTH CHURCH.
-
-THE BURIAL-PLACE OF BOULTON, WATT, AND MURDOCK.
-
-[By Percival Skelton.]]
-
-
-
-
-INDEX.
-
-
-  A.
-
-  ÆOLIPILE, the Greek, 6.
-
-  ADVENTURERS, the Cornish meetings of, 258–60, 273–4, 332.
-
-  ALBION Mill scheme, 353–7;
-    the mill burnt by incendiaries, 358–9.
-
-  ANDERSON, Professor, Glasgow, 113, 119.
-
-  ARKWRIGHT’S patent trial, 302, 347.
-
-  AUSTHORPE ENGINE, Leeds, 61.
-
-
-  B.
-
-  BACON, ROGER, his prophecy of steam power, 4.
-
-  BANKS, Sir JOSEPH, and BOULTON and WATT, 267, 286, 369.
-
-  ‘BEELZEBUB’ ENGINE, Soho, 241, 326.
-
-  BEIGHTON, HENRY, improvements on Newcomen’s engine, 67.
-
-  BELL, ANDREW, and Symington’s steamboat, 449.
-
-  BELL, HENRY,--his ‘Comet,’ 453.
-
-  BERTHOLLET, M., on chlorine, 381.
-
-  BIRMINGHAM, its ancient industry, 161–3;
-    Copper Company formed, 281–2;
-    illegal coining, 386–7;
-    riots at, 410–13.
-
-  BLACK, Dr., intercourse with and friendship for Watt, 110–14, 123,
-        132, 464;
-    lends Watt money, 150;
-    Boulton’s intercourse with, 329;
-    discovers carbonic acid gas, 372;
-    his death, 464;
-    his character, 465.
-
-  BOATS, first constructed of iron, 213.
-
-  BOATS, paddle and steam, _see_ Steam and Paddle boats.
-
-  BONZE, Cornish engineer, 233–4, 236;
-    his atmospheric engine, 245, 296, 313.
-
-  BOULTON, MATTHEW, F.R.S., Birmingham,--his family, 163;
-    birth and education, joins his father in business, 164;
-    his early trade correspondence, 165;
-    his marriage, 166;
-    his business enterprise, 167;
-    removes from Snow-hill to Soho, 168;
-    his aims at excellence, 170;
-    his distinguished and Royal patrons, 171, 174, 176, 180–1;
-    his artistic taste, 172;
-    surpasses French art manufacturers, 173;
-    makes clocks and timepieces, 174;
-    employs first-rate artists, 175;
-    corresponds with Benjamin Franklin concerning his model
-        fire-engine, 182–4;
-    first meeting with Watt, 186;
-    takes Roebuck’s share in Watt’s engine, 197;
-    Boulton’s qualities, 199, 200;
-    his friends, 201;
-    his views as to engine business, 202–3;
-    his grief at the death of Dr. Small, 208;
-    puts Watt’s son to school, is visited by the Empress of
-        Russia, 216;
-    goes to London on financial affairs, 217;
-    terms of partnership, 219;
-    advice to Watt on his marriage, 219–20;
-    pressure of work, 221;
-    his tubular boilers, 222, 283;
-    difficulties, financial, and with his partners, 240, 247;
-    raises extra capital, 242;
-    his visits to Cornwall, raises capital, and combats the
-        adventurers, 247, 261, 270, 273, 317, 320, 331;
-    his property and financial affairs, 262, 277–8, 320, 363–4;
-    pushes the letter-copying machine in London, 266–7;
-    has erysipelas, 270;
-    his courageous perseverance, patience, and business tact, 241,
-        249, 252, 271, 273, 276–7, 294;
-    his tender regard for Watt, and encouraging treatment, 272,
-        301;
-    organises mining business in Cornwall, 273–4;
-    suggests a tooth-cutting machine, 284;
-    his mechanical drawings, 283;
-    suggests horizontal-axled elliptical rotary engines for
-        general uses, 307, 324, 327;
-    life in Cornwall, his scientific tastes, 323, 340–41;
-    ill health, and visit to Scotland, 328–9, 365;
-    his paternal affection and domestic enjoyments, 340–1;
-    a commercial politician, 342;
-    connection with the Copper Company, 349–50;
-    hostility towards him in Cornwall, 351–2;
-    his sympathy with the Quakers, 352;
-    starts the Albion Mill scheme, 353;
-    his depressed spirits, 366;
-    his friendships, 367–71;
-    turns coiner by steam power, his Soho mint, 389–99;
-    his success in medalling, 395;
-    contract with Government for a new coinage, fits up the Royal
-        mint and others, 398–9;
-    Watt on Boulton’s merits in coining, 399;
-    his affectionate nature and generosity, 366, 401, 405, 487;
-    paternal care for young Watt, 406;
-    continued activity, his water-raising machine, 457, 474;
-    his reception of burglars at Soho, 458;
-    correspondence with Sir W. Scott, 459;
-    failing health, 462, 475;
-    counsel of friends to give up business, 475–6;
-    his death and funeral, 477;
-    monumental inscription, his qualities and character, 477, 478,
-        486, 487;
-    his workmen’s assurance society, 480;
-    his powers for organization and business qualities, 481–4;
-    Watt’s estimate of Boulton, 485, 486.
-
-  BOULTON AND WATT commence partnership, 197;
-    prospects of engine business, 207;
-    manufacture of engines commenced, 213–15;
-    terms of partnership, 218–23;
-    orders from Scotland, 219;
-    Gainsborough’s attack on the patent, 222–3;
-    difficulties with workmen and engine men, 227–8;
-    Cornish business, 231, 237;
-    terms on which engines were erected, 243–4;
-    resistance of engine dues, 246, 262;
-    orders from abroad, 249;
-    their altercations with the Cornish miners, 257–60, 315–16,
-        331–2;
-    engines sold, 262;
-    engine patent threatened, they share in mining adventures,
-        273, 278, 295–304;
-    their voluminous correspondence, 307–8;
-    adverse circumstances, 315;
-    dues from pumping-engines, 317;
-    Hornblowers’ opposition, 320;
-    miscellaneous engine orders, 333;
-    profits commence, 363;
-    their personal friends, 367;
-    their sons join the firm, 417–21;
-    partnership dissolved, 456.
-
-  BOULTON, M. ROBINSON, his education and attainments, 433–4;
-    in Paris, 405;
-    returns, 1788, 408;
-    his reception by the Lunar Society, 408–9;
-    settles to business, 417;
-    his business ability, 418–21.
-
-  BOULTON, M. P. W., on alleged photographic discoveries of Boulton
-        and Watt, 383.
-
-  BRANCA’S steam machine, 7.
-
-  BROUGHAM, LORD, opinion of Watt, 490, 503, 507.
-
-  BURKE, EDMUND, opposes Watt’s patent-right, 210;
-    denounces Dr. Priestley, 410;
-    also young Watt, 415.
-
-
-  C.
-
-  CALEDONIAN CANAL surveyed by Watt, 157, 197.
-
-  CALLEY, JOHN, Dartmouth, 63.
-
-  CAMPBELL, THOMAS, opinion of Gregory Watt, 468.
-
-  CARRON IRON WORKS, 138–9, 329, 443.
-
-  CARTSDYKE, Greenock, 80–2.
-
-  CARTWRIGHT, Dr., and steam navigation, 450.
-
-  CAUS, SOLOMON DE, his steam apparatus, 8, 9, 20, 21.
-
-  ‘CENTURY of Inventions,’ Marquis of Worcester’s, 10–16.
-
-  CHARLES II. and mechanical inventors, 15, 28.
-
-  ‘CHARLOTTE DUNDAS,’ steamboat, of Symington, 447.
-
-  CHACEWATER MINE and engine, 231;
-    engine finished, 235;
-    its working, 242–3.
-
-  CHLORINE, bleaching by, 381.
-
-  ‘CLERMONT,’ the steamboat, 453.
-
-  CLYDE, survey of, by Watt, 155, 191.
-
-  COINAGE improved by Boulton, 387–99.
-
-  COINING, illegal, 386;
-    punishments for, 387.
-
-  COINS struck at Soho Mint, 394.
-
-  ‘COMET,’ the steamboat, 453–4.
-
-  COOPER, of Manchester, political friend of young Watt, 408;
-    they are delegates to Paris, 414.
-
-  COPPER COMPANY organized, 281–2, 349–50.
-
-  CORNISH pumping engines, 46, 52, 55, 65, 75, 230–31;
-    Chacewater, 235, 239, 242–3;
-    Dalcoath, 246, 270, 306–7;
-    Hallamanin, 253;
-    Huel Vor, 55;
-    United Mines, 237, 275;
-    Poldice, Polgooth, Tingtang, Wheal Chance, W. Crenver, W.
-        Busy, W. Maid, W. Treasury, W. Union, W. Virgin, and
-        others, see _passim_, 235–327, 339.
-
-  CORNWALL, early mining in, 45–48;
-    Savery’s engines employed, 55;
-    Newcomen’s, 69;
-    Watt’s engines introduced, 230;
-    life in Cornwall, 235;
-    appearance of mining districts, 237;
-    character of miners, 257–60;
-    rain in, 260;
-    postal service, roads, and weather, 321–3;
-    wasteful mining, 349;
-    riots, 351.
-
-  CORN-MILL first worked by steam, 325.
-
-  COSGARNE HOUSE, Cornwall, 275.
-
-  COSMO, Grand Duke of Tuscany, visit to Marquis of Worcester’s water
-        engine, 19.
-
-  COUNTER for steam engine, 245.
-
-  CRAIG, JOHN, Watt’s partner, 125.
-
-  CRANK motion invention stolen, 289.
-
-  CROMWELL and the MARQUIS OF WORCESTER, 14.
-
-
-  D.
-
-  DALRYMPLE, Sir JOHN, and steam navigation, 440.
-
-  DARWIN, Dr. ERASMUS--correspondence with Boulton, 184, 201;
-    a Member of the Lunar Society, 369, 465.
-
-  DAVY, Sir HUMPHRY, on gas-lighting, 429;
-    and Gregory Watt, 468–9;
-    Davy on Gregory’s death, 472.
-
-  DAY, THOS., author of ‘Sandford and Merton,’ 201, 263.
-
-  DICK, Dr., Glasgow, 101, 106, 113–14.
-
-  DIGESTER, PAPIN’S, 32, 120.
-
-  DIRCKS, Mr., on Marquis of Worcester’s inventions, 11, 22.
-
-  DUNDAS, Lord, and steamboats, 448.
-
-  DUNDONALD, Lord, and BOULTON, 329.
-
-
-  E.
-
-  EDGEWORTH, R. L., and BOULTON, 201;
-    and the locomotive, 336;
-    and the Lunar Society, 369–70.
-
-  ENGINE DUES--contests with miners, 243–5, 271, 311, 315, 317, 320,
-        331–2, 339, 418–21.
-
-  EGINTON, FR., at Soho, 171;
-    partnership with Boulton in picture business, 264.
-
-  EWART, PETER,--his opinion of Boulton, 486.
-
-  EXPANSIVE WORKING, 146–7, 228–9, 304, 307, 310–11.
-
-
-  F.
-
-  FAIRBAIRN, WILLIAM, opinion of Murdock, 431–2.
-
-  FIRE AND STEAM ENGINES. _See_ Steam engines.
-
-  FOND, M. ST., describes interviews with Watt and Priestley, 383–5.
-
-  FOTHERGILL, JOHN, a Soho partner, 169;
-    travels on the Continent for the firm, 172, 204;
-    his despondency, 240, 247, 263;
-    his tenacity, his death, 275;
-    his embarrassments, 314.
-
-  FRANKLIN, BENJAMIN,--correspondence with Boulton on steam-engine,
-        182–4.
-
-  FULTON inspects Symington’s steamboat, 449;
-    makes a model steamboat in Paris, 450;
-    applies to James Watt, jun., for an engine, 451;
-    his ‘Nautilus’ infernal-machine, 452;
-    he fits up the ‘Clermont’ steamer, 452.
-
-
-  G.
-
-  GAINSBOROUGH, HUMPHREY, attacks Watt’s patent, 222.
-
-  GARAY, BLASCO, and paddle-boats, 36.
-
-  GAS-LIGHTING invented by Wm. Murdock, 424–7;
-    Wintzer’s wonderful project, 428.
-
-  GEORGE III. and BOULTON, 3, 174;
-    Watt’s interview with the King, 403, 476.
-
-  GLASGOW in 1754, 96–100;
-    the tobacco lords, 98;
-    the clubs, 99;
-    drinking habits, 100;
-    the University and Professors, 106–8, 113–15;
-    the Green, 127.
-
-  GOVERNOR, The, invented by Watt, 335.
-
-  GREENOCK at end of last century, 80–4;
-    improvements, 85;
-    at the rebellion of 1745, 93.
-
-  GUNPOWDER AND STEAM as powers, 5.
-
-
-  H.
-
-  HAMILTON BRIDGE--James Watt architect, 156.
-
-  HANDSWORTH CHURCH, near Birmingham, 477–8, 505, 507, 514.
-
-  HARPER’S HILL, Birmingham, 214.
-
-  HART, ROBERT,--Reminiscences of Watt, 147, 229, 424, 499, 500.
-
-  HEATHFIELD, Birmingham, 460, 493–5, 512–13.
-
-  HERO OF ALEXANDRIA, his writings on steam, 5–7.
-
-  HOLLINS, Mr., Birmingham,--Reminiscence of Watt, 505.
-
-  HOOKE, Dr., on the Vauxhall hydraulic-machine, 19;
-    correspondence with Newcomen, 62.
-
-  HORNBLOWER, JABEZ, and his brothers, 296–7, 332.
-
-  HORNBLOWER, JONATHAN,--Watt’s first meeting with, 232–3;
-    with his sons, erects engine to supersede Watt’s, 296–304,
-        320–24, 331.
-
-  HORNBLOWER, JOSEPH, erects Newcomen engines in Cornwall, 71.
-
-  HULLS, JONATHAN, of Campden, 72;
-    his steamboat, 73;
-    unsatisfactory trial, his publications, 74.
-
-  HUNTSMAN, BENJAMIN, Sheffield, and Boulton, 165.
-
-  HUTTON, WILLIAM, Birmingham, 153, 162;
-    house destroyed by the rioters, 412.
-
-
-  J.
-
-  JOINT STOCK MINING in Cornwall, 47–8.
-
-
-  K.
-
-  KALTOFF, CASPAR, assistant to the Marquis of Worcester, 10, 13, 18,
-        19.
-
-  KEIR, JAS., friend of Boulton, 170, 201;
-    his partner, 265, 409.
-
-  KINNEIL HOUSE, 142;
-    Watt’s workshop, 148.
-
-
-  L.
-
-  LATENT HEAT, 122–3.
-
-  LAWSON, JAMES, on Boulton’s Mints, 391.
-
-  LEMON, WILLIAM, Penzance, 69.
-
-  LETTER-COPYING MACHINES invented by Watt,--partnership, 265.
-
-  LOCOMOTION BY STEAM, 187;
-    patent by Watt, 333, 337;
-    Edgeworth, 336;
-    Murdock’s model, 336–7;
-    Symington, 435–6.
-
-  LUC, M. DE, friend of Boulton and Watt, 351, 369, 376, 381–2, 395,
-        476.
-
-  LUNAR SOCIETY OF BIRMINGHAM, 367–70;
-    its discussions, 375;
-    alleged photographic discovery, 382–3;
-    demise of the Society, its influence, 385;
-    dissolution by deaths, 465.
-
-
-  M.
-
-  MEASON, Mr., Wanlockhead, 435–6.
-
-  MEDALS struck at Soho Mint, 395–7.
-
-  MICROMETER, prismatic, 152.
-
-  MILLER, Mr., of Dalswinton, propels boats by paddle-wheels, 437;
-    employs Symington to make an engine for steamboat, 439;
-    its trial, 442;
-    orders a second engine, 443;
-    another trial, applies to Boulton and Watt, 444;
-    their reply, 445.
-
-  MINES, UNITED DISTRICT, Cornwall, 231.
-
-  MINT, Soho, 390, 396, 400.
-
-  MINT, Tower Hill, fitted up by Boulton, 398–9.
-
-  MINTS, foreign, fitted up by Boulton, 389.
-
-  MONKLAND CANAL,--Watt, engineer, 153–4, 194.
-
-  MORLAND, Sir SAMUEL,--his fire-engine, 29;
-    his poverty and blindness, his death, 30.
-
-  MURDOCK, WILLIAM, employed by Boulton and Watt, 253;
-    his character, early days, and antecedents, 254;
-    his interview with Boulton, the wooden hat, and his
-        engagement, 255;
-    sent to Cornwall, interest in his work, 256;
-    how he dealt with the bullies, fights a duel with Captain
-        Trevithick, 257;
-    invents sun-and-planet motion, 309;
-    his value and merits, 311–12, 337–8, 361;
-    presented with an acknowledgment, 312;
-    his popularity in Cornwall, 313;
-    testimony of Boulton to his worth, 321;
-    makes a model locomotive, 336–435;
-    puts Albion Mill engine to rights, 356;
-    at Soho, 400;
-    his loyalty and usefulness to the firm, 422;
-    his inventions, 423, 430–32;
-    the D slide valve, lighting by gas, 424–28;
-    his steam-gun, engine cement, 431;
-    obtains the Rumford gold medal, 425;
-    Mr. Fairbairn’s opinion of him, 431–3;
-    his death, 433.
-
-
-  N.
-
-  ‘NAUTILUS,’ the infernal machine, by Fulton, 452.
-
-  NEWCOMEN, THOS., of Dartmouth, 59;
-    his house, 60;
-    his family and character, 61;
-    his improvements on the fire-engine, 62–70;
-    correspondence with Dr. Hooke, 62;
-    Newcomen engine described, 63–68;
-    he erects colliery engines, 68;
-    supplies pumping-engines for Cornwall, 69, 71, 74–5;
-    his obscure end, 72.
-
-  NEWCOMEN ENGINES, increased use of for pumping, 74–75;
-    they are superseded, 275.
-
-  NEWCOMEN MODEL at Glasgow University, 119–21.
-
-
-  O.
-
-  “OLD BESS” engine, Soho, 250, 326.
-
-
-  P.
-
-  PAPIN, Dr. D.,--preference for gunpowder to steam, 5;
-    a French refugee, 31;
-    Curator Royal Society, his digester, inventor of the
-        safety-valve, 32;
-    proceeds to Germany, his experiments on water and steam,
-        33–35;
-    his steam-boat, 37;
-    his misfortunes and death, 38.
-
-  PARALLEL MOTION patented by Watt, 333–4.
-
-  PATENT-RIGHT, attacks and defence, Watt on patent-right, 280–1, 295,
-        303;
-    combination against, 347;
-    Watt, junr., vindicates rights, 418.
-
-  PICKARD, JAMES, steals Watt’s crank motion, 289.
-
-  PITT, WILLIAM,--BOULTON, and his commercial policy, 342–6;
-    coinage projects, 388, 393.
-
-  PORT GLASGOW piers, by Watt, 156.
-
-  POTTER, HUMPHREY,--his invention of the “Scoggan,” 66.
-
-  PRIESTLEY, Dr., of Birmingham and the Lunar Society, 369;
-    his gifts, 370–72;
-    Boulton’s association with him, 373;
-    meeting of the Lunar Society, 409;
-    his sympathy with its French revolutionists, 410;
-    the new meeting-house and his house at Fairhill burnt by a
-        mob, 411;
-    grievous loss of his books, MSS., and apparatus, 412;
-    his death, 466.
-
-  PUMPING-ENGINES. _See_ Cornish Pumping-engines.
-
-
-  Q.
-
-  QUEEN CHARLOTTE and BOULTON, 174–5.
-
-
-  R.
-
-  RADSTOKE, Bristol, Hornblowers’ Engine, 322–3.
-
-  RAGLAN CASTLE, 10–12, 26.
-
-  REDRUTH, Cornwall, 237–8.
-
-  RENNIE, JOHN, engineer, Albion Mill, 354.
-
-  REYNOLDS, Mr., of Ketley, has Watt’s first rotary engine, 327.
-
-  ROBINSON FAMILY, The, 166.
-
-  ROBISON, Professor,--his intercourse with Watt, 113–14;
-    his voyagings, his estimate of Watt, 115–16, 118, 121, 130–31;
-    idea of a locomotive, 336;
-    incident in class on his return from Watt’s patent trial,
-        463–4;
-    his death, 472–3.
-
-  ROEBUCK, Dr.,--Carron Works and coal mining adventures, 138;
-    correspondence with Watt, 139;
-    terms of partnership with Watt, 141;
-    his house at Kinneil, 142;
-    his embarrassments, 150;
-    his patent for alkali manufacture, 152;
-    his ruin, 158;
-    correspondence with Boulton, 185, 189, 192;
-    arrangement to transfer his share in Watt’s engine to Boulton,
-        190;
-    his share transferred, 195–7, 204.
-
-  ROTARY MOTION, 286;
-    Watt employs the crank, 287;
-    the invention stolen, 289, 293, 299–301, 309–10, 319, 325–7.
-
-  RUSSIA, Empress of, visit to Boulton, 216.
-
-
-  S.
-
-  SAVERY, CAPTAIN THOMAS, his family, 40;
-    early life, study of mechanics, 41;
-    his clocks, machine for polishing plate glass, his paddle
-        boat, 42, 43;
-    opposed by the Navy Board, 43;
-    his “Navigation Improved,” 42, 44;
-    his paddle yacht on the Thames, 44;
-    his fire-engine, 48–54;
-    his ‘Miner’s Friend,’ 50, 52;
-    his engines used in Cornwall, 55;
-    failures of engines, 56, 57;
-    his later years, death, and will, 58.
-
-  SCHIMMELPENNINCK, Mrs., descriptions of meetings of Lunar Society,
-        &c., 408–9;
-    on Watt’s character, 503.
-
-  SCOTT, Sir W., on gas-lighting, 429, 431;
-    opinion of Boulton, 459;
-    of Watt, 501–4.
-
-  SCREW-PROPELLER suggested by Watt, 192.
-
-  SHELBURNE, LORD, opinion of Boulton, 171.
-
-  SIMSON, PROFESSOR, Glasgow, 112–15.
-
-  SMALL, Dr., birth and parentage, 145;
-    correspondence with Watt, 146–7, 150–51;
-    correspondence, 186–198;
-    his attainments, 201;
-    his death, 208.
-
-  SMEATON, JAMES, engineer, attracted by the atmospheric engine, 68;
-    improvements on Newcomen’s engine, 76;
-    adverse opinion of Watt’s engine, 202;
-    improves York buildings engine, 217, 226, 292, 511.
-
-  SOHO, Birmingham, its situation and cost of building, 167–70;
-    its varied manufactures, 176;
-    its distinguished visitors, 176, 180–1;
-    extent of capital and trade, 177, 180;
-    persons employed and machinery, 179–80;
-    Watt’s first visit, 185; brisk engine trade, 348, 361;
-    workmen tempted to leave, 227;
-    training of workmen, 228;
-    Prussian spies, 250;
-    loss by painting business, 264;
-    letter-copying machine business, 265–8, 349;
-    steam corn-mill at, 325;
-    the mint at, 390, 396–99;
-    illuminated with gas, 427.
-
-  SOHO pictures, the, 264.
-
-  SORBIÈRE, M., on Marquis of Worcester’s inventions, 18–20.
-
-  SPEAKING-TRUMPET invented by Sir S. Morland, 29.
-
-  STEAM and paddle boats. _See_ Bell, Henry, 453;
-    Fulton, 449–52;
-    Garay, 35, 36;
-    Hulls, 72–74;
-    Miller, 437–45;
-    Papin, 37;
-    Savery, 37, 42–44;
-    Symington, 435–49.
-
-  STEAM and fire engines, improvers of, and alleged inventors, 75–76;
-    _see also_ pp. 6;
-    Branca, 7;
-    Caus de, and Worcester, Marquis of, 9–26;
-    Morland, 29;
-    Savery, 49–54, 59;
-    Newcomen, 63;
-    _also index entries_, Boulton, Matthew, and Watt, James;
-    possible defects, 224;
-    Watt’s single acting pumping engine, 236.
-
-  STEAM FLOUR-MILLS, 291, 325–6, 327.
-
-  STEAM-GUN suggested by Murdock, 431.
-
-  STEAM HAMMER, Watt’s, 300.
-
-  STEAM, its employment by the ancients, its enormous power, 5.
-
-  STOCKDALE, Mr., of Carke, visited by Boulton and Watt, 419;
-    describes a visit to Watt, 505.
-
-  STRATFORD-LE-BOW ENGINE, 217, 223–6, 369.
-
-  STRATHMORE CANAL surveyed by Watt, 155.
-
-  “SUN AND PLANET” motion, 309.
-
-  SYCAMORE HILL, Handsworth, Murdock’s residence, 254.
-
-  SYMINGTON, WILLIAM, of Wanlockhead,--his model locomotive, 435–6;
-    matriculates at Edinburgh University, projects steamboat for
-        canals, 436–7;
-    joins Mr. Miller in constructing a steamboat, 439;
-    his first steamboat engine, 441;
-    its trial, 442;
-    makes a second engine for Mr. Miller, 443;
-    another trial, 444;
-    fits up the ‘Charlotte Dundas,’ his adversity and death, 449.
-
-
-  T.
-
-  TELESCOPE FOR MEASURING DISTANCES, invention of Watt, 151.
-
-  TILT-HAMMER worked by steam, patent by Watt, 301, 325, 333.
-
-  TOBACCO TRADE, Glasgow, 98–9.
-
-  TREVITHICK, Captain, Watt’s altercation with, 257;
-    Murdock fights a duel with, 257, 259, 296.
-
-  TUBULAR BOILERS made by Boulton, 282–3.
-
-
-  U.
-
-  UNITED MINES, Cornwall, map, 231, 261, 275.
-
-
-  V.
-
-  VAUXHALL WATER ENGINE, &c., 18, 25, 29.
-
-
-  W.
-
-  “WAGGON AND HORSES,” Birmingham, 288.
-
-  WALKER, ZACCHEUS, manager at Soho, 169, 400.
-
-  WARLTIRE, Mr., Birmingham, lecturer, 377.
-
-  WASHBOROUGH, MATTHEW, of Bristol, 289;
-    Watt’s opinion of him, 291–293.
-
-  WATER, composition of,--Watt, Cavendish, Lavoisier, and Priestley,
-        377–81.
-
-  WATER-RAISING ENGINES, 20–25, 29, 52–5, 63–9.
-    _See_ also Cornish pumping-engines.
-
-  WATT, GREGORY,--his personal beauty and brilliant talents, 467–8;
-    his infirm health, is lodged at Penzance, friendship with
-        Humphry Davy, 468–9;
-    his travels, continued illness and death, 470–71;
-    Davy’s appreciation of Gregory Watt, 472.
-
-  WATT, JAMES,--the engineer’s father, 83;
-    his varied occupations and trade, 85–6;
-    he fills important public offices, 86.
-
-  WATT, JAMES, engineer, F.R.S., &c.,--his ancestry, 80;
-    his birth, feeble constitution, home education, 87;
-    his early exhibition of mechanical taste and dexterity, his
-        precocity, 88;
-    sent to school, 89;
-    continual ailments, taken to Glasgow, gift of storytelling,
-        90;
-    sent to Greenock Grammar School, 91;
-    love of reading, 92;
-    recollections of the rebellion, 93;
-    rambles, scientific pursuits and studies, 94;
-    his single sport, 95;
-    goes to Glasgow to learn a trade, difficulty in finding a
-        master, 100;
-    proceeds to London, 101;
-    has again difficulty in finding a master, serves a
-        watch-maker, cuts letters in metal, finds a master, 102;
-    his rapid progress as mathematical-instrument-maker, his life
-        in London, 103;
-    danger from pressgangs, 104;
-    returns to Scotland, refused permission to commence business
-        in Glasgow, 105;
-    finds asylum in the college, 106;
-    his shop there, 107;
-    his unprofitable business, sells maps and quadrants, 109;
-    makes musical instruments, 110;
-    builds organs, 111;
-    his studies, his club, his intercourse with the professors
-        and students, 112;
-    his principal associates, 113;
-    Dr. Robison and others, 114;
-    Watt’s scientific attainments, 115;
-    studies chemistry, 118;
-    the Newcomen model, studies steam, 119–121;
-    his inquiries and experiments, 122–124;
-    business improves, takes a partner, 125;
-    marries his cousin, 126;
-    his continued brooding over the steam-engine, 127;
-    walk on Glasgow Green, a discovery, 127–8;
-    the separate condenser, experimental apparatus, 129–31;
-    Robison and Watt, anecdote, 131;
-    friendship with Dr. Black, 132;
-    Watt’s air-tight cover, 133;
-    his model engine, 134;
-    working engine, 135;
-    mechanical and financial difficulties, 136–37;
-    Watt’s connexion with Roebuck, 138–9;
-    begins business as surveyor, 139;
-    surveys canals, 140;
-    proceeds with the engine, 141;
-    visit to Roebuck at Kinneil House, 142;
-    a patent determined on, 143;
-    strives after improvements, 144;
-    his perseverance, 145;
-    his foresight, 146;
-    erects Newcomen engines, 147;
-    trial engine erected at Kinneil, 148–9;
-    dreary prospects, Roebuck embarrassed, 150;
-    Watt’s minor inventions, 151;
-    multifarious pursuits, superintends canal works, 152–3;
-    surveys Strathmore Canal, 155;
-    designs Hamilton Bridge and other engineering works, 156;
-    death of Mrs. Watt, 157;
-    Watt visits Soho, 185;
-    first meeting with Boulton, and correspondence with him and
-        Dr. Small, 186, 190;
-    Watt resumes surveying, 191;
-    more unsuccessful engine experiments, 192;
-    Monkland Canal works stopped, and Watt loses employment, 194;
-    resumed overtures, Roebuck’s share transferred to Boulton,
-        and commencement of Boulton and Watt’s partnership, Watt’s
-        arrival in Birmingham, 195–8;
-    contrast between Boulton and Watt, 199–200;
-    the engine re-erected at Soho, 202–4;
-    works successfully, 205;
-    inquiries for engines, extension of patent, Watt’s arguments,
-        Act obtained, 206–12;
-    invited to Russia, 209;
-    visits to London, 206–7;
-    Bow engine, 224–26;
-    goes to Cornwall, his life there, describes the adventurers,
-        231–34;
-    unable to wrestle for engine-dues, 244–46, 257;
-    fears as to financial obligations, 249, 263, 268, 273, 293–4,
-        314, 315, 317;
-    Watt’s imperfections, 258;
-    his infirm health and intolerance of inefficient workmen, 251,
-        269, 270, 272, 276–7, 308–9, 311–12, 316, 348;
-    invents letter-copying machine, 265;
-    opinion on patent right, 280–281;
-    rotary motion, 286, 293, 299–301, 311, 318, 325, 327, 359;
-    Washborough and Pickard’s piracy, 288–93;
-    invents contrivance for stopping engine, 306;
-    equalising beam, 307;
-    experiments on nutgalls, 307;
-    new patent, 300, 309–310;
-    visits Radstoke about Hornblowers’ engine, 322–3;
-    steam applied to the tilt-hammer, 333;
-    parallel motion, 334;
-    the governor, 335;
-    opinions of free commerce, 345;
-    financial caution, 364–5;
-    theory on the composition of water, 377–81;
-    connexion with the Lunar Society, 367;
-    experiments on bleaching by chlorine, 381;
-    takes pleasure tours, 402;
-    interview with the king, 403;
-    fears for his son’s safety, 415–417;
-    letter on steam-navigation, 445;
-    his garret-workshop, 460, 493, 495, 513–14;
-    search after investments, 460–61;
-    his bereavements, 466–74;
-    enjoys retirement, 460, 475;
-    studies medical chemistry, 467;
-    sorrow at the death of Boulton, 488;
-    cheerful occupation of declining years, 489–90;
-    statuary-copying machine, 491;
-    medallions of his friends, 492;
-    consulted by the Glasgow Waterworks Company, his tours and
-        visits, 497–8;
-    Sir W. Scott, Jeffrey, Mrs. Schimmelpenninck, on Watt’s
-        character and attainments, 501–3;
-    caustic criticism by Watt, 506;
-    last illness and death, monumental honours, 507–8;
-    honours conferred upon and offered to him, 509;
-    modest estimate of himself, traits of character, 510–12;
-    concluding reflections, 513.
-
-  WATT, Mrs. JAMES, 218;
-    letters to Boulton about life in Cornwall, 235;
-    Watt’s distresses, 276–7, 308, 475;
-    is very particular in domestic affairs, 496.
-
-  WATT, JAMES, junr.,--his education and attainments, 403–4, 406;
-    Manchester life and training, his confidence in Boulton,
-        405–7;
-    his political proclivities, 408, 417;
-    a delegate to the Jacobin Club, 414;
-    scene with Robespierre, flees Paris, is denounced by Burke in
-        the House of Commons, 415;
-    his liberty endangered, 416;
-    settles to business, 417;
-    his business ability, 418.
-
-  WATT, THOMAS, the engineer’s grandfather, 79–82.
-
-  WEDGWOOD, JOSIAH, and BOULTON, 172–3, 201;
-    a mining adventurer, 273;
-    commercial politics, 343;
-    a member of the Lunar Society, his delicate and generous
-        conduct towards Priestley, 374–5, 465.
-
-  WILKINSON, JOHN, of Broseley, constructs the first iron boats,
-        212–13;
-    orders first engine from Boulton and Watt, 215;
-    casts cylinders for Boulton and Watt, 216–224;
-    a mining adventurer, 273;
-    orders rotary engine, 318.
-
-  WILLIAM III. and SAVERY, 50.
-
-  WITHERING, Dr., and the Lunar Society, 201, 369, 383, 409, 413, 465.
-
-  WOODCROFT, B., on Hero of Alexandria, 7;
-    Marquis of Worcester’s inventions, 23;
-    steam navigation, 448, 452.
-
-  WORCESTER, EDW., Marquis of,--birth and family, early life
-        and studies, water-commanding steam-engine, ‘Century of
-        Inventions,’ 10–13, 16–23;
-    his escutcheon lock, 17;
-    a Royalist in the civil war, advances money to the king, 12;
-    his exile and return, imprisonment in the Tower, College of
-        Artisans at Vauxhall, 13;
-    his poverty, 14;
-    revived hopes, 15;
-    patented inventions, 16;
-    descriptions of his engine, 19;
-    seeks access to the king, 24;
-    his embarrassments, 25;
-    his death, 25.
-
-  WORCESTER, Marchioness of,--zeal for her deceased husband’s honour,
-        25, 27, 28.
-
-
-  Y.
-
-  YORK BUILDINGS ENGINE, 206;
-    improved by Smeaton, 217, 227.
-
-
-THE END.
-
-LONDON: PRINTED BY W. CLOWES AND SONS, DUKE STREET, STAMFORD STREET, AND
-CHARING CROSS.
-
-
-
-
-Lately published. By the same Author.
-
-Vols. I. and II., 8vo., 42_s._, with 5 Steel Portraits and 200
-Illustrations on Wood.
-
-LIVES OF THE ENGINEERS;
-
-WITH AN ACCOUNT OF THEIR PRINCIPAL WORKS, AND A HISTORY OF INLAND
-COMMUNICATION IN BRITAIN.
-
-
-_FIRST SERIES._
-
-Opinions of the Press, &c.
-
-“There may be many here who have made themselves acquainted with a book
-that cannot be too widely brought into public notice--I mean the recent
-publication of a popular author, Mr. Smiles, entitled _The Lives of the
-Engineers_. There may be those here who have read the Life of Brindley,
-and perused the record of his discouragement in the tardiness of his own
-mind, as well as in the external circumstances with which he determined
-to do battle, and over which he achieved his triumph. There may be those
-who have read the exploits of the blind Metcalfe, who made roads and
-bridges in England at a time when nobody else had learnt to make them.
-There may be those who have dwelt with interest on the achievements of
-Smeaton, Rennie, and Telford. In that book we see of what materials
-Englishmen are made. These men, who have now become famous among us,
-had no mechanics’ institutes, no libraries, no classes, no examinations
-to cheer them on their way. In the greatest poverty, difficulties, and
-discouragements, their energies were found sufficient for their work, and
-they have written their names in a distinguished page of the history of
-their country.”--_The Right Hon. W. E. Gladstone at Manchester._
-
-“I have just been reading a work of great interest, which I recommend to
-your notice--I mean Smiles’s _Lives of the Engineers_. No more interesting
-books have been published of late years than those by Mr. Smiles--his
-_Lives of the Engineers_, his _Life of George Stephenson_, and his
-admirable little book on _Self-Help_--a most valuable manual.”--_Sir
-Stafford Northcote at Exeter._
-
-“We cannot but refer, in passing, to the captivating and instructive
-volumes which Mr. Smiles has devoted to the _Lives of the Engineers_, a
-record not before attempted of the achievements of a race of men who have
-conferred the highest honour and the most extensive benefits on their
-country. ‘Who are the great men of the present age?’ said Mr. Bright a
-few nights ago in the House of Commons,--‘Not your warriors--not your
-statesmen; they are your engineers,’”--_Edinburgh Review._
-
-“A chapter of English history which had to be written, and which,
-probably, no one could have written so well. Mr. Smiles, has obtained a
-mass of original materials. It is not too much to say that we now have
-an Engineers’ Pantheon, with a connected narrative of their successive
-reclamations from sea, bog, and fen; a history of the growth of the inland
-communication of Great Britain by means of its roads, bridges, canals,
-and railways; and a survey of the lighthouses, breakwaters, docks, and
-harbours constructed for the protection and accommodation of our commerce
-with the world.”--_Times._
-
-“Happy alike in the choice of his subject and in the treatment he has
-bestowed upon it, Mr. Smiles has in these two delightful volumes made
-another sterling addition to our standard literature. The history of
-English engineering, which he has here traced from the beginning, forms
-an essential part of the history of English civilization, but one which
-had hitherto remained unwritten. The men whose lives he has narrated
-were all men of singular genius, and indomitable energy and perseverance;
-self-taught and self-made for the most part, and impelled by the force of
-their constructive instincts to the accomplishment, without precedents or
-guides, of works of inestimable national importance.”--_Daily News._
-
-“In two handsome volumes, richly illustrated and luxuriously printed, Mr.
-Smiles begins what is in fact a History of the results of Engineering
-Science in this country. He puts his history into the most interesting
-form by developing it through successive stories of the Lives of the
-Engineers. Although his subject is one of the most curious and important
-in the whole history of civilization, and abounds in details that are
-known to delight even our boys, the ground Mr. Smiles traverses is to a
-remarkable degree his own peculiar possession.”--_Examiner._
-
-
-
-
-Lately published. By the same Author.
-
-Vol. III., 8vo., 21_s._, with 2 Portraits and 70 Illustrations.
-
-LIVES OF THE ENGINEERS, ETC. ETC.
-
-_SECOND SERIES._
-
-
-“Mr. Smiles’s third volume of _The Engineers_ contains the biographies
-of George Stephenson and his son Robert. The life of George Stephenson
-is a revised edition of the author’s previous excellent work on the same
-subject, but it is much more complete, from the circumstance that the
-history of George’s son and lifelong colleague is interwoven with his own.
-It is impossible fully to comprehend either without the other. Father
-and son understood one another better than any other person could have
-understood either of them. Their ambition was alike, and they perfectly
-coincided as to the means by which its objects were to be accomplished.
-They were equally kindly and generous, and there never was a shadow of
-reserve or estrangement between them. It is delightful to contemplate
-these two great men in their intercourse with each other, their mutual
-and perfect confidence, the laborious paths of discovery which they trod
-together, and the brilliant combinations of their genius hallowed by
-their strong affection.... This volume brings down the subject of British
-engineering to the establishment of the railway system, in which, as the
-author justly observes, ‘British engineers have displayed their highest
-skill and achieved their greatest triumphs.’ Mr. Smiles’s _Life of George
-Stephenson_ is so well and so favourably known that we confine ourselves
-to the simple announcement of its appearance in the ‘Engineers’ series
-in a greatly improved form, and perfected by being blended with that
-of Robert Stephenson.... This volume is a monument to truth, honour,
-and integrity, as the deepest and most solid foundations of human
-renown.”--_Daily News._
-
-“The Biographical History of British Engineering would be very imperfect
-without the lives of the Stephensons, and we must thank Mr. Smiles for
-a third volume containing the story of the famous father and son, George
-and Robert. The career of George Stephenson, indeed, is already familiar
-to us through the earlier publication of Mr. Smiles, and the greater part
-of the present volume may be looked upon as a new and enlarged edition of
-that work; but, in the life of Robert, Mr. Smiles enters upon new ground,
-and he has produced a biography little inferior in interest to his former
-narrative. As interesting it can scarcely be called; for the difficulties
-which George Stephenson had to encounter were, by his carefulness, removed
-to a great extent from the path of his son, and we are not absorbed in
-the story of a single-handed battle with innumerable obstacles. The career
-of Robert Stephenson is, moreover, so much nearer to us than that of his
-father, that it was probably impossible to write its history with that
-fulness of biographic detail which presented the very man, George, before
-us, and gave such a charm to the story of his life.”--_London Review._
-
-“It was almost necessary, that the life of George Stephenson as an
-engineer should combine itself with that of his son, so closely were
-the two mixed up in the most remarkable project of their lives. Robert
-Stephenson has been removed by death since his father’s biography was
-first given to the world by Mr. Smiles and the author has acted very
-judiciously in adding to his work those special details which are required
-to furnish forth a complete biography of the pair. The keen, bluff,
-intelligent features of the younger Stephenson are finely engraved among
-the illustrations of this volume from a photograph by Claudet. Much is
-recorded respecting the man that is of great interest over and above the
-information given us as to the achievements of the engineer.... This book
-will be a sterling addition to our libraries--adding to its literary and
-human interest the merits of excellent typography and fine ornament in
-the engravings with which it is enriched.”--_John Bull._
-
-“A book which has at once the conciseness necessary to render it valuable
-to the professional man, and the interesting character which makes it
-acceptable to the general reader.... The information is so interspersed
-with anecdotes and interesting notes, that the work will be read with
-pleasure by everybody.... Mr. Smiles has enjoyed the active co-operation
-of those who were able to throw a light upon the subject, including Robert
-Stephenson himself.”--_Mining Journal._
-
-
-
-
-Lately published. By the same Author. Post 8vo. 6_s._
-
-INDUSTRIAL BIOGRAPHY:
-
-IRON WORKERS AND TOOL MAKERS.
-
-
-“Mr. Smiles is not only a skilful workman, but he has chosen a new field
-of work. Hitherto the great biographies have been written of soldiers
-and sailors, statesmen, poets, artists, and philosophers. It would
-seem as if these only were the great men of the world, as if these only
-were the benefactors of mankind, whose deeds are worthy of memory. The
-suspicion has arisen that, after all, there may be other heroes than
-those of the pen, the sceptre, and the sword. There are, indeed, men
-in various walks of life whose footsteps are worthy of being traced;
-but surely, considering what England is, and to what we owe most of our
-material greatness, the lives of our engineers are peculiarly worthy of
-being written. ‘The true Epic of our time,’ says Mr. Carlyle, ‘is not
-Arms and the man, but Tools and the man--an infinitely wider kind of
-Epic.’ Our machinery has been the making of us; our ironworks have, in
-spite of the progress of other nations, still kept the balance in our
-hands. Smith-work in all its branches of engine-making, machine-making,
-tool-making, cutlery, iron ship-building, and iron-working generally, is
-our chief glory. England is the mistress of manufactures and the queen of
-the world, because it is the land of Smith; and Mr. Smiles’s biographies
-are a history of the great family of Smith.... Many of the facts which
-he places before us are wholly new, and are derived from the most likely
-sources. Thus, Maudslay’s partner, Mr. Joshua Field, and his pupil, Mr.
-Nasmyth, supplied the materials for his biography. Mr. John Penn supplied
-the chief material for the memoir of Clement. And so of the other memoirs;
-though they necessarily go over much well-trodden ground, they contain
-also much original information, expressed with great clearness, and with a
-practised skill which renders the reader secure of entertainment in every
-page.”--_Times._
-
-“Mr. Smiles has become the biographer of our profession. Only the other
-day the world knew little or nothing of the _Lives of the Engineers_,
-whether of this century or the last. There were none who, as authors,
-attempted to blend with general biographical portraiture that popular
-reference to constructive and mechanical details, without which the
-life of an engineer or an inventor would be either a chapter of naked
-facts or of indiscriminate eulogy. In his _Life of George Stephenson_,
-Mr. Smiles showed that practical appreciation of the strong points of
-engineering life which, with his skill and industry as a biographer,
-has given us a new department of literature. The great success of that
-book proved that there were many thousands who were not only willing
-but desirous to know something of our railway-makers and mechanicians.
-Mr. Smiles has since done much in this branch of biography, and in
-his present book he has grouped together the leading incidents of the
-professional lives of Dud Dudley, Andrew Yarranton, Abraham Darby,
-Richard Reynolds, Benjamin Huntsman, Henry Cort, Dr. Roebuck, David
-Mushet, J. B. Neilson, Joseph Bramah, Henry Maudslay, Joseph Clement,
-Fox of Derby, Matthew Murray, Richard Roberts, Joseph Whitworth, James
-Nasmyth, and William Fairbairn. A few of the subjects of these memoirs
-are still living, but this, certainly, does not render the more important
-part of their history--already accomplished as we may believe--the less
-interesting.”--_Engineer._
-
-“This is not a very large book, but it is astonishing how much individual,
-conscientious, and thoroughly original research, has been required for its
-composition, and how much interesting matter it contains which we possess
-in no other form. Mr. Smiles rescues no name, but many histories, from
-oblivion. His heroes are known and gratefully remembered for the benefits
-they have conferred on mankind, but our knowledge of our benefactors has
-hitherto been mostly confined to our knowledge of the benefit. It was
-reserved for Mr. Smiles to discover in the workshop heroes as true as
-ever hurled their battalions across a battle-field, and to present us
-with much-enduring, much-endeavouring, and brave men, where hitherto we
-had been content with disembodied, almost meaningless names. The present
-work is further distinguished, not indeed from its predecessors, but from
-much of the current literature, by the exquisitely pellucid English, the
-vigorous but unobtrusive style, in which the narratives are conveyed. The
-value of the work before us is doubled, and the time required for perusing
-and especially for consulting it halved, by the full and minute index in
-which its contents are tabulated.”--_Edinburgh Daily Review._
-
-
-
-
-Lately published. By the same Author. Post 8vo. 5_s._
-
-“SELF-HELP,”
-
-OU CARACTÈRE, CONDUITE, ET PERSÉVÉRANCE,
-
-ILLUSTRÉS À L’AIDE DE BIOGRAPHIES.
-
-TRADUIT DE L’ANGLAIS PAR ALFRED TALANDIER,
-
-SUR LE TEXTE REVU ET CORRIGÉ PAR L’AUTEUR.
-
-
-“Le succès de cet ouvrage, qui s’est répandu comme par enchantement
-dans les mains de la jeunesse, dans les bibliothèques des villes et
-des villages, dans les cottages des ouvriers, est un remarquable indice
-des tendances du génie anglo-saxon. Le titre à lui seul est à peu près
-intraduisible: _Self-Help_ (aide-toi toi-même).... Une grande sagesse
-qu’on pourrait appeler la splendeur du bon sens, comme Platon définissait
-le beau la splendeur du vrai, tel est le caractère qui distingue surtout
-_Self-Help_.... La traduction de M. Talandier est à la fois fidèle,
-nerveuse et élégante; elle contribuera à propager en France les saines
-idées de M. Smiles.”--_Revue des Deux Mondes._
-
-“Les Français, nés malins, mais très-ignorants en ce qui touche leurs
-voisins, viennent de découvrir, après dix ans d’existence, un livre
-anglais classique, destiné à l’éducation des enfants. C’est une espèce de
-morale en action, écrite par un homme de haute valeur, qui a dû faire de
-grands efforts pour se mettre à la portée de jeunes intelligences.... Le
-_Self-Help, ou caractère, conduite et persévérance_, est un livre honnête
-et sérieux qu’on lit à petits coups, en le savourant; il est écrit pour
-les enfants avec une simplicité voulue; il vous dit que la pauvreté est
-sainte, que l’homme ne doit se soucier que de sa conscience; il honore
-l’industrie, enseigne le courage, relève les faibles, humilie les forts,
-vous dicte des maximes pour toutes les circonstances de la vie, et appuie
-tous ses conseils d’une anecdote qui sert d’exemple.... Voici une anecdote
-à écrire en lettres d’or:--Le vrai courage.--‘_Un officier français, au
-combat de cavalerie d’El-Bodon, en Espagne, s’avance, l’épée nue, sur Sir
-Fulton Harvey; il va le frapper, quand il s’aperçoit que son ennemi n’a
-qu’un bras; il s’arrête aussitôt, abaisse son épée devant Sir Fulton et,
-faisant avec courtoisie le salut militaire, part au galop._’ Vous voyez
-que c’est un livre qui élève plus l’âme que les _Mémoires d’une femme de
-chambre_!”--_Le Monde Illustré._
-
-“Le livre de M. Smiles est une nouvelle _Morale en action_, mais elle a
-l’avantage d’être complète, méthodique, raisonnée, et surtout appropriée
-aux goûts et aux tendances modernes. L’origine de cet ouvrage mérite
-d’être rapportée, car c’est le meilleur moyen d’en faire connaître le
-caractère.... Si nous voulions donner une idée du livre, il nous suffirait
-de citer la table des matières où se trouvent réunis les noms des hommes
-qui, fils de leurs œuvres, ont le plus servi la science, le plus honoré
-l’humanité. Nous nous contentons donc de recommander ce volume à tous ceux
-qui aiment les beaux et bons livres, mais nous tenons toutefois à ajouter
-un dernier mot. La plupart des ouvrages de morale (cela est triste à
-dire, mais vrai), sont ennuyeux; les auteurs semblent trop compter sur le
-mérite de leur sujet, et ils ne se donnent pas la peine d’ajouter quelques
-ornements à la vérité. Il en résulte que la sévérité de la forme nuit aux
-sérieuses qualités du fond, et que plus d’un bon livre reste lettre close
-pour ceux qui auraient le plus d’intérêt à le connaître. _Self-Help_ est
-écrit dans un genre tout différent: c’est la morale la plus pure et la
-plus saine présentée sous la forme la plus attrayante: c’est un ouvrage
-dont la lecture offre, plus que toute autre, plaisir et profit.”--_Revue
-de l’Instruction Publique._
-
-“‘Ne t’attends qu’à toi seul, c’est un commun proverbe,’ a dit notre
-immortel Lafontaine. Cette utile vérité vient d’être mise en lumière,
-ou pour mieux dire, développée, dans un bon livre anglais dont je veux
-vous parler. _Self-Help, S’aider soi-même_, c’est ne pas hésiter devant
-le travail du jour, c’est résister à sa paresse, à son égoïsme, à la
-pente de ses vices de toute sorte, et en un mot, se vaincre soi-même.
-Quelle victoire! Rappelez-vous ce mot d’un ancien: ‘Si tu parviens à te
-vaincre toi-même, tu vaincras le monde.’ ... Bref, le _Self-Help_, qui
-vient d’être traduit en français, est un plaidoyer éloquent en faveur
-de la confiance en soi-même, sans orgueil toutefois et sans mépris des
-autres, et de l’aristocratie humaine et sociale du travail dans toutes
-ses applications. _A cœur vaillant rien d’impossible!_ comme s’exprime
-la devise de Jacques Cœur, citée aussi par M. Smiles. C’est pourquoi un
-président americain, à qui on demandait quelles étaient ses armoiries, se
-souvenant qu’il avait été bûcheron dans sa jeunesse, répondit: ‘_Une paire
-de manches de chemise retroussées_.’ Je ne sache rien de plus beau que
-cette mâle et fortifiante devise. Vous qui voulez apprendre à quelle école
-se forment les hommes,--j’entends de ces êtres rarissimes que cherchait
-Diogène à la lueur de sa lanterne,--lisez et méditez le _Self-Help_.”--_La
-Sentinelle du Jura._
-
-“Je veux vous parler ici d’un bon livre. Les livres abondent; mais, dans
-ce fatras de papiers imprimés et réunis en faisceaux de toutes formes et
-de toutes dimensions, à quels signes particuliers reconnaîtrons-nous les
-bons livres?... M. Ampère definissait ainsi un grand nombre d’ouvrages
-parus en ce temps:--‘Ce sont des œuvres qui intéressent et souvent même
-qui attachent; mais, quand on a fini de lire, on éprouve une singulière
-impression: il semble qu’on ait besoin de brosser son habit et de se
-laver les mains.’ Les bons livres sont une nourriture plus ou moins
-délicate, mais saine et fortifiante, qui procure la santé de l’âme et de
-la conscience. On se sent meilleur, plus heureux même, à mesure qu’on
-en suit les douces pages, et, plus tard, c’est avec un esprit content
-qu’on s’en souvient. Il en coule, en effet, de l’espérance et de la
-foi, tout ce qu’il nous faut pour être satisfaits du présent, et pour
-affronter paisiblement l’avenir. _Self-Help_ est un livre précieux à tous
-ces titres, et je ne saurais trop vous le recommander.... Le livre de
-M. Smiles, traduit en français par M. Alfred Talandier, obtiendra tout
-le succès qu’il mérite, le succès d’une bonne et vertueuse action....
-Le moraliste anglais qui nous occupe a donc présenté au public une
-suite de biographies, très-écourtées, mais très-substantielles, des
-grands hommes qui se sont honorés par leur travail et qui ont ensuite
-glorifié l’humanité par leur génie et leurs découvertes.... Quelle
-notice attachante que celle que M. Smiles a consacrée à ces deux hommes
-illustres qui se sont unis dans une œuvre commune et dont la gloire
-est inséparable aussi, Richard et Lenoir! Leur double nom a été donné,
-à Paris, au boulevard _Richard-Lenoir_! Mais tout serait à citer de ce
-curieux assemblage de salutaires leçons et de profitables anecdotes, où
-sont invoqués, tour à tour, Vauquelin, Dupuytren, Ramus, Buffon, Béranger,
-Watt, Jacquart, Papin, Robert Peel, Michel-Ange, Nicolas Poussin,
-Ambroise Paré, Shakspeare, Saint François Xavier et Saint Vincent de
-Paul, Franklin, Walter Scott, Meyerbeer, etc. Chacun d’eux apporte son
-témoignage et vient affirmer à sa façon que le travail seul est grand, que
-la patience honnête est seule féconde, que la persévérance et l’esprit de
-conduite sont la véritable alchimie que doivent pratiquer et étudier tous
-les chercheurs d’or.”--_Le Moniteur Universel du Soir._
-
-“Le _Self-Help_ ou _Aide-toi toi-même_, comme on est obligé de dire pour
-traduire littéralement ces deux mots anglais, c’est le secret de trouver
-en nous-mêmes, si une volonté ferme et un cœur vaillant nous en rendent
-dignes, des ressources et des secours infiniment supérieurs à tous ceux
-qui pourraient nous venir du dehors.... M. Samuel Smiles, s’adressant
-d’abord à ses compatriotes, leur citait à l’appui de ses théories la vie
-et les œuvres des hommes qui, en Angleterre, ont porté le plus haut la
-dignite humaine et poussé le plus loin la force de caractère. Aujourd
-hui que son livre passe en France, il a changé pour nous la plupart de
-ces exemples, et ce sont des noms tels que ceux de Palissy, de Papin,
-de Jacquart, d’Ambroise Paré, de Nicolas Poussin, et de Richard-Lenoir,
-qui lui servent à nous convaincre de la vérité de sa doctrine, en même
-temps qu’ils font plus fortement vibrer en nous le sentiment de l’honneur
-et de l’amour-propre national. L’amour-propre national, en France comme
-en Angleterre, n’a pas cessé d’agir à sa manière sur l’esprit et sur
-le courage des hommes laborieux qui, voulant honorer avant tout leur
-patrie, ont honoré l’humanité entière. Nous ne saurions recommander avec
-trop d’instances ce recueil intéressant, instructif et curieux, moral
-au plus haut degré, gros d’anecdotes et d’histoires plus émouvantes que
-celles des romans, où l’émotion est le mieux conduite et le mieux amenée,
-plein d’enseignements utiles appuyés sur des biographies on ne peut plus
-concluantes et laissant après sa lecture une impression saine et durable.
-Ce livre s’adresse aux travailleurs de tous ordres; sa place est dans
-le cabinet de l’homme d’étude et dans l’atelier de l’ouvrier; sa place
-est surtout dans ces bibliothèques communales, dont nous apprenons la
-création avec tant de plaisir, et qui font naître en nous tant d’espoir.
-_Self-Help_ est du nombre des livres utiles qu’une commune doit acquérir,
-de façon que ceux qui n’ont pas les moyens d’avoir une bibliothèque
-puissent cependant le lire. On a dit de certains ouvrages littéraires
-qu’ils sont une _bonne action_. _Self-Help_ a tous les droits à être ainsi
-qualifié et désigné au public.”--_Le Pays, Journal de l’Empire._
-
-
-
-
-Lately published. By the same Author. Post 8vo. 6_s._ each.
-
-JAMES BRINDLEY
-
-AND
-
-THE EARLY ENGINEERS.
-
-[ABRIDGED FROM ‘LIVES OF THE ENGINEERS.’]
-
-STORY
-
-OF
-
-THE LIFE OF GEORGE STEPHENSON,
-
-CONTAINING ALSO A MEMOIR OF HIS SON, ROBERT STEPHENSON.
-
-[ABRIDGED FROM ‘LIVES OF THE ENGINEERS.’]
-
-
-“We have taken the facts in this account of Brindley from a delightful
-popular edition of that part of Mr. Smiles’s ‘Lives of the Engineers’
-which tells of him and of the earlier water engineers. Of Mr. Smiles’s
-‘Lives of George and Robert Stephenson’ there is a popular edition as a
-companion volume, and therein all may read, worthily told, the tale of
-the foundation and of the chief triumphs of that new form of engineering
-which dealt with water, not by the river-full but by the bucket-full, and
-made a few buckets of water strong as a river to sweep men and their goods
-and their cattle in a mighty torrent from one corner of the country to
-another.”--_All the Year Round._
-
-“It would be impossible to have selected two more valuable works for
-general circulation in a cheap form, or to have given the working classes
-a better incentive, not to ‘rest and be thankful’ with their present
-position and attainments, but to become convinced that the path of success
-is always open to those who, by patience and perseverance, are determined
-to pursue it. No one knows better than Mr. Smiles how to promote this
-important object; and no one is a greater benefactor to his fellow men
-than himself, since by his talent and discrimination he incontestably
-proves how ‘Heaven helps those who help themselves.’”--_Bell’s Weekly
-Messenger._
-
-“The _Story of the Life of George Stephenson_ (including a memoir of
-his son Robert Stephenson), is a cheaper and more compact form of a work
-which, on its first appearance, was received with universal approbation.
-Now we have it cheaper and handier--and better than ever. Is it not
-enough to say this much? Could we say more? _James Brindley and the Early
-Engineers_ was originally published in ‘The Lives of the Engineers.’
-Besides the biography of the man who made canals do the great carrying
-work of the country before railways were extended over the length and
-breadth of the country, the volume contains memoirs of Sir Cornelius
-Vermuyden, who drained the Fens; of Sir Hugh Myddelton, who brought the
-New River water into London; of Captain Perry, who stopped a breach in
-the Thames embankment at Dagenham: and in an appendix we have the life of
-Pierre Paul Riquet, who constructed the Grand Canal of Languedoc, and who
-has been fitly called ‘the French Brindley.’ Two volumes like these cannot
-fail to be as widely circulated as is the reputation of those whom they
-commemorate. They will go through the length and breadth, and into the
-nooks and corners of the land; and they deserve to go wherever the English
-language prevails, for they are models of their kind.”--_Standard._
-
-“The _Life of James Brindley_ is partly a reproduction of the Life of
-Brindley, originally published in the _Lives of the Engineers_, and now
-forms a companion volume to the _Life of Stephenson_--the two men having
-so much in common, that having read the life of one, we look to the
-other with increased interest; what one achieved for railways, the other
-achieved for canals, each being great in his particular branch. There
-are several other lives of engineers given--such as Sir Hugh Myddelton,
-Vermuyden, and Captain Perry; and a very curious memoir of Pierre Riquet,
-the French Brindley, whose life is incorporated in the French edition
-of _Self-Help_ published in Paris. As in the Lives of the Stephensons,
-the liberality of the publisher is evinced in making the work, though
-adapted for the general public, perfect in every respect; it teems with
-illustrations of the most curious nature, which evidently, from their
-character, must have been collected with infinite labour. No one will
-read the lives of Brindley and his brother engineers without that glow
-of satisfaction that rises within us from feeling that these men were
-thoroughly English in every respect, and that the works illustrating their
-lives are models also of English literature.”--_News of the World._
-
-
-
-
-Transcriber’s Notes
-
-Minor inconsistencies in punctuation have been standardised. All
-other original errors and inconsistencies have been retained, except
-as follows:
-
-  Page 33:  changed 1790 to 1690
-            (Leipsic, in 1690. “I felt)
-  Page 38:  changed befel to befell
-            (this calamity befell Papin’s machine)
-  Page 44:  changed Savory to Savery
-            (By Tho. Savery, Gent. London,)
-  Page 52:  removed duplicate ‘A,’
-            (a large, A, and a)
-  Page 111: changed sucessfully to successfully
-            (he had successfully repaired an)
-  Page 120: added missing caption
-            (PAPIN’S DIGESTER.)
-  Page 128: added “
-            (it had been “by chance and)
-  Page 176: changed acromatic to achromatic
-            (exceeding good achromatic telescopes)
-  Page 304: changed 1791 to 1781
-            (19th November, 1781.)
-  Page 315: changed fortitute to fortitude
-            (up your fortitude and try to)
-  Page 404: changed pains to pain
-            (Every pain was taken to)
-  Page 432: changed isinglas to isinglass
-            (substitute for isinglass, he occupied)
-  Page 438: changed ‘ to “
-            Symington was, “Why don’t you
-  Page 447: changed ratched to ratchet
-            (chains and ratchet-wheels, as in)
-  Page 447: changed elate to elated
-            (proportionately elated at the)
-  Page 497: added missing caption
-            (WATER-PIPE IN THE BED OF THE CLYDE.)
-  Page 516: changed Chasewater to Chacewater
-            (Chacewater Mine and engine, 231;)
-  Page 516: changed Chasewater to Chacewater
-            (Chacewater, 235, 239, 242–3;)
-  Page 517: changed Leman to Lemon
-            (Lemon, William, Penzance, 69.)
-  Page 518: changed 525 to 425
-            (Rumford gold medal, 425;)
-  Page 519: changed Sorbiere to Sorbière
-            (Sorbière, M., on Marquis of)
-  Page 519: changed 67 to 37
-            (Papin, 37;)
-  Page 519: changed 5 to 6
-            (Steam flour-mills, 291, 325–6, 327.)
-  Page 520: changed Sotland to Scotland
-            (returns to Scotland, refused permission)
-  Page 520: changed imperfecfections to imperfections
-            (Watt's imperfections, 258;)
-  Page 521: changed Brosely to Broseley
-            (Wilkinson, John, of Broseley, constructs)
-  Page 521: changed Savary to Savery
-            (William III. and Savery, 50.)
-
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-
-<pre>
-
-The Project Gutenberg EBook of Lives of Boulton and Watt, by Samuel Smiles
-
-This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most
-other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
-whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of
-the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at
-www.gutenberg.org.  If you are not located in the United States, you'll have
-to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook.
-
-Title: Lives of Boulton and Watt
-       Principally from the Original Soho Mss.
-
-Author: Samuel Smiles
-
-Release Date: May 15, 2016 [EBook #52069]
-
-Language: English
-
-Character set encoding: UTF-8
-
-*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LIVES OF BOULTON AND WATT ***
-
-
-
-
-Produced by Chris Curnow, Rosanna Murphy, and the Online
-Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
-file was produced from images generously made available
-by The Internet Archive)
-
-
-
-
-
-
-</pre>
-
-
-<div class="tnote">
-<p class="center"><b>Transcriber’s Notes:</b></p>
-
-<p>Punctuation has been standardised. Spelling has been retained as
-it appears in the original publication except as marked
-<ins title="Transcriber's Note: original reads 'likethis'">like
-this</ins> in the text. <span class="noepub">The original text appears when hovering the cursor
-over the marked text.</span> A <a href="#tn-end">list of amendments</a> is
-at the end of the text.</p>
-
-<p class="noepub">Clicking on an illustration with a blue border will open
-a higher resolution version of the image in the current window.</p>
-</div>
-
-
-<hr class="chap noepub" />
-
-
-
-
-
-<div class="frontmatter">
-<p class="half-title">LIVES<br />
-
-<small>OF</small><br />
-
-<span class="smcap">BOULTON and WATT</span>.</p>
-
-</div>
-
-
-<p class="center space-above">BY THE SAME AUTHOR.</p>
-
-
-
-<div class="blockquot">
-<p>LIVES OF BRITISH ENGINEERS, from the Earliest Times
-to the Death of Robert Stephenson; with an Account of their Principal
-Works, and a <span class="smcap">History of Inland Communication in Britain</span>. With
-Portraits and 270 Woodcuts. 3 Vols. 8vo. 63<i>s.</i></p>
-
-<p><span class="smcap">SELF-HELP; with Illustrations of Character and Conduct</span>.
-Post 8vo. 6<i>s.</i></p>
-
-<p><span class="smcap">‘SELF-HELP,’ ou Caractère, Conduite et Persévérance</span>,
-Illustrés à l’aide de Biographie. Traduit de l’Anglais par <span class="smcap">Alfred Talandier</span>
-sur le texte revu et corrigé par l’Auteur. Post 8vo. 5<i>s.</i></p>
-
-<p><span class="smcap">INDUSTRIAL BIOGRAPHY: Iron-Workers and Tool-Makers</span>.
-A Companion Volume to ‘Self-Help.’ Post 8vo. 6<i>s.</i></p>
-
-<p>JAMES BRINDLEY AND THE EARLY ENGINEERS.
-[Abridged from ‘Lives of the Engineers.’] With Illustrations. Post 8vo. 6<i>s.</i></p>
-
-<p><span class="smcap">STORY OF THE LIFE OF GEORGE STEPHENSON
-including a Memoir of his Son Robert Stephenson</span>. [Abridged from
-‘Lives of the Engineers.’] With Illustrations. Post 8vo. 6<i>s.</i></p>
-
-<p><span class="smcap">WORKMEN’S EARNINGS,&mdash;SAVINGS,&mdash;and STRIKES</span>:
-Reprinted from the ‘Quarterly Review.’ Post 8vo. 1<i>s.</i> 6<i>d.</i></p>
-</div>
-
-
-<p class="center space-below">JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET.</p>
-
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_005" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_005.png" width="450" height="446" alt="" />
-<p class="caption"><big><i>James Watt F.R.S.</i></big></p>
-<p class="caption"><i>Engraved by W. Holl, after the portrait by Sir W. Beechy, R.A.</i></p>
-<p class="caption"><small><i>Published by John Murray, Albemarle Street, 1865.</i></small></p>
-</div>
-
-
-
-<hr class="full" />
-
-<h1><big>LIVES</big><br /><br />
-
-<small>OF</small><br /><br />
-
-<big><span class="smcap">BOULTON and WATT</span>.</big></h1>
-
-<div class="frontmatter space-above">
-<p>PRINCIPALLY FROM THE ORIGINAL SOHO MSS.</p>
-
-<p class="space-above"><small>COMPRISING ALSO</small><br />
-
-<big>A HISTORY OF THE INVENTION AND INTRODUCTION
-OF THE STEAM-ENGINE.</big></p>
-
-<p class="space-above"><big><span class="smcap">By SAMUEL SMILES</span>,</big><br />
-
-<small>AUTHOR OF ‘INDUSTRIAL BIOGRAPHY,’ ETC.</small></p>
-
-<p class="space-above">LONDON:<br />
-
-JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET.<br />
-
-1865.</p>
-
-<p class="space-above"><small><i>The right of Translation is reserved.</i></small></p>
-
-<hr class="tb noepub" />
-
-
-
-<p><small>LONDON: PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, STAMFORD STREET,
-AND CHARING CROSS.</small></p>
-</div>
-
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_v">[v]</span></p>
-
-
-<hr class="full" />
-
-
-
-<h2>PREFACE.</h2>
-
-
-<p><span class="smcap">The</span> present volume concludes the author’s ‘Lives of
-the Engineers.’ Its preparation was begun many years
-since. The favourable reception given to the ‘Life
-of George Stephenson,’ the principal improver and
-introducer of the locomotive engine, encouraged the
-author to follow it by a Life of James Watt, the principal
-inventor and introducer of the condensing engine.
-On making inquiries, however, he found that the
-subject had already been taken in hand by J. P. Muirhead,
-Esq., the literary executor of the late Mr. Watt,
-of Aston Hall, near Birmingham. As Mr. Muirhead
-was in all respects entitled to precedence, and was,
-moreover, in possession of the best sources of information,
-the author’s contemplated Life of Watt was
-abandoned, and he satisfied himself with embodying
-the substance of the materials he had collected in a
-review of Mr. Muirhead’s work, which appeared in the
-‘Quarterly Review’ for July, 1858.</p>
-
-<p>Having recently, however, through the kindness
-of M. P. W. Boulton, Esq., of Tew Park, Oxon, been
-enabled to examine the extensive collection of documents
-brought from Soho, including the original correspondence
-between Watt and Small, between Watt and
-Boulton, and between the latter and his numerous
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_vi">[vi]</span>
-intimate friends and business correspondents, it has
-appeared to the author that, notwithstanding the valuable
-publications of Mr. Muirhead, the story of the life
-of Watt is one that will well bear to be told again, in
-connexion with the life and labours of Matthew Boulton
-of Soho. The two men were so intimately related
-during the most important period of their lives, and
-their biographies so closely intermingle, that it is almost
-impossible to separate them. They are therefore treated
-conjointly in the present volume, under the title of
-‘Boulton and Watt,’ the name of the old Soho firm
-which so long enjoyed a world-wide reputation. But
-though the name of Boulton takes priority in the title,
-that of Watt will be found in many respects the most
-prominent in the narrative.</p>
-
-<p>The MS. papers which have been consulted for the
-purposes of the present volume are of an unusually
-complete and varied character. They consist of several
-thousand documents selected from the tons of business
-books and correspondence which had accumulated at
-Soho. The most important were selected and arranged
-by the late M. Robinson Boulton, Esq., who entertained
-the highest regard for his father's memory; and, from
-the character of the collection, the author inclines to the
-opinion that it must have been made with a view to
-the preparation and publication of a Life of Matthew
-Boulton,&mdash;which has not, however, until now been
-undertaken. Thus, among sundry papers endorsed “M.
-Boulton&mdash;Biographical Memoirs,” is found a MS. memoir
-in the handwriting of James Watt, entitled “Memorandum
-concerning Mr. Boulton, commencing with
-my first acquaintance with him,” and another of a
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_vii">[vii]</span>
-similar character, by Mr. James Keir,&mdash;both written
-shortly after Mr. Boulton’s death. Another collection, endorsed
-“<span lang="la" xml:lang="la">Familiarum Epistolæ et Selectæ</span>, 1755 to 1808,”
-contains letters received from various distinguished
-personages in the course of Mr. Boulton’s long and
-interesting career. The number of original documents
-is indeed so large, that, but for a rigid exclusion
-of non-essential matter, these Lives must have
-expanded into several volumes, instead of being compressed
-into one. But the author believes labour to be
-well bestowed in practising the art of condensation, and
-that the interest of biography gains much by judicious
-rejection. What Watt said to Murdock as to the
-production of a machine, holds equally true as to
-the production of a book,&mdash;“It is a great thing,” said
-Watt, “to know what to do without.”</p>
-
-<p>Besides the memoirs of Boulton and Watt, which
-occupy the principal places in the following volume,
-it will also be found to contain memoirs of the other
-inventors who have at various times laboured at the
-invention and application of the steam-engine,&mdash;of
-the Marquis of Worcester, Dionysius Papin, Thomas
-Savery, and Thomas Newcomen. The author has also
-been enabled to gather from the Boulton papers a
-memoir of William Murdock, which probably contains
-all that is likely to be collected respecting that excellent
-and most ingenious mechanic.</p>
-
-<p>In addition to the essential assistance received from
-M. P. W. Boulton, Esq., in preparing the present book,
-without which it would not have been undertaken,
-the author desires to record his acknowledgments
-to J. W. Gibson Watt, Esq., for information relative to
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_viii">[viii]</span>
-James Watt;&mdash;to Charles Savery, Esq., Clifton, J. T.
-Savery, Esq., Modbury, Lieutenant-Colonel Yolland,
-R.E., and Quartermaster Connolly, R.E., for various
-facts as to the family history and professional career
-of Thomas Savery, inventor of the “Fire Engine;”&mdash;and
-to Thomas Pemberton, Esq., Heathfield; W. C.
-Aitkin, Esq., Coventry; George Williamson, Esq.,
-Greenock; the late J. Murdock, Esq., Handsworth;
-and the late Mr. William Buckle, of the Royal Mint,
-formerly of Soho,&mdash;for various information as to the
-lives and labours of Boulton and Watt.</p>
-
-<p>In his treatment of the subject, it will be observed
-that the author has endeavoured, as much as possible,
-to avoid introducing technical details relating to the
-steam-engine. Those who desire further information
-on such points, are referred to the works of Farey,
-Tredgold, Bourne, Scott Russell, Muirhead (‘Mechanical
-Inventions of James Watt’), and other technical
-treatises on the subject, where they will find detailed
-particulars of the various inventions which are only
-incidentally referred to in the following pages.</p>
-
-
-<p class="sig-left"><i>London, October, 1865.</i></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_ix">[ix]</span></p>
-
-
-<hr class="full" />
-
-<h2>CONTENTS.</h2>
-
-
-
-<table id="toc" summary="Table of Contents.">
-  <tr>
-    <td class="chap" colspan="2"><a href="#Page_1">CHAPTER I.</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="desc">Anecdote of Matthew Boulton and George III.&mdash;Roger Bacon on steam
-power&mdash;Early inventors, their steam machines and apparatus&mdash;Hero of
-Alexandria, Branca, De Caus&mdash;The Marquis of Worcester&mdash;His water-works&mdash;His
-imprisonment&mdash;His difficulties&mdash;The water-commanding
-engine&mdash;His “Century of Inventions”&mdash;Obscurity of descriptions
-of his steam-engine&mdash;Persevering struggles&mdash;His later years and death</td>
-    <td class="pgref">Page <a href="#Page_1">1&ndash;26</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="chap" colspan="2"><a href="#Page_27">CHAPTER II.</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="desc">Zeal of the Marchioness of Worcester&mdash;Sir Samuel Morland&mdash;His pumps
-and fire-engines&mdash;His privations and death&mdash;Dr. Dionysius Papin&mdash;His
-digester&mdash;Experiments on the power of steam&mdash;His steam-engine&mdash;Proposed
-steamboat&mdash;Early schemes of paddle-boats&mdash;Blasco Garay&mdash;Papin’s
-model engine and boat&mdash;Destroyed by boatmen&mdash;Papin’s death</td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#Page_27">27&ndash;38</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="chap" colspan="2"><a href="#Page_39">CHAPTER III.</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="desc">Thomas Savery&mdash;The Savery family&mdash;Savery’s mechanical experiments
-and contrivances&mdash;His paddle-boat&mdash;Treatise on ‘Navigation Improved’&mdash;Cornish
-mines and the early pumping machinery&mdash;Savery’s “Fire-engine”&mdash;Exhibition
-of his model&mdash;Explanations in the ‘Miner’s
-Friend’&mdash;The engine tried in Cornwall&mdash;Its failure at Broadwaters,
-Staffordshire&mdash;Savery’s later years&mdash;His death and testament</td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#Page_39">39&ndash;58</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="chap" colspan="2"><a href="#Page_59">CHAPTER IV.</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="desc">Slow progress in invention of the steam-engine&mdash;Thomas Newcomen of
-Dartmouth&mdash;His study of steam-power&mdash;Correspondence with Dr.
-Hooke of the Royal Society&mdash;Newcomen’s experiments&mdash;Assisted by
-John Calley&mdash;Newcomen’s atmospheric engine&mdash;Newcomen and Calley
-erect their first engine&mdash;Humphrey Potter the turn-cock boy’s contrivance&mdash;Engines
-erected at Newcastle-on-Tyne, Leeds, and Cornwall&mdash;Wheal
-Fortune engine&mdash;Mr. William Lemon&mdash;Joseph Hornblower&mdash;Jonathan
-Hulls and steam propulsion of ships&mdash;His steamboat&mdash;Extended
-use of the Newcomen engines in Cornwall and northern mining
-counties&mdash;Payne, Brindley, and Smeaton, improvers of the steam-engine</td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#Page_59">59&ndash;76</a><span class="pagenum" id="Page_x">[x]</span></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="chap" colspan="2"><a href="#Page_77">CHAPTER V.</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="desc">James Watt, his birthplace and lineage&mdash;His grandfather the mathematician&mdash;Cartsdyke
-and Greenock in the last century&mdash;James Watt’s father&mdash;His
-multifarious occupations&mdash;His mother&mdash;Watt’s early years&mdash;His
-fragile constitution&mdash;Sent to school&mdash;His first visit to Glasgow&mdash;His
-indulgence in storytelling&mdash;His boyish ingenuity&mdash;His home education&mdash;The
-Stuart rebellion&mdash;Watt’s love of scientific pursuits&mdash;Sent to
-Glasgow to learn the trade of mathematical-instrument maker</td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#Page_77">77&ndash;95</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="chap" colspan="2"><a href="#Page_96">CHAPTER VI.</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="desc">Glasgow in 1754&mdash;The Glasgow tobacco lords&mdash;The early clubs, and social
-habits of the merchants&mdash;Watt’s master&mdash;Leaves Glasgow, and proceeds
-to London on horseback&mdash;Is placed with a mathematical-instrument
-maker&mdash;His progress in learning the trade&mdash;Frugal living in
-London&mdash;Danger from pressgangs&mdash;His infirm health&mdash;Returns to
-Scotland&mdash;Refused permission to begin business in Glasgow&mdash;Gains
-asylum in the College&mdash;His workshop there&mdash;Makes musical instruments&mdash;His
-various reading and studies&mdash;Intercourse with the professors&mdash;Intimate
-relations of Watt with Robison&mdash;Robison’s estimate
-of Watt</td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#Page_96">96&ndash;116</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="chap" colspan="2"><a href="#Page_118">CHAPTER VII.</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="desc">Robison and Watt’s conferences on the power of steam&mdash;Dr. Black and latent
-heat&mdash;Watt’s experiments on steam&mdash;His apparatus&mdash;The college
-model of the Newcomen engine arrives from London&mdash;Watt’s experiments
-upon it&mdash;His difficulties and perseverance&mdash;His instrument-making
-business improves&mdash;Takes a partner and opens a shop in the
-Salt Market&mdash;His marriage&mdash;Continued experiments on steam&mdash;His
-Sunday walk on Glasgow Green, and his first idea of the condensing
-engine&mdash;His experiments with the model, and successive difficulties&mdash;Anecdote
-of Watt and Robison and the new apparatus&mdash;The model engine&mdash;Removes
-to a cellar and erects a working engine&mdash;Mechanical and
-financial difficulties</td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#Page_118">118&ndash;137</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="chap" colspan="2"><a href="#Page_138">CHAPTER VIII.</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="desc">Watt’s introduction to Dr. Roebuck&mdash;Begins business as surveyor&mdash;Surveys
-canals&mdash;Partnership with Roebuck in the engine&mdash;Difficulties in constructing
-the engine&mdash;Watt’s visit to Kinneil&mdash;A patent determined on&mdash;Watt’s
-despondency&mdash;Continues his improvements&mdash;Learns German&mdash;Correspondence
-with Dr. Small&mdash;Specification of patent lodged&mdash;Watt
-erects a trial engine&mdash;The washhouse behind Kinneil&mdash;The engine
-completed&mdash;Its defects&mdash;Roebuck’s embarrassments&mdash;Watt accepts
-engagement to superintend canal works&mdash;Employed in various surveys&mdash;Designs
-Hamilton Bridge&mdash;Supplies plans for dock and pier at Port
-Glasgow and harbour at Ayr&mdash;Illness and death of Mrs. Watt&mdash;Dr.
-Roebuck’s ruin&mdash;Turning point in Watt’s fortunes</td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#Page_138">138&ndash;158</a><span class="pagenum" id="Page_xi">[xi]</span></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="chap" colspan="2"><a href="#Page_161">CHAPTER IX.</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="desc">Birmingham in early times&mdash;Its industry&mdash;Roads&mdash;William Hutton&mdash;The
-Boulton family&mdash;Matthew Boulton begins business&mdash;His trade
-correspondence&mdash;His marriage&mdash;His love of business&mdash;Snow-hill and
-Soho&mdash;Partnership with Fothergill&mdash;Aims at excellence in his productions&mdash;Emulates
-Wedgwood&mdash;Surpasses French art-manufacturers&mdash;His
-royal and noble patrons&mdash;Employs the best artists&mdash;Visits of
-foreigners at Soho&mdash;Extension of business&mdash;Promotes canals&mdash;His vast
-business&mdash;Commercial panic&mdash;Boulton’s scientific pursuits</td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#Page_161">161&ndash;181</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="chap" colspan="2"><a href="#Page_182">CHAPTER X.</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="desc">Water- and horse-power at Soho&mdash;Boulton’s correspondence with Benjamin
-Franklin concerning fire-engine&mdash;Boulton’s model&mdash;Correspondence with
-Dr. Darwin and Dr. Roebuck&mdash;Watt visits Soho&mdash;First meeting of
-Boulton and Watt&mdash;Correspondence of Boulton and Watt, and of Dr.
-Small and Watt&mdash;Dr. Roebuck visits Boulton&mdash;Watt’s anxiety for
-Boulton to join him&mdash;Watt’s discouragements&mdash;His continued experiments
-and their failure&mdash;Watt engineer for the Monkland Canal&mdash;Commercial
-panic&mdash;Watt loses employment as canal engineer&mdash;Roebuck’s
-failure&mdash;Terms of proposed partnership between Watt, Small, and
-Boulton&mdash;Roebuck’s share in Watt’s engine transferred to Boulton&mdash;Watt’s
-arrival at Birmingham</td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#Page_182">182&ndash;198</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="chap" colspan="2"><a href="#Page_199">CHAPTER XI.</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="desc">Characteristics of Matthew Boulton&mdash;Contrast between him and Watt&mdash;Boulton’s
-friends&mdash;Watt’s engine at Soho&mdash;Boulton’s views of engine
-business&mdash;The Kinneil engine re-erected at Soho&mdash;Works successfully&mdash;Inquiries
-for pumping-engines from the mining districts&mdash;Proposed extension
-of patent by an Act&mdash;Watt in London&mdash;Death of Dr. Small&mdash;Watt
-invited to Russia&mdash;Application to Parliament for extension of
-engine patent&mdash;Application opposed&mdash;Watt’s arguments&mdash;Act obtained&mdash;Watt
-returns to Birmingham&mdash;The manufacture of engines begun&mdash;The
-Wilkinsons&mdash;First iron vessel</td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#Page_199">199&ndash;213</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="chap" colspan="2"><a href="#Page_214">CHAPTER XII.</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="desc">Watt’s house, Harper’s Hill&mdash;First order for engines&mdash;Boulton’s activity&mdash;The
-London engineers prophesy the failure of Watt’s engine&mdash;Watt
-revisits Glasgow&mdash;His second marriage&mdash;Terms of partnership between
-Boulton and Watt&mdash;Orders from Scotland for engines&mdash;Boulton pressed
-with work and anxiety&mdash;Watt returns to Soho with his wife&mdash;Order
-for engine for Tingtang and Chacewater mines, Cornwall&mdash;Watt and
-the Shadwell Waterworks Committee&mdash;Stratford-le-Bow engine&mdash;Difficulties
-with workmen at Soho, and with unskilled enginemen&mdash;Expansive
-working</td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#Page_214">214&ndash;229</a><span class="pagenum" id="Page_xii">[xii]</span></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="chap" colspan="2"><a href="#Page_230">CHAPTER XIII.</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="desc">Inefficiency of the Newcomen pumping-engines&mdash;More orders from Cornwall&mdash;Watt
-in Cornwall&mdash;United Mines district&mdash;Mines drowned&mdash;Watt
-and Jonathan Hornblower&mdash;Mrs. Watt’s account of Cornwall&mdash;Chacewater
-engine finished&mdash;Its successful working&mdash;Watt’s embarrassments
-and financial difficulties&mdash;Boulton’s courage and perseverance, and Fothergill’s
-despondency&mdash;Fire at Soho&mdash;Engine royalty on savings of fuel&mdash;Altercations
-with adventurers&mdash;Watt’s frequent calls for Boulton’s help&mdash;Boulton’s
-harassments&mdash;Proceeds to Cornwall&mdash;Watt’s return to Birmingham&mdash;His
-despondency&mdash;Boulton sustains the firm&mdash;Orders for
-engines from abroad&mdash;William Murdock, his excellencies of character and
-ability&mdash;First interview with Boulton and engagement&mdash;Sent to Cornwall&mdash;His
-mode of dealing with the captains&mdash;Watt’s altercations with
-the Cornishmen&mdash;His reliance on Boulton&mdash;Altercation with Trevithick</td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#Page_230">230&ndash;260</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="chap" colspan="2"><a href="#Page_261">CHAPTER XIV.</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="desc">Lieutenant Henderson in Cornwall&mdash;Boulton’s financial embarrassments
-increase&mdash;Boulton and Fothergill&mdash;The “Soho pictures”&mdash;Watt’s
-letter-copying machine&mdash;Boulton pushes the machine&mdash;Demand for
-copying-presses&mdash;More financial difficulties&mdash;Watt’s sufferings and melancholy&mdash;More
-Cornish engines wanted&mdash;Engine-dues&mdash;Boulton cheers
-Watt&mdash;Mining adventurers’ meetings&mdash;Boulton and Watt take shares&mdash;The
-mines&mdash;Boulton organises the mining business&mdash;Boulton’s house at
-Cosgarne, Cornwall&mdash;Mrs. Watt describes her husband’s miseries and
-weakness&mdash;The engine patent threatened by the Cornish men&mdash;Watt on
-patent right&mdash;The Birmingham Copper Company&mdash;Boulton improves
-engine-boilers by introducing tubes&mdash;His MSS. and drawings concerning
-mechanical and scientific experiments&mdash;His indefatigable industry</td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#Page_261">261&ndash;284</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="chap" colspan="2"><a href="#Page_285">CHAPTER XV.</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="desc">Watt again visits Cornwall&mdash;Rotary motion&mdash;The crank-engine at Soho&mdash;Theft
-of the invention&mdash;Matthew Washborough&mdash;Smeaton and steam-power&mdash;Rotary-motion
-engine&mdash;Boulton and Watt’s cares&mdash;Evasions
-of the engine patent&mdash;The Hornblowers’ engine&mdash;Watt’s new inventions&mdash;Boulton’s
-confidence in the engine&mdash;Air-engine&mdash;Watt’s fears for
-the patent&mdash;The rotary engine invented&mdash;New improvements introduced&mdash;The
-equalising beam&mdash;Watt’s ill health and humour&mdash;Various
-expedients for producing circular motion&mdash;Murdock’s sun-and-planet
-motion&mdash;Patent taken for the reciprocating expansive engine&mdash;Troubles
-with workmen&mdash;Murdock’s efficiency and popularity&mdash;Watt’s despondency&mdash;The
-firm’s London agent’s house burnt&mdash;Gloomy prospects of the
-mining trade</td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#Page_285">285&ndash;316</a><span class="pagenum" id="Page_xiii">[xiii]</span></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="chap" colspan="2"><a href="#Page_317">CHAPTER XVI.</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="desc">Financial position of the firm&mdash;Rotary engines for mills&mdash;Boulton’s battles
-with the Cornish adventurers&mdash;His life in Cornwall&mdash;Murdock and the
-miners&mdash;The Hornblowers’ engine at Radstoke&mdash;Watt at Bristol&mdash;Major
-Tucker&mdash;Steam mills&mdash;Rotary motion applied&mdash;The first rotative
-engines&mdash;Pumping-engines for the Fens&mdash;Boulton’s health fails&mdash;He
-visits Scotland, Carron ironworks, Lord Dundonald&mdash;His extensive correspondence&mdash;Grumbling
-in Cornwall&mdash;Concessions to the miners&mdash;Press
-of work at Soho&mdash;Watt’s invention of the parallel motion and the
-governor&mdash;Murdock’s model locomotive&mdash;Boulton’s praise of Murdock&mdash;More
-pumping-engines wanted&mdash;Boulton’s affection for his children&mdash;Letter
-to his son&mdash;His scientific recreations&mdash;Domestic enjoyment at
-Cosgarne</td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#Page_317">317&ndash;341</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="chap" colspan="2"><a href="#Page_342">CHAPTER XVII.</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="desc">Boulton’s action in commercial politics&mdash;His interview with Pitt&mdash;Agitation
-against Pitt’s commercial policy&mdash;The “Irish resolutions”&mdash;Watt on
-free commerce&mdash;Is opposed to political agitation&mdash;Combination against
-patents&mdash;Fluctuations in the business at Soho&mdash;Engine orders from
-various quarters&mdash;The Cornish copper-miners&mdash;The Copper Company
-formed, and Boulton’s part in it&mdash;Riots in Cornwall&mdash;Boulton’s life
-threatened&mdash;The esteem in which he was held in Cornwall&mdash;His intimacy
-with the Quakers&mdash;The Albion Mill scheme&mdash;The double-acting engines
-for the mill&mdash;Ill-success of the undertaking&mdash;Albion Mill burnt down&mdash;Demand
-for rotative engines&mdash;Want of skill and misconduct of workmen&mdash;Wedgwood’s
-advice to Watt&mdash;Speculativeness of Boulton&mdash;His
-embarrassments&mdash;Watt’s caution in investing&mdash;Boulton’s health fails&mdash;His
-depressed spirits&mdash;Generosity to Watt</td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#Page_342">342&ndash;366</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="chap" colspan="2"><a href="#Page_367">CHAPTER XVIII.</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="desc">Friends of Boulton and Watt&mdash;The Lunar Society&mdash;Provincial scientific
-societies&mdash;Distinguished associates of the Lunar Society&mdash;Dr. Darwin&mdash;Dr.
-Priestley, his gifts and accomplishments&mdash;Josiah Wedgwood&mdash;Meetings
-and discussions of the Lunar Society&mdash;Dr. Priestley’s speculations
-and experiments&mdash;Composition of water, Watt and Cavendish&mdash;Bleaching
-by chlorine&mdash;Sun-pictures&mdash;Saint-Fond at Birmingham, his
-descriptions of Watt and Priestley&mdash;Decline of the Lunar Society</td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#Page_367">367&ndash;385</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="chap" colspan="2"><a href="#Page_386">CHAPTER XIX.</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="desc">Increasing debasement of the coinage&mdash;Punishments for counterfeiting&mdash;Birmingham
-coiners&mdash;Boulton refuses orders for base money&mdash;Executes
-a contract for coin for the East India Company&mdash;Applies the steam-engine
-to coining&mdash;Improves the coining apparatus&mdash;Political action in relation
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_xiv">[xiv]</span>
-to base coin&mdash;Strikes model coins for inspection of the Privy Council&mdash;Opposed
-by the Mint authorities&mdash;Presents model coins to the king&mdash;Executes
-coinage orders for foreign governments&mdash;His success&mdash;Medalling&mdash;Description
-of the Soho mint&mdash;Large consumption of copper in coining&mdash;Threatened
-attack on Soho by a mob&mdash;Boulton executes the new
-copper coinage for Great Britain&mdash;Erects the new Government Mint on
-Tower Hill, and mints for foreign countries&mdash;Watt’s estimate of Boulton’s
-improvements in coining</td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#Page_386">386&ndash;399</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="chap" colspan="2"><a href="#Page_400">CHAPTER XX.</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="desc">Prosperity of Soho&mdash;Relaxed strain upon Boulton and Watt&mdash;Watt’s
-pleasure tours&mdash;His interview with the king at Windsor&mdash;Matthew
-Robinson Boulton, and James Watt, jun., join their fathers in the business&mdash;Their
-character and attainments&mdash;Boulton and young Watt&mdash;Young
-Boulton’s return from Paris&mdash;The French revolution&mdash;The Birmingham
-riots&mdash;Priestley’s house destroyed&mdash;Unpopularity of the “Philosophers”&mdash;Young
-Watt and the Jacobins&mdash;Watt’s flight from Paris&mdash;Denounced
-by Burke&mdash;Mr. Watt’s fear for his son’s safety&mdash;The sons join their
-fathers in partnership&mdash;Important services of the young partners&mdash;Evasion
-of engine-dues, resistance of the Cornish mining companies&mdash;Legal
-proceedings and favourable judgments&mdash;Progress of the engine
-business&mdash;William Murdock&mdash;His valuable services&mdash;His engine
-improvements&mdash;Return to Soho&mdash;Invents gas-lighting&mdash;Winsor’s
-wonderful schemes&mdash;Murdock’s various inventions&mdash;Substitute for
-isinglass, his idea of power wasted in streets, atmospheric railway, &amp;c.&mdash;His
-death</td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#Page_400">400&ndash;433</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="chap" colspan="2"><a href="#Page_434">CHAPTER XXI.</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="desc">First attempts to construct steamboats&mdash;All attempts fail until Watt’s condensing
-engine invented&mdash;The locomotive of Watt and Murdock&mdash;William
-Symington&mdash;His model locomotive&mdash;Symington at Edinburgh&mdash;Steam-engine
-for canal-boats proposed by Symington&mdash;Miller’s paddle-boats&mdash;Symington,
-Miller, and Taylor co-operate to produce a steamboat&mdash;Sir
-John Dalrymple’s inquiries of Boulton on the same subject&mdash;Boulton’s
-reply&mdash;Symington’s engine finished and fitted in Miller’s boat&mdash;Successful
-experiment&mdash;Symington makes another engine, further experiments&mdash;Miller
-applies to Boulton and Watt to join speculation&mdash;Watt’s reply&mdash;Symington’s
-engine for the ‘Charlotte Dundas’&mdash;Symington’s success
-frustrated&mdash;Fulton and Bell inspect the ‘Charlotte Dundas’&mdash;Fulton’s
-steamboat on the Seine&mdash;His ‘Nautilus’&mdash;His application to James
-Watt, jun.&mdash;Boulton’s caution, his letter to Lord Hawkesbury&mdash;Fulton
-orders an engine from Soho for the ‘Clermont’&mdash;Its success&mdash;Henry
-Bell’s steamboat ‘Comet’&mdash;Development of steam-navigation&mdash;First
-rendered practicable through Watt’s inventions</td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#Page_434">434&ndash;455</a><span class="pagenum" id="Page_xv">[xv]</span></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="chap" colspan="2"><a href="#Page_456">CHAPTER XXII.</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="desc">Watt withdraws from Soho&mdash;Boulton continues his interest in business&mdash;His
-patent for raising water&mdash;The burglary at Soho&mdash;Sir Walter Scott
-and Boulton&mdash;Watt in retirement&mdash;Search for investments&mdash;Purchases
-land&mdash;Makes a foreign tour&mdash;Death of Mrs. Keir&mdash;Painful bereavements&mdash;Death
-of Dr. Black&mdash;Deaths of members of the Lunar Society&mdash;Watt’s
-family bereavements&mdash;Watt’s studies on the inhalation of gas&mdash;Gregory
-Watt, his brilliant talents&mdash;His friendship with Humphry
-Davy&mdash;His excursions and tours&mdash;His scientific pursuits&mdash;His illness
-and death&mdash;Davy on Gregory’s death&mdash;Death of Professor Robison&mdash;Watt’s
-estimate of Robison&mdash;Boulton’s last days, his death and funeral&mdash;His
-character&mdash;Opinions of his contemporaries, Boswell and others,
-concerning him&mdash;Attachment of the workmen&mdash;His Mutual Assurance
-Society for the workmen&mdash;His powers of organisation&mdash;His business
-qualities&mdash;His strength, courage, and perseverance in fighting the battle
-of the steam-engine&mdash;Watt’s estimate of Boulton&mdash;Boulton’s generosity</td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#Page_456">456&ndash;487</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="chap" colspan="2"><a href="#Page_488">CHAPTER XXIII.</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="desc">Watt’s closing years&mdash;His pursuits&mdash;His machine for copying statuary&mdash;Medallions
-of his friends&mdash;His garret workshop&mdash;Mrs. Watt’s rule over
-her husband&mdash;Tenacious retention of his faculties&mdash;Is consulted by the
-Glasgow Waterworks Company&mdash;His visits to Cheltenham and other
-places&mdash;Growth and improvement of Glasgow&mdash;Watt’s interview with
-the brothers Hart&mdash;His conversational powers&mdash;Sir Walter Scott’s panegyric
-on Watt&mdash;His extensive and varied knowledge&mdash;His anecdotal powers&mdash;Fondness
-for novels&mdash;Description of him by visitors at Heathfield&mdash;His
-last improvements in the sculpture-copying machine&mdash;His last illness
-and peaceful death&mdash;Monumental honours&mdash;Lord Brougham’s inscription&mdash;His
-qualities and genius&mdash;His modesty&mdash;His close observation&mdash;Facts
-and theory&mdash;Watt and Smeaton compared&mdash;Universal application
-of the steam-engine&mdash;Conclusion</td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#Page_488">488&ndash;514</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="desc"><span class="smcap"><a href="#Page_515">Index</a></span></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#Page_515">515</a></td>
-  </tr>
-</table>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_xvi">[xvi]</span></p>
-
-
-<hr class="full" />
-
-
-<h2>LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.</h2>
-
-
-<table id="loi" summary="">
-  <tr>
-    <td><span class="smcap">Portrait of <a href="#i_005">James Watt</a></span></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><i>to face <a href="#i_005">Title-page</a></i></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><span class="padded">„</span> <span class="smcap"><a href="#i_179">Matthew Boulton</a></span></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><i>to face page</i> <a href="#i_179">159</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td>&nbsp;</td>
-    <td class="pgref"><span class="smcap">Page</span></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_021">Edward, second Marquis of Worcester</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_021">2</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_022">Ancient Greek Æolipile</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_022">3</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_026">Branca’s Machine</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_026">7</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_028">De Caus’s Steam Apparatus</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_028">9</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_045">Ruins of Raglan Castle</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_045">26</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_050">Dionysius Papin</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_050">31</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_055">Ancient Paddle-Boat</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_055">36</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_060">Thomas Savery</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_060">41</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_062">Section of Savery’s Paddle-Boat</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_062">43</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_071">Savery’s Fire-Engine</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_071">52</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_074">Huel Vor</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_074">55</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_079">Newcomen’s House, Dartmouth</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_079">60</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_086">Newcomen’s Atmospheric Engine</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_086">67</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_089">Ruins of Wheal Fortune</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_089">70</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_090">Polgooth</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_090">71</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_092">Jonathan Hull’s Steam-Boat</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_092">73</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_095">Dartmouth from the Harbour</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_095">76</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_097">Greenock and the Clyde, 1865</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_097">78</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_098">Greenock Harbour, 1768</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_098">79</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_099">Crawfordsburn House, Greenock</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_099">80</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_106">James Watt Tavern, Greenock</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_106">87</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_116">Trongate, Glasgow</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_116">97</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_125">Inner Quadrangle, Glasgow College</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_125">107</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_127">Isometric View of Glasgow College, 1693</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_127">108</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_135">The Broomielaw in 1760</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_135">116</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_136">Professor Robison</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_136">117</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_139">Papin’s Digester</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_139">120</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_140">The Newcomen Model</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_140">121</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_145">Watt’s House, Delftfield Lane</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_145">126</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_149">Watt’s first Improved Apparatus</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_149">130</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_151">Dr. Joseph Black</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_151">132</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_161">Kinneil House</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_161">142</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_167">Outhouse behind Kinneil</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_167">148</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_175">Hamilton Bridge</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_175">156</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_177">Port Glasgow</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_177">158</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_181">Birmingham</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_181">160</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_190">Soho Manufactory</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_190">169</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_198">Soho House</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_198">177</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_235">Watt’s House, Harper’s Hill</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_235">214</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_252">Map of United Mines District</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_252">231</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_257">Watt’s Pumping-Engine for Mines</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_257">236</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_259">Redruth, High Street</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_259">238</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_281">Cardozos Pumping-Engine</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_281">260</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_282">United Mines District and St. Day</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_282">261</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_296">Cosgarne House</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_296">275</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_305">Entrance to ditto</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_305">284</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_306">The “Waggon and Horses,” Handsworth</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_306">285</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_308">The Crank as applied in the Foot-Lathe</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_308">287</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_309">Interior of the “Waggon and Horses”</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_309">288</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_327">Old Engine-House, Dalcoath</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_327">306</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_330">Sun-and-Planet Motion</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_330">309</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_347">“Old Bess” Engine</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_347">326</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_355">The parallel Motion</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_355">334</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_356">The Governor</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_356">335</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_360">Polgooth Engine-House</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_360">339</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_376">Double Acting Engine, Albion Mill</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_376">355</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_392">Dr. Priestley</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_392">370</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_420">Site of Soho Mint</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_420">399</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_432">Burning of Dr. Priestley’s House</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_432">411</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_443">William Murdock</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_443">422</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_454">Murdock’s House, Handsworth</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_454">433</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_458">Miller’s Triple Vessel</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_458">437</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_462">Symington’s first Steamboat-Engine</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_462">441</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_463">Miller’s Experimental Steamboat</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_463">442</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_468">Machinery of the ‘Charlotte Dundas’</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_468">447</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_475">The “Comet” passing Dumbarton</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_475">453</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_477">Watt’s House, Heathfield</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_477">456</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_499">Boulton’s Monument in Handsworth Church</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_499">478</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_515">The Garret at Heathfield</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_515">494</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_518">Water-Pipe in the Bed of the Clyde</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_518">497</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_529">Watt’s Chapel and Monument, Handsworth Church</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_529">508</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td><a href="#i_535">Handsworth Church</a></td>
-    <td class="pgref"><a href="#i_535">514</a></td>
-  </tr>
-</table>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_1">[1]</span></p>
-
-
-
-<hr class="full" />
-
-<h2><big>BEGINNINGS OF THE STEAM-ENGINE:</big><br />
-
-THE EARLY INVENTORS.</h2>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_2">[2]</span></p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_021" style="width: 405px;">
-<img src="images/i_021.png" width="405" height="500" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">EDWARD, SECOND MARQUIS OF WORCESTER.</p>
-<p class="caption">[By T. D. Scott after Vandyck.]</p>
-</div>
-
-<hr class="full" />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_3">[3]</span></p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_022" style="width: 250px;">
-<img src="images/i_022.png" width="250" height="418" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">ANCIENT GREEK ÆOLIPILE.</p>
-</div>
-
-
-
-
-<h2 title=""><big>BEGINNINGS OF THE STEAM-ENGINE:</big><br />
-
-THE EARLY INVENTORS.</h2>
-
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-<h3>CHAPTER I.<br />
-
-<small><span class="smcap">Dawnings of Steam Power&mdash;The Marquis of Worcester.</span></small></h3>
-
-
-<p><span class="smcap">When</span> Matthew Boulton entered into partnership with
-James Watt, he gave up the ormolu business in which
-he had before been principally engaged. He had been
-accustomed to supply George III. with articles of this
-manufacture, but ceased to wait upon the King for
-orders after embarking in his new enterprise. Some
-time after, he appeared at the Royal Levee and was at
-once recognised by the King. “Ha! Boulton,” said he,
-“it is long since we have seen you at Court. Pray,
-what business are you now engaged in?” “I am
-engaged, your Majesty, in the production of a commodity
-which is the desire of kings.” “And what is that? what
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_4">[4]</span>
-is that?” asked the King. “<span class="smcap">Power</span>, your Majesty,”
-replied Boulton, who proceeded to give a description of
-the great uses to which the steam-engine was capable
-of being applied.</p>
-
-<p>If the theory of James Mill<a name="Anchor-1" id="Anchor-1" href="#Footnote-1" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 1.">[1]</a> be true, that government
-is founded on the desire which exists among men to
-secure and enjoy the products of labour, by whatsoever
-means produced, probably the answer of Boulton to
-George III. was not far from correct. In the infancy of
-nations this desire manifested itself in the enforcement
-of labour by one class upon another, in the various forms
-of slavery and serfdom. To evade the more onerous
-and exhausting kinds of bodily toil, men were impelled
-to exercise their ingenuity in improving old tools and
-inventing new ones,&mdash;while, to increase production, they
-called the powers of nature to their aid. They tamed
-the horse, and made him their servant; they caught the
-winds as they blew, and the waters as they fell, and
-applied their powers to the driving of mills and machines
-of various kinds.</p>
-
-<p>But there was a power greater by far than that of
-horses, wind, or water,&mdash;a power of which poets and
-philosophers had long dreamt,&mdash;capable of being applied
-alike to the turning of mills, the raising of water, the
-rowing of ships, the driving of wheel-carriages, and
-the performance of labour in its severest forms. As
-early as the thirteenth century, Roger Bacon described
-this great new power in terms which, interpreted by
-the light of the present day, could only apply to the
-power of Steam. He anticipated that “chariots may
-be made so as to be moved with incalculable force, without
-any beast drawing them,” and that “engines of navigation
-might be made without oarsmen, so that the
-greatest river and sea ships, with only one man to steer
-them, may sail swifter than if they were fully manned.”
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_5">[5]</span>
-But Bacon was a seer rather than an expounder, a philosophic
-poet rather than an inventor; and it was left to
-men of future times to find out the practical methods of
-applying the wonderful power which he had imagined
-and foretold.</p>
-
-<p>The enormous power latent in water exposed to heat
-had long been known. Its discovery must have been
-almost contemporaneous with that of fire. The expansive
-force of steam would be obvious on setting the first partially-closed
-pipkin upon the fire. If closed, the lid
-would be blown off; and even if the vessel were of iron,
-it would soon burst with appalling force. Was it possible
-to render so furious and apparently unmanageable an
-agent, docile and tractable? Even in modern times, the
-explosive force of steam could only be compared to that
-of gunpowder; and it is a curious fact, that both De
-Hautefeuille and Papin proposed to employ gunpowder
-in preference to steam in driving a piston in a cylinder,
-considering it to be the more manageable power of the
-two.</p>
-
-<p>Although it appears from the writings of the Greek
-physician, Hero, who flourished at Alexandria more than
-a century before Christ, that steam was well known to
-the ancients, it was employed by them merely as a toy,
-or as a means of exciting the wonder of the credulous.
-In his treatise on Pneumatics, Hero gives descriptions
-of various methods of employing steam or heated air
-for the purpose of producing apparently magical effects;
-from which we infer that the agency of heat was employed
-by the heathen priests in the performance of
-their rites. By one of the devices which he describes,
-water was apparently changed into wine; by another,
-the temple doors were opened by fire placed on the
-sacrificial altar; while by a third, the sacrificial vessel
-was so contrived as to flow only when the money of the
-votary was cast into it. Another ingenious device consisted
-in the method employed to pour out libations.
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_6">[6]</span>
-Upon the altar-fire being kindled, the air in the interior
-became expanded and, pressing upon the surface of the
-liquid which it contained, forced it up a connecting-pipe,
-and so out of the sacrificial cup. The libation
-was made, and the people cried, “A miracle!” But
-Hero knew the trick, and explained the arrangement
-by which it was accomplished: it forms the subject of
-his eleventh theorem.</p>
-
-<p>The most interesting of the other devices described
-by Hero is the whirling Æolipile, or ball of Æolus,
-which, though but a toy, possessed the properties of a
-true steam-engine, and was most probably the first ever
-invented. As Hero’s book professes to be, for the most
-part, but a collection of the devices handed down by
-former writers, and as he does not lay claim to its invention,
-it is probable the Æolipile may have been
-known long before his time. The machine consisted of
-a hollow globe of metal, moving on its axis, and communicating
-with a caldron of water placed underneath.
-The globe was provided with one or more tubes projecting
-from it, closed at the ends, but open on one
-side. When a fire was lit under the caldron, and the
-steam was raised, it filled the globe, and, projecting
-itself against the air through the openings in the tubes,
-the reactive force thus produced caused the globe to spin
-round upon its axis “as if it were animated from within
-by a living spirit.”<a name="Anchor-2" id="Anchor-2" href="#Footnote-2" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 2.">[2]</a></p>
-
-<p>The mechanical means by which these various objects
-were accomplished, as explained by Hero, show that the
-ancients were acquainted with the ordinary expedients
-for communicating motion, such as the wheel and axle,
-spur-wheels, toothed pinions and sectors, the lever-beam,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_7">[7]</span>
-and other well-known expedients; while they also knew
-of the cylinder and piston, the three-way cock, slide-valves
-and valve-clacks,<a name="Anchor-3" id="Anchor-3" href="#Footnote-3" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 3.">[3]</a> and many other ingenious
-mechanical details which have been reinvented in modern
-times.</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_026" style="width: 298px;">
-<img src="images/i_026.png" width="298" height="479" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">BRANCA’S MACHINE.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Hero’s book lay hidden in manuscript and buried in
-libraries, until the revival of learning in Italy in the
-sixteenth century, when a translation of it appeared at
-Bologna in 1547. By that time printing had been invented;
-and the multiplication of copies being thereby
-rendered easy, the book was soon brought under the notice
-of inquiring men throughout Europe. The work must,
-indeed, have excited
-an extraordinary degree
-of interest; in
-proof of which it may
-be mentioned that eight
-different editions, in
-different languages,
-were published within
-a century. The minds
-of the curious and the
-scientific were thus directed
-to the subject of
-steam as a motive
-power. But for a long
-time they never got beyond the idea of
-Hero’s Æolipile, though they endeavoured
-to apply the rotary motion produced by it
-in different ways. Thus, a German writer
-suggested that it should be used to turn
-spits, instead of turnspit dogs; and Branca,
-the Italian architect, used the steam jet
-projected from a brazen head to drive an apparatus
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_8">[8]</span>
-contrived by him for pounding drugs. The jet forced
-round the vanes of a wheel, so as to produce a rotary
-motion, and this, being communicated to other wheels,
-set in motion a rod and stamper, after the manner shown
-in the preceding cut.</p>
-
-<p>Solomon de Caus was another of the speculative inquirers
-whose attention was drawn to the subject of steam
-by the publication of Hero’s book. De Caus was a
-native of Normandy, and for some time studied the profession
-of an architect in Italy; from whence he returned
-to France early in the seventeenth century. Religious
-persecution was then raging, and, being a Protestant,
-he was glad to take refuge from it in England. He
-entered the service of the Prince of Wales, by whom he
-was for a time employed in designing grottoes, fountains,
-and hydraulic ornaments for the Palace Gardens at Richmond.
-While occupied in that capacity he gave lessons
-in design to the Princess Elizabeth; and on her marriage
-to the Elector Palatine he accompanied her to Heidelberg,
-to take charge of the Castle gardens there. It was
-while residing at Heidelberg that De Caus wrote his
-well-known book on hydraulics, which was published at
-Frankfort in 1615.<a name="Anchor-4" id="Anchor-4" href="#Footnote-4" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 4.">[4]</a></p>
-
-<p>One of De Caus’s expedients for raising water consisted
-of an apparatus in which he proposed to employ
-the expansive power of steam for the purpose. In
-Hero’s book it is shown how a column of water may be
-thrown up by means of compressed air; and De Caus
-merely proposed to employ steam instead of air. His
-apparatus was very simple. It consisted of a spherical
-vessel fitted with two pipes, one of them provided
-with a cock and funnel; the other, which reached down
-to near the bottom of the vessel, being open at the top
-to the external air. When the vessel was filled with
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_9">[9]</span>
-water and a fire lit underneath, the water was forced
-up the open tube in a jet, greater or less in proportion
-to the elasticity of the steam. When
-both tubes were tightly closed, so
-that neither steam nor water could
-escape, the heat, says De Caus,
-would shortly cause a compression
-from within so violent that “the
-ball will burst in pieces, with a noise
-like a petard.”</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_028" style="width: 192px;">
-<img src="images/i_028.png" width="192" height="300" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">DE CAUS’S STEAM APPARATUS.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>It will be observed that there was
-little mechanical contrivance, and
-no practical use in this apparatus; it
-merely furnished an illustration of
-the extraordinary force of pent-up
-steam, and that was all. Though De Caus made many
-experiments with his steam-vessel, he never succeeded
-in making&mdash;if, indeed, he ever attempted to make&mdash;a
-working steam-engine of any kind. It is not improbable
-that he was dismayed, as others were, by the
-apparent violence of the imprisoned monster; and it
-needed a more ingenious head than his to contrive a
-method of rendering him docile, and making him go
-quietly in harness.<a name="Anchor-5" id="Anchor-5" href="#Footnote-5" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 5.">[5]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_10">[10]</span></p>
-
-<p>It is probable that the first contriver of a working
-steam-engine was Edward, second Marquis of Worcester,
-one of the first and most illustrious of a long line of
-unfortunate inventors. The career of that nobleman&mdash;born
-though he was to high rank and great estate&mdash;was
-chequered and sad in no ordinary degree. Edward
-Somerset was the eldest son of Henry Lord Herbert,
-afterwards Earl of Worcester, and consequently heir to
-that title. He was born in London in 1601. His early
-years were principally spent at Raglan Castle, his
-father’s country seat, where his education was carefully
-attended to. In the course of his pupilage he made
-occasional visits to the continent, accompanied by his
-tutor, for the purpose of acquiring that degree of
-polish and culture considered necessary for a person
-of his social position. On the accession of his father to
-the Earldom of Worcester, in 1627, Edward became
-Lord Herbert by courtesy; and in the following year
-he married, and went to reside at Raglan Castle.</p>
-
-<p>From an early period of his life Lord Herbert took
-especial pleasure in mechanical studies, and in the
-course of his foreign tours he visited and examined the
-famous works of construction abroad; for as yet there
-were none such in England. On settling down at
-Raglan, he proceeded to set up a laboratory, or workshop,
-wherein to indulge his mechanical tastes, and
-perhaps to while away the tedium of a country life.
-To assist him in his labours, he engaged a clever foreign
-mechanic, named Caspar Kaltoff, who remained in his
-service for many years, and materially helped him in
-his various contrivances. Among the works executed
-by Lord Herbert and his assistant at Raglan, was the
-hydraulic apparatus by means of which the castle was
-supplied with water. From an incidental reference to
-the “water-works” by a contemporary writer, we learn
-that they consisted of a series of engines and wheels, by
-means of which water was raised through pipes to a
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_11">[11]</span>
-cistern placed on the summit of the central tower.<a name="Anchor-6" id="Anchor-6" href="#Footnote-6" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 6.">[6]</a> It
-is probable that the planning and construction of these
-works induced Lord Herbert to prosecute the study of
-hydraulics, and to enter upon that series of experiments
-as to the power of steam which eventually led to the
-contrivance of his “Water-commanding Engine.”</p>
-
-<p>In pursuits and studies such as these, Lord Herbert
-spent about seven years at Raglan Castle. But his wife
-dying in 1635, the place became connected in his mind
-with too painful associations, and he shortly after left
-it to reside in London. On his arrival there, he proceeded
-to put to the practical test a plan of perpetual
-motion which he had long studied, and now thought
-he had brought to perfection. He accordingly had
-his self-moving wheel<a name="Anchor-7" id="Anchor-7" href="#Footnote-7" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 7.">[7]</a> set up in the Tower; but
-though it moved, its motion did not prove perpetual,
-and it shortly dropped out of sight, to be no more
-heard of.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_12">[12]</span></p>
-
-<p>After the lapse of four years, Lord Herbert again
-married, taking to wife the Lady Margaret, second
-daughter of the Earl of Thomond. In the year after his
-second marriage, the celebrated Long Parliament began
-its sittings. Questions of great public import were
-agitating the minds of thinking men, and the nation
-was gradually becoming divided into two hostile parties,
-soon to be arrayed against each other in deadly strife.
-A Royalist and a Roman Catholic like his father, Lord
-Herbert at once ranged himself on the side of the King.
-On the outbreak of the Civil War, we find both father
-and son actively employed in mustering forces, and preparing
-to hold the western counties against the Parliament.
-Raglan Castle was strongly garrisoned, and fortifications
-were thrown up around it, so as to render it
-secure against assault. The Earl, now Marquis of Worcester,
-was appointed Generalissimo of the Western
-Forces, while his son, Lord Herbert, was made General
-of South Wales. From this office he was shortly after
-called by the King, who, creating him Earl of Glamorgan,
-despatched him on a mission to Ireland, with
-the object of stirring up the loyalists of that kingdom,
-and inducing them to come to his help. This delicate
-office he is said to have performed with more zeal than
-discretion. Indeed, the studious habits of his early life
-must in a measure have unfitted him for the conduct of
-so important an affair; and the bungle he made of it
-was such that the King felt himself under the necessity
-of repudiating the acts which the Earl had done in his
-name.</p>
-
-<p>It is unnecessary that we should follow the fortunes
-of the house of Raglan in the course of the civil war.
-Suffice it to say that the King’s cause was utterly lost;
-that Raglan Castle was besieged, taken, and dismantled;
-that the Marquis of Worcester, having advanced to the
-King at different times as much as 122,500<i>l.</i>, had completely
-impoverished himself; and that when the Earl
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_13">[13]</span>
-succeeded to his father’s title, and became second Marquis
-of Worcester, in 1646, he inherited an exhausted
-exchequer, a confiscated estate, and a ruined home.
-The services he had rendered to the King were remembered
-against him; and to escape the vengeance of his
-political enemies he took refuge in France. There he
-lived in poverty and in exile for a period of about five
-years. At length, drawn to England by the powerful
-attractions of wife and family, and probably also commissioned
-to perform a service for the exiled Charles II.,
-the Marquis secretly visited London in 1655, where he
-was shortly after detected, apprehended, and imprisoned
-in the Tower. He sought and found solace, during
-his confinement, in study and contemplation, reverting
-to his early experiments in mechanics; and he occupied
-the long and weary hours in committing to paper
-descriptions of his many ingenious devices, which he
-afterwards published in his ‘Century of Inventions.’
-The Marquis’s old and skilled mechanic, Caspar Kaltoff,
-continued faithful to him in his adversity, and was permitted
-to hold free communication with him; from
-which we infer that his imprisonment was not of a very
-rigid character.</p>
-
-<p>After lying in the Tower for about two years,
-the Marquis was liberated on bail, in October, 1654,
-when he proceeded to take steps to erect his long-contemplated
-Water-commanding Engine. Even while a
-prisoner, we find him negotiating with the then owner
-of Vauxhall for its purchase, with a view to the establishment
-there of a school of skilled industry; thus
-anticipating by nearly two centuries the School of Mines
-and Manufactures at South Kensington. In the month
-preceding his enlargement we find Hartlib writing to
-the Hon. Robert Boyle,&mdash;“The Earl of Worcester is
-buying Fauxhall from Mr. Trenchard, to bestow the use
-of that house upon Caspar Calchoff and his son as long
-as they shall live, for he intends to make it a College of
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_14">[14]</span>
-Artizans.”<a name="Anchor-8" id="Anchor-8" href="#Footnote-8" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 8.">[8]</a> His main difficulty, however, consisted in
-raising the necessary means for carrying his excellent
-project into effect. He was, indeed, so reduced in his
-circumstances as to be under the necessity of petitioning
-his political enemies for the bare means of living; and
-we find Cromwell, in the course of the year following
-his liberation from prison, issuing a warrant for the payment
-to him of three pounds a week “for his better maintenance.”
-The Marquis also tried the experiment of
-levying contributions from his friends; but they were,
-for the most part, as poor as himself. He next tried the
-wealthy men of the Parliamentary party, and succeeded
-in obtaining several advances of money from Colonel
-Copley, who took an active interest in the prosecution
-of various industrial undertakings.<a name="Anchor-9" id="Anchor-9" href="#Footnote-9" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 9.">[9]</a> The following
-letter from the Marquis to Copley shows the straits to
-which he was reduced:&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“<span class="smcap">Dear Friend</span>,&mdash;I knowe not with what face to desire a curtesie
-from you, since I have not yet payed you the five powndes, and the
-mayne businesse soe long protracted, whereby my reality and
-kindnesse should with thankfullnesse appeare; for though the least
-I intende you is to make up the somme already promised to a
-thousand powndes yearly, or a share ammounting to four more,
-which, to nominate before the perfection of the woorke, were but an
-<i lang="la" xml:lang="la">individuum vagum</i>, and, therefore, I deferre it, and upon noe other
-score. Yet in this interim, my disappointments are soe great, as
-that I am forced to begge, if you could possible, eyther to helpe me
-with tenne powndes to this bearer, or to make use of the coache,
-and to goe to Mr. Clerke, and if he could this day help me to fifty
-powndes, then to paye your selfe the five powndes I owe you out of
-them. The Alderman has taken three days’ time to consider of it.
-Pardon the great trouble I give you, which I doubt not but in time
-to deserve, by really appearing</p>
-
-<p class="sig-less">“Your most thankfull friend,</p>
-
-<p class="sig">“<span class="smcap">Worcester</span>.</p>
-
-<p>“<i>28th March, 1656.</i></p>
-
-<p>“To my honoured friend, Collonel <span class="smcap">Christopher Coppley</span>, these.”</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>The original of this letter is endorsed “My Lord of
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_15">[15]</span>
-Worcester’s letter about my share in his engine,” from
-which it would appear that the Marquis induced his
-friends to advance him money on the promise of a certain
-proportion of shares in the undertaking. He also
-pressed his invention upon the notice of Government,
-representing that he was in a position to do his Highness
-the Protector “more service than any one subject
-of his three nations.” But neither the Protector nor his
-Ministers took any further notice of the Marquis or his
-project. It is probable that they regarded him as a
-bore, and his water-commanding engine as the mere
-dream of a projector.</p>
-
-<p>The Marquis himself continued to be as confident as ever
-of the ultimate success of his scheme. He believed that
-it would yet realise him an immense fortune. Writing
-of the engine to the Earl of Lotherdale, he described it
-as “the greatest invention for profit that I ever yet
-heard of vouchsafed to a man, especially so unworthy
-and ignorant as I am.” But the Marquis was not so
-humble as he affected to be, believing in his heart that
-he had invented, without exception, the most wonderful
-machine of the age. Still it remained a mere project.
-Without the means of erecting an engine, it promised
-to remain such; and all his efforts to raise the necessary
-funds had thus far proved unavailing.</p>
-
-<p>The Restoration of Charles II., in 1660, revived his
-hopes. Now that the King enjoyed his own again, the
-Marquis believed that he, too, would come into possession
-of the means for carrying out his project. For
-thirteen years he had lived in exile, in prison, and in
-poverty: but brighter days had dawned at last; and
-he indulged in the hope that compensation would at
-length be made to him for his sufferings in the cause of
-the Stuarts, and that he would now bask in the sunshine
-of Royal favour. He made all haste to represent his case
-to the king, and to claim restitution for his heavy losses
-in the late war. But there were thousands of like suppliants
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_16">[16]</span>
-all over the kingdom, and redress came slowly.
-The Marquis was, however, shortly put in possession of
-such parts of his estates as had not been sold by the Protector;
-but he found them for the most part cleared of
-their timber, and comparatively valueless. The castle
-at Raglan was in ruins. He himself was heavily
-burdened with debt, and his creditors were becoming
-increasingly importunate for money. It was thus long
-before he could shake himself clear of his embarrassments,
-and devote himself to the great object of his life,
-the prosecution of his water-commanding engine.</p>
-
-<p>One of his first cares, on the partial recovery of his
-property, was to obtain a legal protection for his inventions;
-and in the year following the Restoration we
-find him taking out a patent for four of his schemes,&mdash;a
-watch or clock, guns or pistols, an engine to give
-security to a coach, and a boat to sail against wind and
-tide. In the session of Parliament, 1662&ndash;3, he obtained
-an Act securing to himself the profits of the water-commanding
-engine. About the same time he gave to
-the world his famous ‘Century,’<a name="Anchor-10" id="Anchor-10" href="#Footnote-10" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 10.">[10]</a> which contains his
-own account of his various inventions. In the second
-dedication of the book to the members of both Houses
-of Parliament he states that he had already expended
-the large sum of 10,000<i>l.</i> on experiments; but he
-professed that he esteemed himself sufficiently rewarded
-by the passing of “the Act of the Water-commanding
-Engine,” and, his debts once paid, he intended to devote
-the rest of his life to the service of his King and country.
-The ‘Century’ is a mere summary of things alleged to
-have been tried and perfected, conveyed in vague and
-mysterious language, and calculated rather to excite
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_17">[17]</span>
-wonder than to furnish information. The descriptions
-were unaccompanied by plans or drawings, so that we
-can only surmise the means by which he proposed to
-carry his schemes into effect. It is possible that he
-purposely left the descriptions of his inventions vague,
-in order that he might not be anticipated in their
-application; for it is certain that at the time the book
-was written the Marquis had not taken out his first
-patent, nor obtained the Act securing to him the profits
-of his engine.</p>
-
-<p>There can, however, be no doubt that, vague and
-mysterious though the ‘Scantlings’ be, they indicate a
-knowledge of mechanical principles considerably in
-advance of the age, as well as a high degree of mechanical
-ingenuity. The hundred Articles into which
-the book is divided contain suggestions, in shorthand
-descriptions, of things so various as ship-destroying
-machines, telegraphs, combination and escutcheon locks,<a name="Anchor-11" id="Anchor-11" href="#Footnote-11" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 11.">[11]</a>
-improvements in fire-arms, universal alphabets, seals and
-watches, various kinds of cipher, a boat rowing against
-wind and tide, automata, and mechanical appliances of
-different kinds, including the “stupendious and semi-omnipotent”
-engine. Some of them read like descriptions
-of conjuring tricks, such as the artificial bird,
-the hour water-ball, the flying man, the brazen head,
-the dicing-box, and various automata. Others are full
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_18">[18]</span>
-of prophetic insight, and contain anticipations of mechanical
-marvels, which, however wonderful they may
-at that time have appeared, have since been fully realised.
-The style in which the treatise was written, however,
-presented so remarkable a contrast to the contemporary
-writings of Newton, Boyle, Pascal, Guericke, and others,
-that it is not improbable it had the effect of prejudicing
-the minds of scientific men against the writer, and led
-them to regard his schemes as those of a wild projector,
-and hence to treat his propositions with neglect, if not
-with contumely.</p>
-
-<p>So soon as the Marquis had become possessed of the
-requisite funds, he proceeded to erect an engine at Vauxhall
-to illustrate the uses of his principal invention. He
-was assisted, as before, by his old workman, Caspar
-Kaltoff. It is probable that the engine was erected by
-the beginning of 1663; for in the course of that year
-M. Sorbière paid his visit to England, and found the
-Marquis’s “hydraulic machine” at work. He describes
-it as capable of raising, by the strength of one man
-only, within a minute of time, four large buckets of
-water to a height of forty feet, through a pipe eight
-inches in diameter. He proceeds to compare it with
-another machine at Somerset House, worked by one or
-two horses, which he considers the more effective machine
-of the two.<a name="Anchor-12" id="Anchor-12" href="#Footnote-12" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 12.">[12]</a> This account of the Marquis’s invention
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_19">[19]</span>
-is confirmed by another brief description of it,
-which occurs in the narrative of the travels of Cosmo,
-Grand Duke of Tuscany, in England, some years later.
-Count Magalotti, the narrator, says, “It raises water
-more than forty geometrical feet, by the power of one
-man only; and in a very short space of time will draw up
-four vessels of water through a tube or channel not more
-than a span in width, on which account it is considered to
-be of greater service to the public than the other machine
-at Somerset House.” It will thus be observed that the
-Duke’s secretary entertained a different opinion from that
-expressed by M. Sorbière as to the comparative merits
-of the two engines spoken of.</p>
-
-<p>It is worthy of remark that the incidental accounts of
-these two foreigners contain almost the only contemporary
-information we possess as to the character of the
-Marquis’s invention. English writers of the time are
-almost entirely silent about it; and when Dr. Hooke,
-the learned Secretary of the Royal Society, refers to the
-contrivance, it is in a tone of ridicule rather than of
-praise. Writing to Mr. Boyle, in 1667, he characterises
-the definition or description of the water-commanding
-engine as “so purely romantic that it would serve one
-rarely to fill up half a dozen pages in the ‘History of
-Fortunatus his Wishing Cap.’” ... “I was,” he adds,
-“since my return to London to see this engine, when
-I found Caltrop [Kaltoff], his chief engineer, to laugh
-at it; and as far as I was able to see it, it seemed one of
-the perpetual-motion fallacies; of which kind Caltrop
-himself, and two or three others that I know, are labouring
-at this time in vain to make, but after several ways;
-and nothing but costly experience will make them desist.”<a name="Anchor-13" id="Anchor-13" href="#Footnote-13" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 13.">[13]</a></p>
-
-<p>It is difficult to gather from the statements of Sorbière
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_20">[20]</span>
-and Cosmo de Medici what was the precise nature
-of the Marquis’s hydraulic apparatus. There is no mention
-whatever of steam, either in their accounts or in
-that of Dr. Hooke; but the latter does not seem to
-have been allowed to examine the details of the machine.
-From the mention by Sorbière of the “four large
-buckets of water,” and by Cosmo’s secretary, of “four
-vessels of water,” it might possibly have been only an
-improved hydraulic apparatus, worked by a man instead
-of a horse. In order, therefore, to obtain a clue to the
-real nature of the machine we find it necessary to resort
-to the Marquis’s ‘Scantlings’ for his own account of its
-action, and we find it in article No. 68, which runs as
-follows:&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“68. An admirable and most forcible way to drive up water by
-fire, not by drawing or sucking it upwards, for that must be as the
-Philosopher calleth it, <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">Intra sphæram activitatis</i>, which is but at such
-a distance. But this way hath no Bounder, if the Vessels be strong
-enough; for I have taken a piece of a whole Cannon, whereof the
-end was burst, and filled it three-quarters full of water, stopping
-and scruing up the broken end; as also the Touch-hole; and making
-a constant fire under it, within twenty-four hours it burst and made
-a great crack: So that having a way to make my Vessels, so that
-they are strengthened by the force within them, and the one to fill
-after the other, I have seen the water run like a constant Fountaine-stream
-forty foot high; one Vessel of water rarified by fire driveth
-up forty of cold water. And a man that tends the work is but to
-turn two Cocks, that one Vessel of water being consumed, another
-begins to force and refill with cold water, and so successively, the
-fire being tended and kept constant, which the self-same Person
-may likewise abundantly perform in the interim between the
-necessity of turning the said Cocks.”</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>From this account we gather that the Marquis had
-contrived a plan for raising water by the expansive force
-of steam, after the manner of De Caus, but with important
-modifications and improvements. It had obviously
-occurred to him, that by generating the steam in
-a separate vessel, and conveying it by means of a suitable
-pipe to a second closed vessel, he could thereby
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_21">[21]</span>
-make it expel the water which the latter contained by
-pressing upon its surface, as in De Caus’s apparatus.
-The admission of the steam could easily be regulated by
-the turning of two cocks; one to admit the steam from
-the boiler, and the other to allow the exit of the water.
-On the expulsion of the water, and the production of
-a vacuum by the condensation of the contained steam,
-the empty vessel would at once be refilled by the action
-of the atmospheric pressure on the surface of the water
-to be raised. It is probable that this engine was&mdash;in
-the absence of a feed-pump, of which there is
-no mention&mdash;provided with two boilers as well as with
-the two cisterns in which the “forcing and refilling”
-went on, so as to maintain the “constant fountain-stream”
-which the Marquis describes. But the precise arrangement
-of parts by which he accomplished this object must
-ever remain a matter of mere conjecture.</p>
-
-<p>We have other distinct indications of a steam-engine
-in the Marquis’s 98th, 99th, and 100th Articles, which
-ought to be read in connection with the 68th Article:
-they run as follows:&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“98. An Engine so contrived, that working the <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">Primum mobile</i>
-forward or backward, upward or downward, circularly or cornerwise,
-to and fro, streight, upright or downright, yet the pretended
-Operation continueth, and advanceth none of the motions above-mentioned,
-hindering, much less stopping the other; but unanimously,
-and with harmony agreeing they all augment and contribute
-strength unto the intended work and operation: And therefore I call
-this <em>A Semi-omnipotent Engine</em>, and do intend that a Model thereof be
-buried with me.”</p>
-
-<p>“99. How to make one pound weight to raise an hundred as high
-as one pound falleth, and yet the hundred pound descending doth
-what nothing less than one hundred pound can effect.”</p>
-
-<p>“100. Upon so potent a help as these two last-mentioned Inventions
-a Waterwork is by many years experience and labour so
-advantageously by me contrived, that a Child’s force bringeth up
-an hundred foot high an incredible quantity of water, even two
-foot Diameter, so naturally, that the work will not be heard even
-into the next Room; and with so great ease and Geometrical
-Symmetry, that though it work day and night from one end of the
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_22">[22]</span>
-year to the other, it will not require forty shillings reparation to
-the whole Engine, nor hinder ones day-work. And I may boldly
-call it <em>The most stupendious Work in the whole world</em>: not onely with
-little charge to drein all sorts of Mines, and furnish Cities with
-water, though never so high seated, as well to keep them sweet,
-running through several streets, and so performing the work of
-Scavengers, as well as furnishing the Inhabitants with sufficient
-water for their private occasions; but likewise supplying Rivers
-with sufficient to maintaine and make them portable from Towne to
-Towne, and for the bettering of Lands all the way it runs; with
-many more advantageous, and yet greater effects of Profit, Admiration,
-and Consequence. So that deservedly I deem this Invention
-to crown my Labours, to reward my Expences, and make my
-Thoughts acquiesce in way of further Inventions: This making up
-the whole Century, and preventing any further trouble to the
-Reader for the present, meaning to leave to Posterity a Book,
-wherein under each of these Heads the means to put in execution
-and visible trial all and every of these Inventions, with the shape
-and form of all things belonging to them, shall be Printed by Brass-plates.”</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>The promised book was never written, and we are
-accordingly left in uncertainty as to the precise character
-of the Marquis’s inventions. That he had a full conviction
-of the great powers of steam, as well as of its manageability
-and extensive practical uses, is sufficiently clear;
-but that he ever erected any engines after the plans
-thus summarily described is matter of considerable
-doubt. It is remarkable that, notwithstanding the number
-and variety of his suggested inventions, not a single
-model or machine constructed by the Marquis or his
-skilled workmen has been preserved. Mr. Dircks, who
-has collected and published all that is likely to be brought
-to light relative to the life and works of the Marquis,
-and has laboured at his task with a rare love and enthusiasm
-for his subject, naturally expresses surprise that
-“none of the many cabinets of the curious seem to have
-possessed any model or work of his production; not even
-the indefatigable Tradescant, although his museum was
-at Lambeth.”<a name="Anchor-14" id="Anchor-14" href="#Footnote-14" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 14.">[14]</a> But it is probable, as we have already
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_23">[23]</span>
-observed, that the Marquis’s ‘Scantlings,’ notwithstanding
-his statement that he had “tried and perfected” the inventions
-of which he speaks, were rather the foreshadowings
-of things to come than the descriptions of things
-that had actually been executed. Thus, no one pretends
-that the Marquis ever constructed a steamboat, and yet
-his description of a vessel “to work itself against wind
-and tide, yea, both, without the help of man or beast,”
-can apply to nothing else.<a name="Anchor-15" id="Anchor-15" href="#Footnote-15" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 15.">[15]</a> “This engine,” said he, “is
-applicable to any vessel or boat whatsoever, without
-being therefore made on purpose, and worketh these
-effects: it roweth, it draweth, it driveth, (if need be) to
-pass London Bridge against the stream at low-water,
-and a boat laying at anchor, the engine may be used for
-loading or unloading.” But it would not be possible for
-any one to make an engine after the description given
-in the ‘Scantlings;’ and to a generation unacquainted
-with the powers of steam, his suggestions would be
-altogether without meaning.</p>
-
-<p>The strongest evidence which could be adduced of the
-ambiguity of the Marquis’s ‘Articles’ is to be found in
-the fact that the various ingenious writers who have
-given plans of his supposed engine have represented it
-in widely different forms. Farey assumes that it worked
-by the expansive force of steam; Bourne, that it worked
-by condensation and atmospheric pressure; Dircks infers
-that it included such ingenious expedients as valves and
-even a four-way cock, worked by a lever-handle; Stuart,
-that it contained a cylinder and piston, and was, in fact,
-a complete high-pressure lever-engine. Again, the
-drawings of the various writers on engineering who
-have attempted to reproduce the engine&mdash;of Stuart,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_24">[24]</span>
-Galloway, Millington, and Dircks&mdash;differ in essential
-respects.</p>
-
-<p>When Watt was on one occasion asked for his opinion
-as to the precise nature of the Marquis’s contrivance,
-his answer was, that the descriptions given were too
-obscure to enable any definite opinion to be formed on
-the subject; but he thought that the expansive power
-of steam was the principle on which the engine worked.
-He added, that no one could possibly erect an engine
-after the Marquis’s ‘Scantlings,’ and that any inventor
-desirous of constructing a steam-engine would have to
-begin again at the beginning. But though the Marquis
-did not leave the steam-engine in such a state as to be
-taken up and adopted as a practicable working power,
-he at least advanced it several important steps. In this
-world, it is not given to man to finish; to persevere,
-to improve, and to advance, are all that can be hoped for;
-and these are enough for the real philosopher.</p>
-
-<p>Little remains to be told of the unfortunate Marquis’s
-history. His water-commanding engine proved of no
-service to him. It only increased his embarrassments
-by involving him in further debts. The Restoration,
-though it gave him back his estates, did not mend his
-fortunes, and he continued to importune his friends for
-loans. He sought access to the King by petition; but
-it became more and more difficult to approach him. On
-one occasion he tried to accomplish his purpose through
-the influence of his Majesty’s mistress, Lady Castlemaine.
-Provided she could persuade the king to grant his
-request, he offered to present to her “a thousand pieces
-to buy her a little jewel, which she deserves to wear
-every day of the week. And if it please God I live but
-two years,” he added, “I will, out of the profits of my
-water-commanding engine, appropriate four hundred
-pounds yearly, for ever, to her Grace’s disposal ...
-all which, as I am a gentleman and a Christian, shall be
-faithfully and most thankfully performed; though the
-benefit I pretend to by my petition will not amount to
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_25">[25]</span>
-what my gratitude obliges, yet the satisfaction which
-it will be to my mind, and my credit therein at stake,
-I value at ten times as much. And this will enable me
-to place my Water-commanding Engine, when I am
-certained of an hundred pounds a day profit, without
-further troubling the king or anybody.”<a name="Anchor-16" id="Anchor-16" href="#Footnote-16" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 16.">[16]</a></p>
-
-<p>All his piteous importunity proved of no avail. His
-friends turned aside from his petitionings, and the
-king would give him no help. He came to be regarded
-as a crack-brained enthusiast, and a wild projector of
-impracticable things. He could not find any one to
-believe in his water-commanding engine, though he
-himself regarded it as of greater worth than either his
-titles or his estates. It had been his own creation&mdash;the
-child of his brain&mdash;the product of studies and experiments
-extending over nearly forty years. But what
-signified all this if no one would make use of the
-invention?</p>
-
-<p>His difficulties and embarrassments grew from day to
-day; and his projects met with increased contumely
-and even contempt. None valued them, because none
-understood them. It was even proposed to appropriate
-to other purposes the premises at Vauxhall, on
-which he so much plumed himself, but which he had
-been unable to purchase. To prevent this, he again
-petitioned the king in 1666, representing that he had
-expended 9000<i>l.</i> in building the house he occupied there
-as “an operatory for engineers and artists to make
-public works in,” and “above 50,000<i>l.</i> trying conclusions
-of arts in that operatory which may be useful to
-his Majesty and his kingdom;” and he concluded by
-praying that Vauxhall might be granted to him at a
-fee-farm rent. The Marchioness, his wife, at the same
-time petitioned the House of Lords, representing the
-state of poverty to which her husband had been reduced,
-and that, in consequence of an execution having been
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_26">[26]</span>
-put in at Worcester House, through a debt of 6000<i>l.</i>
-which the Marquis had incurred in 1642 to pay the
-garrison of Monmouth, then in a state of mutiny, he
-was actually threatened to be turned out of house and
-home. It is not known what came of this petition;
-but shortly after its presentation the poor Marquis was
-beyond all worldly help. Broken in health, harassed,
-embarrassed, and disappointed, he died in April, 1667,
-in the sixty-sixth year of his age, and his remains were
-conveyed to Raglan for interment in the family vault.</p>
-
-<p>It will be remembered that the Marquis concluded the
-98th article of his ‘Century’ with the words, “I call
-this a semi-omnipotent engine, and do intend that a
-model thereof be buried with me.” A diligent search
-for the model has recently been made in the vault under
-Raglan church, under the direction of Mr. Bennet
-Woodcroft, whose enthusiasm as a collector of primitive
-engines and machines is so well known; but the search
-proved unsuccessful, and no traces of the Marquis’s
-model could be found.</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_045" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_045.png" width="450" height="271" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">RUINS OF RAGLAN CASTLE.</p>
-<p class="caption">[By Percival Skelton.]</p>
-</div>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_27">[27]</span></p>
-
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-<h3>CHAPTER II.<br />
-
-<small><span class="smcap">Sir Samuel Morland&mdash;Dr. Dionysius Papin.</span></small></h3>
-
-
-<p><span class="smcap">After</span> the death of the Marquis of Worcester, the
-Marchioness, his widow, made various efforts to turn his
-inventions to account. Sceptical though the world was
-as to their utility, she fully believed in them; and now
-that he was gone, it would have been dishonouring to
-his memory to entertain a doubt as to his engine being
-able to do all that he had promised. The Marchioness
-had not only to maintain the fame of her dear husband,
-but to endeavour, if possible, to pay the debts he had
-contracted in prosecuting his inventions. She accordingly
-sought to interest persons of authority and
-influence in the water-commanding engine, and seized
-every opportunity of bringing it into notice.</p>
-
-<p>To such an extent did the Marchioness carry her zeal,
-that her friends began to fear lest her mind was becoming
-disordered; and her father-confessor was requested
-to expostulate with her as to the impropriety
-of her conduct. He accordingly implored her to desist
-from her vain endeavours to get “great sums of money
-from the King to pay her deceased lord’s debts, enriching
-herself by the great machine, and the like.”
-He added that he feared “the devil, to make his suggestions
-the more prevalent, doth make use of some motives
-that seem plausible, as of paying your lord’s debts, of
-founding monasteries, and the like;” pointing out that
-the end did not justify the means, and that such undertakings
-were improper for her ladyship, and by no
-means likely to be attended with success. It is not improbable
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_28">[28]</span>
-that these representations had their effect; the
-more especially as the Marchioness was no more successful
-in inducing the public to adopt the invention
-than the Marquis himself had been. Accordingly, the
-water-commanding engine very shortly dropped out of
-sight, and in the course of a few years was almost
-entirely forgotten.</p>
-
-<p>The steam-engine project, however, did not die; it
-only slept. It had been the fruit thus far of noble
-effort, of persevering self-denial, and unquestionable skill.
-What was good in it would yet live, and reappear perhaps
-in other forms, to vindicate the sagacity and foresight
-of its inventor. Even during the Marquis’s lifetime
-other minds besides his were diligently pursuing the
-same subject. Indeed, his enthusiasm was of a kind
-especially calculated to inflame other minds; and the
-success he had achieved with his engine, imperfect
-though it might be, was of so novel and original a character
-that it could not fail to excite a warm interest
-amongst men of like mechanical genius.</p>
-
-<p>One of the most distinguished of these was Sir Samuel
-Morland, appointed Master of Mechanics to Charles II.
-immediately after the Restoration. He had been for
-some time previously in the employment of the Protectorate.
-He formed one of the embassy to Sweden,
-with Whitlocke, in 1653. Some years later he took an
-active part in the relief of the sufferings of the persecuted
-Protestants of Piedmont&mdash;whose history he
-afterwards wrote,&mdash;having been appointed Commissioner
-Extraordinary for the distribution of the collected
-moneys. For some time he officiated as assistant to
-Thurloe, Cromwell’s secretary; and it was while acting
-in this capacity that he became cognisant of a plot
-against the life of Charles II., then in exile. Morland
-divulged the plot to the king’s friends, and thereby
-perhaps saved his life. For this service, Charles, on
-his Restoration, presented him with a medal, as a badge
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_29">[29]</span>
-of his signal loyalty, and also appointed him Master of
-Mechanics.</p>
-
-<p>From that time until the close of his life, Morland
-devoted himself entirely to mechanical studies. Among
-his various inventions may be mentioned the speaking-trumpet;<a name="Anchor-17" id="Anchor-17" href="#Footnote-17" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 17.">[17]</a>
-two arithmetical machines, of which he published
-an illustrated description; the capstan to heave
-ships’ anchors; and various kinds of pumps and water
-engines. His pumps were of a very powerful and
-effective kind. One of them, worked by eight men,
-forced water from the Thames at Blackmoor Park, near
-Winkfield, to the top of Windsor Castle. He also
-devoted himself to the improvement of the fire-engine,
-in which he employed a cylinder and piston, as well as
-a stuffing-box. Towards the later years of his life, he
-applied himself more particularly to the study of the
-powers and uses of steam.<a name="Anchor-18" id="Anchor-18" href="#Footnote-18" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 18.">[18]</a> In 1677, we find him taking
-a lease of Vauxhall, most probably the identical house
-occupied by the Marquis of Worcester, where he conducted
-a series of experiments as to the power requisite to raise
-water by cylinders of different dimensions.<a name="Anchor-19" id="Anchor-19" href="#Footnote-19" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 19.">[19]</a> It is not,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_30">[30]</span>
-however, known that he ever erected a steam-engine.
-If he did, no account of its performances has been
-preserved.</p>
-
-<p>Morland’s inventions proved of no greater advantage
-to him than those of the Marquis of Worcester
-had done. His later years were spent in poverty
-and blindness, and he must have perished but for the
-charitable kindness of Archbishop Tenison and a few
-other friends. Evelyn gives the following interesting
-account of a visit to him in October, 1695, two months
-before his death:&mdash;“The Archbishop and myself went
-to Hammersmith to visit Sir Samuel Morland, who was
-entirely blind; a very mortifying sight. He showed
-me his invention of writing, which was very ingenious;
-also his wooden calendar, which instructed him all by
-feeling, and other pretty and useful inventions of mills,
-pumps, &amp;c., and the pump he had erected that serves
-water to his garden, and to passengers, with an inscription,
-and brings from a filthy part of the Thames now
-near it, a most perfect and pure water. He had newly
-buried 200<i>l.</i> worth of music books, being, as he said, love
-songs and vanity. He plays himself psalms and religious
-hymns on the theorbo.” The inscription to which Evelyn
-refers was on a stone tablet fixed on the wall of his
-house, still preserved, which runs thus:&mdash;“<span class="smcap">Sir Samuel
-Morland’s Well</span>, the use of which he freely gives to
-all persons: hoping that none who shall come after him,
-will adventure to incur God’s displeasure, by denying
-a cup of cold water (provided at another’s cost and not
-their own) to either neighbour, stranger, passenger, or
-poor thirsty beggar. July 8, 1695.”</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_050" style="width: 400px;">
-<img src="images/i_050.png" width="400" height="429" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">DIONYSIUS PAPIN, M.D., F.R.S.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>The next prominent experimenter on the powers of
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_31">[31]</span>
-steam was Dr. Dionysius Papin. He was born at Blois
-about the middle of the seventeenth century, and educated
-to the profession of medicine. After taking his degree at
-Paris, he turned his attention more particularly to the
-study of physics, which soon occupied his whole attention;
-and under the celebrated Huyghens, then resident
-in that city, he made rapid progress. He would, doubtless,
-have risen to great distinction in his own country,
-but for the circumstance of his being a Protestant. To
-escape the persecutions to which all members of that
-persuasion were then subject, Papin fled from France in
-1681, together with thousands of his countrymen, a few
-years before the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes.
-He took refuge in London, where he was welcomed by
-men of science, and more especially by the celebrated
-Boyle, under whose auspices he was introduced to the
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_32">[32]</span>
-Royal Society, of which he was appointed Curator at an
-annual salary.</p>
-
-<p>It formed part of Papin’s duty, in connection with
-his new office, to produce an experiment at each meeting
-of the Society. He was thus induced to prosecute the
-study of physical science; and in order to stimulate the
-interest of the members, he sought to introduce new
-subjects from time to time to their notice. One of the
-greatest novelties of his “entertainments” was the production
-of his well-known Digester, which excited a
-considerable degree of interest; and on one occasion
-a philosophical supper, cooked by the Digester, was
-served up to the Fellows, of which Evelyn gives an
-amusing account in his Diary.</p>
-
-<p>He was led to the invention of the Digester by certain
-experiments which he made for Boyle. He discovered
-that if the vapour of boiling water could be prevented
-escaping, the temperature of the water would be raised
-much above the boiling point; and it occurred to
-him to employ this increased heat in more effectually
-extracting nutritious matter from the bones of animals,
-until then thrown away as useless. The great strength
-required for his Digester, and the means he was obliged
-to adopt for the purpose of securely confining the cover,
-must have early shown him what a powerful agent he
-was experimenting on. To prevent the bursting of
-the vessel from the internal pressure, he was led to the
-invention of the safety-valve, which consisted of a small
-moveable plate, or cylinder, fitted into an opening in
-the cover of the boiler, and kept shut by a lever loaded
-with a weight, capable of sliding along it in the manner
-of a steel yard. The pressure of the weight upon
-the valve could thus be regulated at pleasure. When the
-pressure became so great as to endanger the safety of
-the boiler, the valve was forced up, and so permitted
-the steam to escape. Although Papin was thus the
-inventor of the safety-valve, it is a curious fact that he
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_33">[33]</span>
-did not apply it to the steam-machine which he subsequently
-invented, but adopted another expedient.</p>
-
-<p>The reputation of Papin having extended to Germany,
-he was, in 1687, invited to fill the office of Professor of
-Mathematics in the University of Marburg, and accepted
-the appointment. He continued, however, to maintain
-a friendly correspondence with his scientific friends in
-England, and communicated to the Royal Society the
-results of the experiments in physics which he continued
-to pursue. In the same year in which he settled
-at Marburg, he submitted to the Society an important
-paper, which indicated the direction in which his
-thoughts were then running. It had occurred to him,
-as it had before done to Hautefeuille, that the explosion
-of gunpowder presented a ready means of producing
-a power to elevate a piston in a tube or cylinder, and
-that, when so raised, a vacuum could be formed under
-the piston by condensing the vapour, and so ensuring
-its return by the pressure of the atmosphere. He
-thought that he might thus be enabled to secure an
-efficient moving force. But it was found in practice,
-that the proposed power was too violent as well as uncertain,
-and it was shortly given up as impracticable.</p>
-
-<p>Papin next inquired whether his proposed elastic
-force and subsequent vacuum might not better be produced
-by means of steam. He accordingly entered
-upon a series of experiments, which gradually led him
-to the important conclusions published in his celebrated
-paper on “A New Method of Obtaining very Great
-Moving Powers at Small Cost,” which appeared in the
-‘Acta Eruditorum’ of Leipsic, in <ins title="Transcriber's Note: original reads '1790'" id="Corr-33">1690</ins>. “I felt confident,”
-he there observes, “that machines might be
-constructed wherein water, by means of no very intense
-heat, and at small cost, might produce that perfect
-vacuum which had failed to be obtained by means of
-gunpowder.” He accordingly contrived a machine to
-illustrate this idea, but it was very imperfect and slow
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_34">[34]</span>
-in its action, as may well be imagined from the circumstance
-that to produce the condensation he did not
-apply cold, but merely took away the fire! Still he
-was successfully working out, step by step, the important
-problem of steam power. He clearly perceived that
-a piston might be raised in a cylinder by the elastic
-force of steam, and that on the production of a vacuum
-by its condensation, the piston might be driven home
-again by the pressure of the atmosphere. The question
-was, how was this idea to be realised in a practicable
-working machine? After many experiments, Papin
-had the courage to make the attempt to pump water by
-atmospheric pressure on a large scale. He was employed
-to erect machines after his principle, for the
-purpose of draining mines in Auvergne and Westphalia;
-but from the difficulty he experienced in procuring and
-preserving a vacuum, and the tediousness of the process,
-his enterprise proved abortive.</p>
-
-<p>The truth is, that fertile though Papin was in conception,
-he laboured under the greatest possible disadvantage
-in not being a mechanic. The eyes and
-hands of others are not to be relied on in the execution
-of new and untried machines. Unless eyes and hands
-be disciplined by experience in skilled work, and
-inspired by intelligence, they are comparatively useless.
-The chances of success are vastly greater when mind,
-eyes, and hands, are combined in one person. Hence
-the unquestionable fact that though the motive power
-of steam had long been the subject of ingenious speculation
-and elaborate experiment amongst scientific men,
-it failed to be adopted as a practicable working power
-until it was taken in hand by mechanics&mdash;by such men
-as Newcomen, the blacksmith; Potter, the engine-driver;
-Brindley, the millwright; and, above all, by James Watt,
-the mathematical instrument maker.</p>
-
-<p>The sagacious foresight of Papin as to the extensive
-applicability of steam-power as a motive agent, is
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_35">[35]</span>
-strikingly shown by the following passage in the paper
-above referred to:&mdash;“If any one,” says he, “will consider
-the magnitude of the forces to be obtained in this way
-(<i>i. e.</i>, by the atmospheric high-pressure engine he was
-suggesting), and the trifling expense at which a sufficient
-quantity of fuel can be procured, he will certainly
-admit that this very method is far preferable to the use
-of gunpowder above spoken of, especially as in this
-way a perfect vacuum is obtained, and so the inconveniences
-above recounted are avoided. In what
-manner that power can be applied to draw water or
-ore from mines, to discharge iron bullets to a great
-distance, to propel ships against the wind, and to a
-multitude of other similar purposes, it would be too
-long here to detail; but each individual, according to
-the particular occasion, must select the construction of
-machinery appropriate to his purpose.” This last was,
-however, the real difficulty to be overcome. Steam,
-doubtless, contained a power to do all these things; but
-as for the machine that would work quietly, docilely,
-and effectively, in pumping water, discharging bullets,
-or propelling ships, the mechanic had not yet appeared
-that was able to make one.</p>
-
-<p>Papin was, however, a man of great perseverance;
-and, strong in his faith as to the power of steam to
-propel ships, he gradually worked his way to the contrivance
-of a model steamboat. When in London, he
-had seen an experiment tried by the Prince Palatine
-Rupert on the Thames, in which a boat fitted with
-revolving paddles attached to the two ends of an axle
-which received its motion from a trundle working on
-a wheel turned round by horses, went with such rapidity
-as to leave the king’s barge, manned by sixteen rowers,
-far behind in the race. The idea which occurred to
-Papin was, to apply a steam machine to drive the
-paddles, and thus ensure a ship’s motion independent
-of wind or tide. For this purpose, it was necessary to
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_36">[36]</span>
-convert the alternate motion of the piston-rod into
-a continuous rotary one; and this he proposed to effect
-“by having the rods of the pistons fitted with teeth,
-which would force round small wheels, toothed in like
-manner, fastened to the axis of the paddles.”</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_055" style="width: 250px;">
-<img src="images/i_055.png" width="250" height="204" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">ANCIENT PADDLE-BOAT.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>The use of paddle-wheels in propelling boats had long
-been known. The Harleian MSS. contain an Italian
-book of sketches, attributed to the fifteenth century, in
-which there appears the annexed sketch of a paddle-boat.
-This boat was evidently intended to be worked by
-two men turning the crank
-by which the paddles were
-made to revolve. There
-were many other early
-schemes of paddle-boats,
-some of which were proposed
-to be worked by horse-power.
-The name of Blasco
-Garay has often been mentioned
-as the first who applied
-the power of steam to the driving of paddle-boats;
-but for this there is not the slightest foundation. M. Bergenroth
-informs us that he has carefully examined all
-the documents relating to the trials of Blasco Garay in
-the archives at Simancas, but has found no reference
-whatever to steam as the power employed in causing
-the paddles to revolve.<a name="Anchor-20" id="Anchor-20" href="#Footnote-20" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 20.">[20]</a> The experiments were made at
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_37">[37]</span>
-Malaga and Barcelona respectively, in the years 1540
-and 1543: in one the vessel was propelled by a paddle-wheel
-on each side worked by twenty-five men, and in
-the other by a paddle-wheel worked by forty men.</p>
-
-<p>It appears probable that although others before Papin
-had speculated as to the possibility of constructing a boat
-to be driven by the power of steam, he was the first to
-test the theory by actual experiment; the first to construct
-a model steamboat. His first experiments were
-doubtless failures. The engine contrived by himself
-was found inapplicable to the driving of ships, as it had
-been to the pumping of mines; and it was not until he
-saw the model of Savery’s engine exhibited to the Royal
-Society of London, in 1698, and witnessed the trial of the
-same inventor s paddle-wheel boat on the Thames in the
-course of the same year that it occurred to him to combine
-the two contrivances in one, and apply Savery’s
-engine to drive Savery’s paddle-wheels. Returning to
-Marburg, he proceeded with his experiments, and informed
-Liebnitz that he had employed both suction and
-pressure by steam; that he had made a model of a carriage
-propelled by this force, which succeeded; and he
-hoped that the same power would answer for boats.
-Papin prosecuted his idea with great zeal, trying many
-expedients, encountering many difficulties, and meeting
-with many disappointments. At length, after about
-fifteen years’ labour, he succeeded in constructing a
-model engine, fitted in a boat&mdash;“une petite machine
-d’un vaisseau à roues”&mdash;which worked to his satisfaction.
-His next object was to get his model transported to
-London, to exhibit it on the Thames. “It is important,”
-he writes to Liebnitz (7th July, 1707), “that my new
-construction of vessel should be put to the proof in a
-seaport like London, where there is depth enough to
-apply the new invention, which, by means of fire, will
-render one or two men capable of producing more effect
-than some hundreds of rowers.” Papin had considerable
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_38">[38]</span>
-difficulty in obtaining the requisite permission from
-the authorities to enable his model to pass from the
-Fulda to the Weser; but at length he succeeded, and
-the little vessel reached Münden, when, to Papin’s great
-grief, it was seized by the boatmen of the river, and
-barbarously destroyed.</p>
-
-<p>The year after this calamity <ins title="Transcriber's Note: original reads 'befel'" id="Corr-38">befell</ins> Papin’s machine he
-wrote an urgent letter to his old friends of the Royal
-Society at London, asking them to advance him sufficient
-money to construct another engine “and to fit it so that
-it might be applied for the rowing of ships.” The
-Society, however, did not see their way to assisting
-Papin in the manner proposed, most likely because of
-the expense as well as uncertainty of the experiment.
-Two years later, worn out by work and anxiety, the
-illustrious exile died; and it was left for other labourers
-to realise the great ideas he had formed as to locomotion
-by steam-power.</p>
-
-<p>The apparently resultless labours of these men will
-serve to show what a long, anxious, and toilsome process
-the invention of the steam-engine has been. The early
-inventors had not the gratification of seeing their toils
-rewarded by even the faintest glimmering of practical
-success. One after another, they took up the subject,
-spent days and nights of study over it, and, laying down
-their lives, there left it. To many the study brought
-nothing but anxiety, toil, distress, and sometimes ruin;
-while some fairly broke their hearts over it. But it was
-never abandoned. Disregarding the fate of their predecessors,
-one labourer after another resumed the investigation,
-advancing it by further stages, until at length
-the practicable working steam-engine was invented, presenting,
-perhaps, the most remarkable illustration of the
-power of human skill and perseverance to be found in
-the whole history of civilisation.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_39">[39]</span></p>
-
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-
-<h3>CHAPTER III.<br />
-
-<small><span class="smcap">Captain Savery&mdash;His Fire-engine.</span></small></h3>
-
-
-<p><span class="smcap">The</span> attempts hitherto made to invent a working steam-engine,
-it will be observed, had not been attended with
-much success. The most that could be said of them was,
-that, by demonstrating the impracticable, they were
-gradually leading other experimenters in the direction
-of the practicable. Although the progress made seemed
-but slow, the amount of net result was by no means inconsiderable.
-Men were becoming better acquainted
-with the elastic force of steam. The vacuum produced
-by its condensation in a closed vessel, and the consequent
-atmospheric pressure, had been illustrated by
-repeated experiments; and many separate and minor
-inventions, which afterwards proved of great value, had
-been made, such as the four-way cock, the safety-valve,
-and the piston moving in a cylinder. The principle of
-a true steam-engine had not only been demonstrated,
-but most of the separate parts of such an engine had
-been contrived by various inventors. It seemed as if all
-that was now wanting was a genius of more than ordinary
-power to combine them in a complete and effective
-whole.</p>
-
-<p>To Thomas Savery is usually accorded the merit of
-having constructed the first actual working steam-engine.
-Little is known of his early history; and various surmises
-have been formed as to his origin and calling.
-Some writers have described him as the captain of a tin-mine;
-others as a naval captain; while a third says he
-was an immigrant Frenchman.<a name="Anchor-21" id="Anchor-21" href="#Footnote-21" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 21.">[21]</a> We are, however,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_40">[40]</span>
-enabled to state, from information communicated by his
-descendants, that he was the scion of a well-known
-Devonshire family. John Savery, of Halberton, or
-Harberton, afterwards of Great Totness, was a gentleman
-of considerable property in the reign of Henry VIII.
-In the sixteenth century the Saverys became connected
-by marriage with the Servingtons of Tavistock, another
-old county family, one of whom served as sheriff in the
-reign of Edward III. In 1588, Christopher Savery,
-the head of the family, resided in Totness Castle, of
-which he was the owner; and for a period of nearly
-forty years the town was represented in Parliament by
-members of the Savery family. Sir Charles served as
-Sheriff of Devon in 1619. Though the Saverys took
-the side of the Parliament, in resisting the despotic
-power assumed by Charles I., they nevertheless held a
-moderate course; for we find Colonel Savery, in 1643,
-attaching his name to the famous “round robin” presented
-to Parliament. Richard Savery, the youngest
-son of the Colonel, was father of Thomas Savery, the
-inventor of the “fire-engine.” Other members of the
-Savery family, besides Thomas, were distinguished for
-their prosecution of physical science. Thus we find
-from the family MSS., Servington Savery corresponding
-with Dr. Jurin, Secretary to the Royal Society,
-respecting an improvement which he had made in the
-barometer, and communicating the results of some magnetic
-experiments of a novel kind, which he had recently
-performed.<a name="Anchor-22" id="Anchor-22" href="#Footnote-22" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 22.">[22]</a></p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_060" style="width: 400px;">
-<img src="images/i_060.png" width="400" height="508" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">THOMAS SAVERY, F.R.S.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Thomas Savery was born at Shilston, near Modbury,
-in Devon, about the year 1650. Nothing is known of
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_41">[41]</span>
-his early life, beyond that he was educated to the profession
-of a military engineer, and in course of time duly
-reached the rank of Trench-master. The corps of engineers
-was not, however, regarded as an essential
-part of the military force until the year 1787, when the
-officers ranked with those of the Royal Artillery. The
-pursuit of his profession, as well as his natural disposition,
-led Savery to the study of mechanics, and he became
-well accomplished in the physical knowledge of his
-time. He occupied much of his spare time in mechanical
-experiments, and in projecting and executing contrivances
-of various sorts. One of his early works was a
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_42">[42]</span>
-clock, still preserved in the family,<a name="Anchor-23" id="Anchor-23" href="#Footnote-23" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 23.">[23]</a> which until lately
-kept very good time; and when last repaired by a
-watchmaker of Modbury was pronounced to be a piece
-of very good work, of a peculiar construction, displaying
-much ingenuity.</p>
-
-<p>Another of Savery’s early contrivances was a machine
-for polishing plate-glass, for which he obtained a patent.
-He was occupied about the same time with an invention
-for rowing ships in calms by the mechanical apparatus
-subsequently described in his treatise, entitled ‘Navigation
-Improved.’ He there relates how it troubled his
-thoughts and racked his brains to find out this invention,
-which he accomplished after many experiments, conducted
-“with great charge.” He naturally set much
-value on the product of so much study and labour; and
-he was proportionately vexed on finding that others
-regarded it with indifference. He professed to have
-had “promises of a great reward from the Court, if the
-thing would answer the end for which he proposed it;”
-but instead of a reward, Savery received only contumely
-and scorn. He attributed his want of success to the ill-humour
-of the then Surveyor of the Navy, who reported
-against his engine, because, said he, “it’s the nature of
-some men to decry all inventions that are not the product
-of their own brains.” He only asked for a fair
-trial of his paddle-boat, believing in its efficiency and
-utility; declaring, that it was not his “fondness for his
-own bratt that made him think so,” but the favourable
-opinions of several very judicious persons in town, that
-encouraged him to urge his invention for public
-adoption.</p>
-
-<p>The invention in question consisted of a boat mounted
-with two paddle-wheels, one on each side, worked by a
-capstan placed in the centre of the vessel. The annexed
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_43">[43]</span>
-cut will show the nature of the arrangement, which
-probably did not differ much from the scheme of Blasco
-Garay, above referred to.</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_062" style="width: 350px;">
-<img src="images/i_062.png" width="350" height="264" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">SECTION OF SAVERY’S PADDLE-BOAT.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Savery says
-he was led
-to make the
-invention
-through the
-difficulty which
-had been experienced
-in getting
-ships in
-motion so as
-to place them
-alongside of the
-enemy in sea-fights,
-especially during calm weather. He thought
-that if our fighting-ships could be made to move independent
-of the winds, we should thereby possess an
-advantage of essential consequence to the public service.
-“The gentlemen,” said he, “that were on the Brest expedition
-with my Lord Caermarthen must know how useful
-this engine would have been; for had they had them there
-on board each ship, they might have moved themselves
-where they had pleased.” He also urged the usefulness
-of the engine for packet-boats, bomb-vessels, and sloops,
-and especially for use in sea-fights, in bringing off disabled
-ships. When he had completed his invention, he
-took steps to bring it under the notice of Mr. Secretary
-Trenchard. The plan was shown to the King, who
-thought highly of it, and referred Savery to the Admiralty.
-When he went there he was told that he should
-have gone to the Navy Board. At the Navy Board he
-was told that certain objections to the adoption of his
-scheme had already been sent to the Admiralty.</p>
-
-<p>Savery having ascertained that the Surveyor was
-himself the author of the objections, proceeded to discuss
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_44">[44]</span>
-the matter with him. But the Surveyor was not a man
-to be argued out of his views by an inventor; and he
-shut up Savery with the remark: “What have interloping
-people, that have no concern with us, to do to
-pretend to contrive or invent things for us?” Savery
-was highly indignant at the official snub, and published
-the conversation in his Treatise. “Though one has
-found out,” said he, “an improvement as great to shipping
-as turning to windward or the Compass, unless you can
-sit round the Green Table in Crutched Friars, your invention
-is damned, of course;” and the testy inventor
-concluded: “All I have now to add is, that whoever is
-angry with the Truth for appearing in mean language
-may as well be angry with an honest man for his plain
-habit; for, indeed, it is as common for Lyes and Nonsense
-to be disguised by a jingle of words as for a Blockhead
-to be hid by abundance of Peruke.”<a name="Anchor-24" id="Anchor-24" href="#Footnote-24" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 24.">[24]</a></p>
-
-<p>Notwithstanding his rebuff by the Navy Surveyor,
-Savery proceeded to fit up a small yacht with his engine,
-and tried an experiment with it on the Thames, in sight
-of many thousands of spectators. The experiment was,
-in his opinion, entirely successful. The yacht, manned
-by eight sailors working the capstan, passed a ketch
-with all its sails spread, as well as other vessels. “All
-people,” said Savery, “seemed to like the demonstration
-of the use of my engine, the public newspapers speaking
-very largely of it, yet all to no purpose.” Savery had
-already expended 200<i>l.</i> in his experiments on the paddle-wheel
-boat, and was not disposed to go any further,
-now that Government had decided not to take up the
-invention. Indeed, its practical utility was doubtful.
-The power of the wind was, after all, better than hand-labour
-for working large ships; and it continued to
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_45">[45]</span>
-maintain its superiority until the steam-engine was
-brought to perfection.</p>
-
-<p>It is curious that it should not have occurred to Savery,
-who invented both a paddle-wheel boat and a steam-engine,
-to combine the two in one machine; but he was
-probably sick of the former invention, which had given
-him so much vexation and annoyance, and gave it up
-in disgust, leaving it to Papin, who saw both his inventions
-at work, to hit upon the grand idea of combining
-the two in a steam-vessel,&mdash;the only machine capable of
-effectually and satisfactorily rowing ships in a calm, or
-against wind and tide.</p>
-
-<p>It is probable that Savery was led to enter upon his
-next and most important invention by the circumstance
-of his having been brought up in the neighbourhood of
-the mining districts, and being well aware of the great
-difficulty experienced by the miners in keeping their
-pits clear of water, to enable them to proceed with
-their underground operations. The early tin-mining
-of Cornwall was for the most part what was called
-“stream-work,” being confined mainly to washing and
-collecting the diluvial deposits of the ore. Mines
-usually grew out of these stream-works; the ground
-was laid open at the back of the lodes, and the ore was
-dug out as from a quarry. Some of these old openings,
-called “coffins,” are still to be met with in different
-parts of Cornwall. The miners did not venture much
-below the surface, for fear of the water, by which they
-were constantly liable to be drowned out. But as the
-upper strata became exhausted, they were tempted to go
-deeper in search of the richer ores. Shafts were sunk
-to the lodes, and they were followed underground.
-Then it was that the difficulty of water had to be encountered
-and overcome; for unless it could be got rid
-of, the deeper ores of Cornwall were as so much buried
-treasure. When the mines were of no great depth, it
-was possible to bale out the water by hand-buckets.
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_46">[46]</span>
-But this expedient was soon exhausted; and the power
-of horses was then employed to draw the buckets.
-Where the lodes ran along a hill-side, it was possible, by
-driving an adit from a lower point, to let off the water
-by natural drainage. But this was not often found
-practicable, and in most cases it had to be raised directly
-from the shafts by artificial methods. As the quantity
-increased, a whim or gin moving on a perpendicular
-axis was employed to draw the water.<a name="Anchor-25" id="Anchor-25" href="#Footnote-25" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 25.">[25]</a> An improvement
-on this was the rack and chain pump, consisting
-of an endless iron chain mounted with knobs of cloth
-stiffened with leather, inclosed in a wooden pump of
-from six to eight inches bore, the lower part of which
-rested in the well of the mine. The chain was turned
-round by a wheel two or three feet in diameter, usually
-worked by men, and the knobs with which it was
-mounted brought up a stream of water according to the
-dimensions of the pump. Another method, considered
-the most effectual of all, was known as “the water-wheel
-and bobs,” consisting of a powerful pump, or
-series of pumps, worked by a water-wheel. But
-although there is no want of water underground in
-Cornwall, and no want of rain above ground, there are
-few or no great water-courses capable of driving
-machinery; besides, as the mines are for the most
-part situated on high ground, it will be obvious
-that water-power was available to only a very limited
-extent for this purpose.</p>
-
-<p>It is also worthy of notice that the early mining of
-Cornwall was carried on by men of small capital, principally
-by working men, who were unable to expend
-any large amount of money in forming artificial reservoirs,
-or in erecting the powerful pumping machinery
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_47">[47]</span>
-necessary for keeping the deeper mines clear of
-water. The Cornish miners, like the Whitstable oyster-dredgers,
-worked upon the principle of co-operation.
-This doctrine, now taught as a modern one, was practised
-by them almost time out of mind. The owner of
-the land gave the use of his land, the adventurers gave
-their money, and the miners their labour; all sharing in
-the proceeds according to ancient custom. For the use
-of his land, and for the ore taken from the mine,
-the lord usually took a sixth part; but in consideration
-of draining the mine, and in order to encourage the
-adventure, he was often content with an eighth, or it
-might be only a tenth part of the produce. The miners,
-on their part, agreed to divide in the proportions in
-which they took part in the work. Their shares of the
-ore raised were measured by barrows, and parcelled
-into heaps; “and it is surprising,” says Borlase, “to
-see how ready and exact the reckoners are in dividing,
-though oftentimes they can neither write nor read.
-The parcels being laid forth, lots are cast, and then
-every parcel has a distinct mark laid on it with one,
-two, or three stones, and sometimes a bit of stick or turf
-stuck up in the middle or side of the pile; and when
-these marks are laid on, the parcels may continue there
-half a year or more unmolested.”<a name="Anchor-26" id="Anchor-26" href="#Footnote-26" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 26.">[26]</a></p>
-
-<p>These were, however, the early and primitive days of
-mining, when the operations were carried on comparatively
-near the surface, and the capital invested in
-pumping-machinery was comparatively small in amount.
-As the miners went deeper and deeper into the ground,
-and the richer lodes were struck and followed, the character
-of mining became considerably changed. Larger
-capitals were required to sink the shafts and keep them
-clear of water until the ore was reached; and a new
-class of men, outside the mining districts, was induced
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_48">[48]</span>
-to venture their money in the mines as a speculation.
-Yet the system above described, though greatly modified
-by altered circumstances, continues to this day; and the
-mining of Cornwall continues to be carried on mainly
-upon the co-operative or joint-stock system.</p>
-
-<p>When the surface lodes became exhausted, the necessity
-of employing some more efficient method of pumping the
-water became more and more urgent. In one pit after
-another the miners were being drowned out, and the
-operations of an important branch of national industry
-were in danger of being brought to a complete standstill.
-It was under these circumstances that Captain Savery
-turned his attention to the contrivance of a more
-powerful engine for the raising of water; and after
-various experiments, he became persuaded that the
-most effective agency for the purpose was the power of
-steam. It is very probable that he was aware of the
-attempts that had been previously made in the same
-direction, and he may have gathered many useful and
-suggestive hints from the Marquis of Worcester’s
-‘Century;’ but as that book contained no plans nor
-precise definitions of the methods by which the Marquis
-had accomplished his objects, it could have helped him
-but little towards the contrivance of a practicable
-working engine.<a name="Anchor-27" id="Anchor-27" href="#Footnote-27" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 27.">[27]</a></p>
-
-<p>How Savery was led to the study of the power of
-steam has been differently stated. Desaguliers says his
-own account was this,&mdash;that having drunk a flask of
-Florence at a tavern, and thrown the empty flask on the
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_49">[49]</span>
-fire, he called for a basin of water to wash his hands,
-and perceiving that the little wine left in the flask had
-changed to steam, he took the vessel by the neck and
-plunged its mouth into the water in the basin, when,
-the steam being condensed, the water was immediately
-driven up into the flask by the pressure of the atmosphere.
-Desaguliers disbelieved this account, but admits
-that Savery made many experiments upon the powers
-of steam, and eventually succeeded in making several
-engines “which raised water very well.” Switzer, who
-was on intimate terms with Savery, gives another
-account. He says the first hint from which he took the
-engine was from a tobacco-pipe, which he immersed in
-water to wash or cool it; when he discovered by the
-rarefaction of the air in the tube by the heat or steam,
-and the gravitation or pressure of the exterior air on the
-condensation of the latter, that the water was made to
-spring through the tube of the pipe in a most surprising
-manner;<a name="Anchor-28" id="Anchor-28" href="#Footnote-28" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 28.">[28]</a> and that this phenomenon induced him to
-search for the rationale, and to prosecute a series of experiments
-which issued in the invention of his fire-engine.</p>
-
-<p>However Savery may have obtained his first idea of
-the expansion and condensation of steam, and of atmospheric
-pressure, it is certain that the subject occupied
-his attention for many years. He had the usual difficulties
-to encounter in dealing with a wholly new and
-untried power, in contriving the novel mechanism
-through which it was to work, and of getting his contrivances
-executed by the hands of mechanics necessarily
-unaccustomed to such kind of work. “Though I was
-obliged,” he says, “to encounter the oddest and almost
-insuperable difficulties, I spared neither time, pains, nor
-money, till I had absolutely conquered them.”</p>
-
-<p>Having sufficiently matured his design, he had a
-model of his new “Fire Engine,” as he termed it, made
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_50">[50]</span>
-for exhibition before the King at Hampton Court in
-1698. William III., who was himself of a mechanical
-turn, was highly pleased with the ingenuity displayed
-in Savery’s engine, as well as with its efficient action,
-and he permitted the inventor to dedicate to him ‘The
-Miner’s Friend,’ containing the first published description
-of his invention. The King also promoted Savery’s
-application for a Patent, which was secured in July,
-1698,<a name="Anchor-29" id="Anchor-29" href="#Footnote-29" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 29.">[29]</a> and an Act confirming it was passed in the
-following year.</p>
-
-<p>Savery’s next step was to bring his invention under
-the notice of the Royal Society, whose opinion on all
-matters of science was listened to with profound respect.
-He accordingly exhibited his model at a meeting held
-on the 14th of June, 1699, and it is recorded in the
-minutes of that date, that “Mr. Savery entertained the
-Society with showing his engine to raise water by
-the force of fire. He was thanked for showing the
-experiment, which succeeded according to expectation,
-and was approved of.” The inventor presented the
-Society with a drawing of his engine, accompanied by a
-description, which was printed in the ‘Transactions.’<a name="Anchor-30" id="Anchor-30" href="#Footnote-30" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 30.">[30]</a></p>
-
-<p>Savery next endeavoured to bring his invention into
-practical use, but this was a matter of much greater
-difficulty. So many schemes with a like object had
-been brought out and failed, that the mining interest
-came to regard new projects with increasing suspicion.
-To persuade them that he was no mere projector, but
-the inventor of a practicable working engine, Savery
-wrote and published his ‘Miner’s Friend.’ “I am not
-very fond,” he there said, “of lying under the scandal of
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_51">[51]</span>
-a bare projector, and therefore present you here with a
-draught of my machine, and lay before you the uses
-of it, and leave it to your consideration whether it be
-worth your while to make use of it or no.”</p>
-
-<p>Inventors before Savery’s time were wont to make a
-great mystery of their inventions; but he proclaimed
-that there was no mystery whatever about his machine,
-and he believed that the more clearly it was understood,
-the better it would be appreciated. He acknowledged
-that there had been many pretenders to new inventions
-of the same sort, who had excited hopes which had
-never been fulfilled; but this invention which he had
-made was a thing the uses of which were capable of
-actual demonstration. He urged that the old methods
-of raising water could not be carried further; and that
-an entirely new power was needed to enable the miner to
-prosecute his underground labours. “I fear,” said he,
-“that whoever by the old causes of motion pretends to improvements
-within the last century does betray his knowledge
-and judgment. For more than a hundred years
-since, men and horses would raise by engines then made
-as much water as they have ever done since, or I believe
-ever will, or, according to the law of nature, ever can
-do. And, though my thoughts have been long employed
-about water-works, I should never have pretended to
-any invention of that kind, had I not happily found out
-this new, but yet a much stronger and cheaper force or
-cause of motion than any before made use of.” He
-proceeded to show how easy it was to work his engine,&mdash;boys
-of thirteen or fourteen years being able to
-attend and work it to perfection after a few days’
-teaching,&mdash;and how he had at length, after great
-difficulty, instructed handicraft artificers to construct
-the engine according to his design, so that, after much
-experience, said he, “they are become such masters
-of the thing that they oblige themselves to deliver
-what engines they make exactly tight and fit for service,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_52">[52]</span>
-and as such I dare warrant them to anybody that has
-occasion for them.”<a name="Anchor-31" id="Anchor-31" href="#Footnote-31" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 31.">[31]</a></p>
-
-<div class="figleft" id="i_071" style="width: 185px;">
-<img src="images/i_071.png" width="185" height="600" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">SAVERY’S ENGINE.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Savery’s engine, as described by himself,
-consisted of a series of boilers, condensing
-vessels, and tubes, the action of
-which will be readily understood with
-the help of the annexed drawing.<a name="Anchor-32" id="Anchor-32" href="#Footnote-32" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 32.">[32]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_53">[53]</span></p>
-
-<p>Its principal features were two large cylindrical
-vessels, which were alternately filled with steam from
-an adjoining boiler and with cold water from the
-well or mine out of which the water had to be raised.
-When either of the hollow vessels was filled with steam,
-and then suddenly cooled by a dash of cold water, a
-vacuum was thereby created, and, the vessel being
-closed at the top and open at the bottom, the water was
-at once forced up into it from the well by the pressure
-of the atmosphere. The steam, being then let into the
-vessel from the top, pressed upon the surface of the
-water, and forced it out at the bottom by another pipe
-(its return into the well being prevented by a clack),
-and so up the perpendicular pipe which opened into
-the outer air. The second vessel being treated in the
-same manner, the same result followed; and thus, by
-alternate filling and forcing, a continuous stream of
-water was poured out from the upper opening. The
-whole of the labour required to work the engine was
-capable of being performed by a single man, or even
-by a boy, after very little teaching.</p>
-
-<p>Although Savery’s plans and descriptions of the
-arrangement and working of his engines are clear and
-explicit, he does not give any information as to their
-proportions, beyond stating that an engine employed in
-raising a column of water 3½ inches in diameter 60 feet
-high, requires a fireplace 20 inches deep. Speaking of
-their performances, he says, “I have known, in Cornwall,
-a work with three lifts of about 18 feet each, lift
-and carry a 3½-inch bore, that cost 42<i>s.</i> a day (reckoning
-24 a day) for labour, besides the wear and tear of engines,
-each pump having four men working eight hours,
-at 14<i>d.</i> a man, and the men obliged to rest at least a
-third part of that time.” He pointed out that at least
-one-third part of the then cost of raising water might
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_54">[54]</span>
-be saved by the adoption of his invention, which on
-many mines would amount to “a brave estate” in the
-course of a year. In estimating the power of his
-engine, Savery was accustomed to compare it with the
-quantity of work that horses could perform, and hence
-he introduced the term “horse power,” which is still in
-use.</p>
-
-<p>Although, in the treatise referred to, Savery describes
-an engine with two furnaces, the drawing which he
-presented to the Royal Society showed only one; and
-it appears that in another of his designs he showed only
-one cylindrical vessel instead of two. In order to exhibit
-the working of his engine on a larger scale than in the
-model, he proceeded to erect one in a potter’s house at
-Lambeth, where, Switzer says, though it was a small
-engine, the water struck up the tiles and forced its way
-through the roof in a manner that surprised all the spectators.
-Switzer mentions other engines erected after
-Savery’s designs for the raising of water at Camden
-House and Sion House, which proved quite successful.
-The former, he says, was the plainest and best proportioned
-engine he had seen: it had only a single
-condensing vessel; and “though but a small one in
-comparison with many others of the kind that are made
-for coal-works, it is sufficient for any reasonable family,
-and other uses required for it in watering middling
-gardens.”<a name="Anchor-33" id="Anchor-33" href="#Footnote-33" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 33.">[33]</a> Four receivers full of water, or equal to
-52 gallons, were raised every minute, or 3110 gallons
-in the hour; whilst, in the case of the larger engines
-with double receivers, 6240 gallons an hour might easily
-be raised. The cost of the smaller engine was about
-fifty pounds, and the consumption of coal about a bushel
-in the twenty-four hours, supposing it was kept constantly
-at work during that time.</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_074" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_074.png" width="450" height="262" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">HUEL VOR, WITH REMAINS OF THE OLD WORKS.</p>
-<p class="caption">[By R. P. Leitch.]</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>The uses to which Savery proposed to apply his
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_55">[55]</span>
-engine were various. One was to pump water into a
-reservoir, from which, by falling on a water-wheel, it
-might produce a continuous rotary motion. Another was
-to raise water into cisterns for the supply of gentlemen’s
-houses, and for use in fountains and as an extinguisher
-in case of fire. A third was to raise water for the
-supply of towns, and a fourth to drain fens and marsh
-lands. But the most important, in the inventor’s estimation,
-was its employment in clearing drowned mines
-and coal-pits of water. He showed how water might
-be raised from deep mines by using several engines,
-placed at different depths, one over the other. Thus by
-three lifts, each of 80 feet, water might be raised from
-a mine about 240 feet&mdash;then considered a very great
-depth. From Savery’s own account, it is evident that
-several of his engines were erected in Cornwall; and it
-is said that the first was tried at Huel Vor, or “The
-Great Work in Breage,” a few miles from Helstone,
-then considered the richest tin mine in the county.
-The engine was found to be an improvement on the
-methods formerly employed for draining the mine, and
-sent the miners to considerably greater depths. But
-the great pressure of steam required to force up a high
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_56">[56]</span>
-column of water was such as to strain to the utmost the
-imperfect boilers and receivers of those early days; and
-the frequent explosions which attended its use eventually
-led to its discontinuance in favour of the superior engine
-of Newcomen, which was shortly after invented.</p>
-
-<p>Savery also endeavoured to introduce his engine in
-the coal-mining districts, but without success, and for the
-same reason. The demand for coal in connection with
-the iron manufacture having greatly increased in the
-county of Stafford, and the coal which lay nearest
-the surface having been for the most part “won,” the
-mining interest became very desirous of obtaining some
-more efficient means of clearing the pits of water, in
-order to send the miners deeper into the ground. Windlass
-and buckets, wind-mills, horse-gins, rack-and-chain
-pumps, adits, and all sorts of contrivances had been tried,
-and the limit of their powers had been reached. The
-pits were fast becoming drowned out, and the ironmasters
-began to fear lest their manufacture should become lost
-through want of fuel. Under these circumstances they
-were ready to hail the invention of Captain Savery,
-which promised to relieve them of their difficulty. He
-was accordingly invited to erect one of his engines over
-a coal-mine at the Broadwaters, near Wednesbury. The
-influx of water, however, proved too much for the
-engine; the springs were so many and so strong, that
-all the means which Savery could employ failed to
-clear the mine of water. To increase the forcing
-power he increased the pressure of steam; but neither
-boiler nor receiver could endure it, and the steam “tore
-the engine to pieces; so that, after much time, labour,
-and expense, Mr. Savery gave up the undertaking, and
-the engine was laid aside as useless.”<a name="Anchor-34" id="Anchor-34" href="#Footnote-34" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 34.">[34]</a></p>
-
-<p>He was no more successful with the engine which
-he erected at York-buildings to pump water from the
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_57">[57]</span>
-Thames for the supply of the western parts of London.
-Bradley says that to increase its power he doubled every
-part, but “it was liable to so many disorders, if a single
-mistake happened in the working of it, that at length it
-was looked upon as a useless piece of work, and rejected.”<a name="Anchor-35" id="Anchor-35" href="#Footnote-35" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 35.">[35]</a>
-Savery’s later engines thus lost him much of
-the credit which he had gained by those of an earlier
-and simpler construction. It became clear that their
-application was very limited. They involved much
-waste of fuel through the condensation of the hot steam
-pressing upon the surface of the cold water, previous
-to the expulsion of the latter from the vessel; and
-eventually their use was confined to the pumping of
-water for fountains and the supply of gentlemen’s houses,
-and in some cases to the raising of water for the purpose
-of working an overshot water-wheel. Various attempts
-were made to improve the engine by Bradley, by Papin,
-by Desaguliers, and others; but no great advance was
-made in its construction and method of working until it
-was taken in hand by Newcomen and Calley, whose
-conjoint invention marks an important epoch in the
-history of the steam-engine.</p>
-
-<p>Not much is known of the later years of Savery’s life.
-We find him a Captain of Military Engineers in 1702;<a name="Anchor-36" id="Anchor-36" href="#Footnote-36" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 36.">[36]</a>
-and in 1705, with the view of advancing knowledge in
-his special branch of military science, he gave to the
-world a translation, in folio, of Cohorn’s celebrated work
-on fortification. The book was dedicated to Prince
-George of Denmark, to whom he was indebted, in the
-same year, for his appointment to the office of Treasurer
-of the Hospital for Sick and Wounded Seamen. Various
-letters and documents are still to be found in the Transport
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_58">[58]</span>
-Office, Somerset House, addressed to him in that
-capacity.<a name="Anchor-37" id="Anchor-37" href="#Footnote-37" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 37.">[37]</a> In 1714 he was further indebted to Prince
-George for the appointment of Surveyor to the Waterworks
-at Hampton Court; but he did not live to enjoy
-it, as he died in the course of the following year. He
-is said to have accumulated considerable property,
-which he bequeathed to his wife, together with all
-interest in his inventions. His will was executed on
-the day of his death, the 15th of May, 1715, and was
-proved four days after in the Prerogative Court of Canterbury.
-He there described himself as “of the parish
-of Saint Margaret, at Westminster, Esquire.” His
-widow herself died before all his effects were administered.
-There was a considerable amount of unclaimed
-stock, which the Savery family were prevented from
-claiming, as it had passed to the widow; and it has
-since been transferred to the credit of the National
-Debt.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_59">[59]</span></p>
-
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-
-
-<h3>CHAPTER IV.<br />
-
-<span class="smcap">Thomas Newcomen&mdash;The Atmospheric Engine.</span></h3>
-
-
-<p><span class="smcap">The</span> invention of the steam-engine had advanced thus
-far with halting steps. A new power had been discovered,
-but it was so dangerous and unmanageable
-that it was still doubtful whether it could be applied to
-any useful purpose. What was still wanting was an
-engine strong enough to resist the internal pressure of
-highly-heated steam, and so constructed as to work safely,
-continuously, and economically. Many attempts had
-been made to contrive such a machine; but, as we have
-shown, the results were comparatively barren. Savery’s
-small engine could raise water in moderate quantities to
-limited heights; but the pumping of deep mines was
-beyond its power. It could force water to a height of
-about sixteen fathoms; but as the depth of mines at
-that time was from fifty to a hundred yards, it was
-obviously incompetent for their drainage. It is true,
-Savery proposed to overcome the difficulty by erecting
-a series of engines, placed one over another in the shaft
-of the mine; but the expense of their attendants, the
-great consumption of fuel, the cost of wear and tear,
-the constant danger of explosion, and the risk of the
-works being stopped by any one of the engines becoming
-temporarily deranged, rendered it clear that the use of
-his engine for ordinary mining purposes was altogether
-impracticable.</p>
-
-<p>Such was the state of affairs when Thomas Newcomen
-of Dartmouth took up the subject. Comparatively
-little is known of the personal history of this
-ingenious man.  Mechanical inventors excited little
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_60">[60]</span>
-notice in those days; they were looked upon as schemers,
-and oftener regarded as objects of suspicion than of
-respect. Thomas Newcomen was by trade an ironmonger
-and a blacksmith. The house in which he lived
-and worked stood, until quite recently, in Lower Street,
-Dartmouth. Like many of the ancient timber houses
-of that quaint old town, it was a building of singularly
-picturesque appearance. Lower Street is very narrow;
-the houses in it are tall and irregular, with overhanging
-peaked gable-ends. A few years since, Newcomen’s
-house began to show indications of decay; the timber
-supports were fast failing; and for safety’s sake it was
-determined to pull it to the ground.</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_079" style="width: 400px;">
-<img src="images/i_079.png" width="400" height="541" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">NEWCOMEN’S HOUSE, DARTMOUTH.</p>
-<p class="caption">[By R. P. Leitch.]<a name="Anchor-38" id="Anchor-38" href="#Footnote-38" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 38.">[38]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_61">[61]</span></p>
-
-<p>The Newcomen family have long since become extinct
-in Dartmouth. They are said to have left the place
-long ago, and gone northward; but we have been
-unable to trace them. The Newcomens appear to have
-occupied a respectable position in Dartmouth down to
-about the middle of the last century. Their burying-place
-was in the north-side chapel of the fine old parish
-church of the town, where several tablets are erected to
-their memory. Amongst others, there is one to William
-Newcomin, Attorney-at-Law, who died the 24th of
-August, 1745, aged 57, supposed to have been a brother,
-and another of the same name, who died in 1787, aged
-65, supposed to have been a son of the ironmonger.</p>
-
-<p>Thomas Newcomen was a man of strong religious
-feelings, and from an early period of his life occupied
-his leisure in voluntary religious teaching. He belonged
-to the sect of Baptists; and the place was standing until
-recently in which he regularly preached. When he
-afterwards went into distant parts of the country on
-engine business, he continued to devote his Sundays
-to the same work. How he first came to study the
-subject of steam is not known. Mr. Holdsworth says
-a story was current in Dartmouth in his younger days,
-and generally believed, that Newcomen conceived the
-idea of the motive power to be obtained from steam by
-watching the tea-kettle, the lid of which would frequently
-rise and fall when boiling; and, reasoning upon
-this fact, he contrived, by filling a cylinder with steam,
-to raise the piston, and by immediately injecting some
-cold water, to create a vacuum, which allowed the
-weight of the atmosphere to press the piston down, and
-so give motion to a pump by means of a beam and rods.<a name="Anchor-39" id="Anchor-39" href="#Footnote-39" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 39.">[39]</a></p>
-
-<p>It is probable that Newcomen was well aware of the
-experiments of Savery on steam while the latter was
-living at Modbury, about fifteen miles distant. It
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_62">[62]</span>
-will be remembered that Savery was greatly hampered
-in his earlier contrivances by the want of skilled
-workmen; and as Newcomen had the reputation of
-being one of the cleverest blacksmiths in the county, it
-is supposed that he was employed to make some of the
-more intricate parts of Savery’s engine. At all events,
-he could scarcely fail to hear from the men of his trade
-in the neighbourhood, what his speculative neighbour at
-Modbury was trying to compass in the invention of an
-engine for the purpose of raising water by fire. He
-was certainly occupied in studying the subject about the
-same time as Savery; and Switzer says he was well
-informed that “Mr. Newcomen was as early in his invention
-as Mr. Savery was in his, only the latter being
-nearer the Court, had obtained the patent before the
-other knew it; on which account Mr. Newcomen was
-glad to come in as a partner to it.”<a name="Anchor-40" id="Anchor-40" href="#Footnote-40" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 40.">[40]</a></p>
-
-<p>Another account<a name="Anchor-41" id="Anchor-41" href="#Footnote-41" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 41.">[41]</a> states that a draft of Savery’s engine
-having come under Newcomen’s notice, he proceeded to
-make a model of it, which he fixed in his garden, and
-soon found out its imperfections. He entered into a correspondence
-on the subject with the learned and ingenious
-Dr. Hooke, then Secretary to the Royal Society,
-a man of remarkable ingenuity, and of great mechanical
-sagacity and insight. Newcomen had heard or read of
-Papin’s proposed method of transmitting motive power
-to a distance by creating a vacuum under a piston in a
-cylinder, and transmitting the power through pipes to a
-second cylinder near the mine. Dr. Hooke dissuaded
-Newcomen from erecting a machine on this principle, as
-a waste of time and labour; but he added the pregnant
-suggestion, “could he (meaning Papin) make a speedy
-vacuum under your piston, your work were done.”</p>
-
-<p>The capital idea thus cursorily thrown out&mdash;of introducing
-a moveable diaphragm between the active power
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_63">[63]</span>
-and the vacuum&mdash;set Newcomen at once upon the right
-track. Though the suggestion was merely that of a
-thoughtful bystander, it was a most important step in
-the history of the invention, for it contained the very
-principle of the atmospheric engine. Savery created
-his vacuum by the condensation of steam in a closed
-vessel, and Papin created his by exhausting the air in a
-cylinder fitted with a piston, by means of an air-pump.
-It remained for Newcomen to combine the two expedients&mdash;to
-secure a sudden vacuum by the condensation
-of steam; but, instead of employing Savery’s closed
-vessel, he made use of Papin’s cylinder fitted with a
-piston. After long scheming and many failures, he at
-length succeeded, in the year 1705,<a name="Anchor-42" id="Anchor-42" href="#Footnote-42" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 42.">[42]</a> in contriving a
-model that worked with tolerable precision; after which
-he sought for an opportunity of exhibiting its powers in
-a full-sized working engine. It ought to be mentioned,
-that in the long course of experiments conducted by
-Newcomen with the object of finding out the new
-motive power, he was zealously assisted throughout by
-one John Calley, a glazier of Dartmouth, of whom
-nothing further is known than that he was Newcomen’s
-intimate friend, of the same religious persuasion, and
-afterwards his partner in the steam-engine enterprise.</p>
-
-<p>Newcomen’s engine may be thus briefly described:&mdash;The
-steam was generated in a separate boiler, as in
-Savery’s engine, from which it was conveyed into a
-vertical cylinder underneath a piston fitting it closely,
-but moveable upwards and downwards through its
-whole length. The piston was fixed to a rod, which
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_64">[64]</span>
-was attached by a joint or a chain to the end of a lever
-vibrating upon an axis, the other end being attached to
-a rod working a pump. When the piston in the cylinder
-was raised, steam was let into the vacated space through
-a tube fitted into the top of the boiler, and mounted
-with a stopcock. The pump-rod at the further end of
-the lever being thus depressed, cold water was applied
-to the sides of the cylinder, on which the steam within
-it was condensed, a vacuum was produced, and the
-external air, pressing upon the top of the piston, forced
-it down into the empty cylinder. The pump-rod was
-thereby raised; and the operation of depressing and
-raising it being repeated, a power was thus produced
-which kept the pump continuously at work. Such, in a
-few words, was the construction and action of Newcomen’s
-first engine.</p>
-
-<p>It will thus be observed that this engine was essentially
-different in principle from that of Savery. While
-the latter raised water partly by the force of steam
-and partly by the pressure of the atmosphere, that
-of Newcomen worked entirely by the pressure of the
-atmosphere, steam being only used as the most expeditious
-method of producing a vacuum. The engine
-was, however, found to be very imperfect. It was exceedingly
-slow in its motions; much time was occupied
-in condensing the contained steam by throwing cold
-water on the outside of the cylinder; and as the boiler
-was placed immediately under the cylinder, it was not
-easy to prevent the cold water from splashing it, and
-thus leading to a further loss of heat. To remedy these
-imperfections, Newcomen and Calley altered the arrangement;
-and, instead of throwing cold water on the
-outside of the cylinder, they surrounded it with cold
-water. But this expedient was also found inconvenient,
-as the surrounding water shortly became warm, and
-ceased to condense until replaced by colder water; but
-the colder it was the greater was the loss of heat by condensation,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_65">[65]</span>
-before the steam was enabled to fill the cylinder
-again on each ascent of the piston.</p>
-
-<p>Clumsy and comparatively ineffective though the
-engine was in this form, it was, nevertheless, found of
-some use in pumping water from mines. In 1711
-Newcomen and Calley made proposals to the owners of
-a colliery at Griff, in Warwickshire, to drain the water
-from their pits, which until then had been drained by
-the labour of horses; but, the owners not believing in
-the practicability of the scheme, their offer was declined.
-In the following year, however, they succeeded in obtaining
-a contract with Mr. Back, for drawing the water
-from a mine belonging to him near Wolverhampton.
-The place where the engine was to be erected being
-near to Birmingham, the ironwork, the pump-valves,
-clacks, and buckets, were for the most part made
-there, and removed to the mine, where they were
-fitted together. Newcomen had great difficulty at first
-in making the engine go; but after many laborious
-attempts he at last partially succeeded. It was found,
-however, that the new method of cooling the cylinder
-by surrounding it with cold water did not work so well
-in practice as had been expected. The vacuum produced
-was very imperfect, and the action of the engine
-was both very slow and very irregular.</p>
-
-<p>While the engine was still in its trial state, a curious
-accident occurred which led to another change in the
-mode of condensation, and proved of essential importance
-in establishing Newcomen’s engine as a practicable working
-power. The accident was this: in order to keep
-the cylinder as free from air as possible, great pains were
-taken to prevent it passing down by the side of the
-piston, which was carefully wrapped with cloth or
-leather; and, still further to keep the cylinder air-tight,
-a quantity of water was kept constantly laying on the
-upper side of the piston. At one of the early trials the
-inventors were surprised to see the engine make several
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_66">[66]</span>
-strokes in unusually quick succession; and on searching
-for the cause, they found it to consist in <em>a hole in the piston</em>,
-which had let the cold water in a jet into the inside
-of the cylinder, and thereby produced a rapid vacuum
-by the condensation of the contained steam. A new
-light suddenly broke upon Newcomen. The idea of
-condensing by injection of cold water directly into the
-cylinder, instead of applying it on the outside, at once
-occurred to him; and he proceeded to embody the expedient
-which had thus been accidentally suggested, as part
-of his machine. The result was the addition of the injection-pipe,
-through which, when the piston was raised
-and the cylinder was full of steam, a jet of cold water was
-thrown in, and the steam being suddenly condensed,
-the piston was at once driven down by the pressure
-of the atmosphere.</p>
-
-<p>An accident of a different kind shortly after led to
-the improvement of Newcomen’s engine in another
-respect. To keep it at work, one man was required to
-attend the fire, and another to turn alternately the two
-cocks, one admitting the steam into the cylinder, the
-other admitting the jet of cold water to condense it.
-The turning of these cocks was easy work, usually
-performed by a boy. It was, however, a very monotonous
-duty, though requiring constant attention. To
-escape the drudgery and obtain an interval for rest, or
-perhaps for play, a boy named Humphrey Potter, who
-turned the cocks, set himself to discover some method of
-evading his task. He must have been an ingenious boy,
-as is clear from the arrangement he contrived with
-this object. Observing the alternate ascent and descent
-of the beam above his head, he bethought him of applying
-the movement to the alternate raising and lowering
-of the levers which governed the cocks. The result was
-the contrivance of what he called the <i>scoggan</i>,<a name="Anchor-43" id="Anchor-43" href="#Footnote-43" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 43.">[43]</a> consisting
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_67">[67]</span>
-of a catch worked by strings from the beam of the engine.
-This arrangement, when tried, was found to answer the
-purpose intended. The action of the engine was thus
-made automatic; and the arrangement, though rude, not
-only enabled Potter to enjoy his play, but it had the
-effect of improving the working power of the engine
-itself; the number of
-strokes which it made
-being increased from
-six or eight to fifteen or
-sixteen in the minute.
-This invention was
-afterwards greatly improved
-by Mr. Henry
-Beighton, of Newcastle-on-Tyne,
-who
-added the plug-rod
-and hand-gear. He
-did away with the
-catches and strings of
-the boy Potter’s rude
-apparatus, and substituted
-a rod suspended
-from the beam, which
-alternately opened and shut the tappets attached to the
-steam and injection cocks.</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_086" style="width: 300px;">
-<img src="images/i_086.png" width="300" height="392" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">NEWCOMEN’S ENGINE.<a name="Anchor-44" id="Anchor-44" href="#Footnote-44" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 44.">[44]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Thus, step by step, Newcomen’s engine grew in power
-and efficiency, and became more and more complete as
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_68">[68]</span>
-a self-acting machine. It will be observed that, like all
-other inventions, it was not the product of any one man’s
-ingenuity, but of many. One contributed one improvement,
-and another another. The essential features of
-the atmospheric engine were not new. The piston and
-cylinder had been known as long ago as the time of
-Hero. The expansive force of steam and the creation
-of a vacuum by its condensation had been known to the
-Marquis of Worcester, Savery, Papin, and many more.
-Newcomen merely combined in his machine the result
-of their varied experience, and, assisted by the persons
-who worked with him, down to the engine-boy Potter,
-he advanced the invention several important stages; so
-that the steam-engine was no longer a toy or a scientific
-curiosity, but had become a powerful machine capable of
-doing useful work.</p>
-
-<p>The comparative success which attended the working
-of Newcomen’s first engine at the colliery near Wolverhampton,
-shortly induced other owners of coal-mines to
-adopt it. There were great complaints in the north,
-of the deeper mines having become unworkable. All
-the ordinary means of pumping them clear of water
-had failed. In their emergency, the colliery-owners
-called Newcomen and Calley to their aid. They were
-invited down to Newcastle-upon-Tyne, in the neighbourhood
-of which town they erected their second and third
-engines. They were next summoned to Leeds, and
-erected their fourth engine at Austhorpe, in 1714. It
-was the sight of this engine at work which first induced
-Smeaton, when a boy, to turn his attention to mechanics,
-and eventually led him to study the atmospheric-engine,
-with a view to its improvement. The cylinder of the
-engine erected at Austhorpe, like those which had preceded
-it, was about 23 inches in diameter, and made
-about fifteen strokes a minute. The pumps, which were
-in two lifts, and of 9 inches bore, drew the water from a
-depth of 37 yards. The patentees had 250<i>l.</i> a year for
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_69">[69]</span>
-working and keeping the engine in order. Calley superintended
-its erection, and afterwards its working; but
-he did not long survive its completion, as he died at
-Austhorpe in 1717.</p>
-
-<p>The next engines were erected by Newcomen in
-Cornwall, where there was as great a demand for increased
-pumping-power as in any of the collieries of the
-north. The first of Newcomen’s construction in Cornwall
-was erected in 1720, at the Wheal Fortune tin
-mine, in the parish of Ludgvan, a few miles north-east
-of Penzance. The mine was conducted by Mr. William
-Lemon, the founder of the fortunes of the well-known
-Cornish family. He was born in a humble station in
-life, from which he honourably raised himself by his
-great industry, ability, and energy. He began his career
-as a mining-boy; was at an early age appointed one of
-the managers of a tin-smelting house at Chiandower,
-near Penzance; and after the experience gained by him
-in that capacity he engaged in the working of the Wheal
-Fortune mine. With the help of Newcomen’s engine,
-the enterprise proved completely successful; and after
-realising a considerable sum he removed to Truro, and
-began working the great Gwennap mines on such a
-scale as had never before been known in Cornwall.<a name="Anchor-45" id="Anchor-45" href="#Footnote-45" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 45.">[45]</a></p>
-
-<p>The Wheal Fortune engine was on a larger scale
-than any that had yet been erected, the cylinder being
-47 inches in diameter, making about fifteen strokes a
-minute. It drew about a hogshead of water at each
-stroke, from a pump 30 fathoms deep, through pit-barrels
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_70">[70]</span>
-15 inches in diameter, and its performances were on
-the whole regarded as very extraordinary. The principal
-objection to its use consisted in the very large
-quantity of coal that it consumed and the heavy cost of
-maintaining it in working order. There was a great
-waste, especially in boilers, the making of which was
-then ill understood. Smeaton relates that in the course
-of four years’ working of the first Austhorpe engine, not
-fewer than four boilers were burnt out. The Wheal
-Fortune engine, however, answered its purpose. It kept
-down the water sufficiently to enable Mr. Lemon to draw
-up his tin, and on leaving the mine, he took with him
-to Truro a clear sum of ten thousand pounds. The
-engine-house is now in ruins, and presents a highly
-picturesque appearance, as seen from the heights of
-Trewal, reminding one of a Border Peel rather than
-of a mining engine-house.</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_089" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_089.png" width="450" height="288" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">RUINS OF WHEAL FORTUNE.</p>
-<p class="caption">[By R. P. Leitch.]</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Another of Newcomen’s engines was erected about
-the same time at the Wheal Rose mine, a few miles
-north of Redruth. The engineer appointed to superintend
-its erection was Joseph Hornblower, who came from
-Staffordshire for the purpose about the year 1725. Mr.
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_71">[71]</span>
-Cyrus Redding, one of Hornblower’s
-descendants, says,
-“how he became in any way
-connected with Newcomen
-must have arisen from the
-latter being at Bromsgrove,
-when he visited Mr. Potter,
-who got him to build one
-of his newly-invented engines
-at Wolverhampton in
-1712.”<a name="Anchor-46" id="Anchor-46" href="#Footnote-46" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 46.">[46]</a> Another engine was
-afterwards erected by Hornblower
-at Wheal Busy, or Chacewater, and a third at
-Polgooth&mdash;all rich and well-known mines in Cornwall.</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_090" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_090.png" width="450" height="468" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">POLGOOTH.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Though the use of Newcomen’s engine rapidly extended,
-nothing is known of the man himself during
-this time. All over the mining districts his name was
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_72">[72]</span>
-identified with the means employed for pumping the
-mines clear of water, and thereby enabling an important
-branch of the national industry to be carried on; but of
-Newcomen’s personal history, beyond what has been stated
-above, we can gather nothing. It is not known when or
-where he died, whether rich or poor. The probability
-is that, being a person of a modest and retiring disposition,
-without business energy, and having secured no
-protection for his invention, it was appropriated and
-made use of by others, without any profit to him, whilst
-he quietly subsided into private life. It is supposed that
-he died at Dartmouth about the middle of last century;
-but no stone marks the place where he was laid. The
-only memorial of Newcomen to be found at his native
-place is the little steam-boat called by his name, which
-plies between Totness and Dartmouth.</p>
-
-<p>During Newcomen’s lifetime the proposal was revived
-of applying the steam-engine to the propelling of ships.
-Since Papin’s time nothing had been accomplished in
-this direction. Now that the steam-engine was actively
-employed in pumping mines, it was natural enough that
-the idea should be revived of applying it to navigation.
-The most enthusiastic advocate of the new power was
-Jonathan Hulls, a native of Campden, in Gloucestershire,
-where he was born in 1699. He married a wife in 1719,
-before he was out of his teens; an act of indiscretion
-in which, however, he had the example of one no less
-distinguished than Shakspeare. Living as he did in an
-inland country place, it seems remarkable that he should
-have directed his attention to the subject of steam-navigation.
-We find him making experiments with models
-of boats on the river Avon, at Evesham, and in course
-of time he duly matured his ideas and embodied them
-in his patent of 1736.<a name="Anchor-47" id="Anchor-47" href="#Footnote-47" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 47.">[47]</a> He proposed to place a Newcomen
-engine on board a tow-boat, and by its means to
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_73">[73]</span>
-work a paddle-wheel placed at the stern. His method
-of converting the rectilinear motion of his piston into a
-rotary one was ingenious, but, like Savery, he missed
-the crank on the paddle-shaft, and many years passed
-before this simple expedient was adopted.<a name="Anchor-48" id="Anchor-48" href="#Footnote-48" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 48.">[48]</a> “The
-work to be done by this machine,” said he, “will be
-upon particular occasions, when all other means yet
-found out are wholly insufficient. How often does a
-merchant wish that his ship were on the ocean, when, if
-she were there, the wind would serve tolerably well to
-carry him on his intended voyage, but does not serve at
-the same time to carry him out of the river he happens
-to be in, which a few hours’ work of the machine would
-do. Besides, I know engines that are driven by the
-same power as this is, where materials for the purpose
-are dearer than in any navigable river in England;
-therefore experience demonstrates that the expense will
-be but a trifle to the value of the work performed by
-those sort of machines, which any person that knows
-the nature of those things may easily calculate.” His
-treatise was illustrated by a drawing, of which the following
-is a copy on a reduced scale.</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_092" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_092.png" width="450" height="256" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">JONATHAN HULLS’S STEAM-BOAT.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_74">[74]</span></p>
-
-<p>The inventor, aware of the novelty of his proposal
-and of the readiness of the public to ridicule novelties,
-deprecated rash censure of his project, and only claimed
-for it a fair and unprejudiced trial. In order to exhibit
-the powers of his steam-boat, he constructed an engine
-in 1737, and had it fixed on board a little vessel for trial
-in the river Avon at Evesham. The trial was not satisfactory,
-and the engine was taken on shore again. “A
-failure! A failure!” cried the spectators, who stigmatised
-the projector as an ass. The prophet had, indeed,
-no honour whatever in his own country. Long after
-his steam-boat experiment had been forgotten, these lines
-about him were remembered:&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
-  <div class="i01">“Jonathan Hull,</div>
-    <div class="i02">With his paper skull,</div>
-  <div class="i01">Tried hard to make a machine</div>
-<div class="i00">That should go against wind and tide:</div>
-    <div class="i02">But he, like an ass,</div>
-    <div class="i02">Couldn’t bring it to pass,</div>
-  <div class="i01">So at last was ashamed to be seen.”<a name="Anchor-49" id="Anchor-49" href="#Footnote-49" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 49.">[49]</a></div>
-</div></div>
-
-<p>Not much more is known of Jonathan Hulls’s history.
-In 1754 he published, in conjunction with two others,
-a treatise on ‘The Art of Measuring made Easy, by the
-help of a new Sliding-rule;’ and shortly after ‘The Malt-maker’s
-Instructor;’ but nothing more was heard of
-Jonathan Hulls’s steam-boat.</p>
-
-<p>We return to the Newcomen engine, which became
-increasingly employed as a pumping power in all the
-mining districts. Borlase, writing in 1758, says that
-“fire-engines” were then in regular use at North Downs
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_75">[75]</span>
-near Redruth, Pitt-louarn, Polgooth, Wheal-rith, Pool,
-Dolcoath, Herland, and many other places.<a name="Anchor-50" id="Anchor-50" href="#Footnote-50" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 50.">[50]</a> Indeed
-there was scarcely a tin or copper mine of any importance
-in Cornwall that had not one or more of Newcomen’s
-engines at work. They were also in general use
-in Staffordshire, Yorkshire, Lancashire, and Northumberland.
-In the latter counties, where they were principally
-used for pumping water out of the coal mines, fuel was
-ready at hand, cheap and abundant. But in Cornwall
-it was otherwise. The coal had to be brought thither
-from a great distance, partly by sea and partly by land,
-and the cost of carriage was very heavy. It, therefore,
-became an object of much importance to reduce the consumption
-of fuel, to prevent the profits of the mines
-being absorbed by the heavy cost of working the pumps.
-This, indeed, was the great objection to Newcomen’s
-engine, especially in Cornwall. The consumption of
-fuel at some mines was so enormous, that it was doubtful
-whether the cost of steam did not exceed that of an
-equal amount of horse power, and it became more and
-more difficult to realise even a bare margin of profit.
-The two engines at Wheal Rose and Wheal Busy, near
-Chacewater, of 66 and 72 inches diameter, consumed
-each about thirteen tons of coal daily. To relieve the
-mining interest, in some measure, from this charge,
-government allowed a drawback of five shillings a
-chaldron on coal; but in some cases this was found
-insufficient, and it began to be complained that the
-consumption of coal was so great, that the mines were
-barely paying.</p>
-
-<p>Invention, however, was constantly at work, and
-new improvements were from time to time introduced,
-with the object of economising fuel and increasing the
-efficiency of the engine. Among the ingenious men
-who devoted themselves to this work, were Payne,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_76">[76]</span>
-Brindley, and Smeaton. Of these, the last especially
-distinguished himself by his improvements of the Newcomen
-engine, which he may be said to have carried
-to the highest perfection of which it was capable. His
-famous Chacewater engine was the finest and most
-powerful work of the kind which had until then been
-constructed, and it remained unrivalled until superseded
-by the invention of Watt, to whose life and
-labours we now proceed to direct the attention of the
-reader.</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_095" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_095.png" width="450" height="232" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">DARTMOUTH, FROM THE HARBOUR.</p>
-<p class="caption">[By R. P. Leitch.]</p>
-</div>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_77">[77]</span></p>
-
-
-<hr class="full" />
-
-<h2><big>JAMES WATT:</big><br />
-
-HIS BOYHOOD AND EARLY LIFE: MECHANICAL INSTRUMENT
-MAKER, SURVEYOR, AND INVENTOR.</h2>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_78">[78]</span></p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_097" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_097.png" width="450" height="512" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">GREENOCK AND THE CLYDE, 1865.</p>
-<p class="caption">[By R. P. Leitch, after a sketch by J. S. Smiles.]</p>
-</div>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_79">[79]</span></p>
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_098" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_098.png" width="450" height="288" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">GREENOCK HARBOUR, 1768.</p>
-<p class="caption">[Fac-simile of an old print.]</p>
-</div>
-
-
-
-
-<h3>CHAPTER V.<br />
-
-<small><span class="smcap">James Watt&mdash;Lineage and Birthplace&mdash;Boyhood and
-Apprenticeship.</span></small></h3>
-
-
-<p><span class="smcap">James</span> Watt was born at Greenock, on the Clyde, on
-the 19th of January, 1736. His parents were of the
-middle class, industrious, intelligent, and religious
-people, with a character for probity which had descended
-to them from their “forbears,” and was cherished
-as their proudest inheritance. James Watt was
-thus emphatically well-born. His father and grandfather
-both held local offices of trust, and honourable
-mention is made of them in the records of Greenock.
-His grandfather, Thomas Watt, was the first of the
-family who lived in that neighbourhood. He had migrated
-thither from the county of Aberdeen, where his
-father was a small farmer in the time of Charles I. It
-is supposed that he took part with the Covenanters in
-resisting the Marquis of Montrose in his sudden descent
-upon Aberdeen at the head of his wild Highlanders in
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_80">[80]</span>
-the autumn of 1644; and that the Covenanting farmer
-was killed in one of the battles that ensued. The district
-was ravaged by the victorious Royalists; the crops
-were destroyed, cattle lifted, dwellings burnt; and many
-of the inhabitants fled southwards for refuge in more
-peaceful districts. Hence Thomas Watt’s migration to
-Cartsdyke, where we find him settled as a teacher of
-navigation and mathematics, about the middle of the
-seventeenth century.</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_099" style="width: 400px;">
-<img src="images/i_099.png" width="400" height="247" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">CRAWFORDSBURN HOUSE, NEAR GREENOCK.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Cartsdyke, or Crawfordsdyke, was then a village
-situated a little to the east of Greenock, though now
-forming part of it. Crawfordsburn House, still standing,
-was the residence of the lord of the manor, and is a good
-specimen of the old-fashioned country mansion. It is
-beautifully situated on the high ground overlooking the
-Clyde. In former times a green slope stretched down
-from it towards the beach, along which lay the village,
-consisting of about a hundred cottages, mostly thatched.
-Cartsdyke was, however, in early times, a place of greater
-importance than Greenock. It had a pier, which
-Greenock as yet had not; and from this pier the first
-Clyde ship which crossed the Atlantic sailed for Darien
-in 1697. What little enterprise existed in the neighbourhood
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_81">[81]</span>
-was identified with Cartsdyke rather than
-with Greenock; and hence Thomas Watt’s preference
-for it, in setting up there as a teacher. He, too, like his
-sire, seems to have been a sturdy Covenanter; for we
-find him, in 1683, refusing to take the test in favour of
-prelacy, and he was consequently proclaimed to be a
-“disorderly schoolmaster officiating contrary to law.”
-He nevertheless continued the teaching of the mathematics,
-in which he seems to have prospered, as, besides
-marrying a wife, he shortly after bought the house and
-garden which he occupied, and subsequently added to
-his possessions a tenement in the neighbouring village
-of Greenock.</p>
-
-<p>From the nature of his calling, it is obvious that he
-must have been a thoughtful and intelligent person;<a name="Anchor-51" id="Anchor-51" href="#Footnote-51" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 51.">[51]</a>
-and that he was a man of excellent character is clear
-from the confidence he inspired in those who had the
-best opportunities of knowing him. When William
-and Mary were confirmed in their occupancy of the
-British throne, shortly after the Revolution of 1688,
-one of the first acts of Mr. Crawford, of Crawfordsburn,
-the feudal superior, was to appoint Thomas Watt baillie
-of the barony&mdash;a position of local importance, involving
-the direction of public affairs within the limits of his
-jurisdiction.</p>
-
-<p>A few years later, the Kirk Session of Greenock,
-having found him “blameless in life and conversation,”
-appointed him an Elder of the parish, when it became
-part of his duty to overlook not only the religious
-observances, but the manners and morals, of the little
-community. Kirk Sessions did not then confine themselves
-to ecclesiastical affairs, but assumed the function
-of magistrates, and almost exercised the powers of an
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_82">[82]</span>
-inquisition. One of their most important duties was to
-provide for the education of the rising generation, in
-pursuance of the injunction of John Knox, “that no
-father, of what estate or condition that ever he may be,
-use his children at his own fantasie, especially in their
-youthhead; but all must be compelled to bring up their
-children in learning and virtue,”&mdash;words which lie at
-the root of much of Scotland’s mental culture, as well
-as, probably, of its material prosperity. In 1696
-the Act was passed by the Scotch Parliament which is
-usually regarded as the charter of the Scotch parish-school
-system; and in the following year the Kirk Session
-of Greenock proceeded to make provision for the
-establishment of their parish school, which continued
-until the Town Council superseded it by the Grammar
-School, at which James Watt, the future engineer, received
-the best part of his school education.</p>
-
-<p>After holding the offices of Presbytery Elder and
-Kirk Treasurer for some time, Thomas Watt craved
-leave to retire into private life. He was seventy years
-old, and felt infirmities growing upon him. The plea
-was acknowledged, and the request granted; and on his
-retirement from office the Kirk Session recorded on
-their minutes that Thomas Watt had been found “diligent
-and faithful in the management of his trust.” He
-died at the age of 92, and was buried in the old kirkyard
-of Greenock, where his tombstone is still to be
-seen. He is there described as “Professor of Mathematics
-in Crawfordsdyk.” Not far from his grave lie,
-“mouldering in silent dust,” the remains of Burns’s
-Highland Mary, who died while on a visit to a relative
-at Greenock.</p>
-
-<p>Two sons survived the “Professor,” John and James,
-who were well settled in life when the old man died.
-John, the elder, was trained by his father in mathematics
-and surveying; for some time officiating under
-him as clerk to the barony of Cartsdyke, and afterwards
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_83">[83]</span>
-removing to Glasgow, where he began business on his
-own account. In the year that his father died (1734)
-he made the first survey of the river Clyde; but he
-died shortly after, and the map was published by his
-nephew. James, the engineer’s father, was bound apprentice
-to a carpenter and shipwright at Cartsdyke,
-and on the expiry of his term he set up business for
-himself in the same line at Greenock.</p>
-
-<p>About the beginning of the last century, Greenock,
-now one of the busiest ports in the kingdom, was but a
-little fishing-village, consisting of a single row of
-thatched cottages lying parallel with the sandy beach of
-the Frith of Clyde, in what was then known as “Sir
-John’s little bay.” Sir John Shaw was the superior, or
-lord of the manor, his mansion standing on a height
-overlooking the town,<a name="Anchor-52" id="Anchor-52" href="#Footnote-52" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 52.">[52]</a> and commanding an extensive
-view of the Clyde, from Roseneath to Dumbarton.
-Across the water lay the beautiful north shore, broken
-by the long narrow sea-lochs running far away among
-the Argyleshire hills. Their waters, now plashed by
-the paddles of innumerable Clyde steamers, were then
-only disturbed by the passing of an occasional Highland
-coble; whilst their shores, now fringed with villages,
-villas, and mansions, were as lonely as Glencoe.</p>
-
-<p>Greenock was in a great measure isolated from other
-towns by impassable roads. The only route to Greenock,
-on the west, lay along the beach, and when strong
-winds raised a high tide the communication was entirely
-cut off. Greenock was separated from Cartsdyke,
-on the east, by the Ling Burn, which was crossed by a
-plank, afterwards supplanted by an old ship’s rudder;
-and it was about the middle of the century before a
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_84">[84]</span>
-bridge was built across the stream. The other provisions
-of the place for public service and convenience
-were of a like rude and primitive character: thus,
-Greenock could not boast of a public clock until about
-the middle of the last century, when a town clock was
-mounted in a wooden steeple. Till then, a dial, still
-standing, marked the hours when the sun shone, and a
-bell hung upon a triangle summoned the people to kirk
-and market. Besides the kirk, however, there was
-another public building&mdash;the Black Hole, or prison,
-which, like the other houses in the place, was covered
-with thatch. Before the prison were placed the “jougs,”
-as a terror to evil-doers, as well as a few old pieces of
-cannon, taken from one of the ships of the Spanish
-Armada wrecked near Pencores Castle. The Black
-Hole, the jougs, and the cannon were thought necessary
-precautions against the occasional visits to which the
-place was subject from the hungry Highlandmen on
-the opposite shores of the firth.<a name="Anchor-53" id="Anchor-53" href="#Footnote-53" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 53.">[53]</a></p>
-
-<p>The prosperity of Greenock dates from the year 1707,
-shortly after the Union with England. The British
-Parliament then granted what the Scottish Parliament
-had refused&mdash;the privilege of constructing a harbour.
-Before that time there was no pier,&mdash;only a rude
-landing-stage which Sir John Shaw had provided for
-his barge in the “Little Bay;” but the fishermen’s
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_85">[85]</span>
-boats and other small craft frequenting the place were
-beached in the usual primitive way. Vessels of burden
-requiring to load or unload their cargoes did so at the
-pier at Cartsdyke above referred to. When the necessary
-powers were granted to make a harbour at Greenock,
-the inhabitants proceeded to tax themselves to
-provide the necessary means, paying a shilling and
-fourpence for every sack of malt brewed into ale within
-the barony; ale, not whisky, being then the popular
-drink of Scotland. The devotion of the townspeople to
-their “yill caups” must have been considerable, as the
-harbour was finished and opened in 1710, and in thirty
-years the principal debt was paid off.</p>
-
-<p>In course of time Greenock was made a custom-house
-port, and its trade rapidly increased. The first
-solitary vessel, freighted with Glasgow merchandise
-for the American colonies, sailed from the new harbour
-in 1719; and now the custom-house dues collected
-there amount to more than six times the whole
-revenue of Scotland in the time of the Stuarts.</p>
-
-<p>Here James Watt, son of the Cartsdyke teacher of
-mathematics, and father of the engineer, began business
-about the year 1730. His occupation was of a very
-miscellaneous character, and embraced most branches of
-carpentry. He was a housewright, shipwright, carpenter,
-and undertaker, as well as a builder and contractor,
-having in the course of his life enlarged the
-western front of Sir John Shaw’s mansion-house, and
-designed and built the Town-hall and Council-chambers.
-To these various occupations Mr. Watt added that of a
-general merchant. He supplied the ships frequenting
-the port with articles of merchandise as well as with
-ships’ stores. He also engaged in foreign mercantile
-ventures, and held shares in several ships.</p>
-
-<p>Three months after the death of his father, to a share
-of whose property he succeeded, Mr. Watt purchased a
-house on the Mid-Quay Head, at the lower end of
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_86">[86]</span>
-William-street, with a piece of ground belonging to it,
-which extended to the beach. On this piece of ground
-stood Watt’s carpenter’s shop, in which a great deal of
-miscellaneous work was executed&mdash;household furniture
-and ships’ fittings, chairs, tables, coffins, and capstans, as
-well as the ordinary sorts of joinery; while from his
-stores he was ready to supply blocks, pumps, gun-carriages,
-dead-eyes, and other articles used on board ship.
-He was ready to “touch” ships’ compasses, and to adjust
-and repair nautical instruments generally; while on an
-emergency he could make a crane for harbour uses&mdash;the
-first in Greenock having been executed in his shops,
-and erected on the pier for the convenience of the Virginia
-tobacco-ships beginning to frequent the harbour.
-These multifarious occupations were necessitated by
-the smallness of the place, the business of a single
-calling being as yet too limited to yield a competency
-to an enterprising man, or sufficient scope for his
-powers.</p>
-
-<p>Being a person of substance and respectability, Mr.
-Watt was elected by his fellow townsmen to fill various
-public offices, such as trustee for the burgh fund, town
-councillor, treasurer, and afterwards baillie or chief
-magistrate. He also added to his comfort as well as to
-his dignity by marrying a wife of character, Agnes
-Muirhead, a woman esteemed by her neighbours for her
-graces of person, as well as of mind and heart. She is
-said to have been not less distinguished for her sound
-sense and good manners than for her cheerful temper
-and excellent housewifery.<a name="Anchor-54" id="Anchor-54" href="#Footnote-54" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 54.">[54]</a> Such was the mother of
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_87">[87]</span>
-James Watt. Three of her five children died in childhood;
-John, her fifth son, perished at sea when on a
-voyage to America in one of his father’s ships; and
-James, the fourth of the family, remained her only surviving
-child. He was born in the house which stood at
-the corner between the present Dalrymple-street and
-William-street, since taken down and replaced by the
-building now known as the “James Watt Tavern.”</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_106" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_106.png" width="450" height="244" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">JAMES WATT TAVERN, GREENOCK.</p>
-<p class="caption">[By R. P. Leitch.]</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>From his earliest years James Watt was of an extremely
-fragile constitution, requiring the tenderest
-nurture. Struggling as it were for life all through his
-childhood, he acquired an almost feminine delicacy and
-sensitiveness, which made him shrink from the rough
-play of robust children; and hence, during his early
-years, his education was entirely conducted at home.
-His mother taught him reading, and his father a little
-writing and arithmetic. His mother, to amuse him,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_88">[88]</span>
-encouraged him to draw with a pencil on paper, or with
-chalk upon the floor; and his father supplied him with
-a few tools from the carpenter’s shop, which he soon
-learnt to handle with expertness. In such occupations
-he found the best resource against <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">ennui</i>. He took his
-toys to pieces, and out of the parts ingeniously constructed
-new ones. The mechanical dexterity which he
-thus cultivated even as a child was probably in a great
-measure the foundation upon which he built the speculations
-to which he owes his glory; nor, without his
-early mechanical training, is there reason to believe that
-he would afterwards become the improver and almost
-the creator of the steam-engine.</p>
-
-<p>The invalid thus passed his early years almost entirely
-in the society of his mother, whose gentle nature, strong
-good sense, and unobtrusive piety, exercised a most
-beneficial influence in the formation of his character.
-Nor were his parents without their reward; for as the
-boy grew up to manhood he repaid their anxious care
-with obedience, respect, and affection. Mrs. Watt was
-in after life accustomed to say that the loss of her only
-daughter, which she had felt so severely, had been fully
-made up to her by the dutiful attentions of her son.</p>
-
-<p>Spending his life indoors, without exercise, his nervous
-system became preternaturally sensitive. He was subject
-to violent sick headaches, which confined him to his
-room for weeks together; and it almost seems a marvel
-that, under such circumstances, he should have survived
-his boyhood. It is in such cases as his that indications
-of precocity are generally observed; and parents would
-be less gratified at their display if they knew that they
-are usually the symptoms of disease. Several remarkable
-instances of this precocity are related of Watt. On
-one occasion, when he was bending over the hearth with
-a piece of chalk in his hand, a friend of his father said,
-“You ought to send that boy to a public school, and not
-allow him to trifle away his time at home.” “Look how
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_89">[89]</span>
-my child is occupied,” said the father, “before you condemn
-him.” Though only six years old, it is said he
-was found trying to solve a problem in geometry.</p>
-
-<p>On another occasion he was reproved by Mrs. Muirhead,
-his aunt, for his indolence at the tea-table. “James
-Watt,” said the worthy lady, “I never saw such an idle
-boy as you are: take a book or employ yourself usefully;
-for the last hour you have not spoken one word, but
-taken off the lid of that kettle and put it on again,
-holding now a cup and now a silver spoon over the steam,
-watching how it rises from the spout, catching and
-counting the drops it falls into.” In the view of M.
-Arago, the little James before the tea-kettle becomes
-“the great engineer, preparing the discoveries which
-were soon to immortalize him.” In our opinion the
-judgment of the aunt was the truest. There is no reason
-to suppose that the mind of the boy was occupied with
-philosophical theories on the condensation of steam,
-which he compassed with so much difficulty in his
-maturer years. This is more probably an afterthought
-borrowed from his subsequent discoveries. Nothing is
-commoner than for children to be amused with such
-phenomena, in the same way that they will form air-bubbles
-in a cup of tea, and watch them sailing over the
-surface till they burst. The probability is that little
-James was quite as idle as he seemed.</p>
-
-<p>When he was at length sent to Mr. M‘Adam’s commercial
-school, the change caused him many trials and
-much suffering. He found himself completely out of
-place in the midst of the boisterous juvenile republic.
-Against the tyranny of the elders he was helpless; their
-wild play was most distasteful to him; he could not join
-in their sports, nor roam with them along the beach,
-nor shy stones into the water, nor take part in their
-hazardous exploits in the harbour. Accordingly they
-showered upon him contemptuous epithets; and the
-school being composed of both sexes, the girls joined in
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_90">[90]</span>
-the laugh. He shone as little in the class as in the
-playground. He did not possess that parrot power of
-learning and confidence in self necessary to achieve
-distinction at school; and he was even considered dull
-and backward for his age.<a name="Anchor-55" id="Anchor-55" href="#Footnote-55" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 55.">[55]</a> His want of progress
-may, however, in some measure be accounted for by his
-almost continual ailments, which sometimes kept him
-for weeks together at home. It was not until he reached
-the age of about thirteen or fourteen, when he was put
-into the mathematical class, that his powers appeared to
-develop themselves, and from that time he made rapid
-progress.</p>
-
-<p>When not quite fourteen, he was taken by his mother
-for change of air to Glasgow, then a quiet place without
-a single long chimney, somewhat resembling a rural
-market-town of the present day. He was left in charge
-of a relation, and his mother returned to Greenock. But
-he proved so wakeful during the visit, and so disposed
-to indulge in that habit of storytelling, which even Sir
-Walter Scott could afterwards admire in him, that Mr.
-Watt was very soon written to by his friend, and entreated
-to return to Glasgow and take home his son.
-“I cannot stand the excitement he keeps me in,” said
-Mrs. Campbell; “I am worn out for want of sleep.
-Every evening, before retiring to rest, he contrives to
-engage me in conversation, then begins some striking
-tale, and whether humorous or pathetic, the interest is
-so overpowering, that the family all listen to him with
-breathless attention, and hour after hour strikes unheeded.”
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_91">[91]</span>
-He was taken back to Greenock accordingly,
-and, when well enough, was sent to the Grammar School
-of the town, then kept by Mr. Robert Arrol. Under
-him, Watt made fair progress in the rudiments of Latin
-and Greek; but he was still more successful in the study
-of mathematics, which he prosecuted under Mr. John
-Marr. It was only when he entered on this branch of
-learning that he discovered his strength, and he very
-soon took the lead in his class.</p>
-
-<p>When at home the boy continued to spend much of
-his time in drawing, or in cutting or carving with his
-penknife, or in watching the carpenters at work in
-his father’s shop, sometimes trying his own hand at
-making little articles with the tools which lay about. In
-this he displayed a degree of dexterity which seemed so
-remarkable that the journeymen were accustomed to say
-of him that “little Jamie had gotten a fortune at his
-fingers’ ends.” Even when he had grown old he would
-recall to mind the pleasure as well as the profit which
-he had derived from working in his shirt-sleeves
-in his father’s shop. He was, in fact, educating himself
-in the most effectual manner in his own way;
-learning to use his hands dexterously; familiarising
-himself with the art of handling tools; and acquiring a
-degree of expertness in working with them in wood
-and metal, which eventually proved of the greatest
-value to him. At the same time he was training
-himself in habits of application, industry, and invention.
-Most of his spare time was thus devoted to mechanical
-adaptations of his own contrivance. A small
-forge was erected for him, and a bench fitted up for his
-special use; and there he constructed many ingenious
-little objects, such as miniature cranes, pulleys, pumps,
-and capstans. Out of a large silver coin he fabricated
-a punch-ladle, which is still preserved. But the kind
-of work which most attracted him was the repairing of
-ships’ compasses, quadrants, and nautical instruments,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_92">[92]</span>
-in executing which he exhibited so much neatness, dexterity,
-and accuracy, that it eventually led to his selection
-of the business he determined to follow,&mdash;that of a
-mathematical instrument maker.</p>
-
-<p>The boy at the same time prosecuted his education at
-school; his improving health enabling him to derive
-more advantage from the instructions of his masters
-than in the earlier part of his career. Not the least influential
-part of his training, as regarded the formation
-of his character, consisted, as already observed, in the
-example and conversation of his parents at home. His
-frequent illnesses brought him more directly and continuously
-under their influence than is the case with most
-boys of his age; and reading became one of his chief
-sources of recreation and enjoyment. His fathers library-shelf
-contained well-thumbed volumes of Boston, Bunyan,
-and ‘The Cloud of Witnesses,’ with Henry the Rymer’s
-‘Life of Wallace,’ and other old ballads, tattered by frequent
-use. These he devoured greedily, and re-read
-until he had most of them by heart. His father would
-also recount to him the sufferings of the Covenanters,&mdash;the
-moors and mosses which lay towards the south of
-Greenock having been among their retreats during the
-times of the persecution. Then there were the local and
-traditionary stories of the neighbourhood,&mdash;such as the
-exploits of the Greenock men under Sir John Shaw, at
-Worcester, in 1651,<a name="Anchor-56" id="Anchor-56" href="#Footnote-56" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 56.">[56]</a>&mdash;together with much of that unwritten
-history, heard only around firesides, which
-kindles the Scotchman’s nationality, and influences his
-future life.</p>
-
-<p>We may here mention, in passing, that one of the
-most vividly-remembered incidents of James Watt’s
-boyhood was the Stuart rebellion of the “Forty-five,”
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_93">[93]</span>
-which occurred when he was about ten years old. Watt
-himself is so intimately identified with the material progress
-of the nineteenth century, that it strikes one almost
-with surprise that he should have been a spectator, in
-however remote a degree, of incidents belonging to an
-altogether different age. The Stuart Rebellion may be
-said to have been the end of one epoch and the beginning
-of another; for certain it is that the progress of Scotland
-as an integral part of the British empire, and the
-growth of its skilled industry&mdash;which the inventions of
-Watt did so much to develop&mdash;appeared as if to spring
-from the very ashes of the rebellion. Like other lowland
-towns, Greenock was greatly alarmed at the startling
-news from the Highlands of the threatened descent
-of the clans. Sir John Shaw had the trades mustered
-for drill on the green in front of his mansion, and held
-them in readiness for defence of the town, in case of
-attack. Greenock was otherwise secure, being protected
-against the Highlands by the Clyde; besides, the western
-clans were either neutral or adhered to the house of
-Hanover. The Pretender with his followers passed
-southward by Stirling, and only approached Greenock
-on their return from England,&mdash;a half-starved and ill-clad,
-though still unbroken army. They halted at Glasgow,
-where they levied a heavy contribution on the
-inhabitants, and sent out roving parties to try their
-fortunes in the neighbouring towns. A small detachment
-one day approached Greenock, and came as near
-as the Clune Brae; but the townspeople were afoot, and
-on guard; signal was given to the ships of war moored
-near the old battery, and a few well-directed shots
-speedily sent the Highlanders to the right-about. The
-alarm was over for the present; but it was renewed in
-the following year, when the rumour reached Edinburgh
-that Prince Charles, hunted from the Highlands, had
-landed at Greenock, and lay concealed there. The consequence
-was that a strict search was made throughout
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_94">[94]</span>
-the town, and Mr. Watt’s premises were searched like
-the others; but the Pretender had contrived to escape
-in another direction. Such was one of the most memorable
-incidents in the boy-life of James Watt, so strangely
-in contrast with the later events of his industrial career.</p>
-
-<p>During holiday times, the boy sometimes indulged
-in rambles along the Clyde, occasionally crossing to the
-north shore, and strolling up the Gare Loch and Holy
-Loch, and even as far as Ben Lomond. He was of a
-solitary disposition, and loved to wander by himself at
-night amidst the wooded pleasure-grounds which surrounded
-the old mansion-house overlooking the town,
-watching through the trees the mysterious movements
-of the stars. He became fascinated by the wonders of
-astronomy, and was stimulated to inquire into the science
-by the examination of the nautical instruments which
-he found amongst his father’s shop-stores. For it was
-a peculiarity which characterised him through life, that
-he could not look upon any instrument or machine without
-being seized with a desire to understand its meaning,
-to unravel its mystery, and master the rationale of
-its uses. Before he was fifteen he had twice gone
-through with great attention S’Gravande’s ‘Elements
-of Natural Philosophy,’ a book belonging to his father.
-He performed many little experiments in chemistry, and
-even contrived to make an electrical machine, much to
-the marvel of those who felt its shocks. Like most
-invalids, he read eagerly such books on medicine and
-surgery as came in his way. He went so far as to practise
-dissection; and on one occasion he was found carrying
-off for this purpose the head of a child who had died
-of some uncommon disease. “He told his son,” says
-Mr. Muirhead, “that, had he been able to bear the sight
-of the sufferings of patients, he would have been a
-surgeon.”</p>
-
-<p>In his solitary rambles, his love of wild-flowers and
-plants lured him on to the study of botany. Ever observant
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_95">[95]</span>
-of the aspects of nature, the violent upheavings
-of the mountain-ranges on the north shores of Loch
-Lomond directed his attention to geology. He was a
-great devourer of books; reading all that came in his
-way. On a friend once advising him to be less indiscriminate
-in his reading, he replied, “I have never yet
-read a book without gaining information, instruction,
-or amusement.” This was no answer to the admonition
-of his friend, who merely recommended him to bestow
-upon the best books the time he devoted to the worse.
-But the appetite for knowledge in inquisitive minds is,
-during youth, when curiosity is fresh and unslacked, too
-insatiable to be fastidious, and the volume which gets
-the preference is usually the first which comes in the
-way.</p>
-
-<p>Watt was not, however, a mere bookworm. In his
-solitary walks through the country he would enter the
-cottages of the peasantry, gather their local traditions,
-and impart to them information of a similar kind from
-his own ample stores. Fishing, which suited his tranquil
-nature, was his single sport. When unable to ramble
-for the purpose, he could still indulge the pursuit from
-his father’s yard, which was open to the sea, and the
-water of sufficient depth at high-tide to enable vessels of
-fifty or sixty tons to lie alongside.</p>
-
-<p>But James Watt had now arrived at a suitable age to
-learn a trade; and his rambles must come to a close.
-His father had originally intended him to follow his own
-business; but having sustained some heavy losses about
-this time&mdash;one of his ships having foundered at sea,&mdash;and
-observing the strong bias of his son towards manipulative
-science and exact mechanics, he at length decided
-to send him to Glasgow, in the year 1754, when
-he was eighteen years old, to learn the trade of a mathematical
-instrument maker.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_96">[96]</span></p>
-
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-<h3>CHAPTER VI.<br />
-
-<small><span class="smcap">James Watt, Mathematical Instrument Maker.</span></small></h3>
-
-
-<p><span class="smcap">When</span> James Watt, a youth of eighteen, went to
-Glasgow in 1754 to learn his trade, the place was very
-different from the Glasgow of to-day. Not a steam-engine
-was then at work in the town; not a steam-boat
-disturbed the quiet of the Clyde. There was a rough
-quay along the Broomielaw, then, as the name implies,
-partly covered with broom. The quay was furnished
-with a solitary crane, for which there was very little
-use, as the river was full of sandbanks, and boats and
-gabberts of only six tons burden and under could then
-ascend the Clyde.<a name="Anchor-57" id="Anchor-57" href="#Footnote-57" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 57.">[57]</a> Often for weeks together not a
-single masted vessel was to be seen in the river. The
-principal buildings in the town were the Cathedral and
-the University. The west port, now in the centre of
-Glasgow, was then a real barrier between the town
-and the country. The ground on which Enoch-square
-stands consisted chiefly of gardens. A thick wood
-occupied the site of the present Custom-house and of
-that part of Glasgow situated behind West Clyde-street.
-Blythswood was grazing-ground. Not a house had yet
-been erected in Hutchinson-town, Laurieston, Tradeston,
-or Bridgeton. The land between Jamaica-street on the
-east, and Stobcross on the west, and south from Anderston-road
-to the river, now the most densely populated
-parts of Glasgow, consisted of fields and cabbage-gardens.
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_97">[97]</span>
-The town had but two main streets, which intersected
-each other at the Cross or Market-place, and the only
-paved part of them was known as “The Plainstanes,”
-which extended for a few hundred yards in front of the
-public offices and the Town-hall. The two main streets
-contained some stately well-built houses&mdash;Flemish-looking
-tenements with crow-stepped gables,&mdash;the lower
-stories standing on Doric columns, under which were
-the principal booths or shops&mdash;small, low-roofed, and
-dismal. But the bulk of the houses had only wooden
-fronts and thatched roofs, and were of a very humble
-character. The traffic along the unpaved streets was so
-small, that the carts were left standing in them at night.
-The town was as yet innocent of police;<a name="Anchor-58" id="Anchor-58" href="#Footnote-58" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 58.">[58]</a> it contained
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_98">[98]</span>
-no Irish immigrants, and very few Highlanders. The
-latter then thought it beneath them to engage in any
-pursuit connected with commerce; and Rob Roy’s contempt
-for the wabsters of Glasgow, as described by Sir
-Walter Scott in the novel, was no exaggeration. No
-Highland gentleman, however poor, would dream of
-condemning his son to the drudgery of trade; and even
-the poorest Highland cottar would shrink with loathing
-from the life of a weaver or a shopkeeper. He would
-be a hunter, a fisher, a cattle-lifter, or a soldier; but
-trade he would not touch&mdash;that he left to the Lowlanders.<a name="Anchor-59" id="Anchor-59" href="#Footnote-59" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 59.">[59]</a></p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_116" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_116.png" width="450" height="380" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">TRONGATE, GLASGOW.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>The principal men of business in Glasgow at the time
-of which we speak were the tobacco lords&mdash;importers
-of that article from the plantations in Virginia,<a name="Anchor-60" id="Anchor-60" href="#Footnote-60" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 60.">[60]</a>&mdash;who
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_99">[99]</span>
-were often to be seen strutting along the Plainstanes,
-dressed in scarlet cloaks, cocked hats, and powdered wigs;
-the “boddies” who kept the adjoining shops eying them
-over their half-closed doors, and humbly watching for a
-nod of recognition from the mighty potentates. Yet
-even the greatest of the tobacco lords only lived in flats,
-entering from a common stair; and the domestic accommodation
-was so scanty and so primitive, that visitors
-were of necessity received in the bedrooms. This circumstance
-seems to have had some influence in the
-formation of the Clubs,<a name="Anchor-61" id="Anchor-61" href="#Footnote-61" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 61.">[61]</a> which then formed a curious
-feature of society in most Scotch towns. They consisted
-of knots of men of like tastes and pursuits, who met in
-the evenings at public-houses for purposes of gossip and
-social drinking. There they made new and cultivated
-old acquaintanceships, and exchanged news with each
-other. The Club combined the uses of the newspaper and
-the newsroom, which now accomplish the same objects
-without the drinking. But Glasgow had then no newspaper;
-and a London news-sheet of a week old was looked
-upon as a novelty. There was no coffee-room nor public
-library in the town; no theatre<a name="Anchor-62" id="Anchor-62" href="#Footnote-62" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 62.">[62]</a> nor place of resort open,
-except the “Change-house;” so that the Club was regarded
-as a social necessity. The drinking was sometimes
-moderate, and sometimes “hard.” The better class
-confined themselves to claret and other French wines,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_100">[100]</span>
-which were then cheap, being free from duty. Those
-disposed to indulge in more frugal fare confined themselves
-to oat-cake and small-beer. It was not until
-heavy taxes were laid on foreign wines and malt that
-the hard whisky-drinking of Scotland set in. Whisky
-was introduced from the Highlands shortly after the
-“Forty-five;” and it soon became the popular drink.
-By 1780 the drinking of raw whisky in Glasgow at midday
-had become general.<a name="Anchor-63" id="Anchor-63" href="#Footnote-63" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 63.">[63]</a></p>
-
-<p>When young Watt arrived in Glasgow he carried
-with him but a small quantity of baggage; the articles
-in his trunk including amongst other things a quadrant,&mdash;probably
-a specimen of his own handiwork,&mdash;a leather
-apron, about a score of carpenters’ and other tools, and
-“a pair of bibels.” On making inquiry for a proper master,
-under whom to learn the business of mathematical
-instrument making, it was found that there was no
-such person in Glasgow. There was, however, a mechanic
-in the town, who dignified himself with the name
-of “optician,” under whom Watt was placed for a time.
-He was a sort of Jack-of-all-trades, who sold and mended
-spectacles, repaired fiddles, tuned spinets, made and
-repaired the simpler instruments used in mechanical
-drawing, and eked out a slender living by making and
-selling fishing-rods and fishing-tackle. Watt was as
-handy at dressing trout and salmon flies as at most other
-things, and his master, no doubt, found him useful
-enough; but there was nothing to be learnt in return for
-his services. Though his master was an ingenious
-workman, in a small way, and could turn his ready hand
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_101">[101]</span>
-to anything, it soon became clear to Watt’s relations,
-the Muirheads, with whom he lived during his stay,
-that the instructions of such an artist were little likely
-to advance him in mathematical instrument making.
-Among the gentlemen to whom Watt was introduced
-by his relatives was Dr. Dick, Professor of Natural Philosophy
-in Glasgow College, who strongly recommended
-him to proceed to London, and there place himself under
-the instruction of some competent master. Watt consulted
-his father on the subject, who readily gave his
-sanction to the proposal; and, with a letter of introduction
-from Dr. Dick in his pocket, he set out for the great
-city accordingly.</p>
-
-<p>No stage-coach then ran between Glasgow and London;
-so it was determined that young Watt should proceed
-on horseback, then the most convenient and speedy
-mode of travelling. His chest was sent by sea. Old
-Mr. Watt’s memorandum-book at Heathfield contains the
-following entry, under date the 6th June, 1755:&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“To send James Watt’s chist to the care of Mr. William Oman,
-Ventener in Leith, to be shypt for London to ye care of Captain
-William Watson, at the Hermitage, London.</p>
-
-<ul>
-  <li class="leading-q">“P<sup>d.</sup> 3<i>s.</i> 6<i>d.</i> for wagon carage to Edenbrough of chist.</li>
-  <li>P<sup>d.</sup> to son James 2<i>l.</i> 2<i>s.</i></li>
-  <li>P<sup>d.</sup> Plaster and Pomet, 1<i>s.</i> 4<i>d.</i></li>
-  <li>P<sup>d.</sup> 4 doz. pencels, 1<i>s.</i> 6<i>d.</i>”</li>
-</ul>
-</div>
-
-<p>The “plaster and pomet” may possibly have been provided
-in view of the long journey on horseback and its
-contingencies. It was arranged that the youth should
-travel in the company of a relative, Mr. Marr, a sea-captain,
-who was on his way to join his ship, then lying
-in the Thames. They set out on the 7th of June,
-travelling by way of Coldstream and Newcastle, where
-they joined the great north road, then comparatively
-practicable to the south of Durham. They reached
-London safely on the 19th, having been about a fortnight
-on the road.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_102">[102]</span></p>
-
-<p>Mr. Marr immediately proceeded to make inquiries
-for a mathematical instrument maker with whom to
-place his young friend. But it was found that a serious
-obstacle presented itself in the rules of the trade, which
-prescribed that those employed must either be apprentices
-serving under a seven years’ apprenticeship, or, if
-journeymen, that they should have served for that term.
-Watt, however, had no intention of binding himself to
-serve for so long a period, and he had no pretensions
-to rank as a journeyman. His object was to learn the
-business in the shortest possible time, and then return
-to Glasgow and set up for himself. The two went
-about from shop to shop, but only met with rebuffs.
-“I have not yet got a master,” Watt wrote to his father
-about a fortnight after his arrival; “we have tried
-several, but they all made some objection or other. I
-find that, if any of them agree with me at all, it will
-not be for less than a year; and even for that time they
-will be expecting some money.”</p>
-
-<p>Mr. Marr continued to exert himself on behalf of the
-youth. Anxious to be employed in any way rather
-than not at all, Watt offered his services gratuitously to
-a watchmaker named Neale, with whom Mr. Marr did
-business, and he was allowed to occupy himself in his
-shop for a time, cutting letters and figures in metal. At
-length a situation of a more permanent character was
-obtained for him; and he entered the shop of Mr. John
-Morgan, a respectable mathematical instrument maker
-in Cornhill, on the terms of receiving a year’s instruction
-in return for a fee of twenty guineas and the proceeds
-of his labour during that time. He soon proved
-himself a ready learner and skilful workman. That
-division of labour, the result of an extensive trade,
-which causes the best London carriages to be superior
-to any of provincial construction, was even then applied
-to mathematical instruments. “Very few here,” wrote
-Watt, “know any more than how to make a rule, others
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_103">[103]</span>
-a pair of dividers, and such like.” His first employment
-was in making brass scales, rules, parallels, and the brass-work
-of quadrants; and by the end of a month he was
-able to finish a Hadley’s quadrant in better style than
-any apprentice in the shop. From rule and quadrant
-making he proceeded to azimuth compasses, brass sectors,
-theodolites, and the more delicate kinds of instruments.
-At the end of the year he wrote home to his father that he
-had made “a brass sector with a French joint, which is
-reckoned as nice a piece of framing-work as is in the
-trade;” and he expressed the hope that he would soon be
-able to work for himself, and earn his bread by his own
-industry.</p>
-
-<p>Up to this time he had necessarily been maintained
-by his father, on whom he drew from time to time.
-Mr. Watt’s memorandum-books show that on the 27th
-of June he remitted him 10<i>l.</i>; on the 24th of August
-following he enters: “Sent George Anderson by post
-8<i>l.</i> to buy a bill of 7<i>l.</i> or 8<i>l.</i> to send Wheytbread and
-Gifferd, and ballance of my son’s bill, 2<i>l.</i> 2<i>s.</i> 3<i>d.</i>, for which
-ame to remite him more;” and on the 11th September
-following, the balance was forwarded through the same
-channel. On the 24th October, 4<i>l.</i> 10<i>s.</i> was in like
-manner sent to George Anderson “on son James’s second
-bill;” and on the 31st December, 10<i>l.</i> was remitted, “to
-be put to the credit of son James’s last bill.” To relieve
-his father as much as possible for the cost of his maintenance
-in London, Watt lived in a very frugal style,
-avoiding all unnecessary expenses. His living cost him
-only eight shillings a week; and he could not reduce it
-below that, he wrote to his father, “without pinching
-his belly.” He also sought for some remunerative work
-on his own account; and when he could obtain it he sat
-up at night to execute it.</p>
-
-<p>During Watt’s stay in London he was in a great
-measure prevented from stirring abroad by the hot press
-for sailors which was then going on. As many as forty
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_104">[104]</span>
-pressgangs were at work, seizing all able-bodied men
-they could lay hands on. In one night they took not
-fewer than a thousand men. Nor were the kidnappers
-idle. These were the agents of the East India Company,
-who had crimping-houses in different parts of the
-city for receiving the men whom they had seized
-upon for service in the Indian army. Even when the
-demand for soldiers abated, the kidnappers continued
-their trade, and sold their unhappy victims to the
-planters in Pennsylvania and other North American
-colonies. Sometimes severe fights took place between
-the pressgangs and the kidnappers for possession of
-those who had been seized, the law and police being
-apparently powerless to protect them. “They now
-press anybody they can get,” Watt wrote in the spring
-of 1756, “landsmen as well as seamen, except it be in
-the liberties of the city, where they are obliged to carry
-them before the Lord Mayor first; and unless one be
-either a prentice or a creditable tradesman, there is
-scarce any getting off again. And if I was carried
-before my Lord Mayor, I durst not avow that I wrought
-in the city, it being against their laws for any unfreeman
-to work even as a journeyman within the liberties.”<a name="Anchor-64" id="Anchor-64" href="#Footnote-64" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 64.">[64]</a>
-What a curious glimpse does this give us into the practice
-of man-hunting in London in the eighteenth century!</p>
-
-<p>Watt’s enforced confinement, together with his sedentary
-habits and unremitting labour, soon told upon
-his weak frame. When he hurried to his lodgings at
-night, his body was wearied, and his nerves exhausted,
-so that his hands shook like those of an old man; yet
-he persevered with the extra work which he imposed
-upon himself, in order to earn a little honest money to
-help to pay for his living. His seat in Mr. Morgan’s
-shop being placed close to the door, which was often
-opened and shut in the course of the day, he caught
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_105">[105]</span>
-a severe cold in the course of the winter; and he was
-afflicted by a racking cough and severe rheumatic pains,
-from the effects of which he long continued to suffer.
-Distressed by a gnawing pain in his back, and greatly
-depressed in spirits, he at length, with his father’s
-sanction, determined to return to Greenock, to seek
-for renewal of health in his native air. His father made
-him a further remittance to enable him to purchase
-some of the tools required for his trade, together with
-materials for making others, and a copy of Bion’s work
-on the construction and use of Mathematical Instruments.
-Having secured these, he set out on his return
-journey for Scotland, and reached Greenock in safety in
-the autumn of 1756. There his health soon became
-sufficiently restored to enable him to return to work;
-and with the concurrence and help of his father, he
-shortly after proceeded to Glasgow, in his twentieth
-year, to begin business on his own account.</p>
-
-<p>In endeavouring to establish himself in his trade,
-Watt encountered the same obstacle which in London
-had almost prevented his learning it. Although there
-were no mathematical instrument makers in Glasgow,
-and it must have been a public advantage to have so
-skilled a mechanic settled in the place, Watt was opposed
-by the corporation of hammermen on the ground that
-he was neither the son of a burgess nor had served an
-apprenticeship within the borough.<a name="Anchor-65" id="Anchor-65" href="#Footnote-65" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 65.">[65]</a> Failing in his
-endeavours to open a place of business, he next tried to
-prevail on the corporation to allow him to make use of
-a small workshop wherein to make experiments; but
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_106">[106]</span>
-this also was peremptorily refused. The hammermen
-were doubtless acting in a very narrow spirit, in thus
-excluding the young mechanic from the privileges of
-citizenship; but such was the custom of the times,&mdash;those
-who were within the favoured circles usually
-putting their shoulders together to exclude those who
-were without. Watt had, however, already been employed
-by Dr. Dick, Professor of Natural Philosophy, to
-repair some mathematical instruments which had been
-bequeathed to the University by a gentleman in the West
-Indies; and the professors, having an absolute authority
-within the area occupied by the college buildings, determined
-to give him an asylum there, and thus free him
-from the incubus of the guilds.</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_125" style="width: 400px;">
-<img src="images/i_125.png" width="400" height="252" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">INNER QUADRANGLE, GLASGOW COLLEGE.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>In the heart of old Glasgow city, not far from the
-cathedral of St. Mungo, which Knox with difficulty preserved
-from the fury of the Scotch iconoclasts, stands
-the venerable University, a curiously black and sombre
-building, more than 400 years old. Inside the entrance,
-on the right-hand side, is a stone staircase, guarded
-by fabulous beasts in stone. The buildings consist of
-several quadrangles; but there is not much regularity in
-their design, each part seeming to stand towards the other
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_107">[107]</span>
-parts, in a state of independent crookedness and irregularity.
-There are turrets in the corners of the quadrangles,&mdash;turrets
-with peaked tops, like witches’ caps.
-In the inner quadrangle, entered from the left-hand side
-of the outer court, a workshop was found for our mechanician,
-in which he was securely established by the
-midsummer of 1757. The apartment appropriated to
-Watt by the professors is still to be seen in nearly the
-same rude state in which he left it. It is situated on
-the first floor of the range of building forming the north-west
-side of the inner quadrangle, immediately under
-the gallery of the Natural Philosophy class, with which
-it communicates. It is lighted by three windows, two
-of which open into the quadrangle, and the third, at the
-back, into the Professors’ court. There is a small closet
-in the corner of the room, where some students have
-cut their names in the plaster,&mdash;date “1713.” The
-access to the room used to be from the court by a spiral
-stone staircase; but that entrance is now closed. The
-apartment is only about twenty feet square; but it served
-Watt, as it has since served others, for high thinking
-and noble working.<a name="Anchor-66" id="Anchor-66" href="#Footnote-66" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 66.">[66]</a></p>
-
-<p>In addition to his workshop under the Natural Philosophy
-class, a shop for the sale of his instruments was
-also appropriated to Watt by the Professors. It formed
-the ground-floor of the house situated next to the Principal’s
-Gate, being part of the University Buildings, and
-was entered directly from the pavement of the High
-Street. It has been described to us, on the authority of
-Professor Fleming, as an old house, with a sort of arcade
-in front, supported on pillars. In making some alterations
-in the building the pillars were too much weakened,
-and the house, excepting the basement, had to be taken
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_108">[108]</span>
-down. The shop occupied by Watt is the little tenement
-shown on the right hand of the following engraving;
-but the lower story of the building has since been altered
-and repaired, and is now totally different from what it
-was in Watt’s time.</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_127" style="width: 400px;">
-<img src="images/i_127.png" width="400" height="348" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">ISOMETRIC VIEW OF GLASGOW COLLEGE, 1693, FROM SLEYER’S ‘THEATRUM SCOTIÆ.’<a name="Anchor-67" id="Anchor-67" href="#Footnote-67" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 67.">[67]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Though his wants were few, and he lived on humble
-fare, Watt found it very difficult to earn a subsistence
-by his trade. His father sent him remittances from
-time to time; but the old man had suffered serious losses
-in his own business, and had become much less able to
-help his son with money. After a year’s trial, Watt wrote
-to his father, that “unless it be the Hadley’s instruments
-there is little to be got by it, as at most other jobs
-I am obliged to do the most of them myself; and, as
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_109">[109]</span>
-it is impossible for one person to be expert at everything,
-they often cost me more time than they should
-do.” Of the quadrants, he could make three in a week,
-with the help of a lad; but the profit upon the three
-was not more than 40<i>s.</i> The customers for these were
-very few in number, as seagoing ships with their captains
-could not yet reach Glasgow.<a name="Anchor-68" id="Anchor-68" href="#Footnote-68" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 68.">[68]</a></p>
-
-<p>Failing sufficient customers for his instruments, Watt
-sent those which he had made to Port Glasgow and
-Greenock, where his father helped him to dispose of
-them. He also bethought him of taking a journey to
-Liverpool and London, for the purpose of obtaining
-orders for instruments; though, for some reason or
-other&mdash;most probably because he was averse to “pushing,”
-and detested the chaffering of trade&mdash;his contemplated
-journey was not undertaken. He therefore
-continued to execute only such orders as came to him,
-so that his business remained very small. He began to
-fear that he must give up the trade that would not keep
-him, and he wrote to his father: “If this business does
-not succeed, I must fall into some other.” To eke out
-his income, he took to map and chart selling, and,
-amongst other things, offered for sale the Map of the
-River Clyde,<a name="Anchor-69" id="Anchor-69" href="#Footnote-69" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 69.">[69]</a> originally surveyed by his uncle John.</p>
-
-<p>It is well for the world at large that Watt’s maps and
-quadrants remained on his hands unsold. The most
-untoward circumstances in life have often the happiest
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_110">[110]</span>
-results. It is not Fortune that is blind, but man. Had
-his instrument-making business prospered, Watt might
-have become known as a first-class maker of quadrants,
-but not as the inventor of the condensing steam-engine.
-It was because his own special business failed that he
-was driven to betake himself to other pursuits, and
-eventually to prosecute the invention on which his fame
-mainly rests. At first he employed part of his leisure in
-making chemical and other experiments; but as these
-yielded him no returns in the shape of money, he was
-under the necessity of making some sort of article that
-was in demand, and for which he could find customers.
-Although he had no ear for music, and scarcely knew
-one note from another, he followed the example of the
-old spectacle-maker, his first master, in making fiddles,
-flutes, and guitars, which met with a readier sale than
-his quadrants. These articles were what artists call
-“pot-boilers,” and kept him in funds until a maintenance
-could be earned by higher-class work. We are
-informed, through a lady at Glasgow, that her father
-bought a flute from Watt, who said to him, in selling it:
-“Woe be to ye, Tam, if you’re no guid luck; for this is
-the first I’ve sold!”</p>
-
-<p>His friend Dr. Black, probably to furnish him with
-some profitable employment, asked Watt to make a barrel-organ
-for him, which he at once proceeded to construct.
-Watt was not the man to refuse work of any kind
-requiring the exercise of constructive skill. He first
-carefully studied the principles of harmony,&mdash;making
-science, in a measure, the substitute for want of ear,<a name="Anchor-70" id="Anchor-70" href="#Footnote-70" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 70.">[70]</a>
-and took for his guide the profound but obscure work on
-‘Harmonics,’ published by Dr. R. Smith of Cambridge.
-He next made a model of the instrument; after which
-he constructed the organ, which, when finished, was
-considered a great success. About the same time the
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_111">[111]</span>
-office-bearers of a Mason’s Lodge in Glasgow sent to ask
-him if he would undertake to build for them a finger-organ.
-As he had <ins title="Transcriber's Note: original reads 'sucessfully'" id="Corr-111">successfully</ins> repaired an instrument
-of the same kind, besides making the barrel-organ, he
-readily accepted the order. Watt was always, as he
-said, dissatisfied with other people’s work, as well as
-his own; and this habit of his mind made him study
-to improve upon whatever came before him. Thus, in
-the process of building this organ, he devised a number
-of novel expedients, such as a sustained monochord, indicators
-and regulators of the strength of the blast, means
-of tuning the instrument according to any system of
-temperament, with sundry contrivances for improving
-the efficiency of the stops. The qualities of the organ
-when finished are said to have elicited the surprise and
-admiration of musicians.<a name="Anchor-71" id="Anchor-71" href="#Footnote-71" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 71.">[71]</a></p>
-
-<p>The leisure time which Watt did not occupy with
-miscellaneous work of this sort, he spent in reading. He
-did not want for books, as the College library was near
-at hand; and the professors as well as students were
-willing to lend him from their stores. He was not afraid
-of solid, heavy, dry books, provided he could learn something
-from them. All were alike welcome; and one of
-his greatest pleasures was in devouring a novel, when it
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_112">[112]</span>
-fell in his way. He is even said to have occupied himself
-in writing tales and verses when he had nothing
-else to do. As none of his attempts have been preserved,
-we cannot offer an opinion upon them; but it is doubtful
-whether Watt’s poetry and fiction would display the
-same originality and power of invention as his steam-engine.
-The only youthful exercises of his which have
-been preserved are anything but poetical. One of them,
-at Heathfield, is a ‘Treatise on Practical Megethometry;’
-and another is a ‘Compendium of Definitions,’ in Latin,
-by Gerard de Vries, both written in a neat round hand.</p>
-
-<p>Like most of the Glasgow citizens of that time, Watt
-occasionally visited his club, where he cultivated the
-society of men of greater culture and experience than
-himself.<a name="Anchor-72" id="Anchor-72" href="#Footnote-72" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 72.">[72]</a> As he afterwards observed to a friend, “Our
-conversations then, besides the usual subjects with young
-men, turned principally on literary topics, religion,
-morality, belles-lettres, &amp;c.; and to those conversations
-my mind owed its first bias towards such subjects, in
-which they were all much my superiors, I never having
-attended a college, and being then but a mechanic.”</p>
-
-<p>There was another circumstance connected with his
-situation at this time which must have been peculiarly
-agreeable to a young man of his character, aspirations,
-and thirst for knowledge. His shop, being conveniently
-situated within the College, was a favourite resort of
-the professors and the students. They were attracted
-by the ingenious instruments and models which the shop
-contained, and the pleasure always felt in witnessing
-the proceedings of a skilful mechanic at his work,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_113">[113]</span>
-but more particularly by the easy, unaffected, and original
-conversation of Watt himself. Though a comparative
-youth, the professors were usually glad to
-consult him on points of mechanical knowledge and
-practice; and the acuteness of his observation, the
-accuracy of his knowledge, and the readiness with
-which he communicated what he knew, soon rendered
-him a general favourite. Among his most frequent
-visitors were Dr. Joseph Black, the distinguished professor
-of chemistry, who there contracted a friendship
-with Watt which lasted, uninterrupted, for a period of
-forty years, until the Doctor’s death; Professor Simson,
-one of the most eminent men of his day, whom
-Lord Brougham has described as the restorer of the
-science of geometry; Dr. Dick, the Professor of Natural
-Philosophy; and Professor Anderson.<a name="Anchor-73" id="Anchor-73" href="#Footnote-73" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 73.">[73]</a> Dr. Moor and
-Dr. Adam Smith were also frequent callers. But of all
-Watt’s associates, none is more closely connected with
-his name and history than John Robison, then a student
-at Glasgow College, and afterwards Professor of Natural
-Philosophy at Edinburgh.</p>
-
-<p>Robison was nearer Watt’s age than the rest, and
-stood in the intimate relation to him of bosom friend,
-as well as fellow inquirer in science. He was handsome
-and prepossessing in appearance, frank and lively, full
-of fancy and humour, and a general favourite in the
-College. He was a capital talker, an accomplished
-linguist, and a good musician; yet, with all his versatility,
-he was a profound thinker and a diligent student,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_114">[114]</span>
-especially in mathematical and mechanical science, as
-he afterwards proved in his elaborate ‘System of
-Mechanical Philosophy,’ edited by Sir David Brewster,
-and his many able contributions to the ‘Encyclopædia
-Britannica,’ of which he was the designer and editor.</p>
-
-<p>Robison’s introduction to Watt has been described
-by himself. After feasting his eyes on the beautifully-finished
-instruments in his shop, Robison entered into
-conversation with him. Expecting to find only a workman,
-he was surprised to discover a philosopher. “I
-had the vanity,” says Robison, “to think myself a pretty
-good proficient in my favourite study (mathematical
-and mechanical philosophy), and was rather mortified
-at finding Mr. Watt so much my superior. But his
-own high relish for these things made him pleased
-with the chat of any person who had the same tastes
-with himself; and his innate complaisance made him
-indulge my curiosity, and even encourage my endeavours
-to form a more intimate acquaintance with
-him. I lounged much about him, and, I doubt not,
-was frequently teasing him. Thus our acquaintance
-began.”</p>
-
-<p>In Watt’s workshop also, Robison first met Dr. Black,
-and there initiated a friendship which ended only with
-death. “My first acquaintance with him,” Robison
-afterwards wrote Watt, “began in your rooms when
-you were rubbing up Macfarlane’s instruments. He
-used to come in, and, standing with his back to us,
-amuse himself with Bird’s quadrant, whistling softly to
-himself, in a manner that thrilled me to the heart.”</p>
-
-<p>In 1757 Robison applied for the office of assistant to
-Dr. Dick, Professor of Natural Philosophy, in the
-place of the son of that gentleman, who had just died;
-but though he had already taken the degree of Master
-of Arts, he was thought too young to hold so important
-an office, being only about nineteen years old. His
-friends wished him to study for the church; but, preferring
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_115">[115]</span>
-some occupation in which his mechanical tastes
-might be indulged, he turned his eyes to London. Furnished
-with letters from Professor Dick and Dr. Simson,
-he obtained an introduction to Admiral Knowles, who
-engaged him to take charge of his son’s instruction
-while at sea. In that capacity he sailed from Spithead
-in 1759, with the fleet which assisted the land forces in
-the taking of Quebec; he and his pupil being rated as
-midshipmen in the Admiral’s ship. Robison was on
-duty in the boat which carried Wolfe to the point
-where the army scaled the heights of Montcalm the
-night before the battle; and as the sun was setting in
-the west, the General, doubtless from an association of
-ideas suggested by the dangers of the coming struggle,
-recited, in an under tone, Gray’s ‘Elegy on a Country
-Churchyard;’ and when he had finished, said, “Now,
-gentlemen, I would rather have been the author of that
-poem than take Quebec.”</p>
-
-<p>When Robison returned from his voyagings in 1763,
-a travelled man,&mdash;having had the advantage, during
-his absence, of acting as confidential assistant of Admiral
-Knowles in his marine surveys and observations,&mdash;he
-reckoned himself more than on a par with Watt; but
-he soon found that, during the period of his absence
-from Glasgow, his friend had been even busier than himself.
-When they entered into conversation, he found
-Watt continually striking into new paths where he was
-obliged to be his follower. The extent of the mathematical
-instrument maker’s investigations was no less
-remarkable than the depth to which he had pursued
-them. Not only had he mastered the principles of
-engineering, civil and military, but diverged into
-studies in antiquity, natural history, languages, criticism,
-and art. Every pursuit became science in his
-hands, and he made use of his subsidiary knowledge
-for the purpose of helping him towards his favourite
-objects.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_116">[116]</span></p>
-
-<p>Before long, Watt became to be regarded as one of
-the ablest men about college. “When to the superiority
-of knowledge in his own line,” said Robison,
-“which every man confessed, there was joined the
-naïve simplicity and candour of his character, it is
-no wonder that the attachment of his acquaintances
-was so strong. I have seen something of the world,”
-he continued, “and I am obliged to say that I never
-saw such another instance of general and cordial
-attachment to a person whom all acknowledged to
-be their superior. But this superiority was concealed
-under the most amiable candour, and liberal allowance
-of merit to every man. Mr. Watt was the first to
-ascribe to the ingenuity of a friend things which
-were very often nothing but his own surmises followed
-out and embodied by another. I am well entitled
-to say this, and have often experienced it in my
-own case.”</p>
-
-<p>There are few traits in biography more charming
-than this generous recognition of merit mutually
-attributed by the one friend to the other. Arago,
-in quoting the words of Robison, has well observed that
-it is difficult to determine whether the honour of having
-thus recorded them be not as great as that of having
-inspired them.</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_135" style="width: 350px;">
-<img src="images/i_135.png" width="350" height="205" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">THE BROOMIELAW IN 1760.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_117">[117]</span></p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_136" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_136.png" width="450" height="557" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">PROFESSOR ROBISON, Æt. 60.</p>
-<p class="caption">[By T. D. Scott, after Raeburn.]</p>
-</div>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_118">[118]</span></p>
-
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-<h3>CHAPTER VII.<br />
-
-<small><span class="smcap">Watt’s Experiments on Steam&mdash;Invents the Separate
-Condenser.</span></small></h3>
-
-
-<p><span class="smcap">It</span> was in the year 1759 that Robison first called the
-attention of his friend Watt to the subject of the steam-engine.
-Robison was then only in his twentieth, and
-Watt in his twenty-third year. Robison’s idea was
-that the power of steam might be advantageously
-applied to the driving of wheel-carriages, and he suggested
-that it would be the most convenient for the
-purpose to place the cylinder with its open end downwards
-to avoid the necessity of using a working beam.
-Watt admits that he was very ignorant of the steam-engine
-at the time; nevertheless, he began making a
-model with two cylinders of tinplate, intending that
-the pistons and their connecting-rods should act
-alternately on two pinions attached to the axles of the
-carriage-wheels. But the model, being slightly and inaccurately
-made, did not answer his expectations. Other
-difficulties presented themselves, and the scheme was
-laid aside on Robison leaving Glasgow to go to sea.
-Indeed, mechanical science was not yet ripe for the
-locomotive. Robison’s idea had, however, dropped
-silently into the mind of his friend, where it grew from
-day to day, slowly and at length fruitfully.</p>
-
-<p>At his intervals of leisure and in the quiet of his
-evenings, Watt continued to prosecute his various
-studies. He was shortly attracted by the science of
-chemistry, then in its infancy. Dr. Black was at that
-time occupied with the investigations which led to his
-discovery of the theory of latent heat, and it is probable
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_119">[119]</span>
-that his familiar conversations with Watt on the subject
-induced the latter to enter upon a series of experiments
-with the view of giving the theory some practical
-direction. His attention again and again reverted to
-the steam-engine, though he had not yet seen even a
-model of one. Steam was as yet almost unknown in
-Scotland as a working power. The first engine was
-erected at Elphinstone Colliery, in Stirlingshire, about
-the year 1750; and the second more than ten years
-later, at Govan Colliery, near Glasgow, where it was
-known by the startling name of “The Firework.”
-This had not, however, been set up at the time Watt
-began to inquire into the subject. But he found that
-the College possessed the model of a Newcomen engine
-for the use of the Natural Philosophy class, which had
-been sent to London for repair. On hearing of its
-existence, he suggested to his friend Dr. Anderson, Professor
-of Natural Philosophy, the propriety of getting
-back the model; and a sum of money was placed by
-the Senatus at the Professor’s disposal “to recover the
-steam-engine from Mr. Sisson, instrument maker, in
-London.”</p>
-
-<p>In the mean time Watt sought to learn all that had
-been written on the subject of the steam-engine. He
-ascertained from Desaguliers, from Switzer, and other
-writers, what had been accomplished by Savery,
-Newcomen, Beighton, and others: and he went on
-with his own independent experiments. His first
-apparatus was of the simplest possible kind. He used
-common apothecaries’ phials for his steam reservoirs,
-and canes hollowed out for his steam pipes.<a name="Anchor-74" id="Anchor-74" href="#Footnote-74" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 74.">[74]</a> In 1761
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_120">[120]</span>
-he proceeded to experiment on the force of steam by
-means of a small Papin’s digester and a syringe.
-The syringe was only the third of an inch
-in diameter, fitted with a solid piston;
-and it was connected with the digester
-by a pipe furnished with a stopcock, by
-which the steam was admitted or shut off
-at will. It was also itself provided with
-a stopcock, enabling a communication to
-be opened between the syringe and the
-outer air to permit the steam in the
-syringe to escape. The apparatus, though
-rude, enabled the experimenter to ascertain
-some important facts. When the steam in the
-digester was raised and the cock turned, enabling it to
-rush against the lower side of the piston, he found
-that the expansive force of the steam raised a weight of
-fifteen pounds with which the piston was loaded. Then,
-on turning the cock and shutting off the connexion with
-the digester at the same time that a passage was opened
-to the air, the steam was allowed to escape, when the
-weight upon the piston, being no longer counteracted,
-immediately forced it to descend.</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_139" style="width: 112px;">
-<img src="images/i_139.png" width="112" height="200" alt="" />
-<p class="caption"><ins title="Transcriber's Note: added missing caption" id="Corr-120">PAPIN’S DIGESTER.</ins></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Watt saw that it would be easy to contrive that the
-cocks should be turned by the machinery itself instead of
-by the hand, and the whole be made to work by itself
-with perfect regularity. But there was an objection to
-this method. Water is converted into vapour as soon
-as its elasticity is sufficient to overcome the weight of
-the air which keeps it down. Under the ordinary
-pressure of the atmosphere water acquires this necessary
-elasticity at 212°; but as the steam in the digester was
-prevented from escaping, it acquired increased heat, and
-by consequence increased elasticity. Hence it was that
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_121">[121]</span>
-the steam which issued from the digester was not only
-able to support the piston and the air which pressed
-upon its upper surface, but the additional load with
-which the piston was weighted. With the imperfect
-mechanical construction, however, of those days, there
-was a risk lest the boiler should be burst by the steam,
-which was apt to force its way through the ill-made
-joints of the machine. This, conjoined with the great
-expenditure of steam on the high-pressure system, led
-Watt to abandon the plan; and the exigencies of
-his business for a time prevented him pursuing his
-experiments. Watt’s own account of his early experiments
-will be found appended as notes to Brewster’s
-edition of the articles ‘Steam and Steam-engines,’
-written by Dr. Robison for the ‘Encyclopædia Britannica,’
-and afterwards published in a separate form.</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_140" style="width: 250px;">
-<img src="images/i_140.png" width="250" height="377" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">THE NEWCOMEN MODEL.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>At length the Newcomen
-model arrived
-from London; and, in
-1763, the little engine,
-which was destined to
-become so famous, was
-put into the hands of
-Watt. The boiler was
-somewhat smaller than
-an ordinary tea-kettle.
-The cylinder of the engine
-was only of two
-inches diameter and six
-inches stroke. Watt at
-first regarded it as
-merely “a fine plaything.”
-It was, however,
-enough to set him
-upon a track of thinking
-which led to the most important results. When
-he had repaired the model and set it to work, he
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_122">[122]</span>
-found that the boiler, though apparently large enough,
-could not supply steam in sufficient quantity, and only
-a few strokes of the piston could be obtained, when the
-engine stopped. The fire was urged by blowing, and
-more steam was produced, but still it would not work
-properly. Exactly at the point at which another man
-would have abandoned the task in despair, the mind of
-Watt became thoroughly roused. “Everything,” says
-Professor Robison, “was to him the beginning of a new
-and serious study; and I knew that he would not quit
-it till he had either discovered its insignificance, or had
-made something of it.” Thus it happened with the
-phenomena presented by the model of the steam-engine.
-Watt referred to his books, and endeavoured to ascertain
-from them by what means he might remedy the defects
-which he found in the model; but they could tell him
-nothing. He then proceeded with an independent
-course of experiments, resolved to work out the problem
-for himself. In the course of his inquiries he came
-upon a fact which, more than any other, led his mind
-into the train of thought which at last conducted him to
-the invention of which the results were destined to prove
-so stupendous. This fact was the existence of Latent Heat.</p>
-
-<p>In order to follow the track of investigation pursued
-by Watt, it is necessary for a moment to revert to the
-action of the Newcomen pumping-engine. A beam,
-moving upon a centre, had affixed to one end of it a
-chain attached to the piston of the pump, and at the
-other a chain attached to a piston that fitted into the
-steam cylinder. It was by driving this latter piston up
-and down the cylinder that the pump was worked. To
-communicate the necessary movement to the piston, the
-steam generated in a boiler was admitted to the bottom
-of the cylinder, forcing out the air through a valve,
-when its pressure on the under side of the piston counterbalanced
-the pressure of the atmosphere on its upper
-side. The piston, thus placed between two equal forces,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_123">[123]</span>
-was drawn up to the top of the cylinder by the greater
-weight of the pump-gear at the opposite extremity of
-the beam. The steam, so far, only discharged the office
-which was performed by the air it displaced; but, if
-the air had been allowed to remain, the piston once at
-the top of the cylinder could not have returned, being
-pressed as much by the atmosphere underneath as by
-the atmosphere above it. The steam, on the contrary,
-which was admitted by the exclusion of the air, <em>could be
-condensed</em>, and a vacuum created, by injecting cold water
-through the bottom of the cylinder. The piston being
-now unsupported, was forced down by the pressure of
-the atmosphere on its upper surface. When the piston
-reached the bottom, the steam was again let in, and the
-process was repeated. Such was the engine in ordinary
-use for pumping water at the time that Watt begun his
-investigations.</p>
-
-<p>Among his other experiments, he constructed a boiler
-which showed by inspection the quantity of water evaporated
-in any given time, and the quantity of steam
-used in every stroke of the engine. He was astonished
-to discover that a <em>small</em> quantity of water in the form of
-steam, heated a <em>large</em> quantity of cold water injected
-into the cylinder for the purpose of cooling it; and
-upon further examination he ascertained that steam
-heated <em>six times</em> its weight of cold water to 212°, which
-was the temperature of the steam itself. “Being struck
-with this remarkable fact,” says Watt, “and not understanding
-the reason of it, I mentioned it to my friend
-Dr. Black, who then explained to me his doctrine of
-latent heat, which he had taught for some time before
-this period (the summer of 1764); but having myself
-been occupied by the pursuits of business, if I had heard
-of it I had not attended to it, when I thus stumbled
-upon one of the material facts by which that beautiful
-theory is supported.”<a name="Anchor-75" id="Anchor-75" href="#Footnote-75" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 75.">[75]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_124">[124]</span></p>
-
-<p>When Watt found that water, in its conversion into
-vapour, became such a reservoir of heat, he was more
-than ever bent on economising it; for the great waste
-of heat involving so heavy a consumption of fuel, was
-felt to be the principal obstacle to the extended employment
-of steam as a motive power. He accordingly
-endeavoured, with the same quantity of fuel, at once
-to increase the production of steam, and to diminish its
-waste. He increased the heating surface of the boiler,
-by making flues through it; he even made his boiler
-of wood, as being a worse conductor of heat than
-the brickwork which surrounds common furnaces; and
-he cased the cylinders and all the conducting-pipes
-in materials which conducted heat very slowly. But
-none of these contrivances were effectual; for it turned
-out that the chief expenditure of steam, and consequently
-of fuel, in the Newcomen engine, was occasioned
-by the reheating of the cylinder after the steam
-had been condensed, and the cylinder was consequently
-cooled by the injection into it of the cold water.
-Nearly four-fifths of the whole steam employed was
-condensed on its first admission, before the surplus
-could act upon the piston. Watt therefore came to the
-conclusion, that to make a perfect steam-engine, it was
-necessary that <em>the cylinder should be always as hot as the
-steam that entered it</em>; but it was equally necessary that
-the steam should be condensed when the piston descended,&mdash;nay,
-that it should be cooled down below
-100°, or a considerable amount of vapour would be
-given off, which would resist the descent of the piston,
-and diminish the power of the engine. Thus the
-cylinder was never to be at a less temperature than
-212°, and yet at each descent of the piston it was to be
-less than 100°; conditions which, on the very face of
-them, seemed to be wholly incompatible.</p>
-
-<p>We revert for a moment to the progress of Watt’s
-instrument-making business. The shop in the College
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_125">[125]</span>
-was not found to answer, being too far from the principal
-thoroughfares. If he wanted business he must go
-nearer to the public, for it was evident that they would
-not come to him. But to remove to a larger shop, in a
-more central quarter, involved an expenditure of capital
-for which he was himself unequal. His father had
-helped him with money as long as he could, but could
-do so no longer. Though he was as much respected
-by his neighbours as ever, he had grown poor by his
-losses; and, instead of giving help, himself needed it.
-Watt therefore looked about him for a partner with
-means, and succeeded in finding one in a Mr. John
-Craig, in conjunction with whom he opened a retail
-shop in the Salt-market, nearly opposite St. Andrew’s
-Street, about the year 1760; removing from thence to
-Buchanan’s Land, on the north side of the Trongate,
-a few years later.<a name="Anchor-76" id="Anchor-76" href="#Footnote-76" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 76.">[76]</a> Watt’s partner was not a mechanic,
-but he supplied the requisite capital, and attended to
-the books. The partnership was on the whole successful,
-as we infer from the increased number of hands
-employed. At first Watt could execute all his orders
-himself, and afterwards by the help of a man and a
-boy; but by the end of 1764, the number of hands
-employed by the firm had increased to sixteen.</p>
-
-<p>His improving business brought with it an improving
-income, and Watt&mdash;always a frugal and thrifty
-man&mdash;began to save a little money. He was encouraged
-to economise by another circumstance&mdash;his intended
-marriage with his cousin, Margaret Miller. In anticipation
-of this event, he had removed from his rooms
-in the College to a house in Delftfield Lane&mdash;a narrow
-passage then parallel with York Street, but now converted
-into the spacious thoroughfare of Watt Street.
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_126">[126]</span>
-Having furnished his house in a plain yet comfortable
-style, he brought home his young wife, and installed her
-there in July, 1764. The step was one of much importance
-to his personal wellbeing. Mrs. Watt was of a
-lively, cheerful temperament; and as Watt himself was of
-a meditative disposition, prone to melancholy, and a frequent
-sufferer from nervous headache, her presence at
-his fireside could not fail to have a beneficial influence
-upon his health and comfort.</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_145" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_145.png" width="450" height="376" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">WATT’S HOUSE, DELFTFIELD LANE.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Watt continued to pursue his studies as before.
-Though still occupied with his inquiries and experiments
-as to steam, he did not neglect his proper business,
-but was constantly on the look-out for improvements
-in instrument making. A machine which he
-invented for drawing in perspective proved a success;
-and he made a considerable number of them to order,
-for customers in London as well as abroad. He was
-also an indefatigable reader, and continued to extend
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_127">[127]</span>
-his knowledge of chemistry and mechanics by perusal
-of the best books on these sciences.</p>
-
-<p>Above all other subjects, however, the improvement
-of the steam-engine continued to keep the fastest hold
-upon his mind. He still brooded over his experiments
-with the Newcomen model, but did not seem to make
-much way in introducing any practical improvement in
-its mode of working. His friend Robison says he
-struggled long to condense with sufficient rapidity
-without injection, trying one expedient after another,
-finding out what would do by what would <em>not</em> do, and
-exhibiting many beautiful specimens of ingenuity and
-fertility of resource. He continued, to use his own
-words, “to grope in the dark, misled by many an <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">ignis
-fatuus</i>.” It was a favourite saying of his, that “Nature
-has a weak side, if we can only find it out;” and he
-went on groping and feeling for it, but as yet in vain.
-At length light burst upon him, and all at once the
-problem over which he had been brooding was solved.</p>
-
-<p>One Sunday afternoon, in the spring of 1765, he
-went to take an afternoon walk on the Green, then a
-quiet, grassy meadow, used as a bleaching and grazing-ground.
-On week-days the Glasgow lasses came thither
-with their largest kail-pots, to boil their clothes in;
-and sturdy queans might be seen, with coats kilted,
-tramping blankets in their tubs. On Sundays the place
-was comparatively deserted, and hence Watt, who lived
-close at hand, went there to take a quiet afternoon
-stroll. His thoughts were as usual running on the subject
-of his unsatisfactory experiments with the Newcomen
-engine, when the first idea of the separate condenser
-suddenly flashed upon his mind. But the notable discovery
-is best told in his own words, as related to Mr.
-Robert Hart, many years after:&mdash;</p>
-
-<p>“I had gone to take a walk on a fine Sabbath afternoon.
-I had entered the Green by the gate at the foot
-of Charlotte Street, and had passed the old washing-house.
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_128">[128]</span>
-I was thinking upon the engine at the time,
-and had gone as far as the herd’s house, when the idea
-came into my mind that as steam was an elastic body it
-would rush into a vacuum, and if a communication were
-made between the cylinder and an exhausted vessel, it
-would rush into it, and might be there condensed without
-cooling the cylinder. I then saw that I must get
-rid of the condensed steam and injection-water if I used
-a jet, as in Newcomen’s engine. Two ways of doing
-this occurred to me. First, the water might be run off
-by a descending pipe, if an off-let could be got at the
-depth of 35 or 36 feet, and any air might be extracted
-by a small pump. The second was to make the pump
-large enough to extract both water and air. He continued:
-I had not walked further than the Golf-house<a name="Anchor-77" id="Anchor-77" href="#Footnote-77" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 77.">[77]</a>
-when the whole thing was arranged in my mind.”<a name="Anchor-78" id="Anchor-78" href="#Footnote-78" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 78.">[78]</a></p>
-
-<p>Great and prolific ideas are almost always simple.
-What seems impossible at the outset appears so obvious
-when it is effected that we are prone to marvel that it
-did not force itself at once upon the mind. Late in life
-Watt, with his accustomed modesty, declared his belief
-that if he had excelled, it had been <ins title="Transcriber's Note: added missing quotation mark" id="Corr-128">“by</ins> chance and the
-neglect of others.” To Professor Jardine he said “that
-when it was analysed the invention would not appear so
-great as it seemed to be. In the state,” said he, “in
-which I found the steam-engine, it was no great effort
-of mind to observe that the quantity of fuel necessary to
-make it work would for ever prevent its extensive
-utility. The next step in my progress was equally easy&mdash;to
-inquire what was the cause of the great consumption
-of fuel: this, too, was readily suggested, viz., the
-waste of fuel which was necessary to bring the whole
-cylinder, piston, and adjacent parts from the coldness of
-water to the heat of steam, no fewer than from fifteen
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_129">[129]</span>
-to twenty times in a minute.” The question then
-occurred, how was this to be avoided or remedied?
-It was at this stage that the idea of carrying on the
-condensation in a separate vessel flashed upon his mind,
-and solved the difficulty.<a name="Anchor-79" id="Anchor-79" href="#Footnote-79" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 79.">[79]</a></p>
-
-<p>Mankind has been more just to Watt than he was to
-himself. There was no accident in the discovery. It
-had been the result of close and continuous study; and
-the idea of the separate condenser was merely the last
-step of a long journey&mdash;a step which could not have
-been taken unless the road which led to it had been
-traversed. Dr. Black says, “This capital improvement
-flashed upon his mind at once, and filled him with
-rapture;” a statement which, spite of the unimpassioned
-nature of Watt, we can readily believe.</p>
-
-<p>On the morning following his Sunday afternoon’s
-walk on Glasgow Green, Watt was up betimes making
-arrangements for a speedy trial of his new plan. He
-borrowed from a college friend a large brass syringe, an
-inch and a third in diameter, and ten inches long,
-of the kind used by anatomists for injecting arteries
-with wax previous to dissection. The body of the
-syringe served for a cylinder, the piston-rod passing
-through a collar of leather in its cover. A pipe connected
-with the boiler was inserted at both ends for the
-admission of steam, and at the upper end was another
-pipe to convey the steam to the condenser. The axis of
-the stem of the piston was drilled with a hole, fitted
-with a valve at its lower end, to permit the water
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_130">[130]</span>
-produced by the condensed steam on first filling the
-cylinder to escape. The first condenser made use of
-was an improvised cistern of tinned plate, provided
-with a pump to get rid of the water formed by the
-condensation of the steam, both the condensing-pipes
-and the air-pump being placed in a reservoir of cold
-water.</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“The steam-pipe,” says Watt, “was adjusted to a small boiler.
-When steam was produced, it was admitted into the cylinder, and
-soon issued through the perforation of the
-rod, and at the valve of the condenser;
-when it was judged that the air was expelled,
-the steam-cock was shut, and the
-air-pump piston-rod was drawn up, which
-leaving the small pipes of the condenser
-in a state of vacuum, the steam entered
-them and was condensed. The piston of
-the cylinder immediately rose and lifted
-a weight of about 18 lbs., which was
-hung to the lower end of the piston-rod.
-The exhaustion-cock was shut, the steam
-was readmitted into the cylinder, and the
-operation was repeated. The quantity of
-steam consumed and the weights it could
-raise were observed, and, excepting the non-application of the steam-case
-and external covering, the invention was complete, in so for as
-regarded the savings of steam and fuel.”</p>
-</div>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_149" style="width: 200px;">
-<img src="images/i_149.png" width="200" height="249" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">WATT’S APPARATUS.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>But, although the invention was complete in Watt’s
-mind, it took him many long and laborious years to
-work out the details of the engine. His friend Robison,
-with whom his intimacy was maintained during these
-interesting experiments, has given a graphic account of
-the difficulties which he successively encountered and
-overcame. He relates that on his return from the
-country, after the College vacation in 1765, he went to
-have a chat with Watt and communicate to him some
-observations he had made on Desaguliers’ and Belidor’s
-account of the steam-engine. He went straight into
-the parlour, without ceremony, and found Watt sitting
-before the fire looking at a little tin cistern which he
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_131">[131]</span>
-had on his knee. Robison immediately started the
-conversation about steam, his mind, like Watt’s, being
-occupied with the means of avoiding the excessive
-waste of heat in the Newcomen engine. Watt, all the
-while, kept looking into the fire, and after a time laid
-down the cistern at the foot of his chair, saying nothing.
-It seems that Watt felt rather nettled at Robison
-having communicated to a mechanic of the town a
-contrivance which he had hit upon for turning the
-cocks of his engine. When Robison therefore pressed
-his inquiry, Watt at length looked at him and said
-briskly, “You need not fash yourself any more about
-that, man; I have now made an engine that shall
-not waste a particle of steam. It shall all be boiling
-hot,&mdash;ay, and hot water injected, if I please.” He
-then pushed the little tin cistern with his foot under
-the table.</p>
-
-<p>Robison could learn no more of the new contrivance
-from Watt at that time; but on the same evening he
-accidentally met a mutual acquaintance, who, supposing
-he knew as usual the progress of Watt’s experiments,
-observed to him, “Well, have you seen Jamie Watt?”
-“Yes.” “He’ll be in fine spirits now with his engine?”
-“Yes,” said Robison, “very fine spirits.” “Gad!”
-said the other, “the separate condenser’s the thing:
-keep it but cold enough, and you may have a perfect
-vacuum, whatever be the heat of the cylinder.” This
-was Watt’s secret, and the nature of the contrivance
-was clear to Robison at once.</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_151" style="width: 400px;">
-<img src="images/i_151.png" width="400" height="489" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">DR. JOSEPH BLACK.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>It will be observed that Watt had not made a secret
-of it to his other friends. Indeed Robison himself
-admitted that one of Watt’s greatest delights was to
-communicate the results of his experiments to others,
-and set them upon the same road to knowledge with
-himself; and that no one could display less of the small
-jealousy of the tradesman than he did. To his intimate
-friend, Dr. Black, he communicated the progress made
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_132">[132]</span>
-by him at every stage; and the Doctor kindly
-encouraged him in his struggles, cheered him in
-his encounter with difficulty, and, what was of still
-more practical value at the time, he helped him with
-money to enable him to prosecute his invention.
-Communicative though Watt was disposed to be,
-he learnt reticence when he found himself exposed
-to the depredations of the smaller fry of inventors.
-Robison says that had he lived in Birmingham or
-London at the time, the probability is that some one
-or other of the numerous harpies who live by sucking
-other people’s brains, would have secured patents for
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_133">[133]</span>
-his more important inventions, and thereby deprived
-him of the benefits of his skill, science, and labour.
-As yet, however, there were but few mechanics in
-Glasgow capable of understanding or appreciating the
-steam-engine; and the intimate friends to whom he
-freely spoke of his discovery were too honourable-minded
-to take advantage of his confidence. Shortly
-after, Watt fully communicated to Robison the different
-stages of his invention, and the results at which he had
-arrived, much to the delight of his friend.</p>
-
-<p>It will be remembered that in the Newcomen engine
-the steam was only employed for the purpose of
-producing a vacuum, and that its working power was
-in the down stroke, which was effected by the pressure
-of the air upon the piston; hence it is now usual to
-call it the atmospheric engine. Watt perceived that
-the air which followed the piston down the cylinder
-would cool the latter, and that steam would be wasted
-in re-heating it. In order, therefore, to avoid this
-loss of heat, he resolved to put an air-tight cover upon
-the cylinder, with a hole and stuffing-box for the piston-rod
-to slide through, and to admit steam above the
-piston, to act upon it instead of the atmosphere. When
-the steam had done its duty in driving down the piston,
-a communication was opened between the upper and
-lower part of the cylinder, and the same steam, distributing
-itself equally in both compartments, sufficed
-to restore equilibrium. The piston was now drawn up
-by the weight of the pump-gear; the steam beneath
-it was then condensed in the separate vessel so as to
-produce a vacuum, and a fresh jet of steam from the
-boiler was let in above the piston, which forced it again
-to the bottom of the cylinder. From an atmospheric it
-had thus become a true steam-engine, and with a much
-greater economy of steam than when the air did half the
-duty. But it was not only important to keep the air
-from flowing down the inside of the cylinder: the
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_134">[134]</span>
-air which circulated within cooled the metal and condensed
-a portion of the steam within; and this Watt
-proposed to remedy by a second cylinder, surrounding
-the first with an interval between the two which was to
-be kept full of steam.</p>
-
-<p>One by one these various contrivances were struck
-out, modified, settled, and reduced to definite plans;
-the separate condenser, the air and water pumps, the
-use of fat and oil (instead of water as in the Newcomen
-engine) to keep the piston working in the cylinder
-air-tight, and the enclosing of the cylinder itself within
-another to prevent the loss of heat. They were all but
-emanations from the first idea of inventing an engine
-working by a piston, in which the cylinder should
-be kept continually hot and perfectly dry. “When
-once,” says Watt, “the idea of separate condensation
-was started, all these improvements followed as corollaries
-in quick succession; so that in the course of one or
-two days the invention was thus far complete in my
-mind.”</p>
-
-<p>The next step was to construct a model engine for
-the purpose of embodying the invention in a working
-form. With this object Watt hired an old cellar,
-situated in the first wide entry to the north of the
-beef-market in King Street, and there proceeded with
-his model. He found it much easier, however, to prepare
-his plan than to execute it. Like most ingenious
-and inventive men, Watt was extremely fastidious;
-and this occasioned considerable delay in the execution
-of the work. His very inventiveness to some extent
-proved a hinderance; for new expedients were perpetually
-occurring to him, which he thought would be
-improvements, and which he, by turns, endeavoured
-to introduce. Some of these expedients he admits
-proved fruitless, and all of them occasioned delay.
-Another of his chief difficulties was in finding competent
-workmen to execute his plans. He himself had
-been accustomed only to small metal work, with comparatively
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_135">[135]</span>
-delicate tools, and had very little experience
-“in the practice of mechanics <em>in great</em>,” as he termed it.
-He was therefore under the necessity of depending,
-in a great measure, upon the handiwork of others.
-But mechanics capable of working out Watt’s designs
-in metal were then with difficulty to be found. The
-beautiful self-acting tools and workmanship which have
-since been called into being, principally by his own
-invention, did not then exist. The only available hands
-in Glasgow were the blacksmiths and tinners, little
-capable of constructing articles out of their ordinary
-walks; and even in these they were often found clumsy,
-blundering, and incompetent. The result was, that in
-consequence of the malconstruction of the larger parts,
-Watt’s first model was only partially successful. The
-experiments made with it, however, served to verify
-the expectations he had formed, and to place the advantages
-of the invention beyond the reach of doubt. On
-the exhausting-cock being turned, the piston, when
-loaded with 18 lbs., ascended as quick as the blow of a
-hammer; and the moment the steam-cock was opened,
-it descended with like rapidity, though the steam was
-weak, and the machine snifted at many openings.</p>
-
-<p>Satisfied that he had laid hold of the right principle
-of a working steam-engine, Watt felt impelled to follow
-it to an issue. He could give his mind to no other
-business in peace until this was done. He wrote to a
-friend that he was quite barren on every other subject.
-“My whole thoughts,” said he, “are bent on this
-machine. I can think of nothing else.”<a name="Anchor-80" id="Anchor-80" href="#Footnote-80" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 80.">[80]</a> He proceeded
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_136">[136]</span>
-to make another and bigger, and, he hoped, a more
-satisfactory engine, in the following August; and with
-that object he removed from the old cellar in King-street
-to a larger apartment in the then disused pottery
-or delftwork near the Broomielaw. There he shut
-himself up with his assistant, John Gardiner, for the
-purpose of erecting his engine. The cylinder was five
-or six inches in diameter, with a two-feet stroke. The
-inner cylinder was enclosed in a wooden steam-case, and
-placed inverted, the piston working through a hole in the
-bottom of the steam-case. After two months’ continuous
-application and labour it was finished and set to work;
-but it leaked in all directions, and the piston was far
-from air-tight. The condenser also was in a bad way,
-and needed many alterations. Nevertheless, the engine
-readily worked with 10½ lbs. pressure on the inch, and
-the piston lifted a weight of 14 lbs. The improvement
-of the cylinder and piston continued Watt’s chief difficulty,
-and taxed his ingenuity to the utmost. At so low
-an ebb was the art of making cylinders that the one he
-used was not bored but hammered, the collective mechanical
-skill of Glasgow being then unequal to the
-boring of a cylinder of the simplest kind; nor, indeed,
-did the necessary appliances for the purpose then exist
-anywhere else. In the Newcomen engine a little water
-was poured upon the upper surface of the piston, and sufficiently
-filled up the interstices between the piston and the
-cylinder. But when Watt employed steam to drive down
-the piston, he was deprived of this resource, for the
-water and the steam could not coexist. Even if he had
-retained the agency of the air above, the drip of water
-from the crevices into the lower part of the cylinder
-would have been incompatible with keeping the surface
-hot and dry, and, by turning into vapour as it fell upon
-the heated metal, it would have impaired the vacuum
-during the descent of the piston.</p>
-
-<p>While he was occupied with this difficulty, and striving
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_137">[137]</span>
-to overcome it by the adoption of new expedients, such as
-leather collars and improved workmanship, he wrote to a
-friend, “My old white-iron man is dead;” the old white-iron
-man, or tinner, being his leading mechanic. Unhappily,
-also, just as he seemed to have got the engine into
-working order, the beam broke, and having great difficulty
-in replacing the damaged part, the accident threatened,
-together with the loss of his best workman, to bring
-the experiment to an end. But though discouraged by
-these misadventures, he was far from defeated, but went
-on as before, battling down difficulty inch by inch, and
-holding good the ground he had won, becoming every
-day more strongly convinced that he was in the right
-track, and that the important uses of the invention,
-could he but find time and means to perfect it, were
-beyond the reach of doubt.</p>
-
-<p>But how to find the means! Watt himself was a
-comparatively poor man; having no money but what
-he earned by his business of mechanical instrument
-making, which he had for some time been neglecting
-through his devotion to the construction of his
-engine. What he wanted was capital, or the help of
-a capitalist willing to advance him the necessary funds
-to perfect his invention. To give a fair trial to the
-new apparatus would involve an expenditure of several
-thousand pounds; and who on the spot could be expected
-to invest so large a sum in trying a machine so
-entirely new, depending for its success on physical principles
-very imperfectly understood?</p>
-
-<p>There was no such help to be found in Glasgow.
-The tobacco lords, though rich, took no interest in steam
-power, and the manufacturing class, though growing in
-importance, had full employment for their little capital
-in their own concerns.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_138">[138]</span></p>
-
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-<h3>CHAPTER VIII.<br />
-
-<small><span class="smcap">Watt’s Connexion with Dr. Roebuck&mdash;Watt acts as
-Surveyor and Engineer.</span></small></h3>
-
-
-<p><span class="smcap">Dr. Black</span> continued to take a lively interest in Watt’s
-experiments, and lent him occasional sums of money
-from time to time to enable him to prosecute them to an
-issue. But the Doctor’s means were too limited to
-permit him to do more than supply Watt’s more pressing
-necessities. Meanwhile, the debts which the latter had
-already incurred, small though they were in amount,
-hung like a millstone round his neck. Black then
-bethought him whether it would not be possible to associate
-Watt with some person possessed of sufficient
-means, and of an active commercial spirit, who should
-join as a partner in the risk, and share in the profits of
-the enterprise. Such a person, he thought, was Dr.
-Roebuck, the founder of the Carron Iron Works, an
-enterprising man, of undaunted spirit, not scared by
-difficulties, nor a niggard of expense when he saw
-before him any reasonable prospect of advantage.<a name="Anchor-81" id="Anchor-81" href="#Footnote-81" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 81.">[81]</a></p>
-
-<p>Roebuck was at that time engaged in sinking for coal
-on a large scale near Boroughstoness, where he experienced
-considerable difficulty in keeping the shafts
-clear of water. The Newcomen engine, which he had
-erected, was found comparatively useless, and he was
-ready to embrace any other scheme which held out
-a reasonable prospect of success. Accordingly, when
-his friend Dr. Black informed him of an ingenious
-young mechanic at Glasgow who had invented a steam-engine,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_139">[139]</span>
-capable of working with increased power, speed,
-and economy, Roebuck immediately felt interested,
-and entered into correspondence with Watt on the
-subject. He was at first somewhat sceptical as to
-the practicability of the new engine, so different in its
-action from that of Newcomen; and he freely stated
-his doubts to Dr. Black. He was under the impression
-that condensation might in some way be effected in
-the cylinder without injection; and he urged Watt to
-try whether this might not be done. Contrary to his
-own judgment, Watt tried a series of experiments with
-this object, and at last abandoned them, Roebuck himself
-admitting his error.</p>
-
-<p>Up to this time Watt and Roebuck had not met,
-though they carried on a long correspondence on the
-subject of the engine. In September, 1765, we find
-Roebuck inviting Watt to come over with Dr. Black to
-Kinneil (where Roebuck lived), and discuss with him
-the subject of the engine. Watt wrote to say that “if
-his foot allowed him” he would visit Carron on a
-certain day, from which we infer that he intended
-to walk. But the way was long and the road miry,
-and Watt could not then leave his instrument shop, so
-the visit was postponed. In the mean time Roebuck
-urged Watt to press forward his invention with all
-speed, “whether he pursued it as a philosopher or as a
-man of business.”</p>
-
-<p>In the month of November following, Watt forwarded
-to Roebuck the detailed drawings of a covered cylinder
-and piston to be cast at the Carron Works. Though
-the cylinder was the best that could be made there, it
-was very ill-bored, and was eventually laid aside as
-useless. The piston-rod was made at Glasgow, under
-Watt’s own supervision; and when it was completed
-he was afraid to send it on a common cart, lest
-the workpeople should see it, which would “occasion
-speculation.” “I believe,” he wrote in July, 1766, “it
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_140">[140]</span>
-would be best to send it in a box.” These precautions
-would seem to have been dictated, in some measure, by
-fear of piracy; and it is obvious that the necessity of
-acting by stealth increased the difficulty of getting the
-various parts of the proposed engine constructed. Watt’s
-greatest obstacle continued to be the clumsiness and
-inexpertness of his mechanics. “My principal hinderance
-in erecting engines,” he wrote to Roebuck, “is
-always the smith-work.”</p>
-
-<p>In the mean time it was necessary for Watt to attend
-to the maintenance of his family. He found that the
-steam-engine experiments brought nothing in, while
-they were a constant source of expense. Besides,
-they diverted him from his retail business, which needed
-constant attention. It ought also to be mentioned that
-his partner having lately died, the business had been
-somewhat neglected and had consequently fallen off.
-At length he determined to give it up altogether,
-and begin the business of a surveyor. He accordingly
-removed from the shop in Buchanan’s Land to an office
-on the east side of King-street, a little south of Prince’s-street.
-It would appear that he succeeded in obtaining
-a fair share of business in his new vocation. He already
-possessed a sufficient knowledge of surveying from the
-study of the instruments which it had been his business
-to make; and application and industry did the rest.
-His first jobs were in surveying lands, defining boundaries,
-and surveyor’s work of the ordinary sort; from
-which he gradually proceeded to surveys of a more important
-character.</p>
-
-<p>It affords some indication of the local estimation in
-which Watt was held, that the magistrates of Glasgow
-should have selected him as a proper person to survey a
-canal for the purpose of opening up a new coal-field in
-the neighbourhood, and connecting it with the city,
-with a view to a cheaper and more abundant supply of
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_141">[141]</span>
-fuel. He also surveyed a ditch-canal for the purpose
-of connecting the rivers Forth and Clyde, by what was
-called the Loch Lomond passage; though the scheme of
-Brindley and Smeaton was eventually preferred as the
-more direct line. Watt came up to London in 1767,
-in connexion with the application to Parliament for
-powers to construct his canal; and he seems to have
-been very much disgusted with the proceedings before
-“the confounded committee of Parliament,” as he called
-it; adding, “I think I shall not long to have anything
-to do with the House of Commons again. I never saw
-so many wrong-headed people on all sides gathered together.”
-The fact, however, that they had decided against
-him had probably some share in leading him to form
-this opinion as to the wrong-headedness of the Parliamentary
-Committee.</p>
-
-<p>Though interrupted by indispensable business of this
-sort, Watt proceeded with the improvement of his steam-engine
-whenever leisure permitted. Roebuck’s confidence
-in its eventual success was such that in 1767 he
-undertook to pay debts to the amount of 1000<i>l.</i> which
-Watt had incurred in prosecuting his project up to
-that time, and also to provide the means of prosecuting
-further experiments, as well as to secure a patent for
-the engine. In return for this outlay Roebuck was
-to have two-thirds of the property in the invention.
-Early in 1768 Watt made trial of a new and larger
-model, with a cylinder of seven or eight inches diameter.
-But the result was not very satisfactory. “By
-an unforeseen misfortune,” he wrote Roebuck, “the
-mercury found its way into the cylinder, and played
-the devil with the solder. This throws us back at least
-three days, and is very vexatious, especially as it happened
-in spite of the precautions I had taken to prevent
-it.” Roebuck, becoming impatient, urged Watt to meet
-him to talk the matter over; and suggested that as Watt
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_142">[142]</span>
-could not come as far as Carron, they should meet at
-Kilsyth, about fifteen miles from Glasgow. Watt
-replied, saying he was too unwell to be able to ride so
-far, and that his health was such that the journey would
-disable him from doing anything for three or four days
-after. But he went on with his experiments, patching
-up his engine, and endeavouring to get it into working
-condition. After about a month’s labour, he at last
-succeeded to his heart’s content; and he at once communicated
-the news to his partner, intimating his intention
-of at last paying his long-promised visit to Roebuck
-at Kinneil. “I sincerely wish you joy of this successful
-result,” he said, “and hope it will make some return for
-the obligations I owe you.”</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_161" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_161.png" width="450" height="277" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">KINNEIL HOUSE.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Kinneil House, to which Watt hastened to pay his
-visit of congratulation to Dr. Roebuck, is an old-fashioned
-building, somewhat resembling an old French château.
-It was a former country-seat of the Dukes of Hamilton,
-and is finely situated on the shores of the Frith of
-Forth. The mansion is rich in classical associations,
-having been inhabited, since Roebuck’s time, by Dugald
-Stewart, who wrote in it his ‘Philosophy of the Human
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_143">[143]</span>
-Mind.’<a name="Anchor-82" id="Anchor-82" href="#Footnote-82" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 82.">[82]</a> There he was visited by Wilkie, the painter,
-when in search of subjects for his pictures; and Dugald
-Stewart found for him, in an old farmhouse in the
-neighbourhood, the cradle-chimney introduced in the
-“Penny Wedding.” But none of these names can stand
-by the side of that of Watt; and the first thought at
-Kinneil, of every one who is familiar with his history,
-would be of the memorable day when he rode over
-in exultation to wish Dr. Roebuck joy of the success
-of the steam-engine. His note of triumph was, however,
-premature. He had yet to suffer many sickening
-delays and bitter disappointments; for, though he had
-contrived to get his model executed with fair precision,
-the skill was still wanting to manufacture the
-parts of their full size with the requisite unity; and his
-present elation was consequently doomed to be succeeded
-by repeated discomfiture.</p>
-
-<p>The model went so well, however, that it was determined
-at once to take out a patent for the engine. The
-first step was to secure its provisional protection, and
-with that object Watt went to Berwick-upon-Tweed,
-and made a declaration before a Master in Chancery
-of the nature of the invention. In August, 1768, we
-find him in London on the business of the patent. He
-became utterly wearied with the delays interposed by
-sluggish officialism, and disgusted with the heavy fees
-which he was required to pay in order to protect his
-invention. He wrote home to his wife at Glasgow
-in a very desponding mood. Knowing her husband’s
-diffidence and modesty, but having the fullest confidence
-in his genius, she replied, “I beg that you will not
-make yourself uneasy, though things should not succeed
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_144">[144]</span>
-to your wish. If it [the condensing engine] will not
-do, <em>something else will; never despair</em>.” Watt must have
-felt cheered by these brave words of his noble helpmate,
-and encouraged to go onward cheerfully in hope.</p>
-
-<p>He could not, however, shake off his recurring fits
-of despondency, and on his return to Glasgow, we find
-him occasionally in very low spirits. Though his head
-was full of his engine, his heart ached with anxiety for
-his family, who could not be maintained on hope,
-already so often deferred. The more sanguine Roebuck
-was elated with the good working of the model, and
-impatient to bring the invention into practice. He
-wrote Watt in October, 1768, “You are now letting the
-most active part of your life insensibly glide away.
-A day, a moment, ought not to be lost. And you
-should not suffer your thoughts to be diverted by any
-other object, or even improvement of this, but only the
-speediest and most effectual manner of executing an
-engine of a proper size, according to your present
-ideas.”</p>
-
-<p>Watt, however, felt that his invention was capable of
-many improvements, and he was never done introducing
-new expedients. He proceeded, in the intervals of leisure
-which he could spare from his surveying business, to
-complete the details of the drawings and specification,&mdash;making
-various trials of pipe-condensers, plate-condensers,
-and drum-condensers,&mdash;contriving steam-jackets
-to prevent the waste of heat and new methods
-for securing greater tightness of the piston,&mdash;inventing
-condenser-pumps, oil-pumps, gauge-pumps, exhausting-cylinders,
-loading-valves, double cylinders, beams, and
-cranks. All these contrivances had to be thought out
-and tested, elaborately and painfully, amidst many
-failures and disappointments; and Dr. Roebuck began
-to fear that the fresh expedients which were always
-starting up in Watt’s brain, would endlessly protract the
-consummation of the invention. Watt, on his part, felt
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_145">[145]</span>
-that he could only bring the engine nearer to perfection
-by never resting satisfied with imperfect devices, and
-hence he left no means untried to overcome the many
-practical defects in it of which he was so conscious.
-Long after, when a noble lord was expressing to him
-the admiration with which he regarded his great
-achievement, Watt replied: “The public only look
-at my success, and not at the intermediate failures
-and uncouth constructions which have served me as so
-many steps to climb to the top of the ladder.”</p>
-
-<p>As to the lethargy from which Roebuck sought to
-raise Watt, it was merely the temporary reaction of a
-mind strained and wearied with long-continued application
-to a single subject, and from which it seemed
-to be occasionally on the point of breaking down altogether.
-To his intimate friends, Watt bemoaned his
-many failures, his low spirits, his bad health, and his
-sleepless nights. He wrote to his friend Dr. Small<a name="Anchor-83" id="Anchor-83" href="#Footnote-83" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 83.">[83]</a> in
-January, 1769, “I have many things I could talk to
-you about&mdash;much contrived, and little executed. How
-much would good health and spirits be worth to me!”
-A month later he wrote, “I am still plagued with headaches,
-and sometimes heart-aches.”</p>
-
-<p>It is nevertheless a remarkable proof of Watt’s indefatigable
-perseverance in his favourite pursuit, that at
-this very time, when apparently sunk in the depths of
-gloom, he learnt German for the purpose of getting at
-the contents of a curious book, the <cite lang="la" xml:lang="la">Theatrum Machinarum</cite>
-of Leupold, which just then fell into his hands, and
-contained an account of the machines, furnaces, methods
-of working, profits, &amp;c., of the mines in the Upper
-Hartz. His instructor in the language was a Swiss
-dyer,<a name="Anchor-84" id="Anchor-84" href="#Footnote-84" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 84.">[84]</a> settled in Glasgow. With the like object of
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_146">[146]</span>
-gaining access to untranslated books in French and
-Italian&mdash;then the great depositories of mechanical and
-engineering knowledge&mdash;Watt had already mastered
-both those languages.</p>
-
-<p>In preparing his specification, Watt viewed the subject
-in all its bearings. The production of power by
-steam is a very large one, but Watt grasped it
-thoroughly. The insight with which he searched,
-analysed, arranged, and even provided for future modifications,
-was the true insight of genius. He seems with
-an almost prophetic eye to have seen all that steam was
-capable of accomplishing. This is well illustrated by
-his early plan of working steam expansively by cutting
-it off at about half-stroke, thereby greatly economising its
-use;<a name="Anchor-85" id="Anchor-85" href="#Footnote-85" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 85.">[85]</a> as well as by his proposal to employ high-pressure
-steam where cold water could not be used for purposes
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_147">[147]</span>
-of condensation.<a name="Anchor-86" id="Anchor-86" href="#Footnote-86" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 86.">[86]</a> The careful and elaborate manner in
-which he studied the specification, and the consideration
-which he gave to each of its various details, are clear from
-his correspondence with Dr. Small, which is peculiarly
-interesting, as showing Watt’s mind actively engaged in
-the very process of invention. At length the necessary
-specification and drawings were completed and lodged
-early in 1769,&mdash;a year also remarkable as that in which
-Arkwright took out the patent for his spinning-machine.</p>
-
-<p>In order to master thoroughly the details of the ordinary
-Newcomen engine, and to ascertain the extent of its
-capabilities as well as of its imperfections, Watt undertook
-the erection of several engines of this construction;
-and during his residence at Kinneil took charge of the
-Schoolyard engine near Boroughstoness, in order that
-he might thereby acquire a full practical knowledge of
-its working. Mr. Hart, in his interesting ‘Reminiscences
-of James Watt,’ gives the following account:
-“My late brother had learned from an old man who had
-been a workman at Dr. Roebuck’s coal-works when
-Mr. Watt was there, that he had erected a small engine
-on a pit they called Taylor’s Pit. The workman could
-not remember what kind of engine it was, but it was
-the fastest-going one he ever saw. From its size, and
-from its being placed in a small timber-house, the
-colliers called it ‘the Box Bed.’ We thought it likely
-to have been the first of the patent engines made by
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_148">[148]</span>
-Mr. Watt, and took the opportunity of mentioning this
-to him at our interview. He said he had erected that
-engine, but he did not wish at the time to venture on a
-patent one until he had a little more experience.”<a name="Anchor-87" id="Anchor-87" href="#Footnote-87" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 87.">[87]</a></p>
-
-<p>At length he proceeded
-to erect the trial engine
-after his new patent, and
-made arrangements to
-stay at Kinneil until the
-work was finished. It had
-been originally intended
-to erect it in the little town
-of Boroughstoness; but
-as prying eyes might have
-there watched his proceedings,
-and as he wished
-to avoid display, being
-determined, as he said,
-“not to puff,” he fixed
-upon an outhouse behind
-Kinneil, close by the burn-side
-in the glen, where
-there was abundance of
-water and secure privacy.
-The materials were
-brought to the place,
-partly from Watt’s small
-works at Glasgow, and
-partly from Carron, where
-the cylinder&mdash;of eighteen
-inches diameter and five
-feet stroke&mdash;had been
-cast; and a few workmen were placed at his disposal.</p>
-
-<div class="figleft" id="i_167" style="width: 213px;">
-<img src="images/i_167.png" width="213" height="500" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">THE OUTHOUSE BEHIND KINNEIL.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>The process of erection was very tedious, owing to
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_149">[149]</span>
-the clumsiness of the mechanics employed on the job.
-Watt was occasionally compelled to be absent on other
-business, and on his return he usually found the men
-at a standstill, not knowing what to do next. As
-the engine neared completion, his “anxiety for his
-approaching doom” kept him from sleep; for his fears,
-as he said, were at least equal to his hopes. He was
-easily cast down by little obstructions, and especially
-discouraged by unforeseen expense. Roebuck, on the
-contrary, was hopeful and energetic, and often took
-occasion to rally the other on his despondency under
-difficulties, and his almost painful want of confidence in
-himself. Roebuck was, doubtless, of much service to Watt
-in encouraging him to proceed with his invention, and
-also in suggesting some important modifications in the
-construction of the engine. It is probable, indeed, that
-but for his help, Watt could not have gone on. Robison
-says, “I remember Mrs. Roebuck remarking one evening,
-‘Jamie is a queer lad, and, without the Doctor, his
-invention would have been lost; but Dr. Roebuck won’t
-let it perish.’”</p>
-
-<p>The new engine, on which Watt had expended so
-much labour, anxiety, and ingenuity, was completed
-in September, 1759, about six months from the date
-of its commencement. But its success was far from
-decided. Watt himself declared it to be “a clumsy
-job.” His new arrangement of the pipe-condenser
-did not work well; and the cylinder having been
-badly cast, was found almost useless. One of his greatest
-difficulties consisted in keeping the piston tight. He
-wrapped it round with cork, oiled rags, tow, old hat,
-paper, horse-dung, and other things, but still there were
-open spaces left, sufficient to let the air in and the
-steam out. Watt was grievously depressed by his want
-of success, and he had serious thoughts of giving up the
-thing altogether. Before abandoning it, however,
-the engine was again thoroughly overhauled, many
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_150">[150]</span>
-improvements were introduced in it, and a new trial
-was made of its powers. But this proved not more
-successful than the earlier ones had been. “You cannot
-conceive,” he wrote to Small, “how mortified I am with
-this disappointment. It is a damned thing for a man
-to have his all hanging by a single string. If I had
-wherewithal to pay the loss, I don’t think I should so
-much fear a failure; but I cannot bear the thought of
-other people becoming losers by my schemes; and I
-have the happy disposition of always painting the
-worst.”</p>
-
-<p>Watt was therefore bound to prosecute his project by
-honour not less than by interest; and summoning up
-his courage, he went on with it anew. He continued
-to have the same confidence as ever in the principles of
-his engine: where it broke down was in workmanship.
-Could mechanics but be found capable of accurately
-executing its several parts, he believed that its success
-was certain. But there were no such mechanics then at
-Carron.</p>
-
-<p>By this time Roebuck was becoming embarrassed
-with debt, and involved in various difficulties. The
-pits were drowned with water, which no existing
-machinery could pump out, and ruin threatened to overtake
-him before Watt’s engine could come to his help.
-He had sunk in the coal-mine, not only his own fortune,
-but much of the property of his relatives; and
-he was so straitened for money that he was unable
-to defray the cost of taking out the engine patent
-according to the terms of his engagement, and Watt
-had accordingly to borrow the necessary money from
-his never-failing friend, Dr. Black. He was thus
-adding to his own debts, without any clearer prospect
-before him of ultimate relief. No wonder that he should,
-after his apparently fruitless labour, express to Small his
-belief that, “of all things in life, there is nothing more
-foolish than inventing.” The unhappy state of his mind
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_151">[151]</span>
-may be further inferred from his lamentation expressed
-to the same friend on the 31st of January, 1770. “To-day,”
-said he, “I enter the thirty-fifth year of my life,
-and I think I have hardly yet done thirty-five pence
-worth of good in the world; but I cannot help it.”</p>
-
-<p>Notwithstanding the failure of his engine thus far,
-and the repeated resolution expressed to Small that he
-would invent no more, leading, as inventing did, to only
-vexation, failure, loss, and increase of headache, Watt
-could not control his irrepressible instinct to invent;
-and whether the result might be profitable or not, his
-mind went on as before, working, scheming, and
-speculating. Thus, at different times in the course of
-his correspondence with Small, who was a man of a
-like ingenious turn of mind, we find him communicating
-various new things, “gimcracks,” as he termed
-them, which he had contrived. He was equally ready
-to contrive a cure for smoky chimneys, a canal sluice
-for economising water, a method of determining “the
-force necessary to dredge up a cubic foot of mud under
-any given depth of water,” and a means of “clearing
-the observed distance of the moon from any given
-star of the effects of refraction and parallax;” illustrating
-his views by rapid but graphic designs embodied
-in the text of his letters to Small and other correspondents.
-One of his minor inventions was a new
-method of readily measuring distances by means of a
-telescope.<a name="Anchor-88" id="Anchor-88" href="#Footnote-88" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 88.">[88]</a> At the same time he was occupied in
-making experiments on kaolin, with the intention of
-introducing the manufacture of porcelain in the pottery
-work on the Broomielaw, in which he was a partner.
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_152">[152]</span>
-He was also concerned with Dr. Black and Dr. Roebuck
-in pursuing experiments with the view of decomposing
-sea-salt by lime, and thereby obtaining alkali
-for purposes of commerce. A patent for the process
-was taken out by Dr. Roebuck, but eventually proved
-a failure, like most of his other projects. We also find
-Watt inventing a muffling furnace for melting metals,
-and sending the drawings to Mr. Boulton at Birmingham
-for trial. At other times he was occupied with
-Chaillet, the Swiss dyer, experimenting on various
-chemical substances; corresponding with Dr. Black as
-to the new fluoric or spar acid; and at another time
-making experiments to ascertain the heats at which
-water boils at every inch of mercury from vacuo to air.
-Later we find him inventing a prismatic micrometer
-for measuring distances, which he described in considerable
-detail in his letters to Small.<a name="Anchor-89" id="Anchor-89" href="#Footnote-89" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 89.">[89]</a> He was at
-the same time busy inventing and constructing a new
-surveying quadrant by reflection, and making improvements
-in barometers and hygrometers. “I should like
-to know,” he wrote to Small, “the principles of <em>your</em>
-barometer: De Luc’s hygrometer is nonsense. <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">Probavi.</i>”
-Another of his contrivances was his dividing-screw,
-for dividing an inch accurately into 1000 equal
-parts. He states that he found this screw exceedingly
-useful, as it saved him much needless compass-work,
-and, moreover, enabled him to divide lines into the
-ordinates of any curve whatsoever.</p>
-
-<p>Such were the multifarious pursuits in which this
-indefatigable student and inquirer was engaged;
-all tending to cultivate his mind and advance his education,
-but comparatively unproductive, so far as regarded
-pecuniary return. So unfortunate, indeed, had
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_153">[153]</span>
-Watt’s speculations proved, that his friend Dr. Hutton,
-of Edinburgh, addressed to him a New-year’s day letter,
-with the object of dissuading him from proceeding
-further with his unprofitable brain-distressing work.
-“A happy new year to you!” said Hutton; “may it
-be fertile to you in lucky events, but no new inventions!”
-He went on to say that invention was only for
-those who live by the public, and those who from pride
-choose to leave a legacy to the public. It was not a thing
-likely to be well paid for under a system where the rule
-was to be the best paid for the work that was easiest
-done. It was of no use, however, telling Watt that he
-must not invent. One might as well have told Burns
-that he was not to sing because it would not pay, or
-Wilkie that he was not to paint, or Hutton himself that
-he was not to think and speculate as to the hidden
-operations of nature. To invent was the natural and
-habitual operation of Watt’s intellect, and he could not
-restrain it.</p>
-
-<p>Watt had already been too long occupied with this
-profitless work: his money was all gone; he was in
-debt; and it behoved him to turn to some other employment
-by which he might provide for the indispensable
-wants of his family. Having now given up the
-instrument-making business, he confined himself almost
-entirely to surveying. Among his earliest surveys was
-one of a coal canal from Monkland to Glasgow, in
-1769; and the Act authorising its construction was
-obtained in the following year. Watt was invited to
-superintend the execution of the works, and he had
-accordingly to elect whether he would go on with the
-engine experiments, the event of which was doubtful,
-or embrace an honourable and perhaps profitable employment,
-attended with much less risk and uncertainty.
-His necessities decided him. “I had,” he said, “a wife
-and children, and saw myself growing grey without
-having any settled way of providing for them.” He
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_154">[154]</span>
-accordingly accepted the appointment offered him by
-the directors of the canal, and undertook to superintend
-the construction of the works at a salary of
-200<i>l.</i> a year. At the same time he determined not to
-drop the engine, but to proceed with it at such leisure
-moments as he could command.</p>
-
-<p>The Monkland Canal was a small concern, and Watt
-had to undertake a variety of duties. He acted at the
-same time as surveyor, superintendent, engineer, and
-treasurer, assisted only by a clerk. But the appointment
-proved useful to him. The salary he earned
-placed his family above want, and the out-doors life
-he was required to lead improved his health and
-spirits. After a few months he wrote Dr. Small that
-he found himself more strong, more resolute, less lazy,
-and less confused, than when he began the occupation.
-His pecuniary affairs were also more promising.
-“Supposing the engine to stand good for itself,” he
-said, “I am able to pay all my debts and some little
-thing more, so that I hope in time to be on a par with
-the world.” But there was a dark side to the picture.
-His occupation exposed him to fatigue, vexation, hunger,
-wet, and cold. Then, the quiet and secluded
-habits of his early life did not fit him for the out-door
-work of the engineer. He was timid and reserved,
-and had nothing of the navvy in his nature. He had
-neither the roughness of tongue nor stiffness of back
-to enable him to deal with rude labour gangs. He
-was nervously fearful lest his want of practical experience
-should betray him into scrapes, and lead to
-impositions on the part of his workmen. He hated
-higgling, and declared that he would rather “face a
-loaded cannon than settle an account or make a bargain.”
-He had been “cheated,” he said, “by undertakers, and
-was unlucky enough to know it.”</p>
-
-<p>Watt continued to act as engineer for the Monkland
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_155">[155]</span>
-Canal Company for about a year and a half,<a name="Anchor-90" id="Anchor-90" href="#Footnote-90" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 90.">[90]</a> during
-which he was employed in other engineering works.
-Among these was a survey of the river Clyde, with a
-view to the improvement of the navigation. Watt
-sent in his report; but no steps were taken to carry
-out his suggestions until several years later, when the
-beginning was made of a series of improvements, which
-have resulted in the conversion of the Clyde from a
-pleasant trouting and salmon stream into one of the
-busiest navigable highways in the world.<a name="Anchor-91" id="Anchor-91" href="#Footnote-91" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 91.">[91]</a></p>
-
-<p>Among Watt’s other labours about the same period
-may be mentioned his survey of a canal between Perth
-and Cupar Angus, through Strathmore; of the Crinan
-Canal, afterwards carried out by Rennie; and other
-projects in the western highlands. The Strathmore
-Canal survey was conducted at the instance of the Commissioners
-of Forfeited Estates. It was forty miles long,
-through a very rough country. Watt set out to make
-it in September, 1770, and was accompanied by snowstorms
-through almost the entire survey. He suffered
-severely from the cold: the winds swept down from
-the Grampians with fury and chilled him to the bone.
-The making of this survey occupied him forty-three
-days, and the remuneration he received for it was
-only eighty pounds, which included expenses. The
-small pay of engineers at that time may be further
-illustrated by the fee paid him in the same year for
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_156">[156]</span>
-supplying the magistrates of Hamilton with a design
-for the proposed new bridge over the Clyde at that
-town. It was originally intended to employ Mr.
-Smeaton; but as his charge was ten pounds, which
-was thought too high, Watt was employed in his
-stead. The Burgh minutes record that, after the Act
-had been obtained in 1770, Baillie Naismith was appointed
-to proceed to Glasgow to see Mr. Watt on the
-subject of a design, and his charge being only 7<i>l.</i> 7<i>s.</i>,
-he was requested to supply it accordingly. “I have
-lately,” wrote Watt to Small, “made a plan and estimate
-of a bridge over our river Clyde, eight miles above
-this: it is to be of five arches and 220 feet waterway,
-founded upon piles on a muddy bottom.”<a name="Anchor-92" id="Anchor-92" href="#Footnote-92" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 92.">[92]</a> The bridge,
-after Watt’s plan, was begun in 1771, but it was not
-finished until 1780.<a name="Anchor-93" id="Anchor-93" href="#Footnote-93" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 93.">[93]</a></p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_175" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_175.png" width="450" height="286" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">HAMILTON BRIDGE.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>About the same time Watt prepared plans of docks
-and piers at Port Glasgow, and of a new harbour at
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_157">[157]</span>
-Ayr. The Port Glasgow works were carried out, but
-those at Ayr were postponed. When Rennie came to
-examine the design for the improvement of the Ayr
-navigation, of which the new harbour formed part, he
-took objections to it, principally because of the parallelism
-of the piers, and another plan was eventually adopted.
-His principal engineering job, and the last of the kind
-on which Watt was engaged in Scotland, was a survey
-of the Caledonian Canal, long afterwards carried out
-by Telford. The survey was made in the autumn of
-1773, through a country without roads. “An incessant
-rain,” said he, “kept me for three days as wet as water
-could make me; I could hardly preserve my journal
-book.”</p>
-
-<p>In the midst of this dreary work, Watt was summoned
-to Glasgow by the intelligence which reached him of the
-illness of his wife; and when he reached home he found
-that she had died in childbed.<a name="Anchor-94" id="Anchor-94" href="#Footnote-94" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 94.">[94]</a> Of all the heavy blows
-he had suffered, this he felt to be the worst. His wife
-had struggled with him through poverty; she had often
-cheered his fainting spirit when borne down by doubt,
-perplexity, and disappointment; and now she was gone,
-without being able to share in his good fortune as she
-had done in his adversity. For some time after, when
-about to enter his humble dwelling, he would pause on
-the threshold, unable to summon courage to enter the
-room where he was never more to meet “the comfort of
-his life.” “Yet this misfortune,” he wrote to Small,
-“might have fallen upon me when I had less ability to
-bear it, and my poor children might have been left
-suppliants to the mercy of the wide world.”</p>
-
-<p>Watt tried to forget his sorrow, as was his custom, in
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_158">[158]</span>
-increased application to work, though the recovery of
-the elasticity of his mind was in a measure beyond
-the power of his will. There were, at that time, very
-few bright spots in his life. A combination of unfortunate
-circumstances threatened to overwhelm him. No
-further progress had yet been made with his steam-engine,
-which he almost cursed as the cause of his misfortunes.
-Dr. Roebuck’s embarrassments had reached
-their climax. He had fought against the water which
-drowned his coal until he could fight no more, and he
-was at last delivered into the hands of his creditors a
-ruined man. “My heart bleeds for him,” said Watt,
-“but I can do nothing to help him. I have stuck by
-him, indeed, till I have hurt myself.”</p>
-
-<p>But the darkest hour is nearest the dawn. Watt had
-passed through a long night, and a gleam of sunshine at
-last beamed upon him. Matthew Boulton, of Birmingham,
-was at length persuaded to take up the invention on
-which Watt had expended so many of the best years
-of his life, and the turning-point in Watt’s fortunes had
-arrived.</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_177" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_177.png" width="450" height="238" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">PORT GLASGOW.</p>
-<p class="caption">[By R. P. Leitch.]</p>
-</div>
-
-
-
-
-<hr class="full" />
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_179" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_179.png" width="450" height="436" alt="" />
-<p class="caption"><big><i>Mathew Boulton, F.R.S.</i></big></p>
-<p class="caption"><i>Engraved by W. Hall, after the portrait by Sir W. Beechy, R.A.</i></p>
-<p class="caption"><small><i>Published by John Murray Albemarle Street. 1865.</i></small></p>
-</div>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_159">[159]</span></p>
-
-
-
-<h2><big>BOULTON AND WATT,</big><br />
-ENGINEERS, BIRMINGHAM.</h2>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_160">[160]</span></p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_181" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_181.png" width="450" height="509" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">BIRMINGHAM.</p>
-<p class="caption">[By Percival Skelton.]</p>
-</div>
-
-
-
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_161">[161]</span></p>
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-<h3>CHAPTER IX.<br />
-
-<small><span class="smcap">Birmingham&mdash;Matthew Boulton.</span></small></h3>
-
-
-<p><span class="smcap">From</span> an early period, Birmingham has been one of the
-principal centres of mechanical industry in England.
-The neighbourhood abounds in coal and iron, and has
-long been famous for the skill of its artisans. Swords
-were forged there in the time of the Ancient Britons.
-The first guns made in England bore the Birmingham
-mark. In 1538 Leland found “many smiths in the
-town that use to make knives and all manner of cutting
-tools, and many loriners that make bittes, and a great
-many nailers.” About a century later Camden described
-the place as “full of inhabitants, and resounding with
-hammers and anvils, for the most part of them smiths.”
-As the skill of the Birmingham artisans increased, they
-gradually gave up the commoner kinds of smithery, and
-devoted themselves to ornamental metal-work, in brass,
-steel, and iron. They became celebrated for their
-manufacture of buckles, buttons, and various fancy
-articles; and they turned out such abundance of toys
-that towards the close of last century Burke characterised
-Birmingham as “the great toy-shop of Europe.”</p>
-
-<p>The ancient industry of Birmingham was of a staid
-and steady character, in keeping with the age. Each
-manufacturer kept within the warmth of his own forge.
-He did not go in search of orders, but waited for the
-orders to come to him. Ironmongers brought their
-money in their saddle-bags, took away the goods in exchange,
-or saw them packed ready for the next waggon
-before they left. Notwithstanding this quiet way of
-doing business, many comfortable fortunes were made in
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_162">[162]</span>
-the place; the manufacturers, like their buttons, moving
-off so soon as they had received the stamp and the gilt.
-Hutton, the Birmingham bookseller, says he knew men
-who left the town in chariots who had first approached
-it on foot. Hutton himself entered the town a poor
-boy, and lived to write its history, and make a fortune
-by his industry.</p>
-
-<p>Until towards the end of last century the town was
-not very easy of approach from any direction. The
-roads leading to it had become worn by the traffic of
-many generations. The hoofs of the pack-horses, helped
-by the rains, had deepened the tracks in the sandy soil,
-until in many places they were twelve or fourteen feet
-deep, so that it was said of travellers that they approached
-the town by sap. One of these old hollow
-roads, still called Holloway-head, though now filled
-up, was so deep that a waggon-load of hay might pass
-along it without being seen. There was no direct communication
-between Birmingham and London until
-about the middle of the century. Before then, the
-Great Road from London to Chester passed it four
-miles off, and the Birmingham manufacturer, when
-sending wares to London, had to forward his package
-to Castle Bromwich, there to await the approach of the
-packhorse train or the stage-waggon journeying south.
-The Birmingham men, however, began to wake up, and
-in 1747 a coach was advertised to run to London in two
-days “if the roads permit.” Twenty years later a stage-waggon
-was put on, and the communication by coach
-became gradually improved.</p>
-
-<p>When Hutton entered Birmingham in 1740, he was
-struck by the activity of the place and the vivacity of
-the inhabitants, which expressed itself in their looks as
-he passed them in the streets. “I had,” he says, “been
-among dreamers, but now I saw men awake. Their
-very step showed alacrity. Every man seemed to know
-and to prosecute his own affairs.” The Birmingham
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_163">[163]</span>
-men were indeed as alert as they looked&mdash;steady
-workers and clever mechanics&mdash;men who struck hard
-on the anvil. The artisans of the place had the advantage
-of a long training in mechanical skill. It had
-been bred in their bone, and descended to them from
-their fathers as an inheritance.<a name="Anchor-95" id="Anchor-95" href="#Footnote-95" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 95.">[95]</a> In no town in England
-were there then to be found so many mechanics capable
-of executing entirely new work; nor, indeed, has the
-ability yet departed from them, the Birmingham artisans
-maintaining their individual superiority in intelligent
-execution of skilled work to the present day. We are
-informed that inventors of new machines, foreign as
-well as English, are still in the practice of resorting
-to them for the purpose of getting their inventions embodied
-in the best forms, with greater chances of success
-than in any other town in England.</p>
-
-<p>About the middle of last century the two Boultons,
-father and son, were recognised as among the most enterprising
-and prosperous of Birmingham manufacturers.
-The father of the elder Matthew Boulton was
-John Boulton of Northamptonshire, in which county
-Boultons or Boltons have been settled for a long period,
-and where there are records of many clergymen of the
-name. About the end of the seventeenth century, this
-John Boulton settled at Lichfield, where he married
-Elizabeth, heir of Matthew Dyott of Stitchbrooke, by
-whom he obtained considerable property. His means
-must, however, have become reduced; in consequence
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_164">[164]</span>
-of which his son Matthew was sent to Birmingham to
-enter upon a career of business, and make his own
-way in the world. He became established in the place
-as a silver stamper and piecer, to which he added other
-branches of manufacture, which his son Matthew afterwards
-largely extended.</p>
-
-<p>Matthew Boulton the younger was born at Birmingham
-on the 3rd September, 1728. Little is known of
-his early life, beyond that he was a bright, clever boy,
-and a general favourite with his companions. He received
-his principal education at a private academy at
-Deritend, kept by the Rev. Mr. Ansted, under whom
-he acquired the rudiments of a good ordinary English
-education. Though he left school early for the purpose
-of following his father’s business, he nevertheless continued
-the work of self-instruction, and afterwards
-acquired considerable knowledge of Latin and French,
-as well as of drawing and mathematics. But his chief
-pleasure was in pursuing the study of chemistry and
-mechanics, in which, as we shall shortly find, he became
-thoroughly accomplished. Long after he joined his
-father in business, he delighted to revert to his classical
-favourites. From an entry in his private memorandum-book
-of expenses at the age of about thirty, though then
-very economical in other respects, we find him expending
-considerable sums in experiments on electricity,
-and on one occasion laying out a guinea on a copy of
-Virgil, from which it appears that trade had not spoilt
-his taste for either science or letters.</p>
-
-<p>Young Boulton appears to have engaged in business
-with much spirit. By the time he was seventeen he
-had introduced several important improvements in the
-manufacture of buttons, watch-chains, and other trinkets;
-and he had invented the inlaid steel buckles which
-shortly after became the fashion. These buckles were
-exported in large quantities to France, from whence
-they were brought back to England and sold as the
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_165">[165]</span>
-most recent productions of French ingenuity. The
-elder Boulton, having every confidence in his son’s discretion
-and judgment, adopted him as a partner so soon
-as he came of age, and from that time forward he took
-almost the entire management of the concern. Although
-in his letters he signed “for father and self,” he always
-spoke in the first person of matters connected with the
-business. Thus, in 1757, we find him writing to
-Timothy Holles, London, as to the prices of “coat-link
-and vest buttons,” intimating that to lower them would
-be to beat down price and quality until it became no
-business at all; “yet,” said he, “as I have put myself
-to greater expense than anybody else in erecting the
-best conveniences and the completest tools for the purpose,
-I am not willing that any interlopers should run
-away with it.” We find him at the same time carrying
-on a correspondence with Benjamin Huntsman, of Sheffield,
-the celebrated inventor of cast-steel.<a name="Anchor-96" id="Anchor-96" href="#Footnote-96" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 96.">[96]</a> On the 19th
-January, 1757, he sends Huntsman “a parcel of goods
-of the newest patterns,” and at the same time orders a
-quantity of Huntsman’s steel. “When thou hast some
-of a proper size and quality for me, and an opportunity
-of sending it, thou may’st, but I should be glad to have
-it a little tougher than the last.” He concludes&mdash;“I
-hope thy Philosophic Spirit still laboureth within thee,
-and may it soon bring forth Fruit useful to mankind,
-but more particularly to thyself, is the sincere wish of
-Thy Obliged Friend.” With a view to economy, Boulton
-in course of time erected a steel-house of his own
-for the purpose of making steel; and he frequently used
-it to convert the cuttings and scraps of the small iron
-wares which he manufactured, into ordinary steel, afterwards
-melting and converting it into cast-steel in the
-usual way.</p>
-
-<p>From the earliest glimpses we can get of Boulton as a
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_166">[166]</span>
-man of business, it would appear to have been his aim
-to be at the top of whatsoever branch of manufacture he
-undertook. He endeavoured to produce the best possible
-articles in regard of design, material, and workmanship.
-Taste was then at a low ebb, and “Brummagem”
-had become a byword for everything that was
-gaudy, vulgar, and meretricious. Boulton endeavoured
-to get rid of this reproach, and aimed at raising the
-standard of taste in manufacture to the highest point.
-With this object, he employed the best artists to design
-his articles, and the cleverest artisans to manufacture
-them. Apart from the question of elevating the popular
-taste, there can be no doubt that this was good policy on
-his part, for it served to direct public attention to the
-superior and honest quality of the articles produced by
-his firm, and eventually brought him a large accession
-of business.</p>
-
-<p>In 1759, Boulton’s father died, bequeathing to him
-the considerable property which he had accumulated by
-his business. The year following, when thirty-two
-years of age, Matthew married Anne, the daughter of
-Luke Robinson, Esq., of Lichfield. The lady was a
-distant relation of his own; the Dyotts of Stitchbrooke,
-whose heir his grandfather had married, being nearly
-related to the Babingtons of Curborough, from whom
-Miss Robinson was lineally descended&mdash;Luke Robinson
-having married the daughter and co-heir of John
-Babington of Curborough and Patkington. Considerable
-opposition was offered to the marriage by the
-lady’s friends, on account of Matthew Boulton’s occupation;
-but he pressed his suit, and with good looks
-and a handsome presence to back him, he eventually
-succeeded in winning the heart and hand of Anne
-Robinson. He was now, indeed, in a position to have
-retired from business altogether. But a life of inactivity
-had no charms for him. He liked to mix with men in
-the affairs of active life, and to take his full share in the
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_167">[167]</span>
-world’s business. Indeed, he hated ease and idleness,
-and found his greatest pleasure in constant occupation.</p>
-
-<p>Instead, therefore, of retiring from trade, he determined
-to engage in it more extensively. He entertained
-the ambition of founding a manufactory that should be
-the first of its kind, and serve as a model for the manufacturers
-of his neighbourhood. His premises on Snow-hill,<a name="Anchor-97" id="Anchor-97" href="#Footnote-97" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 97.">[97]</a>
-Birmingham, having become too small for his
-purpose, he looked about him for a suitable spot on
-which to erect more commodious workshops; and he
-was shortly attracted by the facilities presented by the
-property afterwards so extensively known as the famous
-Soho.</p>
-
-<p>Soho is about two miles north of Birmingham, on the
-Wolverhampton road. It is not in the parish of Birmingham,
-nor in the county of Warwick, but just over
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_168">[168]</span>
-the border, in the county of Stafford. Down to the
-middle of last century the ground on which it stands
-was a barren heath, used only as a rabbit-warren.
-The sole dwelling on it was the warrener’s hut, which
-stood near the summit of the hill, on the spot afterwards
-occupied by Soho House; and the warrener’s well is still
-to be found in one of the cellars of the mansion. In
-1756, Mr. Edward Ruston took a lease of the ground
-for ninety-nine years from Mr. Wyerley, the lord of
-the manor, with liberty to make a cut about half a mile
-in length for the purpose of turning the waters of
-Hockley Brook into a pool under the brow of the hill.
-The head of water thus formed was used to drive a
-feeble mill below, which Mr. Ruston had established for
-laminating metals. He also built a small dwelling-house
-about 150 yards from the mill, and expended
-upon the place a sum of about 1000<i>l.</i> in all. When
-Mr. Boulton was satisfied that the place would suit his
-purpose, he entered into arrangements with Mr. Ruston
-for the purchase of his lease,<a name="Anchor-98" id="Anchor-98" href="#Footnote-98" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 98.">[98]</a> on the completion of
-which he proceeded to rebuild the mill on a large scale,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_169">[169]</span>
-and in course of time removed thither the whole of his
-tools, machinery, and workmen. The new manufactory,
-when finished, consisted of a series of roomy workshops
-conveniently connected with each other, and capable of
-accommodating upwards of a thousand workmen. The
-building and stocking of the premises cost upwards of
-20,000<i>l.</i></p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_190" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_190.png" width="450" height="295" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">SOHO MANUFACTORY.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Before removing to Soho, Mr. Boulton took into
-partnership Mr. John Fothergill, with the object of
-more vigorously extending his business operations. Mr.
-Fothergill possessed a very limited capital, but he was
-a man of good character and active habits of business,
-with a considerable knowledge of foreign markets. On
-the occasion of his entering the concern, stock was taken
-of the warehouse on Snow Hill; and some idea of the
-extent of Boulton’s business at the time may be formed
-from the fact, that his manager, Mr. Zaccheus Walker,
-assisted by Farquharson, Nuttall, Frogatt, and half-a-dozen
-labourers, were occupied during eight days in
-weighing metals, counting goods, and preparing an
-inventory of the effects and stock in trade. The partnership
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_170">[170]</span>
-commenced at midsummer, 1762, and shortly
-after the principal manufactory was removed to Soho.</p>
-
-<p>Steps were immediately taken to open up new connexions
-and agencies at home and abroad; and a large
-business was shortly established with many of the principal
-towns and cities of Europe, in filagree and inlaid
-work, livery and other buttons, buckles, clasps, watch-chains,
-and various kinds of ornamental metal wares.
-The firm shortly added the manufacture of silver plate
-and plated goods to their other branches,<a name="Anchor-99" id="Anchor-99" href="#Footnote-99" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 99.">[99]</a> and turned
-out large quantities of candlesticks, urns, brackets, and
-various articles in ormolu. The books of the firm indicate
-the costly nature of their productions, 500 ounces of
-silver being given out at a time, besides considerable
-quantities of gold and platina for purposes of fabrication.
-Boulton himself attended to the organization and
-management of the works and to the extension of the
-trade at home, while Fothergill devoted himself to
-establishing and superintending the foreign agencies.</p>
-
-<p>From the first, Boulton aimed at establishing a
-character for the excellence of his productions. They
-must not only be honest in workmanship, but tasteful
-in design. He determined, so far as in him lay, to
-get rid of the “Brummagem” reproach. Thus we find
-him writing to his partner from London:&mdash;“The prejudice
-that Birmingham hath so justly established
-against itself makes every fault conspicuous in all
-articles that have the least pretensions to taste. How
-can I expect the public to countenance rubbish from
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_171">[171]</span>
-Soho, while they can procure sound and perfect work
-from any other quarter?”</p>
-
-<p>He frequently went to town for the express purpose
-of reading and making drawings of rare works in metal
-in the British Museum, sending the results down to
-Soho. When rare objects of art were offered for sale,
-he endeavoured to secure them. “I bid five guineas,”
-he wrote his partner on one occasion, “for the Duke of
-Marlborough’s great blue vase, but it sold for ten....
-I bought two bronzed figures, which are sent herewith.”
-He borrowed antique candlesticks, vases, and
-articles in metal from the Queen and from various
-members of the nobility. “I wish Mr. Eginton,” he
-wrote, “would take good casts from the Hercules and
-the Hydra, and then let it be well gilt and returned
-with the seven vases; for ’tis the Queen’s. I perceive
-we shall want many such figures, and therefore we
-should omit no opportunity of taking good casts.”
-The Duke of Northumberland lent Boulton many of
-his most highly-prized articles for imitation by his
-workmen. Among his other liberal helpers in the same
-way, we find the Duke of Richmond, Lord Shelburne,
-and the Earl of Dartmouth. The Duke gave him an
-introduction to Horace Walpole, for the purpose of
-enabling him to visit and examine the art treasures of
-Strawberry Hill. “The vases,” said he, in writing to
-Boulton, “are, in my opinion, better worth your seeing
-than anything in England, and I wish you would have
-exact drawings of them taken, as I may very possibly
-like to have them copied by you.” Lord Shelburne’s
-opinion of Boulton may be gathered from his letter to
-Mr. Adams, the architect, in which he said:&mdash;“Mr.
-Boulton is the most enterprising man in different ways
-in Birmingham, and is very desirous of cultivating Mr.
-Adams’s taste in his productions, and has bought his
-Dioclesian by Lord Shelburne’s advice.”</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_172">[172]</span></p>
-
-<p>Boulton, however, did not confine himself to England;
-he searched the Continent over for the best specimens
-of handicraft as models for imitation; and when he
-found them he strove to equal, if not to excel them in
-style and quality. He sent his agent, Mr. Wendler, on
-a special mission of this sort, to Venice, Rome, and
-other Italian cities, to purchase for him the best
-specimens of metal-work, and obtain for him designs
-of various ornaments&mdash;vases, cameos, intaglios, and
-statuary. On one occasion we find Wendler sending
-him 456 prints, Boulton acknowledging that they
-will prove exceedingly useful for the purposes of his
-manufacture. At the same time, Fothergill was travelling
-through France and Germany with a like object,
-while he was also establishing new connexions with a
-view to extended trade.<a name="Anchor-100" id="Anchor-100" href="#Footnote-100" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 100.">[100]</a></p>
-
-<p>While Boulton was ambitious of reaching the highest
-excellence in his own line of business, he did not confine
-himself to that, but was feeling his way in various
-directions outside of it. Thus to his friend Wedgwood
-he wrote on one occasion, that he admired his vases so
-much that he “almost wished to be a potter.” At one
-time, indeed, he had serious thoughts of beginning the
-fictile manufacture; but he rested satisfied with mounting
-in metal the vases which Wedgwood made. “The
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_173">[173]</span>
-mounting of vases,” he wrote, “is a large field for
-fancy, in which I shall indulge, as I perceive it possible
-to convert even a very ugly vessel into a beautiful
-vase.”<a name="Anchor-101" id="Anchor-101" href="#Footnote-101" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 101.">[101]</a></p>
-
-<p>Another branch of business that he sought to establish
-was the manufacture of clocks. It was one of his leading
-ideas, that articles in common use might be made
-much better and cheaper if manufactured on a large
-scale with the help of the best machinery; and he
-thought this might be successfully done in the making
-of clocks and timepieces. The necessary machinery
-was erected accordingly, and the new branch of business
-was started. Some of the timepieces were of an
-entirely novel arrangement. One of them, invented
-by Dr. Small, contained but a single wheel, and was
-considered a piece of very ingenious construction.
-Boulton also sought to rival the French makers of
-ornamental timepieces, by whom the English markets
-were then almost entirely supplied; and some of the
-articles of this sort turned out by him were of great
-beauty. One of his most ardent encouragers and admirers,
-the Hon. Mrs. Montagu, wrote to him,&mdash;“I
-take greater pleasure in our victories over the French
-in the contention of arts than of arms. The achievements
-of Soho, instead of making widows and orphans,
-make marriages and christenings. Your noble industry,
-while elevating the public taste, provides new occupations
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_174">[174]</span>
-for the poor, and enables them to bring up their
-families in comfort. Go on, then, sir, to triumph over
-the French in taste, and to embellish your country with
-useful inventions and elegant productions.”</p>
-
-<p>Boulton’s efforts to improve the industrial arts did
-not, however, always meet with such glowing eulogy as
-this. Two of his most highly finished astronomical
-clocks could not find purchasers at his London sale; on
-which he wrote to his wife at Soho, “I find philosophy
-at a very low ebb in London, and I have therefore
-brought back my two fine clocks, which I will
-send to a market where common sense is not out of
-fashion. If I had made the clocks play jigs upon bells,
-and a dancing bear keeping time, or if I had made a
-horse-race upon their faces, I believe they would have
-had better bidders. I shall therefore bring them back
-to Soho, and some time this summer will send them to
-the Empress of Russia, who, I believe, would be glad
-of them.”<a name="Anchor-102" id="Anchor-102" href="#Footnote-102" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 102.">[102]</a> During the same visit to London, he
-was more successful with the king and queen, who
-warmly patronised his productions. “The king,” he
-wrote to his wife, “hath bought a pair of cassolets,
-a Titus, a Venus clock, and some other things, and
-inquired this morning how yesterday’s sale went. I
-shall see him again, I believe. I was with them, the
-queen and all the children, between two and three
-hours. There were, likewise, many of the nobility
-present. Never was man so much complimented as I
-have been; but I find that compliments don’t make
-fat nor fill the pocket. The queen showed me her
-last child, which is a beauty, but none of ’em are equal
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_175">[175]</span>
-to the General of Soho or the fair Maid of the Mill.<a name="Anchor-103" id="Anchor-103" href="#Footnote-103" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 103.">[103]</a>
-God bless them both, and kiss them for me.”</p>
-
-<p>In another letter he described a subsequent visit to
-the palace. “I am to wait upon their majesties again
-so soon as our Tripod Tea-kitchen arrives, and again
-upon some other business. The queen, I think, is much
-improved in her person, and she now speaks English
-like an English lady. She draws very finely, is a great
-musician, and works with her needle better than Mrs.
-Betty. However, without joke, she is extremely sensible,
-very affable, and a great patroness of English
-manufactures. Of this she gave me a particular instance;
-for, after the king and she had talked to me
-for nearly three hours, they withdrew, and then the
-queen sent for me into her boudoir, showed me her
-chimneypiece, and asked me how many vases it would
-take to furnish it; ‘for,’ said she, ‘all that china shall
-be taken away.’ She also desired that I would fetch
-her the two finest steel chains I could make. All
-this she did of her own accord, without the presence of
-the king, which I could not help putting a kind construction
-upon.”<a name="Anchor-104" id="Anchor-104" href="#Footnote-104" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 104.">[104]</a></p>
-
-<p>Thus stimulated by royal and noble patronage,
-Boulton exerted himself to the utmost to produce articles
-of the highest excellence. Like his friend Wedgwood,
-he employed Flaxman and other London artists to
-design his choicer goods; but he had many foreign
-designers and skilled workmen, French and Italian, in
-his regular employment. He attracted these men by
-liberal wages, and kept them attached to him by kind
-and generous treatment. On one occasion we find the
-Duke of Richmond applying to him to recommend a
-first-class artist to execute some special work in metal
-for him. Boulton replies that he can strongly recommend
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_176">[176]</span>
-one of his own men, an honest, steady workman,
-an excellent metal turner. “He hath made for me
-some exceeding good <ins title="Transcriber's Note: original reads 'acromatic'" id="Corr-176">achromatic</ins> telescopes [another
-branch of Boulton’s business].... I give him two
-guineas a week and a house to live in. He is a
-Frenchman, and formerly worked with the famous M.
-Germain; he afterwards worked for the Academy of
-Sciences at Berlin, and he hath worked upwards of
-two years for me.”<a name="Anchor-105" id="Anchor-105" href="#Footnote-105" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 105.">[105]</a></p>
-
-<p>Before many years had passed, Soho was spoken of
-with pride, as one of the best schools of skilled industry
-in England. Its fame extended abroad as well as at
-home, and when distinguished foreigners came into
-England, they usually visited Soho as one of the
-national sights. When the manufactory was complete<a name="Anchor-106" id="Anchor-106" href="#Footnote-106" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 106.">[106]</a>
-and in full work, Boulton removed from his house
-on Snow-hill to the mansion of Soho, which he had
-by this time considerably enlarged and improved.
-There he continued to live until the close of his life,
-maintaining a splendid hospitality. Men of all nations,
-and of all classes and opinions, were received there by
-turns,&mdash;princes, philosophers, artists, authors, merchants,
-and poets. In August, 1767, while executing the two
-chains for the queen, we find him writing to his London
-agent as his excuse for a day’s delay in forwarding it:
-“I had lords and ladies to wait on yesterday; I have
-French and Spaniards to-day; and to-morrow I shall
-have Germans, Russians, and Norwegians.” For many
-years the visitors at Soho House were so numerous and
-arrived in such constant succession, that it more resembled
-an hotel than a private mansion.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_177">[177]</span></p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_198" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_198.png" width="450" height="277" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">SOHO HOUSE.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>The rapid extension of the Soho business necessarily
-led to the increase of the capital invested in it. Boulton
-had to find large sums of money for increased stock,
-plant, and credits. He raised 3000<i>l.</i> on his wife’s
-estate; he borrowed 5000<i>l.</i> from his friend Baumgarten;
-and he sold considerable portions of the property
-left him by his father, by which means he was
-enabled considerably to extend his operations. There
-were envious busybodies about who circulated rumours
-to his discredit, and set the report on foot, that to carry
-on a business on so large a scale would require a capital
-of 80,000<i>l.</i> “Their evil speaking,” said he to a correspondent,
-“will avail but little, as our house is founded
-on so firm a rock that envy and malice will not be able
-to shake it; and I am determined to spare neither pains
-nor money to establish such a house as will acquire
-both honour and wealth.” The rapid strides he was
-making may be inferred from the statement made to
-the same correspondent, which showed that the gross
-returns of the firm, which were 7000<i>l.</i> in 1763, had
-advanced to 30,000<i>l.</i> in 1767, with orders still upon the
-increase.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_178">[178]</span></p>
-
-<p>Though he had a keen eye for business, Boulton
-regarded character more than profit. He would have
-no connexion with any transaction of a discreditable
-kind. Orders were sent to him from France for base
-money, but he spurned them with indignation. “I
-will do anything,” he wrote to M. Motteaux, his
-Paris agent, “short of being common informer against
-particular persons, to stop the malpractices of the
-Birmingham coiners.” He declared he was as ready
-to do business on reasonable terms as any other person,
-but he would not undersell; “for,” said he, “to run
-down prices would be to run down quality, which could
-only have the effect of undermining confidence, and
-eventually ruining trade.” His principles were equally
-honourable as regarded the workmen of rival employers.
-“I have had many offers and opportunities,” he said to
-one, “of taking your people, whom I could, with convenience
-to myself, have employed; but it is a practice
-I abhor. Nevertheless, whatever game we play at, I
-shall always avail myself of the rules with which
-’tis played, or I know I shall make but a very indifferent
-figure in it.”<a name="Anchor-107" id="Anchor-107" href="#Footnote-107" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 107.">[107]</a></p>
-
-<p>He was frequently asked to take gentlemen apprentices
-into his works, but declined to receive them,
-though hundreds of pounds’ premium were in many
-cases offered with them. He preferred employing
-the humbler class of boys, whom he could train up
-as skilled workmen. He was also induced to prefer
-the latter for another reason, of a still more creditable
-kind. “I have,” said he, in answer to a gentleman
-applicant, “built and furnished a house for the reception
-of one kind of apprentices&mdash;fatherless children,
-parish apprentices, and hospital boys; and gentlemen’s
-sons would probably find themselves out of place in
-such companionship.”</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_179">[179]</span></p>
-
-<p>While occupied with his own affairs, and in conducting
-what he described as “the largest hardware
-manufactory in the world,” Boulton found time to take
-an active part in promoting the measures then on foot
-for opening up the internal navigation of the country.
-He was a large subscriber to the Grand Trunk and
-Birmingham Canal schemes, the latter of which was
-of the greater importance to him personally, as it
-passed close by Soho, and thus placed his works in
-direct communication both with London and the northern
-coal and manufacturing districts.<a name="Anchor-108" id="Anchor-108" href="#Footnote-108" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 108.">[108]</a></p>
-
-<p>Coming down to a few years later, in 1770, we find
-his business still growing, and his works and plant
-absorbing still more capital, principally obtained by
-borrowing. In a letter to Mr. Adams, the celebrated
-architect, requesting him to prepare the design of a
-new sale-room in London, he described the manufactory
-at Soho as in full progress, from 700 to 800 persons
-being employed as metallic artists and workers in
-tortoiseshell, stones, glass, and enamel. “I have almost
-every machine,” said he, “that is applicable to those
-arts; I have two water-mills employed in rolling, polishing,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_180">[180]</span>
-grinding, and turning various sorts of lathes. I
-have trained up many, and am training up more plain
-country lads into good workmen; and wherever I find
-indications of skill and ability, I encourage them. I
-have likewise established correspondence with almost
-every mercantile town in Europe, and am thus regularly
-supplied with orders for the grosser articles in
-common demand, by which I am enabled to employ
-such a number of hands as to provide me with an
-ample choice of artists for the finer branches of work;
-and I am thereby encouraged to erect and employ
-a more extensive apparatus than it would be prudent
-to provide for the production of the finer articles
-only.”</p>
-
-<p>It is indeed probable&mdash;though Boulton was slow to
-admit it&mdash;that he had been extending his business more
-rapidly than his capital would conveniently allow;
-for we find him becoming more and more pressed for
-means to meet the interest on the borrowed money
-invested in buildings, tools, and machinery. He had
-obtained 10,000<i>l.</i> from a Mr. Tonson of London; and
-on the death of that gentleman, in 1772, he had considerable
-difficulty in raising the means to pay off the
-debt. His embarrassment was increased by a serious
-commercial panic, aggravated by the failure of Fordyce
-brothers, by which a considerable sum deposited with
-them remained locked up for some time, and he was
-eventually a loser to the extent of 2000<i>l.</i> Other failures
-and losses followed; and trade came almost to a standstill.
-Yet he bravely held on. “We have a thousand
-mouths at Soho to feed,” he says; “and it has taken so
-much labour and pains to get so valuable and well-organised
-a staff of workmen together, that the operations
-of the manufactory must be carried on at whatever
-risk.” He continued to receive distinguished visitors
-at his works. “Last week,” he wrote Mr. Ebbenhouse,
-“we had Prince Poniatowski, nephew of the King
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_181">[181]</span>
-of Poland, and the French, Danish, Sardinian, and
-Dutch Ambassadors; this week we have had Count
-Orloff, one of the five celebrated brothers who are
-such favourites with the Empress of Russia; and only
-yesterday I had the Viceroy of Ireland, who dined
-with me. Scarcely, a day passes without a visit from
-some distinguished personage.”</p>
-
-<p>Besides carrying on the extensive business connected
-with his manufactory at Soho, this indefatigable man
-found time to prosecute the study of several important
-branches of practical science. It was scarcely to be
-supposed that he had much leisure at his disposal; but
-in life it often happens that the busiest men contrive
-to find the most leisure; and he who is “up to the ears”
-in work, can, nevertheless, snatch occasional intervals
-to devote to inquiries in which his heart is engaged.
-Hence we find Boulton ranging at intervals over a
-wide field of inquiry; at one time studying geology,
-and collecting fossils, minerals, and specimens for his
-museum; at another, reading and experimenting on
-fixed air; and at another studying Newton’s works
-with the object of increasing the force of projectiles.<a name="Anchor-109" id="Anchor-109" href="#Footnote-109" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 109.">[109]</a>
-But the subject which perhaps more than all interested
-him was the improvement of the Steam Engine, which
-shortly after led to his introduction to James Watt.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_182">[182]</span></p>
-
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-<h3>CHAPTER X.<br />
-
-<small><span class="smcap">Boulton and the Steam Engine&mdash;Correspondence
-with Watt.</span></small></h3>
-
-
-<p><span class="smcap">Want</span> of water-power was one of the great defects of
-Soho as a manufacturing establishment, and for a long
-time Boulton struggled with the difficulty. The severe
-summer droughts obliged him to connect a horse-mill
-with the water-wheel. From six to ten horses were employed
-as an auxiliary power, at an expense of from five
-to eight guineas a week. But this expedient, though costly,
-was found very inconvenient. Boulton next thought
-of erecting a pumping-engine after Savery or Newcomen’s
-construction, for the purpose of raising the water
-from the mill-stream and returning it back into the reservoir&mdash;thereby
-maintaining a head of water sufficient to
-supply the water-wheel and keep the mill in regular work.
-“The enormous expense of the horse-power,” he wrote
-to a friend, “put me upon thinking of turning the mill
-by fire, and I made many fruitless experiments on the
-subject.”</p>
-
-<p>In 1766 we find him engaged in a correspondence
-with the distinguished Benjamin Franklin as to steam
-power. Eight years before, Franklin had visited Boulton
-at Birmingham and made his acquaintance. They were
-mutually pleased with each other, and continued to correspond
-during Franklin’s stay in England, exchanging
-their views on magnetism, electricity, and other subjects.<a name="Anchor-110" id="Anchor-110" href="#Footnote-110" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 110.">[110]</a>
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_183">[183]</span>
-When Boulton began to study the fire-engine with a
-view to its improvement, Franklin was one of the first
-whom he consulted. Writing him on the 22nd February,
-1766, he said,&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“My engagements since Christmas have not permitted me to make
-any further progress with my fire-engine; but, as the thirsty season
-is approaching apace, necessity will oblige me to set about it in
-good earnest. Query,&mdash;Which of the steam-valves do you like best?
-Is it better to introduce the jet of cold water at the bottom of the
-receiver, or at the top? Each has its advantages and disadvantages.
-My thoughts about the secondary or mechanical contrivances of the
-engine are too numerous to trouble you with in this letter, and yet
-I have not been lucky enough to hit upon any that are objectionless.
-I therefore beg, if any thought occurs to your fertile genius which
-you think may be useful, or preserve me from error in the execution
-of this engine, you’ll be so kind as to communicate it to me, and
-you’ll very greatly oblige me.”</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>From a subsequent letter it appears that Boulton, like
-Watt&mdash;who was about the same time occupied with his
-invention at Glasgow&mdash;had a model constructed for experimental
-purposes, and that this model was now with
-Franklin in London; for we find Boulton requesting
-the latter to “order a porter to nail up the model in the
-box again and take it to the Birmingham carrier at the
-Bell Inn, Smithfield.” After a silence of about a month
-Franklin replied,&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“You will, I trust, excuse my so long omitting to answer your
-kind letter, when you consider the excessive hurry and anxiety I
-have been engaged in with our American affairs.... I know not
-which of the valves to give the preference to, nor whether it is best
-to introduce your jet of cold water above or below. Experiments
-will best decide in such cases. I would only repeat to you the hint
-I gave, of fixing your grate in such a manner as to burn all your
-smoke. I think a great deal of fuel will then be saved, for two
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_184">[184]</span>
-reasons. One, that smoke is fuel, and is wasted when it escapes
-uninflamed. The other, that it forms a sooty crust on the bottom of
-the boiler, which crust not being a good conductor of heat, and preventing
-flame and hot air coming into immediate contact with the
-vessel, lessens their effect in giving heat to the water. All that is
-necessary is, to make the smoke of fresh coals pass descending
-through those that are already thoroughly ignited. I sent the
-model last week, with your papers in it, which I hope got safe to
-hand.”<a name="Anchor-111" id="Anchor-111" href="#Footnote-111" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 111.">[111]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>The model duly arrived at Soho, and we find Boulton
-shortly after occupied in making experiments with it,
-the results of which are duly entered in his note-books.
-Dr. Erasmus Darwin, with whom he was on very intimate
-terms, wrote him from Lichfield, inquiring what
-Franklin thought of the model and what suggestions he
-had made for its improvement. “Your model of a steam-engine,
-I am told,” said he, “has gained so much approbation
-in London, that I cannot but congratulate you
-on the mechanical fame you have acquired by it, which,
-assure yourself, is as great a pleasure to me as it could
-possibly be to yourself.”<a name="Anchor-112" id="Anchor-112" href="#Footnote-112" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 112.">[112]</a> Another letter of Darwin to
-Boulton is preserved, without date, but apparently written
-earlier than the preceding, in which the Doctor lays
-before the mechanical philosopher the scheme of “a fiery
-chariot” which he had conceived,&mdash;in other words, of a
-locomotive steam-carriage. He proposed to apply an
-engine with a pair of cylinders working alternately, to
-drive the proposed vehicle;<a name="Anchor-113" id="Anchor-113" href="#Footnote-113" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 113.">[113]</a> and he sent Boulton some
-rough diagrams illustrative of his views, which he begged
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_185">[185]</span>
-might be kept a profound secret, as it was his intention,
-if Boulton approved of his plan and would join him as a
-partner, to endeavour to build a model engine, and, if it
-answered, to take out a joint patent for it. But Dr.
-Darwin’s scheme was too crude to be capable of being
-embodied in a working model; and nothing more was
-heard of his fiery chariot.</p>
-
-<p>Another of Boulton’s numerous correspondents about
-the same time was Dr. Roebuck, of Kinneil, then occupied
-with his enterprise at Carron, and about to engage
-in working the Boroughstoness coal mines, of the results
-of which he was extremely sanguine. He also wished
-Boulton to join him as a partner, offering a tenth share
-in the concern, and to take back the share if the result
-did not answer expectations. But Boulton’s hands
-were already full of business nearer home, and he declined
-the venture. Roebuck then informed him of the
-invention made by his ingenious friend Watt, and of
-the progress of the model engine. This was a subject
-calculated to excite the interest of Boulton, himself occupied
-in studying the same subject, and he expressed a
-desire to see Watt, if he could make it convenient to
-visit him at Soho.</p>
-
-<p>It so happened that Watt had occasion to be in London
-in the summer of 1767, on the business connected with
-the Forth and Clyde Canal Bill, and he determined to
-take Soho on his way home. When Watt paid his promised
-visit, Boulton was absent; but he was shown over
-the works by his friend Dr. Small, who had settled in
-Birmingham as a physician, and already secured a high
-place in Boulton’s esteem. Watt was much struck with
-the admirable arrangements of the Soho manufactory,
-and recognised at a glance the admirable power of organisation
-which they displayed. Still plodding wearily
-with his model, and contending with the “villanous bad
-workmanship” of his Glasgow artisans, he could not but
-envy the precision of the Soho tools and the dexterity of
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_186">[186]</span>
-the Soho workmen. Some conversation on the subject
-must have occurred between him and Small, to whom he
-explained the nature of his invention; for we find the
-latter shortly after writing Watt, urging him to come to
-Birmingham and join partnership with Boulton and
-himself in the manufacture of steam-engines.<a name="Anchor-114" id="Anchor-114" href="#Footnote-114" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 114.">[114]</a> Although
-nothing came of this proposal at the time, it had probably
-some effect, when communicated to Dr. Roebuck, in
-inducing him to close with Watt as a partner, and thus
-anticipate his Birmingham correspondents, of whose
-sagacity he had the highest opinion.</p>
-
-<p>In the following year Watt visited London on the
-business connected with the engine patent. Small wrote
-to him there, saying, “Get your patent and come to
-Birmingham, with as much time to spend as you can.”
-Watt accordingly again took Birmingham on his way
-home. There he saw his future partner for the first
-time, and they at once conceived a hearty liking for
-each other. They had much conversation about the
-engine, and it greatly cheered Watt to find that the sagacious
-and practical Birmingham manufacturer should
-augur so favourably of its success as he did. Shortly
-after, when Dr. Robison visited Soho, Boulton told him
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_187">[187]</span>
-that although he had begun the construction of his proposed
-pumping-engine, he had determined to proceed no
-further with it until he saw what came of Watt and
-Roebuck’s scheme. “In erecting my proposed engine,”
-said he, “I would necessarily avail myself of what I
-learned from Mr. Watt’s conversation; but this would
-not now be right without his consent.” Boulton’s conduct
-in this proceeding was thoroughly characteristic of
-him, and merely affords another illustration of the general
-fairness and honesty with which he acted in all his
-business transactions.</p>
-
-<p>Watt returned to Glasgow to resume his engine experiments
-and to proceed with his canal surveys. He
-kept up a correspondence with Boulton, and advised
-him from time to time of the progress made with his
-model. Towards the end of the year we find him sending
-Boulton a package from Glasgow containing “one dozen
-German flutes at 5<i>s.</i>, and a copper digester 1<i>l.</i> 10<i>s.</i>”
-He added, “I have almost finished a most complete model
-of my reciprocating-engine: when it is tried, I shall
-advise the success.” To Dr. Small he wrote more confidentially,
-sending him in January, 1769, a copy of the
-intended specification of his steam-engine. He also spoke
-of his general business: “Our pottery,” said he, “is
-doing tolerably, though not as I wish. I am sick of the
-people I have to do with, though not of the business,
-which I expect will turn out a very good one. I have
-a fine scheme for doing it all by fire or water mills, but
-not in this country nor with the present people.”<a name="Anchor-115" id="Anchor-115" href="#Footnote-115" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 115.">[115]</a> Later,
-he wrote: “I have had another three days of fever, from
-which I am not quite recovered. This cursed climate
-and constitution will undo me.” Watt must have told
-Small when at Birmingham of the probability of his
-being able to apply his steam-engine to locomotion; for
-the latter writes him, “I told Dr. Robison and his pupil
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_188">[188]</span>
-that I hoped soon to travel in a fiery chariot of your
-invention.” Later, Small wrote: “A linendraper at
-London, one Moore, has taken out a patent for moving
-wheel-carriages by steam. This comes of thy delays. I
-dare say he has heard of your inventions.... Do come
-to England with all possible speed. At this moment,
-how I could scold you for negligence! However, if you
-will come hither soon, I will promise to be very civil,
-and buy a steam-chaise of you and not of Moore. And
-yet it vexes me abominably to see a man of your superior
-genius neglect to avail himself properly of his great
-talents. These short fevers will do you good.”<a name="Anchor-116" id="Anchor-116" href="#Footnote-116" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 116.">[116]</a> Watt
-replied: “If linendraper Moore does not use <em>my</em> engines
-to drive his chaises, he can’t drive them by steam. If
-he does, I will stop them. I suppose by the rapidity
-of his progress and puffing he is too volatile to be dangerous....
-You talk to me about coming to England,
-just as if I was an Indian that had nothing to remove
-but my person. Why do we encumber ourselves with
-anything else? I can’t see you before July at soonest,
-unless you come here. If you do I can recommend you
-to a fine sweet girl, who will be anything you want
-her to be if you can make yourself agreeable to her.”
-Badinage apart, however, there was one point on which
-Watt earnestly solicited the kind services of his friend.
-He had become more than ever desirous of securing the
-powerful co-operation of Matthew Boulton in introducing
-his invention to public notice:&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“Seriously,” says he, “you will oblige me if you will negotiate
-the following affair:&mdash;I find that if the engine succeeds my whole
-time will be taken up in planning and erecting Reciprocating
-engines, and the Circulator must stand still unless I do what I have
-done too often, neglect certainty for hope. Now, Mr. Boulton wants
-one or more engines for his own use. If he will make a model of
-one of 20 inches diameter at least, I will give him my advice and as
-much assistance as I can. He shall have liberty to erect one of any
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_189">[189]</span>
-size for his own use. If he should choose to have more the terms
-will be easy, and I shall consider myself much obliged to him. If
-it should answer, and he should not think himself repaid for his
-trouble by the use of it, he shall make and use it until he is repaid.
-If this be agreeable to him let me know, and I will propose it to the
-Doctor [Roebuck], and doubt not of his consent. I wish Mr. Boulton
-and you had entered into some negotiation with the Doctor about
-coming in as partners. I am afraid it is now too late; for the nearer
-it approaches to certainty, he grows the more tenacious of it.<a name="Anchor-117" id="Anchor-117" href="#Footnote-117" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 117.">[117]</a>
-For my part, I shall continue to think as I did, that it would be for
-our mutual advantage. His expectations are solely from the
-Reciprocator. Possibly he may be tempted to part with the half of
-the Circulator to you. This I say of myself. Mr. Boulton asked
-if the Circulator was contrived since our agreement. It was; but
-it is a part of the scheme, and virtually included in it.”<a name="Anchor-118" id="Anchor-118" href="#Footnote-118" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 118.">[118]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>From this it will be seen how anxious Watt was
-to engage Boulton in taking an interest in his invention.
-But though the fly was artfully cast over the
-nose of the fish, still he would not rise. The times
-were out of joint, business was stagnant, and Boulton
-was of necessity cautious about venturing upon new
-enterprises. Small doubtless communicated the views
-thus confidentially conveyed to him by Watt; and
-in his next letter he again pressed him to come to
-Birmingham and have a personal interview with
-Boulton as to the engine, adding, “bring this pretty
-girl with you when you come.” But, instead of Watt,
-Roebuck himself went to see Boulton on the subject.
-During the time of this visit, Watt again communicated
-to Small his anxiety that Boulton should join in the
-partnership. “As for myself,” said he, “I shall say
-nothing; but if you three can agree among yourselves,
-you may appoint me what share you please, and you
-will find me willing to do my best to advance the
-good of the whole; or, if this [the engine] should not
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_190">[190]</span>
-succeed, to do any other thing I can to make you
-all amends, only reserving to myself the liberty of
-grumbling when I am in an ill humour.”<a name="Anchor-119" id="Anchor-119" href="#Footnote-119" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 119.">[119]</a></p>
-
-<p>Small’s reply was discouraging. Both Boulton and
-he had just engaged in another scheme, which would
-require all the ready money at their command. Possibly
-the ill-success of the experiment Watt had by
-this time made with his new model at Kinneil may
-have had some influence in deterring them from engaging
-in what still looked a very unpromising speculation.
-Watt was greatly cast down at this intelligence,
-though he could not blame his friend for the
-caution he displayed in the matter.<a name="Anchor-120" id="Anchor-120" href="#Footnote-120" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 120.">[120]</a> He nevertheless
-again returned to the subject in his letters to Small;
-and at last Boulton was persuaded to enter into a conditional
-arrangement with Roebuck, which was immediately
-communicated to Watt, who received the
-intelligence with great exultation. “I shake hands,”
-he wrote to Small, “with you and Mr. Boulton in our
-connexion, which I hope will prove agreeable to us
-all.” His joy, however, proved premature, as it
-turned out that the agreement was only to the effect,
-that if Boulton thought proper to exercise the option
-of becoming a partner in the engine to the extent of
-one-third, he was to do so within a period of twelve
-months, paying Roebuck a sum of 1000<i>l.</i>; but this
-option Boulton never exercised, and the engine enterprise
-seemed to be as far from success as ever.</p>
-
-<p>In the mean time Watt became increasingly anxious
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_191">[191]</span>
-about his own position. He had been spending more
-money on fruitless experiments, and getting into more
-debt. The six months he had been living at Kinneil
-had brought him in nothing. He had been neglecting
-his business, and could not afford to waste more
-time in prosecuting an apparently hopeless speculation.
-He accordingly returned to his regular work, and
-proceeded with the survey of the river Clyde, at the
-instance of the Glasgow Corporation. “I would not
-have meddled with this,” he wrote to Dr. Small, “had
-I been certain of being able to bring the engine to
-bear. But I cannot, on an uncertainty, refuse every
-piece of business that offers. I have refused some
-common fire-engines, because they must have taken
-my attention so up as to hinder my going on with
-my own. However, if I cannot make it answer soon,
-I shall certainly undertake the next that offers, for I
-cannot afford to trifle away my whole life, which&mdash;God
-knows&mdash;may not be long. Not that I think
-myself a proper hand for keeping men to their duty;
-but I must use my endeavours to make myself square
-with the world, though I much fear I never shall.”<a name="Anchor-121" id="Anchor-121" href="#Footnote-121" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 121.">[121]</a></p>
-
-<p>Small lamented this apparent abandonment of the
-engine to its fate. But though he had failed in inducing
-Boulton heartily to join Watt in the enterprise,
-he did not yet despair. He continued to urge
-Watt to complete his engine, as the fourteen years
-for which the patent lasted would soon be gone. At
-all events he might send drawings of his engine to
-Soho; and Mr. Boulton and he would undertake to
-do their best to have one constructed for the purpose
-of exhibiting its powers.<a name="Anchor-122" id="Anchor-122" href="#Footnote-122" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 122.">[122]</a> To this Watt agreed, and
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_192">[192]</span>
-about the beginning of 1770, the necessary drawings
-were sent to Soho, and an engine was immediately
-put in course of execution. Patterns were made and
-sent to Coalbrookdale to be cast; but when the castings
-were received, they were found exceedingly imperfect,
-and were thrown aside as useless. They were then
-sent to an ironfounder at Bilston to be executed; but
-the result was only another failure.</p>
-
-<p>About the beginning of 1770, another unsuccessful
-experiment was made by Watt and Roebuck with
-the engine at Kinneil. The cylinder had been repaired
-and made true by beating, but as the metal of which
-it was made was soft, it was feared that the working
-of the piston might throw it out of form. To prevent
-this, two firm parallel planes were fixed, through which
-the piston worked, in order to prevent its vibration.
-“If this should fail,” Roebuck wrote to Boulton, in
-giving an account of the intended trial, “then the
-cylinder must be made of cast-iron. But I have great
-confidence that the present engine will work completely,
-and by this day se’nnight you may expect to hear the
-result of our experiments.”<a name="Anchor-123" id="Anchor-123" href="#Footnote-123" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 123.">[123]</a> The good news, however,
-never went to Birmingham; on the contrary, the
-trial proved a failure. There was some more tinkering
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_193">[193]</span>
-at the engine, but it would not work satisfactorily; and
-Watt went back to Glasgow with a heavy heart.</p>
-
-<p>Small again endeavoured to induce Watt to visit
-Birmingham, to superintend the erection of the engine,
-the materials for which were now lying at Soho. He
-also held out to Watt the hope of obtaining some
-employment for him in the midland counties as a
-consulting engineer. But Watt could not afford to
-lose more time in erecting trial-engines; and he was
-too much occupied at Glasgow to leave it for the
-proposed uncertainty at Birmingham. He accordingly
-declined the visit, but invited Small to continue the
-correspondence; “for,” said he, “we have abundance
-of matters to discuss, though the damned engine
-sleep in quiet.” Small wrote back, professing himself
-satisfied that Watt was so fully employed in his
-own profession at Glasgow. “Let nothing,” he said,
-“divert you from the business of engineering. You
-are sensible that both Boulton and I engaged in the
-patent scheme much more from inclination to be in
-some degree useful to you than from any other principle;
-so that if you are prosperous and happy, we do
-not care whether you find the scheme worth prosecuting
-or not.”<a name="Anchor-124" id="Anchor-124" href="#Footnote-124" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 124.">[124]</a> Replying to Small’s complaint of
-himself, that he felt <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">ennuyé</i> and stupid, taking pleasure
-in nothing but sleep, Watt said: “You complain of
-physic; I find it sufficiently stupifying to be obliged
-to think on any subject but one’s hobby; and I really
-am become monstrously stupid, and can seldom think
-at all. I wish to God I could afford to live without
-it; though I don’t admire your sleeping scheme. I
-must fatigue myself, otherwise I can neither eat nor
-sleep. In short, I greatly doubt whether the silent
-mansion of the grave be not the happiest abode. I am
-cured of most of my youthful desires, and if ambition
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_194">[194]</span>
-or avarice do not lay hold of me, I shall be almost
-as much <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">ennuyé</i> as you say you are.”<a name="Anchor-125" id="Anchor-125" href="#Footnote-125" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 125.">[125]</a></p>
-
-<p>Small again recurred to the subject of Watt’s removal
-to Birmingham, informing him that he had provided
-accommodation for him, “having kept a whole house
-in my power, in hopes you may come to live here.”</p>
-
-<p>Watt’s prospects were, however, brightening. He
-was then busily occupied in superintending the construction
-of the Monkland Canal. He wrote Small
-that he had a hundred men working under him, who
-had “made a confounded gash in a hill,” at which
-they had been working for twelve months; that by
-frugal living he had contrived to save money enough
-to pay his debts, and that he had plenty of remunerative
-work before him. He had also become concerned in
-a pottery, which, he said, “does very well, though we
-make monstrous bad ware.”<a name="Anchor-126" id="Anchor-126" href="#Footnote-126" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 126.">[126]</a> He had not, indeed, got
-rid of his headaches, though he was not so much
-afflicted by low spirits as he had been. But he confessed
-that after all he hated the business of engineering,
-and wished himself well rid of it, for the reasons
-stated in a preceding chapter.</p>
-
-<p>This comparatively prosperous state of Watt’s affairs
-did not, however, last long. The commercial panic
-of 1772 put a sudden stop to most of the canal schemes
-then on foot. The proprietors of the Monkland Canal
-could not find the necessary means for carrying on the
-works, and Watt consequently lost his employment
-as their engineer. He was thus again thrown upon
-the world, and where was he to look for help? Naturally
-enough, he reverted to his engine. But it was
-in the hands of Dr. Roebuck, who was overwhelmed
-with debt, and upon the verge of insolvency. It
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_195">[195]</span>
-was clear that no help was to be looked for in that
-quarter. Again he bethought him of Small’s invitations
-to Birmingham, and of the interest that Boulton
-had taken in the engine scheme. Could he be induced
-at last to become a partner? He again broached the
-subject to Small, telling him how business had failed
-him; that he was now ready to go to Birmingham
-and engage in English surveys, or do anything that
-would bring him in an honest income. But, above all,
-would Boulton and Small, now that Roebuck had failed,
-join him as partners in the engine business?</p>
-
-<p>By this time Boulton himself had become involved
-in difficulties arising out of the commercial pressure of
-the time, and was more averse than ever to enter
-upon such an enterprise. But having lent Roebuck a
-considerable sum of money, it occurred to Watt that
-the amount might be taken as part of the price of
-Boulton’s share in the patent, if he would consent to
-enter into the proposed partnership. He represented
-to Small the great distress of Roebuck’s situation, which
-he had done all that he could to relieve. “What little I
-can do for him,” he said, “is purchased by denying
-myself the conveniences of life my station requires,
-or by remaining in debt, which it galls me to the bone
-to owe.” Reverting to the idea of a partnership with
-Boulton, he added, “I shall be content to hold a very
-small share in it, or none at all, provided I am to be
-freed from my pecuniary obligations to Roebuck, and
-have any kind of recompense for even a part of the
-anxiety and ruin it has involved me in.” And again:
-“Although I am out of pocket a much greater sum
-upon these experiments than my proportion of the
-profits of the engine, I do not look upon that money
-as the price of my share, but as money spent on my
-education. I thank God I have now reason to believe
-that I can never, while I have health, be at any loss
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_196">[196]</span>
-to pay what I owe, and to live at least in a decent
-manner; more, I do not violently desire.”<a name="Anchor-127" id="Anchor-127" href="#Footnote-127" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 127.">[127]</a></p>
-
-<p>In a subsequent letter Watt promised Small that he
-would pay an early visit to Birmingham, and added, “there
-is nowhere I so much wish to be.” In replying, Small
-pointed out a difficulty in the way of the proposed partnership:
-“It is impossible,” he wrote, “for Mr. Boulton
-and me, or any other honest man, to purchase, especially
-from two particular friends, what has no market
-price, and at a time when they might be inclined to
-part with the commodity at an under value.”<a name="Anchor-128" id="Anchor-128" href="#Footnote-128" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 128.">[128]</a> He
-added that the high-pressure wheel-engine constructing
-at Soho, after Watt’s plans, was nearly ready, and that
-Wilkinson, of Bradley, had promised that the boiler
-should be sent next week. “Should the experiment
-succeed, or seem likely to succeed,” he said, “you ought
-to come hither immediately upon receiving the notice,
-which I will instantly send. In that case we propose to
-unite three things under your direction, which would
-altogether, we hope, prove tolerably satisfactory to you,
-at least until your merit shall be better known.”<a name="Anchor-129" id="Anchor-129" href="#Footnote-129" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 129.">[129]</a></p>
-
-<p>But before the experiment with the wheel-engine
-could be tried at Soho, the financial ruin of Dr. Roebuck
-brought matters to a crisis. He was now in the hands
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_197">[197]</span>
-of his creditors, who found his affairs in inextricable
-confusion. He owed some 1200<i>l.</i> to Boulton, who, rather
-than claim against the estate, offered to take Roebuck’s
-two-thirds share in the engine patent in lieu of the
-debt. The creditors did not value the engine as worth
-one farthing, and were but too glad to agree to the
-proposal. As Watt himself said, it was only “paying
-one bad debt with another.” Boulton wrote to Watt
-requesting him to act as his attorney in the matter. He
-confessed that he was by no means sanguine as to the
-success of the engine, but, being an assayer, he was
-willing “to assay it and try how much gold it contains.”
-“The thing,” he added, “is now a shadow; ’tis merely
-ideal, and will cost time and money to realise it. We
-have made no experiment yet that answers my purpose,
-and the times are so horrible throughout the mercantile
-part of Europe, that I have not had my thoughts sufficiently
-disengaged to think of new schemes.”<a name="Anchor-130" id="Anchor-130" href="#Footnote-130" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 130.">[130]</a></p>
-
-<p>So soon as the arrangement for the transfer of Roebuck’s
-share to Boulton was concluded, Watt ordered
-the engine in the outhouse at Kinneil to be taken to
-pieces, packed up, and sent to Birmingham.<a name="Anchor-131" id="Anchor-131" href="#Footnote-131" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 131.">[131]</a> Small
-again pressed him to come and superintend the work
-in person. But before he could leave Scotland it was
-necessary that he should complete the survey of the
-Caledonian Canal, which was still unfinished. This
-done, he promised at once to set out for Soho. In any
-case, he had made up his mind to leave his own country,
-of which he declared himself “heart-sick.”<a name="Anchor-132" id="Anchor-132" href="#Footnote-132" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 132.">[132]</a> He hated
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_198">[198]</span>
-its harsh climate, so trying to his fragile constitution.
-Moreover, he disliked the people he had to deal with.
-He was also badly paid for his work, a whole year’s
-surveying having brought him in only about 200<i>l.</i>
-Out of this he had paid some portion to Dr. Roebuck to
-help him in his necessity, “so that,” he said, “I can
-barely support myself and keep untouched the small
-sum I have allotted for my visit to you.”<a name="Anchor-133" id="Anchor-133" href="#Footnote-133" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 133.">[133]</a></p>
-
-<p>Watt’s intention was either to try to find employment
-as a surveyor or engineer in England, or obtain
-a situation of some kind abroad. He was, however,
-naturally desirous of ascertaining whether it was yet
-possible to do anything with the materials which now
-lay at Soho; and with the object of visiting his friends
-there and superintending the erection of the trial-engine,
-he at length made his final arrangements to
-leave Glasgow. We find him arrived in Birmingham
-in May, 1774, where he at once entered on a new and
-important phase of his professional career.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_199">[199]</span></p>
-
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-
-<h3>CHAPTER XI.<br />
-
-<small><span class="smcap">Boulton and Watt&mdash;Their Partnership.</span></small></h3>
-
-
-<p><span class="smcap">Watt</span> had now been occupied for about nine years in
-working out the details of his invention. Five of these
-had passed since he had taken out his patent, and he
-was still struggling with difficulty. Several thousand
-pounds had been expended on the engine, besides much
-study, labour, and ingenuity; yet it was still, as Boulton
-expressed it, “a shadow, as regarded its practical
-utility and value.” So long as Watt’s connexion with
-Roebuck continued, there was indeed very little chance
-of getting it favourably introduced to public notice.
-What it was yet to become as a working power depended
-in no small degree upon the business ability,
-the strength of purpose, and the length of purse of his
-new partner.</p>
-
-<p>Had Watt searched Europe through, probably he
-could not have found a man better fitted than Matthew
-Boulton for bringing his invention fairly before the
-world. Many would have thought it rash on the part
-of the latter, burdened as he was with heavy liabilities,
-to engage in a new undertaking of so speculative a
-character. Feasible though the scheme might be, it
-was an admitted fact that nearly all the experiments
-with the models heretofore made had proved failures.
-It is true Watt firmly believed that he had hit upon
-the right principle, and he was as sanguine as ever of
-the eventual success of his engine. But though inventors
-are usually sanguine, men of capital do not
-take up their schemes on that account. Capitalists are
-rather disposed to regard sanguine inventors as visionaries,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_200">[200]</span>
-full of theories of what is possible rather than of
-well-defined plans of what is practicable and useful.</p>
-
-<p>Boulton, however, amongst his many other gifts possessed
-an admirable knowledge of character. His judgment
-of men was almost unerring. In Watt he had
-recognised at his first visit to Soho, not only a man
-of original inventive genius, but a plodding, earnest,
-intent, and withal an exceedingly modest man; not given
-to puff, but on the contrary rather disposed to underrate
-the merit of his inventions. Different though their
-characters were in most respects, Boulton at once conceived
-a hearty liking for him. The one displayed in
-perfection precisely those qualities which the other
-wanted. Boulton was a man of ardent and generous
-temperament, bold and enterprising, undaunted by difficulty,
-and possessing an almost boundless capacity for
-work. He was a man of great tact, clear perception,
-and sound judgment. Moreover, he possessed that
-indispensable quality of perseverance, without which
-the best talents are of comparatively little avail in the
-conduct of important affairs. While Watt hated business,
-Boulton loved it. He had, indeed, a genius for
-business,&mdash;a gift almost as rare as that for poetry, for
-art, or for war. He possessed a marvellous power of organisation.
-With a keen eye for details he combined a
-comprehensive grasp of intellect. While his senses were
-so acute, that when sitting in his office at Soho he could
-detect the slightest stoppage or derangement in the
-machinery of that vast establishment, and send his message
-direct to the spot where it had occurred, his
-power of imagination was such as enabled him to look
-clearly along extensive lines of possible action in Europe,
-America, and the East. For there is a poetic as well
-as a commonplace side to business; and the man of
-business genius lights up the humdrum routine of daily
-life by exploring the boundless region of possibility
-wherever it may lie open before him.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_201">[201]</span></p>
-
-<p>Boulton had already won his way to the very front
-rank in his calling, honestly and honourably; and he
-was proud of it. He had created many new branches
-of industry, which gave regular employment to hundreds
-of families. He had erected and organised a manufactory
-which was looked upon as one of the most complete of
-its kind in England, and was resorted to by visitors from
-all parts of the world. But Boulton was more than a
-man of business: he was a man of culture, and the friend
-of cultivated men. His hospitable mansion at Soho was
-the resort of persons eminent in art, in literature, and
-in science; and the love and admiration with which
-he inspired such men affords one of the best proofs
-of his own elevation of character. Among the most
-intimate of his friends and associates were Richard Lovell
-Edgeworth,<a name="Anchor-134" id="Anchor-134" href="#Footnote-134" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 134.">[134]</a> a gentleman of fortune, enthusiastically
-devoted to his long-conceived design of moving land-carriages
-by steam; Captain Keir, an excellent practical
-chemist, a wit and a man of learning; Dr. Small, the
-accomplished physician, chemist, and mechanist; Josiah
-Wedgwood, the practical philosopher and manufacturer,
-founder of a new and important branch of skilled
-industry; Thomas Day, the ingenious author of ‘Sandford
-and Merton;’ Dr. Darwin, the poet-physician; Dr.
-Withering, the botanist; besides others who afterwards
-joined the Soho circle,&mdash;not the least distinguished of
-whom were Joseph Priestley and James Watt.<a name="Anchor-135" id="Anchor-135" href="#Footnote-135" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 135.">[135]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_202">[202]</span></p>
-
-<p>Boulton could not have been very sanguine at first
-as to the success of Watt’s engine. There were a thousand
-difficulties in the way of getting it introduced
-to general use. The principal one was the difficulty of
-finding workmen capable of making it. Watt had
-been constantly worried by “villanous bad workmen,”
-who failed to make any model that would go properly.
-It mattered not that the principle of the engine was
-right; if its construction was beyond the skill of
-ordinary handicraftsmen, the invention was practically
-worthless. The great Smeaton was of this opinion.
-When he saw the first model working at Soho, he admitted
-the excellence of the contrivance, but predicted
-its failure, on the ground that it was too complicated,
-and that workmen were not to be found capable of
-manufacturing it on any large scale for general uses.</p>
-
-<p>Watt himself felt that, if the engine was ever to
-have a fair chance, it was now; and that if Boulton,
-with his staff of skilled workmen at command, could
-not make it go, the scheme must be abandoned henceforward
-as impracticable. Boulton must, however, have
-seen the elements of success in the invention, otherwise
-he would not have taken up with it. He knew the
-difficulties Watt had encountered in designing it, and
-he could well appreciate the skill with which he had
-overcome them; for Boulton himself, as we have seen,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_203">[203]</span>
-had for some time been occupied with the study of the
-subject. But the views of Boulton on entering into his
-new branch of business, cannot be better expressed than
-in his own words, as stated in a letter written by him
-to Watt in 1769, when then invited to join the Roebuck
-partnership:&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“The plan proposed to me,”<a name="Anchor-136" id="Anchor-136" href="#Footnote-136" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 136.">[136]</a> said he, “is so very different from
-that which I had conceived at the time I talked with you upon the
-subject, that I cannot think it a proper one for me to meddle with,
-as I do not intend turning engineer. I was excited by two motives
-to offer you my assistance&mdash;which were, love of you, and love of a
-money-getting ingenious project. I presumed that your engine
-would require money, very accurate workmanship, and extensive
-correspondence, to make it turn out to the best advantage; and that
-the best means of keeping up our reputation and doing the invention
-justice, would be to keep the executive part out of the hands of the
-multitude of empirical engineers, who, from ignorance, want of
-experience, and want of necessary convenience, would be very liable
-to produce bad and inaccurate workmanship; all which deficiencies
-would affect the reputation of the invention. To remedy which, and
-to produce the most profit, my idea was to settle a manufactory near
-my own, by the side of our canal, where I would erect all the conveniences
-necessary for the completion of engines, and from which
-manufactory we would serve the world with engines of all sizes.
-By these means and your assistance we could engage and instruct
-some excellent workmen, who (with more excellent tools than would
-be worth any man’s while to procure for one single engine) could
-execute the invention 20 per cent. cheaper than it would be
-otherwise executed, and with as great a difference of accuracy as
-there is between the blacksmith and the mathematical instrument
-maker.”</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>He went on to state that he was willing to enter
-upon the speculation with these views, considering
-it well worth his while “to make engines for all
-the world,” though it would not be worth his while
-“to make for three counties only;” besides, he declared
-himself averse to embark in any trade that he had not
-the inspection of himself. He concluded by saying,
-“<span class="pagenum" id="Page_204">[204]</span>
-Although there seem to be some obstructions to our
-partnership in the engine trade, yet I live in hopes that
-you or I may hit upon some scheme or other that may
-associate us in this part of the world, which would
-render it still more agreeable to me than it is, by the
-acquisition of such a neighbour.”<a name="Anchor-137" id="Anchor-137" href="#Footnote-137" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 137.">[137]</a></p>
-
-<p>Five years had passed since this letter was written,
-during which the engine had made no way in the
-world. The partnership of Roebuck and Watt had
-yielded nothing but vexation and debt; until at last,
-fortunately for Watt&mdash;though at the time he regarded
-it as a terrible calamity&mdash;Roebuck broke down, and
-the obstruction was removed which had prevented
-Watt and Boulton from coming together. The latter
-at once reverted to the plan of action which he had
-with so much sagacity laid down in 1769; and he
-invited Watt to take up his abode at Soho until the
-necessary preliminary arrangements could be made.
-He thought it desirable, in the first place, to erect
-the engine, of which the several parts had been sent
-to Soho from Kinneil, in order, if possible, to exhibit
-a specimen of the invention in actual work. Boulton
-undertook to defray all the necessary expenses, and
-to find competent workmen to carry out the instructions
-of Watt, whom Boulton was also to maintain
-until the engine business had become productive.<a name="Anchor-138" id="Anchor-138" href="#Footnote-138" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 138.">[138]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_205">[205]</span></p>
-
-<p>The materials brought from Kinneil were accordingly
-put together with as little delay as possible;
-and, thanks to the greater skill of the workmen who
-assisted in its erection, the engine, when finished,
-worked in a more satisfactory manner than it had
-ever done before. In November, 1774, Watt wrote Dr.
-Roebuck, informing him of the success of his trials;
-on which the Dr. expressed his surprise that the
-engine should have worked at all, “considering the
-slightness of the materials and its long exposure to the
-injuries of the weather.” Watt also wrote to his
-father at Greenock. “The business I am here about
-has turned out rather successful; that is to say, the
-fire-engine I have invented is now going, and answers
-much better than any other that has yet been made;
-and I expect that the invention will be very beneficial
-to me.”<a name="Anchor-139" id="Anchor-139" href="#Footnote-139" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 139.">[139]</a> Such was Watt’s modest announcement of
-the successful working of the engine on which such
-great results depended.</p>
-
-<p>Much, however, remained to be done before either
-Watt or Boulton could reap any benefit from the
-invention. Six years out of the fourteen for which the
-patent was originally taken had already expired; and
-all that had been accomplished was the erection of this
-experimental engine at Soho. What further period
-might elapse before capitalists could be brought to recognise
-the practical uses of the invention could only be
-guessed at; but the probability was that the patent right
-would expire long before such a demand for the engines
-arose as should remunerate Boulton and Watt for their
-investment of time, labour, and capital. And the patent
-once expired, the world at large would be free to make
-the engines, though Watt himself had not recovered
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_206">[206]</span>
-one farthing towards repaying him for the long years
-of experiment, study, and ingenuity bestowed by him in
-bringing his invention to perfection. These considerations
-made Boulton hesitate before launching out the
-money necessary to provide the tools, machinery, and
-buildings, for carrying on the intended manufacture on
-a large scale and in the best style.</p>
-
-<p>When it became known that Boulton had taken an
-interest in a new engine for pumping water, he had
-many inquiries about it from the mining districts. The
-need of a more effective engine than any then in use
-was every year becoming more urgent. The powers of
-Newcomen’s engine had been tried to the utmost. So long
-as the surface-lodes were worked, its power was sufficient
-to clear the mines of water; but as they were carried
-deeper, it was found totally inadequate for the work,
-and many mines were consequently becoming gradually
-drowned out and abandoned. The excessive consumption
-of coals by the Newcomen engines was another
-serious objection to their use, especially in districts such
-as Cornwall, where coal was very dear. When Small
-was urging Watt to come to Birmingham and make
-engines, he wrote: “A friend of Boulton’s, in Cornwall,
-sent us word a few days ago that four or five copper-mines
-are just going to be abandoned because of the
-high price of coals, and begs us to apply to them instantly.
-The York Buildings Company delay rebuilding their
-engine, with great inconvenience to themselves, waiting
-for yours. Yesterday application was made to me by a
-Mining Company in Derbyshire to know when you are
-to be in England about the engines, because they must
-quit their mine if you cannot relieve them.” The necessity
-for an improved pumping power had set many
-inventors to work besides Watt, and some of the less
-scrupulous of them were already trying to adopt his
-principle in such a way as to evade his patent. Moore,
-the London linendraper, and Hatley, one of Watt’s
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_207">[207]</span>
-Carron workmen, had brought out and were pushing
-engines similar to Watt’s; the latter having stolen and
-sold for a considerable sum working drawings of the
-Kinneil engine.</p>
-
-<p>From these signs Boulton saw that, in the event of
-the engine proving successful, he and his partner would
-have to defend the invention against a host of pirates;
-and he became persuaded that he would not be justified
-in risking his capital in the establishment of a steam-engine
-manufactory unless a considerable extension of
-the patent-right could be secured. To ascertain whether
-this was practicable, Watt proceeded to London in the
-beginning of 1775, to confer with his patent agent and
-take the opinion of counsel on the subject. Mr. Wedderburn,
-who was advised with, recommended that the
-existing patent should be surrendered, and in that case
-he did not doubt that a new one would be granted.
-While in London, Watt looked out for possible orders for
-his engine: “I have,” he wrote Boulton, “a prospect of
-two orders for fire-engines here, one to water Piccadilly,
-and the other to serve the south end of Blackfriars
-Bridge with water. I have taken advice of several
-people whom I could trust about the patent. They all
-agree that an Act would be much better and cheaper, a
-patent being now 130<i>l.</i>, the Act, if obtainable, 110<i>l.</i>
-The present patent has eight years still to run, bearing
-date January, 1769. I understand there will be an
-almost unlimited sale for wheel-engines to the West
-Indies, at the rate of 100<i>l.</i> for each horse’s power.”<a name="Anchor-140" id="Anchor-140" href="#Footnote-140" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 140.">[140]</a></p>
-
-<p>Watt also occupied some of his time in London in
-superintending the adjustment of weights manufactured
-by Boulton and Fothergill, then sold in considerable
-quantities through their London agent. That he continued
-to take an interest in his old business of mathematical
-instrument making is apparent from the visits
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_208">[208]</span>
-which he made to several well-known shops. One of
-the articles which he examined with most interest was
-Short’s Gregorian telescope. At other times, by Boulton’s
-request, he went to see the few steam-engines then at
-work in London and the neighbourhood, and make
-inquiries as to their performances. With that object he
-examined the engines at the New River, Hungerford,
-and Chelsea. At the latter place, he said, “it was impossible
-to try the quantity of injection, and the fellow
-told me lies about the height of the column of water.”
-But Watt soon grew tired of London, “running from
-street to street all day about gilding,” inquiring after
-metal-rollers, silver-platers, and button-makers. He did
-his best, however, to execute the commissions which
-Boulton from time to time sent him; and when these
-were executed, he returned to Birmingham to confer
-with his friends as to the steps to be taken with respect
-to the patent. The result of his conferences with Boulton
-and Small was, that it was determined to take steps to
-apply for an Act for its extension in the ensuing session
-of Parliament.</p>
-
-<p>Watt went up to London a second time for the purpose
-of having the Bill drawn. He had scarcely arrived
-there when the sad intelligence reached him of the
-death of Dr. Small. He had long been ailing, yet
-the event was a shock alike to himself and Boulton.
-The latter wrote Watt in the bitterness of his grief, “If
-there were not a few other objects yet remaining for
-me to settle my affections upon, I should wish also to
-take up my abode in the mansions of the dead.” Watt
-replied, reminding him of the sentiments of their departed
-friend, as to the impropriety of indulging in unavailing
-sorrow, the best refuge from which was the more sedulous
-performance of duty. “Come, my dear sir,” said
-he, “and immerse yourself in this sea of business as
-soon as possible. Pay a proper respect to your friend by
-obeying his precepts. I wait for you with impatience,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_209">[209]</span>
-and assure yourself no endeavour of mine shall be wanting
-to render life agreeable to you.”</p>
-
-<p>It had been intended to include Small in the steam-engine
-partnership on the renewal of the patent. He
-had been consulted in all the stages of the proceedings,
-and one of the last things he did was to draw up Watt’s
-petition for the Bill. No settled arrangement had yet
-been made&mdash;not even between Boulton and Watt. Everything
-depended upon the success of the application for
-the extension of the patent.</p>
-
-<p>Meanwhile, through the recommendation of his old
-friend Dr. Robison, then in Russia officiating as Mathematical
-Professor at the Government Naval School at
-Cronstadt, Watt was offered an appointment under
-the Russian Government, at a salary of about 1000<i>l.</i>
-a year. He was thus presented with a means of escape
-from his dependence upon Boulton, and for the first
-time in his life had the prospect before him of an
-income that to him would have been affluence. But he
-entertained strong objections to settling in Russia: he
-objected to its climate, its comparative barbarism, and,
-notwithstanding the society of his friend Robison, to
-the limited social resources of St. Petersburg. Besides,
-Boulton’s favours were so gracefully conferred, that the
-dependence on him was not felt; for he made the recipient
-of his favours feel as if the obligation were entirely
-on the side of the giver. “Your going to Russia staggers
-me,” he wrote to Watt; “the precariousness of your
-health, the dangers of so long a journey or voyage, and
-my own deprivation of consolation, render me a little
-uncomfortable; but I wish to assist and advise you for
-the best, without regard to self.” The result was, that
-Watt determined to wait the issue of the application for
-the extension of his patent.</p>
-
-<p>The Bill was introduced to Parliament on the 28th of
-February, 1775, and it was obvious from the first that
-it would have considerable opposition to encounter. The
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_210">[210]</span>
-mining interest had looked forward to Watt’s invention
-as a means of helping them out of their difficulties and
-giving a new value to their property by clearing the
-drowned mines of water. They therefore desired to
-have the free use of the engine at the earliest possible
-period; and when it was proposed to extend the patent
-by Act of Parliament, they set up with one accord the
-cry of “No monopoly.” Up to the present time, as we
-have seen, the invention had been productive to Watt of
-nothing but loss, labour, anxiety, and headaches; and it
-was only just that a reasonable period should be allowed
-to enable him to derive some advantage from the results
-of his application and ingenuity. But the mining
-interest took a different view of the matter. They
-did not see the necessity of recognising the rights of the
-inventor beyond the term of his existing patent, and
-they held that the public interests would suffer if the proposed
-“monopoly” were granted. Nor were they without
-supporters in Parliament, for among the most strenuous
-we find the name of Edmund Burke,&mdash;influenced, it is
-supposed, by certain mining interests in the neighbourhood
-of Bristol, which city he then represented.</p>
-
-<p>There is no doubt that the public would have benefited
-by Watt’s invention having been made free to all. But
-it was not for the public merely that Watt had been
-working at his engine for fifteen long years. He
-was a man of comparatively small means, and had
-been buoyed up and stimulated to renewed exertion
-during that time by the hope of ultimate reward in
-the event of its success. If labour could give a man
-a title to property in his invention, Watt’s claim was
-clear. The condensing-engine had been the product of
-his own skill, contrivance, and brain-work. But there
-has always been a difficulty in getting the claims of
-mere brain-work recognised. Had he expended his
-labour in building a house instead of in contriving a
-machine, his right of property would at once have been
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_211">[211]</span>
-acknowledged. As it was, he had to contend for justice
-and persuade the legislature of the reasonableness of
-granting his application for an extension of the patent.
-In the “Case” which he drew up for distribution amongst
-the members of the Lower House, on the motion being
-carried for the recommittal of the Bill, he set forth that
-having, after great labour and expense extending over
-many years, succeeded in completing working engines
-of each of the two kinds he had invented, he found that
-they could not be carried into profitable execution without
-the further expenditure of large sums of money in
-erecting mills, and purchasing the various materials
-and utensils necessary for making them; and from the
-reluctance with which the public generally adopt new
-inventions, he was afraid that the whole term granted
-by his patent would expire before the engines should
-have come into general use and any portion of his
-expenses be repaid:&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“The inventor of these new engines,” said he, “is sorry that
-gentlemen of knowledge, and avowed admirers of his invention,
-should oppose the Bill by putting it in the light of a monopoly.
-He never had any intention of circumscribing or claiming the
-inventions of others; and the Bill is now drawn up in such a
-manner as sufficiently guards those rights, and must oblige him
-to prove his own right to every part of his invention which may at
-any time be disputed.... If the invention be valuable, it has been
-made so by his industry, and at his expense; he has struggled with
-bad health, and many other inconveniences, to bring it to perfection,
-and all he wishes is to be secured in the profits which he may
-reasonably expect from it,&mdash;profits which he cannot obtain without an
-exertion of his abilities to bring it into practice, by which the public
-must be the greatest gainers, and which are limited by the performance
-of the common engines; for he cannot expect that any
-person will make use of his contrivance, unless he can prove to them
-that savings will take place, and that his demand for the privilege
-of using the invention will amount only to a reasonable part of
-them. No man will lay aside a known engine, and stop his work
-to erect one of a new contrivance, unless he is certain to be a very
-great gainer by the exchange; and if any contrivance shall so
-far excel others as to enforce the use of it, it is reasonable that the
-author of such a contrivance should be rewarded.”</p>
-</div>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_212">[212]</span></p>
-
-<p>These weighty arguments could not fail to produce
-an impression on the minds of all reasonable men, and
-the result was, that Parliament passed an Act extending
-Watt’s patent right for the further term of twenty-four
-years. Watt wrote Boulton on the 27th May,&mdash;“I
-hope to be clear to come away by Wednesday or Thursday.
-I am heartily sick of this town and <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">fort ennuyée</i>
-since you left it. Dr. Roebuck is likely to get an order,
-out of Smeaton’s hands, for an engine in Yorkshire that,
-according to Smeaton’s calculation, will burn 1200<i>l.</i> per
-annum in coals. But this has had one bad effect. It
-has made the Doctor repent of his bargain and wish
-again to be upon the 1-10th [profits]; but we must see
-to keep him right if possible, so don’t vex yourself about
-it.” Dr. Roebuck had been finally settled with before
-the passing of the Act. It had been arranged that
-Boulton should pay him 1000<i>l.</i> out of the first profits
-arising from his share in the engine, making about
-2200<i>l.</i> in all paid by Boulton to Roebuck for his two-thirds
-of the patent.<a name="Anchor-141" id="Anchor-141" href="#Footnote-141" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 141.">[141]</a></p>
-
-<p>Watt returned to Birmingham to set about the
-making of the engines for which orders had already been
-received. Boulton had been busily occupied during his
-absence in experimenting on the Soho engine. A new
-18-inch cylinder had been cast for it at Bersham by John
-Wilkinson, the great ironfounder,<a name="Anchor-142" id="Anchor-142" href="#Footnote-142" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 142.">[142]</a> who had contrived a
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_213">[213]</span>
-machine for boring it with accuracy. This cylinder was
-substituted for the tin one brought from Kinneil, and
-other improvements having been introduced, the engine
-was again set to work with very satisfactory results.
-Watt found his partner in good spirits; not less elated
-by the performances of the model than by the passing
-of the Act; and arrangements were at once set on foot
-for carrying on the manufacture of engines upon an
-extensive scale. Applications for terms, followed by
-orders, shortly came in from the mining districts; and
-before long the works at Soho were resounding with
-the clang of hammers and machinery employed in
-manufacturing steam-engines for all parts of the civilised
-world.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_214">[214]</span></p>
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_235" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_235.png" width="450" height="291" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">WATT’S HOUSE, HARPER’S HILL, BIRMINGHAM.</p>
-</div>
-
-
-
-
-<h3>CHAPTER XII.<br />
-
-<small><span class="smcap">Boulton and Watt begin the Manufacture of Steam-engines.</span></small></h3>
-
-
-<p><span class="smcap">Watt</span> now arranged to take up his residence in Birmingham
-until the issue of the steam-engine enterprise
-could be ascertained, and he went down to Glasgow to
-bring up his two children, whom he had left in charge
-of their relatives. Boulton had taken a house on Harper’s
-Hill, which was in readiness for the reception of the
-family on their arrival about the end of August, 1775.
-Regent’s-place, Harper’s Hill, was then the nearest house
-to Soho on that side of Birmingham. It was a double
-house, substantially built in brick, with stone facings,
-standing on the outskirts of the town, surrounded by
-fields and gardens. St. Paul’s, the nearest church, was
-not built until four years after Watt took up his abode
-there. But the house at Harper’s Hill is in the country
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_215">[215]</span>
-no longer: it is now surrounded in all directions by
-dense masses of buildings, and is itself inhabited by
-working people.</p>
-
-<p>The first engine made at Soho was one ordered by
-John Wilkinson to blow the bellows of his ironworks at
-Broseley. Great interest was, of course, felt in the
-success of this engine. Watt took great pains with
-the drawings; the workmen did their best to execute
-the several parts accurately, for it was understood that
-many orders depended upon whether it worked satisfactorily
-or not. Wilkinson’s iron-manufacturing neighbours,
-who were contemplating the erection of Newcomen
-engines, suspended their operations until they
-had an opportunity of seeing what Boulton and Watt’s
-engine could do; and all looked forward to its completion
-with the most eager interest. When all was
-ready at Soho, the materials were packed up and sent
-to Broseley, Watt accompanying them to superintend
-the erection. He had as yet no assistant to whom he
-could intrust such a piece of work, on which so much
-depended. The engine was erected and ready for use
-about the beginning of 1776. As it approached completion
-Watt became increasingly anxious to make a
-trial of its powers. But Boulton wrote to him not to
-hurry&mdash;not to let the engine make a stroke until every
-possible hinderance to its successful action had been
-removed; “and then,” said he, “in the name of God,
-fall to and do your best.” The result of the extreme
-care taken with the construction and erection of the
-engine was entirely satisfactory. It worked to the admiration
-of all who saw it, and the fame of Boulton and
-Watt became great in the midland counties.</p>
-
-<p>While Watt was thus occupied, Boulton was pushing
-on the new buildings at Soho. He kept his partner fully
-advised of all that was going on. “The new forging-shop,”
-he wrote, “looks very formidable: the roof is
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_216">[216]</span>
-nearly put on, and the hearths are both built.” Tools and
-machinery were being prepared, and all looked hopeful
-for the future. Orders were coming in for engines.
-One in hand for Bloomfield Colliery was well advanced.
-Many inquiries had come from Cornwall. Mr. Papps, of
-Truro, was anxious to introduce the engine in that county.
-Out of forty engines there, only eighteen were in work;
-so that there was a fine field for future operations. “Pray
-tell Mr. Wilkinson,” Boulton added, “to get a dozen
-cylinders cast and bored, from 12 to 50 inches diameter,
-and as many condensers of suitable sizes. The latter
-must be sent here, as we will keep them ready fitted up,
-and then an engine can be turned out of hand in two or
-three weeks. I have fixed my mind upon making from
-twelve to fifteen reciprocating and fifty rotative engines
-per annum. I assure you that of all the toys and trinkets
-which we manufacture at Soho, none shall take the place
-of fire-engines in respect of my attention.”<a name="Anchor-143" id="Anchor-143" href="#Footnote-143" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 143.">[143]</a></p>
-
-<p>Boulton was not, however, exclusively engrossed by
-engine affairs. Among other things he informed Watt
-that he had put his little boy Jamie to a good school,
-and that he was very much occupied, as usual, in entertaining
-visitors. “The Empress of Russia,” he wrote,
-“is now at my house, and a charming woman she is.”
-The Empress afterwards sent Boulton her portrait, and
-it was long one of the ornaments of Soho. Amidst
-his various occupations he contrived to find leisure for
-experiments on minerals, having received from a correspondent
-in Wales a large assortment of iron-ores to
-assay. He was also trying experiments on the model
-engine, the results of which were duly communicated to
-his partner.<a name="Anchor-144" id="Anchor-144" href="#Footnote-144" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 144.">[144]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_217">[217]</span></p>
-
-<p>On Watt’s return to Soho, Boulton proceeded to
-London on financial affairs, as well as to look after
-engine orders. He there found reports in circulation
-among the engineering class that the new engine had
-proved a failure. The Society of Engineers in Holborn,
-of which Smeaton was the great luminary, had settled
-it that neither the tools nor the workmen existed that
-could manufacture so complex a machine with sufficient
-precision, and it was asserted that all the ingenuity and
-skill of Soho had been unable to conquer the defects of
-the piston. “So said Holmes, the clockmaker,” wrote
-Boulton,&mdash;Holmes being the intimate friend of Smeaton;
-“but no language will be sufficiently persuasive on that
-head except the good performance of the engines themselves.”<a name="Anchor-145" id="Anchor-145" href="#Footnote-145" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 145.">[145]</a>
-Boulton, therefore, urged the completion of
-the engine then in hand for Cooke and Company’s distillery
-at Stratford-le-Bow, near London. “Wilby,”
-[the managing partner,] said he, “seems very impatient,
-and so am I, both for the sake of reputation as well as
-to begin to turn the tide of money,”&mdash;the current of
-which had as yet been all outwards. Boulton went to
-see the York Buildings engine, which had been reconstructed
-by Smeaton, and was then reckoned one of the
-best on the Newcomen plan. The old man who tended
-it lauded the engine to the skies, and notwithstanding
-Boulton’s description of the new engines at work in
-Staffordshire, he would not believe that any engine in
-existence could excel his own.</p>
-
-<p>In the course of the summer Watt again visited Glasgow,&mdash;this
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_218">[218]</span>
-time for the purpose of bringing back a
-wife. The lady he proposed to marry was Miss Anne
-Macgregor, daughter of a respectable dyer. The young
-lady’s consent was obtained, as well as her father’s, to
-the proposed union; but the latter, before making any
-settlement on his daughter, intimated to Watt that he
-desired to see the partnership agreement between him
-and Boulton. Now, although the terms of partnership
-had been generally arranged, they had not yet been put
-into legal form, and Watt asked that this should be done
-for the cautious old gentleman’s satisfaction without
-delay.<a name="Anchor-146" id="Anchor-146" href="#Footnote-146" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 146.">[146]</a> About his love affair Watt wrote,&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“Whether a man of the world, such as you, look upon my present
-love as the folly of youth or the dotage of age [Watt was then in his
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_219">[219]</span>
-fortieth year], I find myself in no humour to lay it aside, or to look
-upon it in either of these lights, but consider it as one of the wisest
-of my actions, and should look upon a disappointment in it as one
-of the greatest of my misfortunes.... I have had better health
-since I left you than has been my lot for years, and my spirits have
-borne me through my vexations wonderfully. I have lost all dread
-of any future connexion with Monsieur la Verole, and, if I carry
-my point in this matter, I hope to be very much more useful to
-you than has hitherto been in my power. The spur will be
-greater.”<a name="Anchor-147" id="Anchor-147" href="#Footnote-147" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 147.">[147]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>While in Scotland Watt obtained orders for several
-engines; amongst others, he undertook to supply one
-for the Torryburn Colliery, in Fife, on the terms of
-receiving one-third of the savings effected by it compared
-with the engine then at work, with such further
-sum as might be judged fair. Another was ordered
-by Sir Archibald Hope for his colliery near Edinburgh,
-on similar terms. At the same time Watt proceeded
-with the collection of his old outstanding debts,
-though these did not amount to much. “I believe,”
-he wrote to Boulton, “I shall have no occasion to draw
-on you for any money, having got in some of my old
-scraps, which will serve, or nearly serve, my occasions
-here.”</p>
-
-<p>The deed of partnership not arriving, Watt wrote
-again, pressing Boulton for some communication from
-him to satisfy the old gentleman as to his situation.</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“Don’t let me be detected in a falsehood,” said he, “or accused of
-imprudence. The thing which sticks most in his [Mr. Macgregor’s]
-stomach is, that somehow or other, in case of the failure of success,
-I may be brought into a load of debt which may totally ruin me.
-I hope you will excuse his caution in this matter, as I do, when
-you consider that he is disposing of a favourite child, and consequently
-must expect all the security possible for her wellbeing.
-I must also do him the justice to say that he has behaved to me in
-a very open and friendly manner; and, when he found that his
-daughter’s affections were engaged beyond recall, gave his consent
-with a good grace.... I have nothing to write you in the way of
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_220">[220]</span>
-news. I am bandied about like a football, and perfectly impatient
-to leave this country, but do not care to come away without my
-errand. I long vastly to hear from you, how you all are, and how
-matters go on. I hope Jemmy is minding his school and is well:
-you need not tell him nor anybody else that I am going to bring
-him home a mamma.”<a name="Anchor-148" id="Anchor-148" href="#Footnote-148" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 148.">[148]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Boulton’s reply was perfectly satisfactory. He confirmed
-the heads of the agreement, as sketched out by
-Watt himself, adopting his own words. He warmly
-congratulated him on his approaching marriage, being
-convinced that it was the goddess of wisdom that had
-led him to the altar of love. But he thought Watt
-might be over delicate as to money matters.</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“You certainly,” said he, “have a right to expect from the lady’s
-father a child’s share, both present and reversionary; and you
-certainly have a right to expect some ready money, as a small sum
-may be of more importance to you in the meridian of life than a
-large one at the close of it. I have always heard you speak of the
-old gentleman as a man of exceeding good sound sense, and therefore
-I should think you will have the less difficulty in settling matters
-with him. No doubt he will expect some settlement to be made
-upon his daughter, and all that I advise is, that you do not undervalue
-(according to your custom) your own abilities or your
-property. It may be difficult to say what is the value of your
-property in partnership with me. However, I will give it a name,
-and I do say that I would willingly give you two or perhaps three
-thousand pounds for the assignment of your third part of the Act of
-Parliament; but I should be sorry to make you so bad a bargain,
-or to make any bargain at all that tended to deprive me of your
-friendship, acquaintance, and assistance,&mdash;hoping, as I do, that we
-shall harmoniously live to wear out the twenty-five years together,
-which I had rather do than gain a Nabob’s fortune by being the
-sole proprietor.... I wish I had more time to tell you all the
-circumstances that have occurred in the engine trade; but that
-shall be the subject of my next. All is well, and when you return
-you’ll be quite charmed at the simplicity and quietness of the Soho
-engine.”<a name="Anchor-149" id="Anchor-149" href="#Footnote-149" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 149.">[149]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>With his usual want of confidence in himself, Watt
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_221">[221]</span>
-urged Boulton to come down to Glasgow and assist him
-in concluding matters with the old gentleman.</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“I am afraid,” he wrote, “that I shall otherwise make a very
-bad bargain in money matters, which wise men like you esteem the
-most essential part, and I myself, although I be an enamoured
-swain, do not altogether despise. You may perhaps think it odd
-that in the midst of my friends here I should call for your help;
-but the fact is, that from several reasons I do not choose to place
-that confidence in any of my friends here that would be necessary
-in such a case, and I do not know any of them that have more to
-say with the gentleman in question than I have myself. Besides,
-you are the only person who can give him satisfactory information
-concerning my situation.”</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>But Boulton was too busy at the time to go down to
-Glasgow to the help of his partner. He was full of
-work, full of orders, full of Soho. He replied,&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“Although I have added to the list of my bad habits by joking
-upon matrimony, yet my disposition and my judgment would lead
-me to marry again were I in your case. I know you will be
-happier as a married man than as a single one, and therefore it is
-wisdom in you to wed; and if that could not be done without my
-coming to Scotland, I certainly would come if it were as far again;
-but I am so beset with difficulties, that nothing less than the
-absolute loss of your life, or wife&mdash;which is virtually the same
-thing&mdash;could bring me.”</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>He further explained that a good deal of extra work
-had fallen upon him, through the absence of some of his
-most important assistants. Mr. Matthews, his London
-financial agent, like Watt, was about to be married, and
-would be absent abroad for a tour on a wedding trip, in
-which he was to be accompanied by Fothergill, Boulton’s
-partner in the toy and button trade. Mr. Scale, the
-manager, was also absent, added to which the button
-orders were in arrear some 16,000 gross; so that, said
-Boulton, “I have more real difficulties to grapple with
-than I hope ever to have in any other year in my life.”</p>
-
-<p>There were also constant visitors arriving at Soho:
-among others the Duke of Buccleuch, who had called to
-see the works and inquire after Mr. Watt; and Mr.
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_222">[222]</span>
-Moor, of the Society of Engineers in the Adelphi, who
-had come to see with his own eyes whether the reports
-in circulation against the new engine were true or false.
-The perfecting of the details of the engine also required
-constant attention.</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“Our copper bottom,” said Boulton, “hath plagued us very much
-by steam leaks, and therefore I have had one cast (with its
-conducting pipe) all in one piece; since which the engine doth not
-take more than 10 feet of steam, and I hope to reduce that quantity,
-as we have just received the new piston, which shall be put in and
-at work to-morrow. Our Soho engine never was in such good
-order as at present. Bloomfield and Willey [engines] are both
-well, and I doubt not but Bow engine will be better than
-any of ’em.”</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Boulton was almost as full of speculation as Watt himself
-as to the means of improving the engine. “I did not
-sleep last night,” he wrote, “my mind being absorbed by
-steam.” One of his speculations was as to the means of
-increasing the heating surface, and with that object he
-proposed to apply the fire “in copper spheres within the
-water.” His mind was also running on economising
-power by working steam expansively, “being clear that
-the principle is sound.”</p>
-
-<p>Later, he wrote Watt that he had an application from
-a distiller at Bristol for an engine to raise 15,000 gallons
-of ale per hour 15 feet high; another for a coal mine in
-Wales, and two others for London distilleries. To add to
-his anxieties, one Humphry Gainsborough, a dissenting
-minister at Henley-on-Thames, had instituted proceedings
-against Watt for an alleged piracy of his invention!
-On this Boulton wrote to his partner,&mdash;“I have just
-received a summons to attend the Solicitor-General next
-week in opposition to Gainsborough, otherwise the
-solicitor will make his report. This is a disagreeable
-circumstance, particularly at this season, when you are
-absent. Joseph [Harrison] is in London, and idleness
-is in our engine-shop.” There was therefore every
-reason why Watt should make haste to get married, and
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_223">[223]</span>
-return to Soho as speedily as possible. On the 28th July,
-1776, Watt wrote to apologise for his long absence, and
-to say that the event was to come off on the following
-Monday, after which he would set out immediately for
-Liverpool, where he proposed to meet Boulton, unless
-countermanded. He also intimated that he had got
-another order for an engine at Leadhills.<a name="Anchor-150" id="Anchor-150" href="#Footnote-150" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 150.">[150]</a> Arrived at
-Liverpool, a letter from Boulton met him, saying he
-had been under the necessity of proceeding to London.</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“Gainsborough,” said he, “hath appointed to meet me at Holt’s,
-his attorney, on Monday, when I shall say little besides learning
-his principles and invention. If we had a hundred wheels [wheel-engines]
-ready made, and a hundred small engines, like Bow engine,
-and twenty large ones executed, we could readily dispose of them.
-Therefore let us make hay while the sun shines, and gather our
-barns full before the dark cloud of age lowers upon us, and before
-any more Tubal Cains, Watts, Dr. Faustuses, or Gainsboroughs,
-arise with serpents like Moses’s to devour all others.... As to
-your absence, say nothing about it. I will forgive it this time,
-provided you promise me never to marry again.”<a name="Anchor-151" id="Anchor-151" href="#Footnote-151" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 151.">[151]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Watt hastened back to Birmingham, and after settling
-his wife in her new home, proceeded with the execution
-of the orders for engines which had come in
-during his two months’ absence. Mr. Wilby was impatient
-for the delivery of the Bow engine, and as
-soon as it was ready, which was early in September,
-the materials were forwarded to London with Joseph
-Harrison, to be fitted and set to work. Besides careful
-verbal instructions, Watt supplied Joseph with full
-particulars in writing of the measures he was to adopt
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_224">[224]</span>
-in putting the engine together. Not a point in detail
-was neglected, and if any difficulty arose, Joseph was
-directed at once to communicate with him by letter.
-When the engine was set to work, it was found that the
-steam could not be kept up, on which Watt suggested
-that as it had been calculated to make only ten strokes
-per minute&mdash;that being enough to raise the quantity of
-water desired&mdash;the reason of the defect must be that, as
-it was going at fourteen or fifteen strokes the minute, it
-must be going too fast. He also pointed out that probably
-the piston was not quite good, and perhaps there
-was some steam-leak into the inner cylinder, or by the
-regulators into the condenser; or it was possible that the
-injection might spout too far up the horizontal steam-pipe
-and throw water into the inner nozzle. All these
-points Joseph must carefully look to. On further trials
-the engine improved; still its performances did not come
-up to Watt’s expectations, and there were consequently
-more directions from him as to the packing of the pistons
-and measures for the prevention of leaks. But to
-see that his suggestions were properly carried out, Watt
-himself went up to town in November, and had the
-machine put in complete working trim. His partner,
-however, could not spare him long, as other orders were
-coming in. “We have a positive order,” wrote Boulton,
-“for an engine for Tingtang mine, and, from what I
-heard this day from Mr. Glover, we may soon expect
-other orders from Cornwall. Our plot begins to thicken
-apace, and if Mr. Wilkinson don’t bustle a little, as well
-as ourselves, we shall not gather our harvest before sunset.”
-... “I hope to hear,” he added, “that Joseph
-hath made a finish, for he is much wanted here....
-I perceive we shall be hard pushed in engine-work; but
-I have no fears of being distanced when once the exact
-course or best track is determined on.”<a name="Anchor-152" id="Anchor-152" href="#Footnote-152" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 152.">[152]</a> Joseph Harrison
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_225">[225]</span>
-got quite knocked up and ill through his anxiety about
-the Bow engine, on which Boulton wrote Watt to send
-at once for Dr. Fordyce to attend him, “let the expense
-be what it will, until you think him safe landed.”</p>
-
-<p>A letter reached Soho from the Shadwell Waterworks
-Company relative to a pumping-engine, and Boulton
-asked Watt, while in town, to wait upon them on the
-subject; but he cautioned Watt that he “never knew a
-Committee but, in its corporate capacity, was both rogue
-and fool, and that the Shadwell Committee were rich
-rogues.” Watt, by his own account, treated them very
-cavalierly. “Yesterday,” said he, “I went again to
-Shadwell to meet the deputies of the Committee, and
-to examine their engines when going. We came to no
-terms further than what we wrote them before, which I
-confirmed, and offered moreover to keep the engine in
-order for one year. They modestly insisted that we
-should do so for the whole twenty-five years, which I
-firmly refused. They seemed to doubt the reality of the
-performances of the Bow engine; so I told them we did
-not solicit their orders and would wait patiently until
-they were convinced,&mdash;moreover, that while they had
-any doubts remaining, we would not undertake their
-business on any terms. I should not have been so sharp
-with them had they not begun with bullying me, <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">selon
-la mode de Londres</i>. But the course I took was not
-without its effect, for in proportion as they found I
-despised their job, they grew more civil. After parting
-with these heroes I went down to Stratford, where I
-found that the engine had gone very well. I caused it
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_226">[226]</span>
-to be kept going all the afternoon, and this morning I
-new-heat the piston and kept it going till dinner time
-at about fifteen strokes per minute, with a steam of one
-inch or at most two inches strong, and the longer it went
-the better it grew.... I propose that Joseph should
-not leave it for a few days, until both his health and
-that of the engine be confirmed. A relapse of the
-engine would ruin our reputation here, and indeed
-elsewhere.”<a name="Anchor-153" id="Anchor-153" href="#Footnote-153" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 153.">[153]</a></p>
-
-<p>The Bow engine had, however, a serious relapse in
-the following spring, and it happened in this way:&mdash;Mr.
-Smeaton, the engineer, having heard of its success, which
-he doubted, requested Hadley, Boulton’s agent, to go
-down with him to Stratford-le-Bow to witness its performances.
-He carefully examined the engine, and
-watched it while at work, and the conclusion he arrived
-at was, that it was a pretty engine, but much too complex
-for practical uses. On leaving the place Smeaton
-gave the engineman some money to drink, and he drank
-so much that next day he let the engine run quite wild,
-and it was thrown completely out of order. Mr. Wilby,
-the manager, was very wroth at the circumstance. He
-discharged the engineman and called upon Hadley to
-replace the valves, which had been broken, and make
-good the other damage that had been done to the engine.
-When the repairs were made, everything went satisfactorily
-as before.</p>
-
-<p>Watt had many annoyances of this sort to encounter,
-and one of his greatest difficulties was the incapacity and
-unsteadiness of his workmen. Although the original
-Soho men were among the best of their kind, the increasing
-business of the firm necessarily led to the introduction
-of a large number of new hands, who represented
-merely the average workmen of the day. They were
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_227">[227]</span>
-for the most part poor mechanics, very inexpert at
-working in metal, and greatly given to drink.<a name="Anchor-154" id="Anchor-154" href="#Footnote-154" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 154.">[154]</a></p>
-
-<p>In organising the works at Soho, Boulton and
-Watt found it necessary to carry division of labour to
-the farthest practicable point. There were no slide-lathes,
-planing-machines, or boring-tools, such as now
-render mechanical accuracy of construction almost a
-matter of certainty. Everything depended upon the
-individual mechanic’s accuracy of hand and eye; and
-yet mechanics generally were then much less skilled
-than they are now. The way in which Boulton and
-Watt contrived partially to get over the difficulty was,
-to confine their workmen to special classes of work, and
-make them as expert in them as possible. By continued
-practice in handling the same tools and fabricating the
-same articles, they thus acquired great individual proficiency.
-“Without our tools and our workmen,” said
-Watt, “very little could be done.”</p>
-
-<p>But when the men got well trained, the difficulty
-was to keep them. Foreign tempters were constantly
-trying to pick up Boulton and Watt’s men, and induce
-them by offers of larger wages to take service abroad.
-The two fitters sent up to London to erect the Bow engine
-were strongly pressed to go out to Russia.<a name="Anchor-155" id="Anchor-155" href="#Footnote-155" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 155.">[155]</a> There were
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_228">[228]</span>
-also French agents in England at the same time, who
-tried to induce certain of Boulton and Watt’s men to go
-over to Paris and communicate the secret of making the
-new engines to M. Perrier, who had undertaken to pump
-water from the Seine for the supply of Paris. The
-German States also sent over emissaries with a like object,
-Baron Stein having been specially commissioned by his
-Government to master the secret of Watt’s engine&mdash;to
-obtain working plans of it and bring away workmen
-capable of making it,&mdash;the first step taken being to
-obtain access to the engine-rooms by bribing the workmen.</p>
-
-<p>Besides the difficulties Boulton and Watt had to encounter
-in training and disciplining their own workmen,
-they had also to deal with the want of skill on the part
-of those to whom the working of their engines was
-intrusted after they had been delivered and fixed complete.
-They occasionally supplied trustworthy men of
-their own; but they could not educate mechanics fast
-enough, and needed all the best men for their own work.
-They were therefore compelled to rely on the average
-mechanics of the day, the greater part of whom were
-comparatively unskilled and knew nothing of the steam-engine.
-Hence such mishaps as those which befell the
-Bow engine, through the engineman getting drunk and
-reckless, as above described. To provide for this contingency
-Watt endeavoured to simplify the engine as
-much as possible, so as to bring its working and repair
-within the capacity of the average workman.</p>
-
-<p>At a very early period, while experimenting at Kinneil,
-he had formed the idea of working steam expansively,
-and altered his model from time to time with that object.
-Boulton had taken up and continued the experiments at
-Soho, believing the principle to be sound and that great
-economy would attend its adoption. The early engines
-were accordingly made so that the steam might be cut
-off before the piston had made its full stroke, and expand
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_229">[229]</span>
-within the cylinder, the heat outside it being maintained
-by the expedient of the steam-case. But it was shortly
-found that this method of working was beyond the
-capacity of the average engineman of that day, and it
-was consequently given up for a time.</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“We used to send out,” said Watt to Robert Hart, “a cylinder of
-double the size wanted, and cut off the steam at half stroke. This
-was a great saving of steam so long as the valves remained as at
-first; but when our men left her to the charge of the person who
-was to keep her, he began to make or try to make improvements,
-often by giving more steam. The engine did more work while the
-steam lasted, but the boiler could not keep up the demand. Then
-complaints came of want of steam, and we had to send a man down
-to see what was wrong. This was so expensive that we resolved to
-give up the expansion of the steam until we could get men that
-could work it, as a few tons of coal per year was less expensive than
-having the work stopped. In some of the mines a few hours’
-stoppage was a serious matter, as it would cost the proprietor as
-much as 70<i>l.</i> per hour.”<a name="Anchor-156" id="Anchor-156" href="#Footnote-156" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 156.">[156]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>The principle was not, however, abandoned. It was
-of great value and importance in an economical point of
-view, and was again taken up by Watt and embodied in
-a more complete form in a subsequent invention. Since
-his time, indeed, expansive working has been carried to
-a much farther extent than he probably ever dreamt of,
-and has more than realised the beneficial results which
-his sagacious insight so early anticipated.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_230">[230]</span></p>
-
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-<h3>CHAPTER XIII.<br />
-
-<small><span class="smcap">Watt in Cornwall&mdash;Introduction of his Pumping-engines.</span></small></h3>
-
-
-<p><span class="smcap">The</span> Cornish miners continued baffled by their attempts
-to get rid of the water which hindered the working of
-their mines. The Newcomen engines had been taxed to
-the utmost, but were unable to send them deeper into
-the ground, and they were accordingly ready to welcome
-any invention that promised to relieve them of their
-difficulty. Among the various new contrivances for
-pumping water, that of Watt seemed to offer the greatest
-advantages; and if what was alleged of it proved true&mdash;that
-it was of greater power than the Newcomen engine,
-while its consumption of fuel was much less,&mdash;then it
-could not fail to prove of the greatest advantage to
-Cornish industry.</p>
-
-<p>Long before Watt’s arrival in Birmingham, the Cornishmen
-had been in correspondence with Boulton, making
-inquiries about the new Scotch invention, of which they
-had heard; and Dr. Small, in his letters to Watt, repeatedly
-urged him to perfect his engine, with a view
-to its being employed in the drainage of the Cornish
-mines. Now that the engine was at work in several
-places, Boulton invited his correspondents in Cornwall
-to inquire as to its performances, at Soho, or Bedworth,
-or Bow, or any other place where it had been erected.
-The result of the inquiry and inspection was satisfactory,
-and several orders for engines for Cornwall were received
-at Soho by the end of 1776. The two first that were
-ready for erection were those ordered for Wheal Busy,
-near Chacewater, and for Tingtang, near Redruth. The
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_231">[231]</span>
-materials for the former were shipped by the middle of
-1777; and, as much would necessarily depend upon the
-successful working of the first engines put up in Cornwall,
-Watt himself went to superintend their erection in
-person.</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_252" style="width: 450px;"><a href="images/i_252_full.png">
-<img src="images/i_252.png" width="450" height="294" class="lborder" alt="" /></a>
-<p class="caption">MAP OF UNITED MINES DISTRICT.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Watt reached his destination after a long and tedious
-journey over bad roads. He rode by stage as far as
-Exeter, and posted the rest of the way. At Chacewater
-he found himself in the midst of perhaps the richest
-mining district in the world. From thence to Camborne,
-which lies to the west, and Gwennap to the south, is a
-constant succession of mines. The earth has been burrowed
-in all directions for many miles in search of ore,
-principally copper&mdash;the surface presenting an unnaturally
-blasted and scarified appearance by reason of the
-“deads” or refuse run out in heaps from the mine-heads.
-Engine-houses and chimneys are the most prominent
-features in the landscape, and dot the horizon as far as
-the eye can reach.</p>
-
-<p>When Watt arrived at Chacewater he found the
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_232">[232]</span>
-materials for the Wheal Busy engine had come to hand,
-and that some progress had been made with its erection.
-The materials for the Tingtang engine, however, had
-not yet been received from Soho, and the owners of the
-mine were becoming very impatient for it. Watt wrote
-to his partner urging despatch, otherwise the engine
-might be thrown on their hands, especially if the Chacewater
-engine, now nearly ready for work, did not give
-satisfaction. From Watt’s account, it would appear that
-the Cornish mines were in a very bad way. “The
-Tingtang people,” he said, “are now fairly put out by
-water, and the works are quite at a stand.” The other
-mines in the neighbourhood were in no better plight.
-The pumping-engines could not keep down the water.
-“Poldice has grown worse than Wheal Virgin was:
-they have sunk 400<i>l.</i> a month for some months past, and
-700<i>l.</i> the last month; they will probably soon give up.
-North Downs seems to be our next card.”<a name="Anchor-157" id="Anchor-157" href="#Footnote-157" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 157.">[157]</a> The owners
-of the Wheal Virgin mine, though drowned out, like
-many others, could not bring their minds to try Watt’s
-engine. They had no faith in it, and stuck by the old
-atmospheric of Newcomen. They accordingly erected
-an additional engine of this kind to enable them to go
-about eight fathoms deeper, “and they have bought,”
-wrote Watt, “an old boiler of monstrous size at the
-Briggin, which they have offered 50<i>l.</i> to get carried to
-its place.”</p>
-
-<p>At Chacewater Watt first met Jonathan Hornblower,
-son of the Joseph Hornblower who had come into Cornwall
-from Staffordshire, some fifty years before, to erect
-one of the early Newcomen engines. The son had followed
-in his father’s steps, and become celebrated in the Chacewater
-district as an engineer. It was natural that he
-should regard with jealousy the patentees of the new
-engine; for if it proved a success, his vocation as a
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_233">[233]</span>
-maker of atmospheric engines would be at an end.
-Watt thus referred to him in a letter to Boulton: “Hornblower
-seems a very pleasant sort of old Presbyterian:
-he carries himself very fair, though I hear that he is an
-unbelieving Thomas.” His unbelief strongly showed
-itself on the starting of the Wheal Busy engine shortly
-after, when he exclaimed, “Pshaw! it’s but a bauble: I
-wouldn’t give twopence halfpenny for her.” There were
-others beside Hornblower who disliked and resented what
-they regarded as the intrusion of Boulton and Watt in
-their district, and indeed never became wholly reconciled
-to the new engine, though they were compelled to admit
-the inefficiency of the old one. Among these was old
-Bonze, the engineer, a very clever mechanic, who positively
-refused to undertake the erection of the proposed
-new engine at Wheal Union if Boulton and Watt were
-to be in any way concerned with it. But the mine-owners
-had to study their own interest rather than the
-humour of their former engineers, and Watt secured
-the order for the Wheal Union engine. Several other
-orders were promised, conditional on the performances
-of the Wheal Busy engine proving satisfactory. “Ale
-and Cakes,”<a name="Anchor-158" id="Anchor-158" href="#Footnote-158" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 158.">[158]</a> wrote Watt, “must wait the result of Chacewater:
-several new engines will be erected next year,
-for almost all the old mines are exhausted, or have got
-to the full power of the present engines, which are
-clumsy and nasty, the houses cracked, and everything
-dropping with water from their cisterns.”<a name="Anchor-159" id="Anchor-159" href="#Footnote-159" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 159.">[159]</a></p>
-
-<p>Watt liked the people as little as he did their engines.
-He thought them ungenerous, jealous, and treacherous.
-“Certainly,” said he, “they have the most ungracious
-manners of any people I have ever yet been amongst.”
-At the first monthly meeting of the Wheal Virgin adventurers,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_234">[234]</span>
-which he attended, he found a few gentlemen,
-but “the bulk of them would not be disgraced by being
-classed with Wednesbury colliers.” What annoyed him
-most was, that the miners invented and propagated all
-sorts of rumours to his prejudice. “We have been accused,”
-said he, “of working without leather upon our
-buckets, and making holes in the clacks in order to
-deceive strangers.... I choose to keep out of their
-company, as every word spoken by me would be bandied
-about and misrepresented. I have already been accused
-of making several speeches at Wheal Virgin, where, to
-the best of my memory, I have only talked about eating,
-drinking, and the weather. The greater part of the adventurers
-at Wheal Virgin are a mean dirty pack, preying
-upon one another, and striving who shall impose most
-upon the mine.”<a name="Anchor-160" id="Anchor-160" href="#Footnote-160" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 160.">[160]</a> Watt was of too sensitive and shrinking
-a nature to feel himself at home amongst such people.
-Besides, he was disposed to be peevish and irritable, easily
-cast down, and ready to anticipate the worst. It had
-been the same with him when employed amongst the
-rough labourers on the Monkland Canal, where he had
-declared himself as ready to face a loaded cannon as to
-encounter the altercations of bargain-making. But Watt
-must needs reconcile himself to his post as he best could;
-for none but himself could see to the proper erection of
-the Wheal Busy engine and get it set to work with any
-chance of success. Meanwhile, the native engineers were
-stimulated by his presence, and by the reputed power of
-the new engine, to exert themselves in improving the
-old one. Bonze was especially active in contriving new
-boilers and new arrangements, by which he promised to
-outstrip all that Watt could possibly accomplish.<a name="Anchor-161" id="Anchor-161" href="#Footnote-161" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 161.">[161]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_235">[235]</span></p>
-
-<p>A letter from Mrs. Watt to Mrs. Boulton, dated
-Chacewater, September 1st, 1777, throws a little light
-on Watt’s private life during his stay in Cornwall. She
-describes the difficulty they had in obtaining accommodation
-on their arrival, “no such thing as a house or
-lodging to be had for any money within some miles of
-the place where the engine was to be erected;” hence
-they had been glad to accept of the hospitality of Mr.
-Wilson, the superintendent of the mine.</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“I scarcely know what to say to you of the country. The spot
-we are at is the most disagreeable in the whole county. The face
-of the earth is broken up in ten thousand heaps of rubbish, and
-there is scarce a tree to be seen. But don’t think that all Cornwall
-is like Chacewater. I have been at some places that are very
-pleasant, nay beautiful. The sea-coast to me is charming, but not
-easy to be got at. In some cases my poor husband has been obliged
-to mount me behind him to go to some of the places we have been
-at. I assure you I was not a little perplexed at first to be set on a
-great tall horse with a high pillion. At one of our jaunts we were
-only charged twopence a piece for our dinner. You may guess
-what our fare would be from the cost of it; but I assure you I
-never ate a dinner with more relish in my life, nor was I ever
-happier at a feast, than I was that day at Portreath.... One thing
-I <em>must</em> tell you of is, to take care Mr. Boulton’s principles are well
-fixed before you trust him here. Poor Mr. Watt is turned Anabaptist,
-and duly attends their meeting; he is, indeed, and goes to chapel
-most devoutly.”</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>At last the Chacewater engine was finished and ready
-for work. Great curiosity was felt about its performances,
-and mining men and engineers came from
-all quarters to see it start. “All the world are agape,”
-said Watt, “to see what it can do.” It would not have
-displeased some of the spectators if it had failed. But
-to their astonishment it succeeded. At starting, it made
-eleven eight-feet strokes per minute; and it worked with
-greater power, went more steadily, and “forked” more
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_236">[236]</span>
-water than any of the ordinary engines, with only about
-one-third the consumption of coal. “We have had
-many spectators,” wrote Watt, “and several have
-already become converts. I understand all the west-country
-captains are to be here to-morrow to see the
-prodigy.”<a name="Anchor-162" id="Anchor-162" href="#Footnote-162" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 162.">[162]</a> Even Bonze, his rival, called to see it, and
-promised not only to read his recantation as soon as convinced,
-but never to touch a common engine again.
-“The velocity, violence, magnitude, and horrible noise
-of the engine,” Watt added, “give universal satisfaction
-to all beholders, believers or not. I have once or twice
-trimmed the engine to end its stroke gently, and to
-make less noise; but
-Mr. Wilson cannot
-sleep without it
-seems quite furious,
-so I have left it to
-the engine-men;
-and, by the by, the
-noise seems to convey
-great ideas of
-its power to the
-ignorant, who seem
-to be no more taken
-with modest merit
-in an engine than
-in a man.” In a
-later letter he
-wrote, “The voice
-of the country
-seems to be at present
-in our favour;
-and I hope will be
-much more so when
-the engine gets on its whole load, which will be by Tuesday
-next. So soon as that is done, I shall set out for home.”</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_257" style="width: 300px;">
-<img src="images/i_257.png" width="300" height="436" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">WATT’S SINGLE-ACTING PUMPING-ENGINE FOR MINES.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_237">[237]</span></p>
-
-<p>A number of orders for engines had come in at Soho
-during Watt’s absence; and it became necessary for him
-to return there as speedily as possible, to prepare the
-plans and drawings, and put the work in hand. There
-was no person yet attached to the concern who was
-capable of relieving him of this part of his duties; while
-Boulton was fully occupied with conducting the commercial
-part of the business. By the end of autumn
-he was again at home; and for a week after his return
-he kept so close to his desk in his house on Harper’s
-Hill, that he could not even find time enough to go out
-to Soho and see what had been doing in his absence.
-At length he felt so exhausted by the brain-work and
-confinement that he wrote to his partner, “a very little
-more of this hurrying and vexation will knock me
-up altogether.” To add to his troubles, letters arrived
-from Tingtang, urging his return to Cornwall, to erect
-the engine, the materials for which had at last arrived.
-“I fancy,” said Watt, “that I must be cut in pieces, and
-a portion sent to every tribe in Israel.”</p>
-
-<p>After four month’s labour of this sort, during which
-seven out of the ten engines then in hand were finished
-and erected, and the others well advanced, Watt again
-set out for Cornwall, which he reached by the beginning
-of June, 1778. He took up his residence at Redruth, as
-being more convenient for Tingtang than Chacewater,
-hiring a house at Plengwarry, a hamlet on the outskirts
-of the town. Redruth is the capital of the mining
-districts of Camborne, Redruth, and Gwennap. It is
-an ancient town, consisting for the most part of a long
-street, which runs down one hill and up another.</p>
-
-<p>All round it the country seems to have been disembowelled;
-and heaps of scoriæ, “deads,” rubbish, and
-granite blocks cover the surface. The view from the
-lofty eminence of Carn Brea, a little to the south of
-Redruth, strikingly shows the scarified and apparently
-blasted character of the district, and affords a prospect
-the like of which is rarely to be seen.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_238">[238]</span></p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_259" style="width: 350px;">
-<img src="images/i_259.png" width="350" height="476" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">REDRUTH HIGH STREET.</p>
-<p class="caption">[By R. P. Leitch.]</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>On making inquiry as to the materials which had
-arrived during his absence, Watt was much mortified to
-find that the Soho workmen had made many mistakes.
-“Forbes’s eduction-pipe,” he wrote, “is a most vile job,
-and full of holes. The cylinder they have cast for Chacewater
-is still worse, for it will hardly do at all. The
-Soho people have sent here Chacewater eduction-pipe
-instead of Wheal Union; and the gudgeon pipe has not
-arrived with the nozzles. These repeated disappointments,”
-said he, “will undoubtedly ruin our credit in
-the country; and I cannot stay here to bear the shame
-of such failures of promise.”</p>
-
-<p>Watt had a hard time of it while in Cornwall, what
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_239">[239]</span>
-with riding and walking from mine to mine, listening
-to complaints of delay in the arrival of the engines from
-Soho, and detecting and remedying the blunders and
-bad workmanship of his mechanics. Added to which,
-everybody was low-spirited and almost in despair at the
-bad times,&mdash;ores falling in price, mines filled with water,
-engine-men standing idle, and adventurers bemoaning
-their losses. Another source of anxiety was the serious
-pecuniary embarrassments in which the Soho firm had
-become involved. Boulton had so many concerns going
-that a vast capital was required for the purpose of
-meeting current engagements; and the engine business,
-instead of relieving him, had hitherto only proved a
-source of additional outlay, and increased his difficulties
-at a time of general commercial depression. He wrote
-Watt, urging him to send remittances for the Cornish
-engines; but the materials, though partly delivered, were
-not erected; and the miners demurred to paying on
-account until they were fixed complete and at work.
-Boulton then suggested to Watt that he should try to
-obtain an advance from the Truro bankers, on security
-of the engine materials. “No,” replied Watt, “that
-cannot be done, as the knowledge of our difficulties
-would damage our position in Cornwall, and hurt our
-credit. Besides,” said he, “no one can be more cautious
-than a Cornish banker; and the principal of the firm
-you name is himself exceedingly distressed for money.”<a name="Anchor-163" id="Anchor-163" href="#Footnote-163" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 163.">[163]</a>
-Nor was there the least chance, in Watt’s opinion, even
-if they had the money to advance, of their accepting
-any security that Boulton and Watt had to offer. “Such
-is the nature of the people here,” said he, “and so little
-faith have they in our engine, that very few of them
-believe it to be materially better than the ordinary one,
-and so far as I can judge, no one I have conversed with
-would advance us 500<i>l.</i> on a mortgage of it.”<a name="Anchor-164" id="Anchor-164" href="#Footnote-164" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 164.">[164]</a></p>
-
-<p>All that Watt could do was to recommend that the
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_240">[240]</span>
-evil day should be staved off as long as possible, or at
-all events until the large engines he was then erecting
-were at work, when he believed their performances
-would effect a complete change in the views of the
-adventurers. The only suggestion he could offer was
-to invite John Wilkinson, or some other moneyed
-man, to join them as partner and relieve them of their
-difficulties; for “rather than founder at sea,” said he,
-“we had better run ashore.”<a name="Anchor-165" id="Anchor-165" href="#Footnote-165" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 165.">[165]</a> Meanwhile, he urged
-Boulton to apply the pruning-knife and cut down expenses,
-assuring him that he himself was practising all
-the frugality in his power. But as Watt’s personal
-expenses at the time did not amount to 2<i>l.</i> a week, it is
-clear that any savings he could effect, however justifiable
-and laudable, were but a drop in the ocean compared
-with the liabilities to be met, and which must be provided
-without delay to avoid insolvency and ruin.</p>
-
-<p>Fothergill, Boulton’s other partner, was even more
-desponding than Watt. When Boulton left Soho on
-his journeys to raise ways and means, Fothergill pursued
-him with dolorous letters, telling him of mails
-that had arrived without remittances, of bills that must
-be met, of wages that must be paid on Saturday night,
-and of the impending bankruptcy of the firm, which he
-again and again declared to be “inevitable.” “Better
-stop payment at once,” said he, “call our creditors together,
-and face the worst, than go on in this neck-and-neck
-race with ruin.” Boulton would hurry back to
-Soho, to quiet Fothergill, and keep the concern going;
-on which another series of letters would pour in upon
-him from Mr. Matthews, the London financial agent,
-pressing for remittances, and reporting the increasingly
-gloomy and desperate state of affairs.</p>
-
-<p>Boulton himself was, as usual, equal to the occasion.
-His courage and determination rose in proportion to the
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_241">[241]</span>
-difficulties to be overcome. He was borne up by his invincible
-hope, by his unswerving purpose, and above all
-by his unshaken belief in the commercial value of the
-condensing engine. If they could only weather the storm
-until its working powers could be fully demonstrated,
-all would yet be well.</p>
-
-<p>In illustration of his hopefulness, we may mention
-that in the midst of his troubles a fire took place in the
-engine-room at Soho, which was happily extinguished,
-but not before it had destroyed the roof and done serious
-damage to the engine, which was brought to a standstill.
-Boulton had long been desirous of rebuilding the
-engine-house in a proper manner, but had been hindered
-by Watt, who was satisfied with alterations merely sufficient
-to accommodate the place to the changes made
-from time to time in the engine which he called
-“Beelzebub.”<a name="Anchor-166" id="Anchor-166" href="#Footnote-166" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 166.">[166]</a> On hearing of the damage done by the
-fire, Boulton, instead of lamenting over it, exclaimed,
-“<em>Now</em> I shall be able at last to have the engine-house
-built as it should be.”</p>
-
-<p>After many negotiations, Boulton at length succeeded
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_242">[242]</span>
-in raising a sum of 7000<i>l.</i> by granting a Mr. Wiss
-security for the payment of an annuity, while the
-London bankers, Lowe, Vere, and Williams, allowed
-an advance of 14,000<i>l.</i> on security of a mortgage
-granted by Boulton and Watt on the royalties derived
-from the engine patent, and of all their rights and privileges
-therein. Though the credit of the house was thus
-saved, the liabilities of Boulton and his partners continued
-to press heavily upon them for a long time to
-come. Meanwhile, however, a gleam of light came from
-Cornwall. Watt sent the good news to Soho that “both
-Chacewater and Tingtang engines go on exceedingly
-well, and give great satisfaction. Chacewater goes 14
-strokes of 9 foot long per minute, and burns about 128
-bushels per 24 hours. The water has sunk 12 fathoms
-in the mine, and the engine will fork [<i>i. e.</i> pump out]
-the first lift this night. No cross nor accident of any
-note has happened, except the bursting of a pump at
-Tingtang, which was soon repaired.” Four days later
-Watt wrote, “The engines are both going very well,
-and Chacewater has got the water down 18½ fathoms;
-but after this depth it must make slower progress, as
-a very large house of water begins there, and the feeders
-grow stronger as we go deeper.”<a name="Anchor-167" id="Anchor-167" href="#Footnote-167" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 167.">[167]</a></p>
-
-<p>Watt looked upon the Chacewater trial as the <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">experimentum
-crucis</i>, and continued to keep his partner duly
-informed of every circumstance connected with it.
-“They say,” he wrote, “that if the new engine can fork
-the water from Chacewater, it can fork anything, as that
-is the heaviest to fork in the whole county.” On the
-15th of August he wrote, “Chacewater is now down to
-10 fathoms of the second lift, and works steady and
-well; it sinks 9 feet per day. Chacewater people in
-high spirits: Captain Mayor furiously in love with the
-engine.” On the 29th he wrote again, “Chacewater
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_243">[243]</span>
-engine is our capital card, for should it succeed in forking
-this mine all doubts will then be removed.” The adventurers
-of the great Poldice mine watched the operations
-at Chacewater with much interest. Two common
-engines, pumping night and day for months, had failed
-to clear their mine of water; and now they thought of
-ordering one of the new engines to take their place;
-“but all this,” said Watt, “depends on the success of
-Chacewater, which God protect: it is now down 31½
-fathoms, and will be in fork of this lift to-morrow, when
-it is to be put down three fathoms lower, and fixed
-there.” On the 17th he wrote, “I have been at Chacewater
-to-day, where they are in fork of the second lift
-34½ fathoms. The great connexion-rod still unbalanced.
-The engine went yesterday 14 strokes per minute. To-morrow
-I go to Wheal Union, and on Saturday to Truro,
-to meet Poldice adventurers.... By attending to the
-business of this county alone,” said he, “we may at least
-live comfortably; for I cannot suppose that less than
-twelve engines will be wanted in two or three years,
-but after that very few more, as these will be sufficient
-to get ore enough; though you cannot reckon the average
-profits to us at above 200<i>l.</i> per engine.”</p>
-
-<p>When Boulton and Watt first started the manufacture
-of steam-engines, they were mainly concerned
-to get orders, and were not very particular as to the
-terms on which they were obtained. But when the
-orders increased, and the merits of the invention gradually
-became recognised, they found it necessary to require
-preliminary agreements to be entered into as to
-the terms on which the patent was to be used. It
-occurred to them, that as one of its principal merits
-consisted in the saving of fuel, it would be a fair
-arrangement to take one-third of the value of such
-saving by way of royalty, leaving the owners of the
-engines to take the benefit of the remaining two-thirds.
-Nothing could be fairer than the spirit of
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_244">[244]</span>
-this arrangement, which, it will be seen, was of even
-more advantage to the owners of the engines than to
-the patentees themselves. The first Cornish engines
-were, however, erected without any condition as to
-terms; and it was only after they had proved their
-power by “forking” the water, and sending the miners
-twenty fathoms deeper into the ground, that the question
-of terms was raised. Watt proposed that agreements
-should be entered into on the basis above indicated.
-But the Cornish men did not see the use of agreements.
-They had paid for the engines, which were theirs, and
-Boulton and Watt could not take them away. Here was
-the beginning of a long series of altercations, which
-ended only with the patent right itself. The miners
-could not do without the engine. It was admitted to
-be of immense value to them, rendering many of their
-mines workable that would otherwise have been valueless.
-But why should they have to pay for the use
-of such an invention? This was what they never could
-clearly understand.</p>
-
-<p>To prevent misunderstandings in future, Watt wrote
-to Boulton, recommending that no further orders for
-engines should be taken unless the terms for using
-them were definitely settled beforehand. “You must
-excuse me,” he added, “when I tell you that, for my
-part, I will not put pen to paper [<i>i. e.</i> make the requisite
-drawings] on a new subject until that is done.
-Until an engine is ordered, our power is greater than
-that of the Lord Chancellor; as I believe even he cannot
-compel us to make it unless we choose. Let our terms
-be moderate, and, if possible, consolidated into money
-<i lang="la" xml:lang="la">à priori</i>, and it is certain we shall get <em>some</em> money,
-enough to keep us out of jail, in continual apprehension
-of which I live at present.”<a name="Anchor-168" id="Anchor-168" href="#Footnote-168" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 168.">[168]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_245">[245]</span></p>
-
-<p>To meet the case, a form of agreement was drawn up
-and required to be executed before any future engine
-was commenced. It usually provided that an engine of
-certain given dimensions and power was to be erected
-at the expense of the owners of the mine; and that the
-patentees were to take as their recompense for the use
-of their invention, one-third of the value of the fuel saved
-by it compared with the consumption of the ordinary
-engine. It came to be understood that the saving of
-fuel was to be estimated according to the number of
-strokes made. To ascertain this, Watt contrived an ingenious
-piece of clockwork, termed the Counter, which,
-being attached to the main beam, accurately marked and
-registered, under lock and key, the number of its vibrations.
-Thus the work done was calculated, and the
-comparative saving of fuel was ascertained.</p>
-
-<p>Though the Cornish miners had been full of doubts
-as to the successful working of Watt’s engine, they
-could not dispute the evidence of their senses after it
-had been erected and was fairly at work. There it
-was, “forking water” as never engine before had been
-known to “fork.” It had completely mastered the
-water at Wheal Busy; and if it could send the workmen
-down that mine, it could in like manner send them
-down elsewhere. Wheal Virgin was on the point of
-stopping work, in which case some two thousand persons
-would be thrown out of bread. Bonze’s new atmospheric
-engine had proved a failure, and the mine continued
-flooded. It had also failed at Poldice, which was
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_246">[246]</span>
-drowned out. “Notwithstanding the violence and prejudice
-against us,” wrote Watt, “nothing can save the
-mines but our engines.... <em>Even the infidels of Dalcoath</em>
-are now obliquely inquiring after our terms!
-Cook’s Kitchen, which communicates with it, has been
-drowned out some time.” Watt, accordingly, had
-many applications about engines; and on that account
-he entreated his partner to come to his help. He continued
-to hate all negotiating about terms, and it did
-not seem as if he would ever learn to like it. He had
-neither the patience to endure, nor the business tact to
-conduct a negotiation. He wanted confidence in himself,
-and did not feel equal to make a bargain. He
-would almost as soon have wrestled with the Cornish
-miners as higgled with them. They were shrewd, practical
-men, rough in manner and speech, yet honest
-withal;<a name="Anchor-169" id="Anchor-169" href="#Footnote-169" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 169.">[169]</a> but Watt would not encounter them when he
-could avoid it. Hence his repeated calls to Boulton to
-come and help him. Writing to him about the proposed
-Wheal Virgin engine, he said, “Before I make any
-bargain with these people, I must have you here.” A
-few days after, when communicating the probability of
-obtaining an order for the Poldice engine, he wrote,&mdash;“I
-wish you would dispose yourself for a journey here,
-and strike while this iron is hot.” A fortnight later he
-said, “Poldice people are now welding hot, and must
-not be suffered to cool. They are exceedingly impatient,
-as they lose 150<i>l.</i> a month until our engine is going....
-I hope this will find you ready to come away. At
-Redruth, inquire for Plengwarry Green, where you
-will find me.”</p>
-
-<p>Boulton must have been greatly harassed by the
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_247">[247]</span>
-woes of his partners. Fothergill was still uttering
-lamentable prophecies of impending ruin; his only
-prospect of relief being in the success of the engine.
-He urged Boulton to endeavour to raise money by the
-sale of engine contracts or annuities, in order to avert
-a crash. Matthews, the London agent, also continued
-to represent the still urgent danger of the house, and
-pressed Boulton to go to Cornwall and try to raise money
-there upon his engine contracts. Indeed, it was clear
-that the firm of Boulton and Fothergill had been losing
-money by their business for several years past; and
-that, unless the engine succeeded, they must, ere long,
-go to the wall. But when Boulton turned to Cornwall,
-he found little comfort. Though the engines there
-were successful, Watt could not raise money upon them.
-The adventurers were poor,&mdash;were for the most part
-losing by their ventures, in consequence of the low
-price of the ore; and they almost invariably put off
-payment by excuses. Thus, while Boulton was in
-London trying to obtain accommodation from his
-bankers, the groans of his partner in Birmingham were
-more than re-echoed by the lamentations of his other
-partner in Cornwall, who rang the changes of misery
-through all the notes of the gamut.</p>
-
-<p>At length, about the beginning of October, 1778,
-Boulton contrived to make his long-promised journey
-into Cornwall.<a name="Anchor-170" id="Anchor-170" href="#Footnote-170" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 170.">[170]</a> He went round among the mines, and
-had many friendly conferences with the managers. He
-found the engine had grown in public favour, and that
-the impression prevailed throughout the mining districts
-that it would before long become generally
-adopted. Encouraged by his London financial agent,
-he took steps to turn this favourable impression to
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_248">[248]</span>
-account.<a name="Anchor-171" id="Anchor-171" href="#Footnote-171" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 171.">[171]</a> Before he left Cornwall, where he remained
-until the end of the year, he succeeded in borrowing
-a sum of 2000<i>l.</i> from Elliot and Praed, the Truro
-bankers, on security of the engines erected in the
-county; and the money was at once forwarded to
-the London agents for the relief of the Birmingham
-firm. He also succeeded in getting the terms definitely
-arranged for the use of several of the more important
-engines erected and at work. It was agreed that
-700<i>l.</i> a year should be paid as royalty in respect of
-the Chacewater engine,&mdash;an arrangement even more
-advantageous to the owners of the mine than to the
-patentees, as it was understood that the saving of coals
-amounted to upwards of 2400<i>l.</i> a year. Other agreements
-were entered into for the use of the engines
-erected at Wheal Union and Tingtang, which brought
-in about 400<i>l.</i> per annum more, so that the harvest of
-profits seemed at length fairly begun.</p>
-
-<p>Watt remained at Cornwall for another month, plodding
-at Poldice and Wheal Virgin engines, and returned
-to Birmingham early in January, 1779. Though the
-pumping-engine had thus far proved remarkably successful,
-and accomplished all that Watt had promised, he
-was in no better spirits than before. “Though we have,
-in general, succeeded in our undertakings,” he wrote
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_249">[249]</span>
-Dr. Black, “yet that success has, from various unavoidable
-circumstances, produced small profits to us; the
-struggles we have had with natural difficulties, and with
-the ignorance, prejudices, and villanies of mankind,
-have been very great, but I hope are now nearly come
-to an end, or vanquished.”<a name="Anchor-172" id="Anchor-172" href="#Footnote-172" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 172.">[172]</a> His difficulties were not,
-however, nearly at an end, as the heavy liabilities of
-the firm had still to be met. More money had to be
-borrowed; and Watt continued to groan under his intolerable
-burden. “The thought of the debt to Lowe,
-Vere, and Co.,” he wrote to his partner, “lies too heavy
-on my mind to leave me the proper employment of my
-faculties in the prosecution of our business; and, besides,
-common honesty will prevent me from loading the scheme
-with debts which might be more than it could pay.”<a name="Anchor-173" id="Anchor-173" href="#Footnote-173" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 173.">[173]</a></p>
-
-<p>A more hopeful man would have borne up under
-these difficulties; for the reputation of the engine was
-increasing, and orders were coming in from various
-quarters. Soho was full of work; and, provided their
-credit could be maintained, it was clear that the undertaking
-on which the firm had entered could not fail to
-prove remunerative. Watt could not see this, but his
-partner did; and Boulton accordingly strained every
-nerve to keep up the character of the concern. While
-Watt was urging upon him to curtail the business,
-Boulton sought in all ways to extend it. He sent
-accounts of his marvellous engines abroad, and orders for
-them came in from France<a name="Anchor-174" id="Anchor-174" href="#Footnote-174" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 174.">[174]</a> and Holland. Watt was
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_250">[250]</span>
-more alarmed than gratified by the foreign orders,
-fearing that the engine would be copied and extensively
-manufactured abroad, where patents had not yet
-been secured. He did not see that the best protection
-of all was in the superiority of his tools and mechanics,
-enabling first-class work to be turned out,&mdash;important
-advantages, in which the Soho firm had the start of the
-world. It is true his mechanics were liable to be
-bribed, and foreigners were constantly haunting Soho
-for the purpose of worming out the secrets of the manufacture,
-and decoying away the best men. Against
-this every precaution was taken, though sometimes in
-vain. Two Prussian engineers came over from Berlin
-in 1779, to whom Watt showed every attention; after
-which, in his absence, they got into the engine-room,
-and carefully examined all the details of “Old Bess,”
-making notes. When Watt returned, he was in high
-dudgeon, and wrote to his partner that he “could not
-help it unless by discountenancing every foreigner who
-does not come avowedly to have an engine.”<a name="Anchor-175" id="Anchor-175" href="#Footnote-175" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 175.">[175]</a></p>
-
-<p>Their principal reliance, however, was necessarily on
-home orders, and these came in satisfactorily. Eight
-more engines were wanted for Cornwall, those already
-at work continuing to give satisfaction. Inquiries were
-also made about pumping engines for collieries in
-different parts of England. But where coals were cheap,
-and the saving of fuel was of less consequence, the
-patentees were not solicitous for orders unless the purchasers
-would fix a fair sum for the patent right, or
-rate the coals used at a price that would be remunerative
-in proportion to the savings effected. The
-orders were, indeed, becoming so numerous, that the
-firm, beginning to feel their power, themselves fixed
-the annual royalty, though it was not always so easy
-to get it paid.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_251">[251]</span></p>
-
-<p>The working power of Watt himself was but limited.
-He still continued to suffer from intense headaches; and,
-as all the drawings of new engines were made by his
-own hands, it was necessary in some measure to limit
-the amount of work undertaken. “I beg,” he wrote to
-his partner in May, 1779, relative to proposals made for
-two new engines, “that you will not undertake to do
-anything for them before Christmas. It is, in fact,
-impossible, at least on my part; I am quite crushed.”
-But he was not always so dispirited, for in the following
-month we find him writing Boulton an exultant letter,
-announcing orders for three new engines from Cornwall.<a name="Anchor-176" id="Anchor-176" href="#Footnote-176" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 176.">[176]</a></p>
-
-<p>Watt continued for some time longer to suffer great
-annoyance from the shortcomings of his workmen.
-He was himself most particular in giving his instructions,
-verbally, in writing, and in drawings. When he
-sent a workman to erect an engine, he sent with him
-a carefully drawn up detail of the step by step proceedings
-he was to adopt in fitting the parts together.
-Where there was a difficulty, and likely to be a hitch,
-he added a pen and ink drawing, rapid but graphic, and
-pointed out how the difficulty was to be avoided. It
-was not so easy, however, to find workmen capable of
-intelligently fitting together the parts of a machine so
-complicated and of so novel a construction. Moreover,
-the first engines were in a great measure experimental,
-and to have erected them perfectly, and provided by anticipation
-for their various defects, would have argued
-a knowledge of the principles of their construction
-almost as complete as that of Watt himself. He was
-not sufficiently disposed to make allowances for the workmen’s
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_252">[252]</span>
-want of knowledge and want of experience, and
-his letters were accordingly full of complaints of their
-shortcomings. He was especially annoyed with the
-mistakes of a foreman, named Hall, who had sent the
-wrong articles to Cornwall, and he urged Boulton to
-dismiss him at once. But Boulton knew better. Though
-Watt understood engines, he did not so well understand
-men. Had Boulton dismissed such as Hall because they
-made mistakes, the shop would soon have been empty.
-The men were as yet but at school, learning experience,
-and Boulton knew that in course of time they would
-acquire dexterity. He was ready to make allowance for
-their imperfections, but at the same time he did not
-abate in his endeavours to find out and engage the best
-hands, wherever they were to be found&mdash;in Wales, in
-Cornwall, or in Scotland. He therefore kept on Hall,
-notwithstanding Watt’s protest, and the latter submitted.<a name="Anchor-177" id="Anchor-177" href="#Footnote-177" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 177.">[177]</a></p>
-
-<p>Watt was equally wroth with the enginemen at Bedworth.
-“I beg and expect,” he wrote Boulton, “that so
-soon as everything is done to that engine, you will instantly
-proceed to trial before creditable witnesses, and
-if possible have the whole brood of these enginemen
-displaced, if any others can be procured; for nothing
-but slovenliness, if not malice, is to be expected of
-them.” It must, however, be acknowledged that the
-Bedworth engine was at first very imperfect, having
-been made of bad iron, in consequence of which it frequently
-broke down. In Cornwall the men were no
-better. Dudley, Watt’s erector at Wheal Chance and
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_253">[253]</span>
-Hallamanin, was pronounced incapable and a blunderer.
-“If something be not very bad in London, I wish you
-would employ Hadley to finish those engines, and send
-Joseph here to receive his instructions and proceed to
-Cornwall, otherwise Dudley will ruin us.”<a name="Anchor-178" id="Anchor-178" href="#Footnote-178" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 178.">[178]</a></p>
-
-<p>The trusty “Joseph” was accordingly despatched to
-Cornwall to look after Dudley, and remedy the defects
-in Wheal Chance and Hallamanin engines; but when
-Watt arrived at Chacewater shortly after, he found that
-Joseph, too, had proved faithless. He wrote to Boulton,
-“Joseph has pursued his old practice of drinking in the
-neighbourhood in a scandalous manner, until the very
-enginemen turned him into ridicule.... I have not
-heard how he behaved in the west; but that he gave
-the ale there a bad character.”<a name="Anchor-179" id="Anchor-179" href="#Footnote-179" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 179.">[179]</a> Notwithstanding, however,
-his love of strong potations, Joseph was a first-rate
-workman. Two days later, Watt wrote, “Though
-Joseph has attended to his drinking, he has done much
-good at his leisure hours, and has certainly prevented
-much mischief at Hallamanin and some at Wheal Union.
-He has had some hard and long jobs, and consequently
-merits some indulgence for his foibles.” By the end of
-the month “Joseph had conquered Hallamanin engine,
-all but the boiler,” but Watt added, “His indulgence
-has brought on a slight fit of the jaundice, and as soon
-as the engine is finished, he must be sent home.”<a name="Anchor-180" id="Anchor-180" href="#Footnote-180" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 180.">[180]</a></p>
-
-<p>By this time Watt had called to his aid two other
-skilled workmen, Law and Murdock, who arrived in
-Cornwall in the beginning of September, 1779. In
-Watt’s letters we find frequent allusions to Murdock.
-Wherever any work had to be done requiring more
-than ordinary attention, Watt specially directed that
-“William” should be put to it. “Let William be sent
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_254">[254]</span>
-for from Bedworth,” he wrote from Cornwall in 1778,
-“to set the patterns for nozzles quite right for Poldice.”
-Boulton wished to send him into Scotland to erect the
-engine at Wenlockhead, but Watt would not hear of it.
-“William” was the only man he could trust with the
-nozzles. Then William was sent to London to take the
-charge of Chelsea engine; next to Bedworth, to see to
-the completion of the repairs previous to the final trial;
-then to Birmingham again to attend to some further
-special instructions of Watt; and now we find him in
-Cornwall, to take charge of the principal engines
-erecting there.</p>
-
-<p>William Murdock was not only a most excellent and
-steady workman, but a man of eminent mechanical
-genius. He was the first maker of a model locomotive
-in this country; he was the introducer of lighting by
-gas, and the inventor of many valuable parts of the
-working steam-engine, hereafter to be described. His
-father was a millwright and miller, at Bellow Mill, near
-Old Cumnock, in Ayrshire, and was much esteemed for
-his probity and industry, as well as for his mechanical
-skill. He was the inventor of bevelled cast-iron gear
-for mills, and his son was proud to exhibit, on the lawn
-in front of his house at Sycamore Hill, Handsworth, a
-piece of the first work of the kind executed in Britain.
-It was cast for him at Carron Ironworks, after the pattern
-furnished by him, in 1766. William was born in
-1754, and brought up to his father’s trade. On arriving
-at manhood, he became desirous of obtaining a larger
-experience of mill-work and mechanics than he could
-acquire in his father’s little mill. Hearing of the fame
-of Boulton and Watt, and the success of their new
-engine, he determined to travel south, and seek for a
-job at Soho. Many Scotchmen were accustomed to call
-there on the same errand, probably relying on the
-known clanship of their countrymen, and thinking that
-they would find a friend and advocate in Watt. But
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_255">[255]</span>
-strange to say, Watt did not think Scotchmen capable
-of becoming first-class mechanics.<a name="Anchor-181" id="Anchor-181" href="#Footnote-181" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 181.">[181]</a></p>
-
-<p>When Murdock called at Soho, in the year 1777, to
-ask for a job, Watt was from home, but he saw Boulton,
-who was usually accessible to callers of every rank. In
-answer to Murdock’s inquiry whether he could have a
-job, Boulton replied that work was rather slack with
-them then, and that every place was filled up. During
-the brief conversation that ensued, the blate young
-Scotchman, like most country lads in the presence of
-strangers, had some difficulty in knowing what to do
-with his hands, and unconsciously kept twirling his hat
-with them. Boulton’s attention was directed to the
-twirling hat, which seemed to be of a peculiar make. It
-was not a felt hat, nor a cloth hat, nor a glazed hat;
-but it seemed to be painted, and composed of some unusual
-material. “That seems to be a curious sort of
-hat,” said Boulton, looking at it more closely; “why,
-what is it made of?” “Timmer, sir,” said Murdock,
-modestly. “Timmer! Do you mean to say that it is
-made of wood?” “Yes, sir.” “Pray, <em>how</em> was it made?”
-“I turned it mysel’, sir, in a bit lathey of my own
-making.” Boulton looked at the young man again.
-He had risen a hundred degrees in his estimation. He
-was tall, good-looking, and of open and ingenuous countenance;
-and that he had been able to turn a wooden
-hat for himself in a lathe of his own making was proof
-enough that he was a mechanic of no mean skill. “You
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_256">[256]</span>
-may call again, my man,” said Boulton. “Thank you,
-sir,” said Murdock, giving his hat a final twirl.</p>
-
-<p>When Murdock called again, he was at once put upon
-a trial job, after which he was entered as a regular
-hand. We learn from Boulton’s memorandum-book
-that he was engaged for two years, at 15<i>s.</i> a week when
-at home, 17<i>s.</i> when from home, and 18<i>s.</i> when in London.
-Boulton’s engagement of Murdock was amply
-justified by the result. Beginning as a common mechanic,
-he applied himself diligently and conscientiously
-to his work, and became trusted. More responsible
-duties were confided to him, and he strove to perform
-them to the best of his power. His industry and his
-skilfulness soon marked him for promotion, and he rose
-from grade to grade until he became Boulton and Watt’s
-most trusted co-worker and adviser in all their mechanical
-undertakings of importance.</p>
-
-<p>When Murdock went into Cornwall to take charge
-of the engines, he gave himself no rest until he had
-conquered their defects and put them in thorough
-working order. He devoted himself to his duties
-with a zeal and ability that completely won Watt’s
-heart. He was so filled with his work, that when he
-had an important job in hand, he could scarcely sleep
-at nights for thinking of it. When the engine at
-Wheal Union was ready for starting, the people of
-the house at Redruth, in which Murdock lodged, were
-greatly disturbed one night by a strange noise in his
-room. Several heavy blows on the floor made them
-start from their beds, thinking the house was coming
-down. They rushed to Murdock’s room, and there
-was he in his shirt, heaving away at the bedpost
-in his sleep, calling out, “Now she goes, lads!
-now she goes.”</p>
-
-<p>Murdock was not less successful in making his
-way with the Cornishmen with whom he was brought
-into daily contact; indeed, he fought his way to their
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_257">[257]</span>
-affections. One day at Chacewater, some half-dozen
-of the mining captains came into the engine-room and
-began bullying him. This he could not stand, and
-adopted a bold expedient. He locked the door, and
-said, “Now, then, you shall not leave this place until
-I have it fairly out with you.” He selected the biggest,
-and put himself in a fighting attitude. The Cornishmen
-love fair play, and while the two engaged in battle, the
-others, without interfering, looked on. The contest was
-soon over; for Murdock was a tall, powerful fellow,
-and speedily vanquished his opponent. The others,
-seeing the kind of man they had to deal with, made
-overtures of reconciliation; and they shook hands all
-round, and parted the best of friends.<a name="Anchor-182" id="Anchor-182" href="#Footnote-182" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 182.">[182]</a></p>
-
-<p>Watt continued to have his differences and altercations
-with the Cornishmen, but he had no such way
-of settling them. Indeed, he was almost helpless
-when he came in contact with rough men of business.
-Most of the mines were then paying very badly, and
-the adventurers raised all sorts of objections to making
-the stipulated payment of the engine dues. Under such
-circumstances, altercations with them took place for
-which Watt was altogether unprepared. He was under
-the apprehension that they were constantly laying their
-heads together for the purpose of taking advantage of
-him and his partner. He never looked on the bright
-side of things, but always on the darkest. “The rascality
-of mankind,” said he to Dr. Black, “is almost
-beyond belief.” Though his views of science were large,
-his views of men were narrow. Much of this may have
-been the result of his recluse habits and closet life, as
-well as of his constant ill-health. With his racking
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_258">[258]</span>
-headaches, it was indeed difficult for him to be cheerful.
-But no one could be more conscious of his own defects&mdash;of
-his want of tact, his want of business qualities, and
-his want of temper&mdash;than he was himself. He knew
-his besetting infirmities, from which even the best and
-wisest are not exempt. His greatness was mingled with
-imperfections, and his strength with weakness, else had
-he been more than human. It is not in the order of
-Providence that the gifts and graces of life should be
-concentrated in any one perfectly adjusted character.
-Even when we inquire into the “Admirable Crichton”
-of biography, and seek to trace his life, it vanishes almost
-into a myth.</p>
-
-<p>In the midst of his many troubles and difficulties,
-Watt’s invariable practice was to call upon Boulton for
-help. Boulton was satisfied to take men as he found
-them, and try to make the best of them. Watt was a
-man of the study; Boulton a man of the world. Watt
-was a master of machines; but Boulton, of men.
-Though Watt might be the brain, Boulton was the
-heart of the concern. “If you had been here,” wrote
-Watt to Boulton, after one of his disagreeable meetings
-with the adventurers, “If you had been here, and gone
-to that meeting with your cheerful countenance and brave
-heart, perhaps they would not have been so obstinate.”
-The scene referred to by Watt occurred at a meeting of
-the Wheal Union Adventurers, at which the savings
-effected by the new engine were to be calculated and
-settled. Here is Watt’s own description of the affair,
-and his feelings on the occasion, which will give a good
-idea of the irksomeness of his position, and the disagreeable
-people he had occasionally to encounter:&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“At Wheal Union account our savings were ordered to be charged
-to the interest of Messrs. Edwards and Phillips; but when to be
-paid, God knows! Bevan said in a month. After all this was
-settled, in came Capt. Trevithick, I believe on purpose, as he came
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_259">[259]</span>
-late and might have heard that I was gone there. He immediately
-fell foul of our account, in a manner peculiar to himself ... laboured
-to demonstrate that Dalcoath engines not only surpassed the table,
-but even did more work with the coals than Wheal Union did, and
-concluded with saying that we had taken or got the advantage of
-the adventurers. I think he first said the former and then hedged
-off by the latter statement. Mr. Phillips defended, and Mr. Edwards,
-I thought, seemed staggered, though candid. Mr. Phillips desired
-the data that he might calculate it over in his way. Mr. Edwards
-slipped away, but I found afterwards that he was in another room
-with Capt. Gundry (who, and Hodge also, behaved exceedingly well&mdash;I
-believe Gundry to be a very sincere, honest man). I went out
-to speak to Joseph, and on my return found only Trevithick, Bevan,
-Hodge, and some others. Soon after, Mr. Edwards called out
-Trevithick to him and Gundry. I heard them very loud, and
-waited their return for an hour; but they not seeming ready to return,
-night coming on, and feeling myself very uncomfortable, I came away&mdash;so
-know not what passed further. During all this time, I was so
-confounded with the impudence, ignorance, and overbearing manner
-of the man that I could make no adequate defence, and indeed could
-scarcely keep my temper; which however I did, perhaps to a fault;
-for nothing can be more grievous to an ingenuous mind than the
-being suspected or accused of deceit. To mend the matter, it had
-been an exceedingly rainy morning, and I had got a little wet going
-thither, which had rather hurt my spirits. Yesterday I had a
-violent headache and could do nothing.... Some means must be
-taken to satisfy the country, otherwise this malicious man will hurt
-us exceedingly. The point on which Mr. Edwards seemed to lay
-the most stress was the comparing with a 77 <sup>1</sup>&frasl;<sub>10</sub> cylinder, as he
-alleged they would not have put in so large an engine; and in this
-there is some reason, as I do not think they believed that the engine
-would be so powerful as it is. Add to this, that the mine barely
-pays its way. Trevithick made a great noise about short strokes at
-setting on, &amp;c. The Captains seemed to laugh at that; and I can
-demonstrate that, were it allowed for, it would not come to 2<i>s.</i> 6<i>d.</i>
-per month. I believe they can be brought to allow that they would
-have put in a 70-inch. Now, query if we ought to allow this to be
-calculated from a 70 (at which it will come to near 400<i>l.</i> a year),
-and on making this concession insist on our having a good paymaster
-to pay regularly once a month, and not be obliged to go like
-beggars to their accounts to seek our due and be insulted by such
-scoundrels into the bargain. As to Hallamanin, they have not met
-yet, and when they do meet, I shall not go to them. I cannot bear
-such treatment, but it is not prudent to resent it too warmly just
-now. I believe you <em>must</em> come here. I think fourteen days would
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_260">[260]</span>
-settle matters. Besides my inability to battle such people, I really
-have not time to bestow on them.”<a name="Anchor-183" id="Anchor-183" href="#Footnote-183" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 183.">[183]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>In subsequent letters Watt continued to urge Boulton
-to come to him. His headaches were constant, unfitting
-him for work. Besides, he could scarcely stir out of
-doors for the rain. “It rains here,” said he, “prodigiously.
-When you come, bring with you a waxed
-linen cloak for yourself, and another for me, as there is
-no going out now for a few miles without getting wet to
-the skin. When it rains in Cornwall, and it rains often,
-it rains solid.”</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_281" style="width: 300px;">
-<img src="images/i_281.png" width="300" height="369" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">CARDOZOS PUMPING-ENGINE, UNITED MINES.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_261">[261]</span></p>
-
-
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_282" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_282.png" width="450" height="349" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">UNITED MINES DISTRICT&mdash;ST. DAY IN THE MIDDLE DISTANCE.</p>
-<p class="caption">[By R. P. Leitch.]</p>
-</div>
-
-
-
-
-<h3>CHAPTER XIV.<br />
-
-<small><span class="smcap">Financial Difficulties&mdash;Boulton in Cornwall&mdash;Attack
-and Defence of the Engine Patent.</span></small></h3>
-
-
-<p><span class="smcap">Boulton</span> again went to Watt’s help in Cornwall at the
-end of autumn, 1779. He could not afford to make a
-long stay, but left so soon as he had settled several
-long-pending agreements with the mine proprietors.
-The partners then returned to Birmingham together.
-Before leaving, they installed Lieutenant Henderson as
-their representative, to watch over their interests in
-their absence. Henderson was a sort of Jack-of-all-trades
-and master of none. He had been an officer of marines,
-and afterwards a West India sugar-planter. He lost
-all that he possessed in Jamaica, but gained some knowledge
-of levelling, draining, and machinery. He was
-also a bit of an inventor, and first introduced himself
-to Boulton’s notice by offering to sell him a circular
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_262">[262]</span>
-motion by steam which he alleged he had discovered.
-This led to a correspondence, which resulted in his engagement
-to travel for the firm, and to superintend the
-erection of engines when necessary.</p>
-
-<p>Henderson experienced the same difficulty that Watt
-had done in managing the adventurers, and during his
-stay in Cornwall he was never done calling upon Boulton
-to hasten to his assistance and help him, as he said, “to
-put them in good spirits and good temper.” As the
-annual meetings drew near, Henderson anticipated a
-stormy time of it, and pleaded harder than ever for
-Boulton to come to him. It seemed as if it would be
-necessary for Boulton to take up his residence in Cornwall;
-and as the interests at stake were great, it might
-be worth his while to do so. By the summer of 1780,
-Boulton and Watt had made and sold forty pumping-engines,
-of which number twenty were erected and at
-work in different parts of Cornwall; and it was generally
-expected that before long there would scarcely be
-an engine of the old construction at work in the county.
-This was, in fact, the only branch of Boulton’s extensive
-concerns that promised to be remunerative.<a name="Anchor-184" id="Anchor-184" href="#Footnote-184" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 184.">[184]</a> He had
-become loaded with a burden of debt, from which the
-success of the engine-business seemed to offer the only
-prospect of relief.</p>
-
-<p>Boulton’s affairs seemed indeed fast approaching to a
-crisis. He had raised money in all directions to carry
-on his extensive concerns. He had sold the Patkington
-estate, which came to him by his wife, to Lord Donegal,
-for 15,000<i>l.</i>; he had sold the greater part of his father’s
-property, and raised further sums by mortgaging the
-remainder; he had borrowed largely from Day,<a name="Anchor-185" id="Anchor-185" href="#Footnote-185" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 185.">[185]</a> Wedgwood,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_263">[263]</span>
-and others of his personal friends, and obtained
-heavy advances from his bankers; but all this was found
-insufficient, and his embarrassments seemed only to increase.
-Watt could do nothing to help him with money,
-though he had consented to the mortgage of the steam-engine
-royalties to Mr. Wiss, by which the sum of 7000<i>l.</i>
-had been raised. This liability lay heavy on the mind
-of Watt, who could never shake himself free of the
-horror of having incurred such a debt; and many were
-the imploring letters that he addressed to Boulton on
-the subject. “I beg of you,” said he, “to attend to
-these money affairs. I cannot rest in my bed until they
-[<i>i. e.</i> the mortgage and banker’s advance] have some
-determinate form. I beg you will pardon my importunity,
-but I cannot bear the uneasiness of my own
-mind, and it is as much your interest as mine to have
-them settled.”<a name="Anchor-186" id="Anchor-186" href="#Footnote-186" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 186.">[186]</a></p>
-
-<p>The other partner, Fothergill, was quite as downhearted.
-He urged that the firm of Boulton and
-Fothergill should at once stop payment and wind up;
-but as this would have seriously hurt the credit of the
-engine firm, Boulton would not listen to the suggestion.
-They must hold on as they had done before, until better
-days came round. Fothergill recommended that at least
-the unremunerative branches of the business should be
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_264">[264]</span>
-brought to a close. The heaviest losses had indeed been
-sustained through Fothergill himself, whose foreign
-connexions, instead of being of advantage to the firm,
-had proved the reverse; and Mr. Matthews, the London
-agent, repeatedly pressed Boulton to decline further
-transactions with foreigners.</p>
-
-<p>There was one branch of the Boulton and Fothergill
-business which Boulton at once agreed to give up.
-This was the painting and japanning business; by
-which, as appears from a statement prepared by Mr.
-Walker, now before us, the firm were losing at the rate
-of 500<i>l.</i> a year.</p>
-
-<p>The picture-painting business seems to have been
-begun in 1777, and was carried on for some years under
-the direction of Mr. Eginton, who afterwards achieved
-considerable reputation at Birmingham as a manufacturer
-of painted glass. A degree of interest has been
-recently raised on the subject of the Soho pictures,
-in consequence of the statements hazarded as to the
-method by which they are supposed to have been produced.
-It has been surmised that they were taken by
-some process resembling photography. We have, however,
-been unable to find anything in the correspondence
-of the firm calculated to support this view. On
-the contrary, they are invariably spoken of as “mechanical
-paintings,” “pictures,” or “prints,” produced by
-means of “paints” or “colours.” Though the precise
-process by which they were produced is not now known,
-there seems reason to believe that they were impressions
-from plates prepared in a peculiar manner. The impressions
-were taken “mechanically” on paper; and
-both oil and water colours<a name="Anchor-187" id="Anchor-187" href="#Footnote-187" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 187.">[187]</a> were made use of. Some
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_265">[265]</span>
-of the pictures were of large size&mdash;40 by 50 inches&mdash;the
-subjects being chiefly classical. This branch of the business
-being found unproductive, was brought to a close
-in 1780, when the partnership with Eginton was at the
-same time dissolved.</p>
-
-<p>Another and more fortunate branch of business into
-which Boulton entered with Watt and Keir, about the
-same time, was the manufacture of letter-copying machines.
-Watt made the invention, Boulton found the
-money for taking out the patent, and Keir conducted
-the business. Watt was a very voluminous correspondent,
-and the time occupied by him in copying letters, the
-contents of which he desired to keep secret from third
-parties, was such that in order to economise it he
-invented the method of letter-copying in such common
-use. The invention consisted in the transfer, by
-pressure, of the writing made with mucilaginous ink,
-to damped and unsized transparent copying-paper, by
-means either of a rolling press or a screw press. Though
-Watt himself preferred the rollers, the screw press is
-now generally adopted as the more simple and efficacious
-process.</p>
-
-<p>This invention was made by Watt in the summer of
-1778. In June we find him busy experimenting on
-copying-papers of different kinds, requesting Boulton to
-send him specimens of “the most even and whitest unsized
-paper;” and in the following month he wrote
-Dr. Black, “I have lately discovered a method of
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_266">[266]</span>
-copying writing instantaneously, provided it has been
-written the same day, or within twenty-four hours.
-I send you a specimen, and will impart the secret if
-it will be of any use to you. It enables me to copy
-all my business letters.”<a name="Anchor-188" id="Anchor-188" href="#Footnote-188" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 188.">[188]</a> For two years Watt kept
-his method of copying a secret; but hearing that
-certain persons were prying into it with the view of
-turning it to account, he determined to anticipate them
-by taking out a patent, which was secured in May,
-1780. By that time Watt had completed the details
-of the press and the copying-ink. Sufficient mahogany
-and lignum-vitæ had been ordered for making 500
-machines, and Boulton went up to London to try and
-get the press introduced in the public offices. He first
-waited upon several noblemen to interest them in the
-machine, amongst others on Lord Dartmouth, who proposed
-to show it to George III. “The King,” said
-Boulton, in a letter to Watt, “writes a great deal, and
-takes copies of all he writes with his own hand, so that
-Lord Dartmouth thinks it will be a very desirable thing
-for His Majesty.” Several of those to whom the machine
-was first shown, apprehended that it would lead to increase
-of forgery&mdash;then a great source of terror to commercial
-men. The bankers concurred in this view, and
-strongly denounced the invention; and they expostulated
-with Boulton and Watt’s agent for offering the
-presses for sale. “Mr. Woodmason,” wrote Boulton,
-“says the bankers mob him for having anything to do
-with it; they say that it ought to be suppressed.”
-Boulton was not dismayed by this opposition, but proceeded
-to issue circulars to the members of the Houses
-of Lords and Commons, descriptive of the machine,
-inviting them to an inspection of it, after which he
-communicated the results to his partner:&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>... “On Tuesday morning last I waited on some particular
-noblemen, according to promise, at their own houses, with the press,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_267">[267]</span>
-and at one o’clock I took possession of a private room adjoining the
-Court of Requests, Westminster Hall, where I was visited by several
-members of both Houses, who in general were well pleased with the
-invention; but all expressed their fears of forgery, which occasioned
-and obliged me to exercise my lungs very much. Many of the
-members tried to copy bank notes, but in vain. I had a full
-audience till half-past eight o’clock.... I had quite a mob of
-members next day; some of them mobbed me for introducing such
-wicked arts; however, upon the whole, I had a greater majority
-than Lord North hath had this year.</p>
-
-<p>On Thursday ... at half-past two ... I had a tolerable good
-House, even a better than the Speaker, who was often obliged to
-send his proper officer to fetch away from me the members to vote,
-and sometimes to make a House. As soon as the House formed into
-a Committee upon the Malt-tax, the Speaker left the chair and sent
-for me and the machine, which was carried through the gallery in
-face of the whole House into the Speaker’s Chamber. I found him
-full of fears about the dreadful consequences, which I quieted before
-I left him, and he with his two friends subscribed. I attended again
-on Friday, but, from a very thin House and curiosity abating, I had
-very few [subscriptions]. Mr. Banks came to see the machine on
-Thursday. I thought it might be of service to show it to the Royal
-Society that evening.... After the business of the Society was over,
-he announced Mr. Watt’s invention, and my readiness to show it,
-and it was accordingly brought in and afforded much satisfaction to
-a crowded audience. I did not show the list of subscribers and the
-proposals, nor dishonour philosophy by trade in that room....
-I spent Friday evening with Smeaton and other engineers at a
-coffee-house, when a gentleman (not knowing me) exclaimed against
-the copying-machine, and wished the inventor was hanged and the
-machines all burnt, which brought on a laugh, as I was known to
-most present.... There are great names enough already among
-the subscribers to give a sanction and authority to it, as well as to
-make it fashionable, which has more influence upon the minds
-of three-fourths of the Londoners than the intrinsic merit of the
-thing, and without which it would have been some years in making
-its way.”<a name="Anchor-189" id="Anchor-189" href="#Footnote-189" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 189.">[189]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>By the end of the year, the 150 machines first made
-were sold off, and more orders were coming in. Thirty
-were wanted for exportation abroad, and a still greater
-number were wanted at home. The letter-copying machine
-gradually and steadily made its way, until at
-length there was scarcely a house of any extensive
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_268">[268]</span>
-business transactions in which it was not to be found.
-Watt himself, writing of the invention some thirty years
-later, observed that it had proved so useful to himself that
-it had been worth all the trouble of inventing it, even had
-it been attended with no pecuniary profit whatever.</p>
-
-<p>Boulton’s principal business, however, while in town,
-was not so much to push the letter-copying machine, but
-to set straight the bankers’ account, which had been
-overdrawn to the amount of 17,000<i>l.</i> He was able to
-satisfy them to a certain extent by granting mortgages
-on the engine royalties payable in Cornwall, besides
-giving personal bonds for repayment of the advances
-within a given time. It was necessary to obtain Watt’s
-consent to both these measures; but, though Watt was
-willing to agree to the former expedient, he positively
-refused to be a party to the personal bonds.<a name="Anchor-190" id="Anchor-190" href="#Footnote-190" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 190.">[190]</a> Boulton
-was therefore under the necessity of arranging the
-matter himself. He was thereby enabled to meet the
-more pressing claims upon the firm, and to make
-arrangements for pushing on the engine business with
-renewed vigour. Watt was, however, by no means so
-anxious on this score as Boulton was. He was even
-desirous of retiring from the concern, and going abroad
-in search of health. “Without I can spare time
-this next summer,” he wrote, “to go to some more
-healthy climate to procure a little health, if climate
-will do, I must give up business and the world too.
-My head is good for nothing.”<a name="Anchor-191" id="Anchor-191" href="#Footnote-191" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 191.">[191]</a> While Boulton was
-earnestly pressing the invention on the mining interest,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_269">[269]</span>
-and pushing for orders, Watt shuddered at the prospect
-of one. He saw in increase of business only increase of
-headaches. “The care and attention which our business
-requires,” said he, “make me at present dread a fresh
-order with as much horror as other people with joy
-receive one. What signifies it to a man though he
-gain the whole world, if he lose his health and his life?
-The first of these losses has already befallen me, and
-the second will probably be the consequence of it, without
-some favourable circumstances which at present I
-cannot foresee should prevent it.”</p>
-
-<p>Judging by the correspondence of Watt, his sufferings
-of mind and body at this time must have been excessive;
-and the wonder is how he lived through it. But “the
-creaking gate hangs long on its hinges,” and he lived to
-the age of eighty-three, long surviving his stronger and
-more courageous partner. Intense headache seemed to
-be his normal state, and his only tolerable moments
-were those in which the headache was less violent than
-usual. His son has since described how he remembered
-seeing his father about this time, sitting by the fireside
-for hours together, with his head leaning on his elbow,
-suffering from most acute sick-headaches, and scarcely
-able to give utterance to his thoughts. “My headache,”
-he would write to Boulton, “keeps its week-aversary
-to-day.” At another time, “I am plagued with the
-blues; my head is too much confused to do any brain-work.”
-Once, when he had engaged to accompany his
-wife to an evening concert, he wrote, “I am quite eat
-up with the mulligrubs, and to complete the matter I
-am obliged to go to an oratorio, or serenata, or some
-other nonsense, to-night.” Mrs. Watt tried her best to
-draw him out of himself, but it was not often that she
-could divert him from his misery. What relieved him
-most was sleep, when he could obtain it; and, to recruit
-his powers, he was accustomed to take from nine to
-eleven hours sleep at night, besides naps during the
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_270">[270]</span>
-day. When Boulton had erysipelas, in Cornwall, and
-could not stir abroad, he wrote to his partner complaining
-of an unusual lowness of spirits, on which
-Watt undertook to be his comforter in his own peculiar
-way. “There is no pitch of low spirits,” said he,
-“that I have not a perfect notion of, from hanging
-melancholy to peevish melancholy: conquer the devil
-when he is young.” Watt experienced all the tortures
-of confirmed dyspepsia, which cast its dark shadow over
-the life of every day. His condition was often most
-pitiable. It is true, many of the troubles which beset
-him were imaginary, but he suffered from them in idea
-as much as if they had been real. Small evils fretted
-him, and great ones overwhelmed him. He met them
-all more than halfway, and usually anticipated the
-worst. He had few moments of cheerfulness, hopefulness,
-or repose. Speaking of one of his violent headaches,
-he said, “I believe it was caused by something
-making my stomach very acid;” and unhappily, as
-in the case of most dyspeptics, the acidity communicated
-itself to his temper. When these fits came upon him,
-and the world was going against him, and ruin seemed
-about to swallow him up quick, he would sit down and
-pen a long gloomy letter to his partner, full of agony
-and despair. His mental condition at the time shows at
-what expense of suffering in mind and body the triumphs
-of genius are sometimes achieved.</p>
-
-<p>In the autumn of 1780, Boulton went into Cornwall
-for a time to look after the business there. Several new
-engines had been ordered, and were either erected or
-in progress, at Wheal Treasury, Tresavean, Penrydee,
-Dalcoath, Wheal Chance, Wheal Crenver, and the United
-Mines. One of the principal objects of his visit was to
-settle the agreements with the mining companies for the
-use of these engines.</p>
-
-<p>It had been found difficult to estimate the actual savings
-of fuel, and the settlement of the accounts was a constant
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_271">[271]</span>
-source of cavil. There was so much temptation
-on the one side to evade the payments according to the
-tables prepared by Watt, and so much occasion for suspicion
-on the other that they had been evaded by unfair
-means, that it appeared to Boulton that the only practicable
-method was to agree to a fixed annual payment
-for each engine erected, according to its power and the
-work it performed. Watt was very averse to giving up
-the tables which had cost him so much labour to prepare;
-but Boulton more wisely urged the adoption of the plan
-that would work most smoothly, and get rid of the
-heartburnings on both sides. Boulton accordingly sent
-down to Watt a draft agreement with the Wheal Virgin
-adventurers, who were prepared to pay the large sum
-of 2500<i>l.</i> a year in respect of five new engines erected
-for their firm; and urged him to agree to the terms.
-“You must not be too rigid,” said he, “in fixing the
-dates of payment. A hard bargain is a bad bargain.”
-Watt replied in a long letter, urging the accuracy of
-his tables, and intimating his reluctance to depart from
-them. To this Boulton responded, “Now, my dear Sir,
-the way to do justice to our own characters, and to
-trample under our feet envy, hatred, and malice, is to
-dispel the doubts, and to clear up the minds of the
-gentlemanly part of this our best of all kingdoms; for
-if they think we do wrong, it operates against us
-although we do none, just as much as if we really did
-the wrong. Patience and candour should mark all our
-actions, as well as firmness in being just to ourselves
-and others. A fair character and standing with the
-people is attended with great advantage as well as satisfaction,
-of which you are fully sensible, so I need say
-no more.”<a name="Anchor-192" id="Anchor-192" href="#Footnote-192" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 192.">[192]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_272">[272]</span></p>
-
-<p>Watt did not give up his favourite tables without
-further expostulation and argument, but at length he
-reluctantly gave his assent to the Wheal Virgin agreement,
-by which the annual payment of 2500<i>l.</i> was
-secured. Though this was really an excellent bargain,
-Watt seemed to regard it in the light of a calamity.
-In the letter intimating his reluctant concurrence, he
-observed: “These disputes are so very disagreeable to
-me, that I am very sorry I ever bestowed so great a
-part of my time and money on the steam-engine. I can
-bear with the artifices of the designing part of mankind,
-but having myself no intention to deceive others, I
-cannot brook the suspicions of the honest part, which
-I am conscious I never merited even in intention, far
-less by any actual attempt to deceive;”<a name="Anchor-193" id="Anchor-193" href="#Footnote-193" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 193.">[193]</a> Two days later
-Watt again wrote, urging the superiority of his tables,
-concluding thus: “I have been so much molested with
-headaches this week, that I have perhaps written in a
-more peevish strain than I should have done if I had
-been in better health, which I hope you will excuse.”
-Boulton replied, expressing regret at his lowness of
-spirits and bad health, advising him to cheer up. “At
-your leisure,” said he, “you may amuse yourself with a
-calculation of what all the engines we shall have in
-eighteen months erected in Cornwall will amount to;
-you will find it good for low spirits.” “I assure you,”
-he said at another time, “you have no cause for apprehension
-as to anything in this country; all is going on
-well.” Boulton seemed to regard his partner in the
-light of a permanent invalid, which he was; and on
-writing to his various correspondents on matters of
-business at Soho, he would abjure them not to cross
-Mr. Watt. To Fothergill he wrote respecting the
-execution of an order, “the matter must be managed
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_273">[273]</span>
-with some delicacy respecting Mr. Watt, as you know
-that when he is low-spirited he is vexed at trifles.”</p>
-
-<p>Another important part of Boulton’s business in
-Cornwall, besides settling the engine agreement, was
-to watch the mining adventures themselves, in which
-by this time Boulton and Watt had become largely
-interested. In the then depressed state of the mining
-interest, it was in many cases found difficult to raise
-the requisite money to pay for the new engines; and the
-engineers must either go without orders or become
-shareholders to prevent the undertakings dropping
-through altogether. Watt’s caution impelled him at
-first to decline entering into such speculations. He
-was already in despair at what he considered the bad
-fortunes of the firm, and the load of debts they had
-incurred in carrying on the manufacture of engines.
-But there seemed to be no alternative, and he at length
-came to the conclusion with Boulton, that it was better
-“not to lose a sheep for a ha’porth of tar.”<a name="Anchor-194" id="Anchor-194" href="#Footnote-194" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 194.">[194]</a></p>
-
-<p>Rather than lose the orders, therefore, or risk the
-losses involved by the closing of the mines worked by
-their engines, the partners resolved to incur the risk of
-joining in the adventures, and in course of time they
-became largely interested in them. They also induced
-friends in the North to join them, more particularly
-Josiah Wedgwood and John Wilkinson, who took
-shares to a large amount.</p>
-
-<p>Boulton now made it his business to attend the
-meetings of the adventurers, in the hope of improving
-their working arrangements, which he believed were
-very imperfect. He was convinced of this after his first
-meeting with the adventurers of the Wheal Virgin
-mine. He found their proceedings conducted without
-regard to order. The principal attention was paid to
-the dining, and after dinner and drink little real
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_274">[274]</span>
-business could be done. No minutes were made of the
-proceedings; half the company were talking at the same
-time on different subjects; no one took the lead in conducting
-the discussions, which were disorderly and
-anarchical in the extreme. Boulton immediately addressed
-himself to the work of introducing order and
-despatch. He called upon his brother adventurers to do
-their business first, and dine and talk afterwards. He
-advised them to procure a minute-book in which to enter
-the resolutions and proceedings. His clear-headed
-suggestions were at once agreed to; and the next meeting,
-for which he prepared the agenda, was so entirely
-different from all that had preceded it, in respect of
-order, regularity, and the business transacted, that his
-influence with the adventurers was at once established.
-“The business,” he wrote to Watt, “was conducted with
-more regularity, and more of it was done, than was
-ever known at any previous meeting.” He perceived,
-however, that there was still room for great improvements,
-and added, “somebody must be here all next
-summer ... I shall be here myself the greater part of
-it, for there will want more kicking than you can do....
-<i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">Grace au Dieu!</i> I neither want health, nor spirits,
-nor even flesh, for I grow fat.”<a name="Anchor-195" id="Anchor-195" href="#Footnote-195" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 195.">[195]</a></p>
-
-<p>To increase his influence among the adventurers, and
-secure the advantages of a local habitation among them,
-Boulton deemed it necessary to take a mansion capable
-of accommodating his family, and which should serve
-the same purpose for his partner when sojourning
-in the neighbourhood. Boulton’s first idea was to have a
-portable wooden house built and fitted up in the manner
-of a ship’s cabin, which might readily be taken to pieces
-and moved from place to place as business required.
-This plan was, however, eventually abandoned in favour
-of a residence of a more fixed kind. After much searching,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_275">[275]</span>
-a house was found which promised to answer the intended
-purpose,&mdash;an old-fashioned, roomy mansion, with
-a good-sized garden full of fruit trees, prettily situated
-at Cosgarne, in the Gwennap valley. Though the
-United Mines district was close at hand, and fourteen
-of Boulton and Watt’s engines were at work in the
-immediate neighbourhood, not an engine chimney was
-to be seen from the house, which overlooked Tresamble
-Common, then an unenclosed moor. Here the partners
-by turns spend much of their time for several successive
-years, travelling about from thence on horseback from
-mine to mine to superintend the erection and working
-of their engines.</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_296" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_296.png" width="450" height="289" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">COSGARNE HOUSE.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>By this time the old Newcomen engines had been
-almost completely superseded, only one of that construction
-remaining at work in the whole county of Cornwall.
-The prospects of the engine business were, indeed, so
-promising, that Boulton even contemplated retiring altogether
-from his other branches of business at Soho, and
-settling himself permanently in Cornwall.<a name="Anchor-196" id="Anchor-196" href="#Footnote-196" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 196.">[196]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_276">[276]</span></p>
-
-<p>Notwithstanding the great demand for engines, the
-firm continued for some time in serious straits for money,
-and Boulton was under the necessity of resorting to
-all manner of expedients to raise it, sometimes with
-Watt’s concurrence, but oftener without. Watt’s inexperience
-in money matters, conjoined with his extreme
-timidity and nervousness, made him apprehend ruin and
-bankruptcy from every fresh proposition made to him
-on the subject of raising money. He was kept so
-utterly wretched by his fears as to be on occasions quite
-unmanned, and he would brood for days together on the
-accumulation of misery and anxiety which his great
-invention had brought upon him. His wife was kept
-almost as miserable as himself, and as Matthew Boulton
-was the only person, in her opinion, who could help him
-out of his troubles, she privately appealed to him in the
-most pathetic terms:&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“I know,” she wrote, “the goodness of your heart will readily
-forgive me for this freedom, and your friendship for Mr. Watt will,
-I am sure, excuse me for pointing out a few things that press upon
-his mind. I am very sorry to tell you that both his health and
-spirits have been much worse since you left Soho. It is all that
-I can do to keep him from sinking under that fatal depression.
-Whether the badness of his health is owing to the lowness of his
-spirits, or the lowness of his spirits to his bad health, I cannot
-pretend to tell. But this I know, that there are several things that
-prey so upon his mind as to render him perfectly miserable. You
-know the bond that he is engaged in to Vere’s house has been the
-source of great uneasiness to him. It is still so, and the thought of
-it bows him down to the very ground. He thinks that company
-has used both you and him very ill in refusing to release him, when
-you can give them security for a vast deal more than you are bound
-for. Forgive me, dear Sir, if I express myself wrong. It is a
-subject I am not used to write on. I know if you can you will set
-his mind at rest on this affair. I need not tell you that the seeing
-him so very unhappy must of consequence make me so. There is
-another affair that sits very heavy on his mind; that is, some old
-accounts that have remained unsettled since the commencement of the
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_277">[277]</span>
-business. They never come across his mind but he is rendered
-unfit for doing anything for a long time. A thousand times have I
-begged him to mention them to you.... I am sure he would suffer
-every kind of anxiety rather than ask you to do a thing you seemed
-not to approve of. I know the humanity of your nature would
-make you cheerfully give relief to any of the human race that was
-in distress, as far as was within your power. The knowledge of
-this makes me happy in the thought that you will exert every nerve
-to give ease to the mind of your friend. Believe me, there is not
-on earth a person who is dearer to him than you are. It causes
-him pain to give you trouble. The badness of his constitution, and
-his natural dislike to business, make him leave many things undone
-that he knows ought to be done, and, when it is perhaps too late, to
-make himself unhappy at their being neglected.... In his present
-state of weakness, every ill, however trifling, appears of a gigantic
-size, while on the other hand every good is diminished. Again,
-I repeat, that from the certain knowledge I have of his temper,
-nothing could contribute more to his happiness and make him go
-on cheerfully with business than having everything finished as he
-goes along, and have no unsettled scores to look back to and brood
-over in his mind.”<a name="Anchor-197" id="Anchor-197" href="#Footnote-197" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 197.">[197]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Mrs. Watt concluded by entreating that no mention
-would be made to her husband of her having written
-this letter, as it would only give him pain, and explaining
-that she had adopted the expedient merely in
-the hope that something might be done to alleviate his
-sufferings. This, however, was a very difficult thing
-to do. Boulton could remind his hopeless partner of
-the orders coming in for engines, and that such orders
-meant prosperity, not ruin; but he could not alter the
-condition of a mind essentially morbid. Boulton was
-himself really in far greater straits than Watt. He
-had risked his whole fortune on the enterprise; and
-besides finding money for buildings, plant, wages, materials,
-and credits, he was maintaining Watt until the
-engine business became productive. We find from the
-annual balance-sheets that Watt was regularly paid
-330<i>l.</i> a year, which was charged upon the hardware
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_278">[278]</span>
-business; and that this continued down to the year
-1785. Till then everything had been out-go; the profits
-were all to come. It was estimated that upwards of
-40,000<i>l.</i> were invested in the engine business before it
-began to yield profits; and all this was found by Boulton.
-In one of his letters to Matthews he wrote, “I find myself
-in the character of P, pay for all,” but so long as
-his credit held good, Watt’s maintenance was secure.</p>
-
-<p>So soon, however, as it became clear that the enterprise
-would be a success, and that the demand for engines
-must shortly become national, the firm was threatened
-with a danger of another kind, which occasioned almost as
-much alarm to Boulton as it did to Watt. This was the
-movement set on foot in Cornwall and elsewhere with
-the object of upsetting their patent. Had the engine been
-a useless invention, no one could have questioned their
-right of property in it; but, being recognised as of boundless
-utility, it began to be urged that the public ought
-to be free to use it without paying for it. It was
-alleged that it had become indispensable for the proper
-working of the mines, and that the abolition of the
-patent right would be an immense boon to the mining
-interest, and enable them to work the ores at a much
-reduced cost, while the general industry of the country
-would also be greatly benefited.</p>
-
-<p>When Boulton wrote Watt from Cornwall, informing
-him that the Cornishmen were agitating the repeal of
-the special Act by which their patent had been extended,
-and getting up petitions with that object, Watt replied,
-“I suspected some such move as this; and you may
-depend upon it they will never be easy while they pay
-us anything. This is a match of all Cornwall against
-Boulton and Watt; and though we may be the better
-players, yet they can hold longer out. However, if we
-do die, let us die hard.”<a name="Anchor-198" id="Anchor-198" href="#Footnote-198" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 198.">[198]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_279">[279]</span></p>
-
-<p>But would Parliament really take away that right of
-property in the invention which they had granted, and
-deprive Watt and his partner of the fruits of their long
-labour and anxiety, and their heavy outlay, now that
-the superiority of the engine had become established?
-Would the legislature consign them to certain ruin
-because it would be for the advantage of the Cornish
-miners to have the use of the invention without paying
-for it? Watt would not for a moment believe this, and
-both he and Boulton felt strong in the conviction that
-their patent right would be maintained.</p>
-
-<p>Time was, when Watt would have gladly parted with
-his invention for a very small sum, and made the engine
-free to all, so far as he was concerned. Even after
-it had been perfected at Soho, after repeated and costly
-experiments, he declared his willingness to sell all
-his interest in it for 7000<i>l.</i>, which would have barely
-remunerated him for the time and labour he had
-bestowed upon it, then extending over nearly twenty
-years of the best period of his life. And now, after six
-years of the partnership had run, and the heavy expenditure
-incurred by Boulton in introducing the engine
-was still unproductive, he regarded it as cruel in the
-extreme to attempt to deprive him of his just reward.
-To Boulton he disburdened himself fully, in strong and
-sometimes bitter terms. “They charge us,” he said, “with
-establishing a monopoly, but if a monopoly, it is one
-by means of which their mines are made more productive
-than ever they were before. Have we not
-given over to them two-thirds of the advantages
-derivable from its use in the saving of fuel, and reserved
-only one-third to ourselves, though even that has been
-still further reduced to meet the pressure of the times?
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_280">[280]</span>
-They say it is inconvenient for the mining interest to be
-burdened with the payment of engine dues; just as it is
-inconvenient for the person who wishes to get at my
-purse that I should keep my breeches-pocket buttoned.
-It is doubtless also very inconvenient for the man who
-wishes to get a slice of the squire’s land, that there
-should be a law tying it up by an entail. Yet the
-squire’s land has not been of his own making, as the
-condensing engine has been of mine. He has only
-passively inherited his property, while this invention
-has been the product of my own labour, and of God
-knows how much anguish of mind and body;”&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“Why don’t they,” he asked, “petition Parliament to take
-Sir Francis Bassett’s mines from him? He acknowledges that he
-has derived great profits from using our engines, which is more
-than we can say of our invention; for it appears by our books that
-Cornwall has hitherto eaten up all the profits we have drawn from
-it, as well as all that we have got from other places, and a good sum
-of our own money into the bargain. We have no power to compel
-anybody to erect our engines. What, then, will Parliament say to
-any man who comes there to complain of a grievance he can avoid,
-and which does not exist but in his own imagination? Will
-Parliament give away our property without an equivalent?
-Will they not collect that equivalent from the county of Cornwall?
-Will they adjudge them to pay us any less sum than it has cost
-ourselves? Will they not further add some reward for the quantity
-of life that has been devoted to the pursuit of what is evidently for
-the advantage of others, but hitherto has not been for our own?
-Lastly, will Parliament compel us to work for anybody without a
-remuneration adequate to our experience, or will they oblige us to
-labour for any one without our consent? We are in the state of
-the old Roman who was found guilty of raising better crops than
-his neighbours, and was therefore ordered to bring before the
-assembly of the people his instruments of husbandry, and to tell
-them of his art. He complied, and when he had done said, ‘These
-O Romans, are the instruments of our art; but I cannot bring into
-the forum the labours, the sweats, the watchings, the anxieties, the
-cares, which produced these crops.’ So, every one sees the reward
-which we may yet probably receive from <em>our</em> labours; but few
-consider the price we have paid for that reward, which is by no
-means a certain annuity, but a return of the most precarious sort.
-To put an end, as far as lies in my power, to all disputes with the
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_281">[281]</span>
-people of Cornwall, let them pay my debts and give me a reasonable
-sum for the time I have lost, and I will resign my part in their
-favour, and think myself well off by the bargain. Or, if you can
-find any man who is agreeable to yourself, I’ll sell him my share
-on reasonable terms, and, like the sailor, I will promise to contrive
-no more fire-engines. In short, my dear Sir, with a good cause in
-hand, I do not fear going before Parliament or anywhere. I am
-sure that if they did anything they would put us in a better position
-than we are in now.”<a name="Anchor-199" id="Anchor-199" href="#Footnote-199" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 199.">[199]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>The petition to Parliament, though much talked
-about, was not, however, presented; and the schemers
-who envied Boulton and Watt the gains which they
-had now the prospect of deriving from the use of their
-engine, shortly after resorted to other means of participating
-in them, to which we shall hereafter refer.
-In the mean time Boulton, at the urgent entreaty of
-Watt, who described himself as “loaded to 12 lbs. on the
-inch,” returned to Birmingham; though he had scarcely
-left before urgent entreaties were sent after him that he
-must come back again to Cornwall.<a name="Anchor-200" id="Anchor-200" href="#Footnote-200" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 200.">[200]</a></p>
-
-<p>While Boulton was in Cornwall, the principal manufacturers
-of Birmingham, dissatisfied with the bad and
-dear supply of copper, resolved to form themselves into
-a company for the purpose of making brass and spelter;
-and they wrote to Boulton offering to raise the requisite
-means, provided he would take the lead in the management
-of the concern. He could not but feel gratified at
-this best of all proofs of the esteem in which his townsmen
-held him, and of their confidence in his business
-qualities. Boulton, however, declined to undertake so
-large an addition to his labours. He felt that he would
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_282">[282]</span>
-soon be an old man, and that it would be necessary for
-him to contract rather than extend the field of his operations;
-besides, the engine business was already sufficiently
-prosperous to induce him to devote to it the chief
-share of his attention. But he promised to his Birmingham
-friends that he would always be glad to give them
-his best advice and assistance. He accordingly furnished
-them with a plan of operations, and drew up a scheme
-for their consideration, which was unanimously adopted,
-and the whole of the share capital was at once subscribed
-for. He also made arrangements with his Cornish
-friends for a regular supply of copper direct from the
-mines on the best terms. On his return to Birmingham,
-we find him entering upon an elaborate series of experiments,
-to determine the best constituents of brass; in
-the course of which he personally visited the principal
-calamine works in Wales and Derbyshire, for the purpose
-of testing their different produce. He diligently
-read all the treatises on the subject, and made inquiries
-as to the practice adopted in foreign countries. Finding,
-however, that the continuance of his connexion with the
-brass company was absorbing more of his time than he
-could afford to bestow upon it, he shortly withdrew from
-the concern,&mdash;partly also, because he was dissatisfied with
-what he considered the illiberal manner in which the
-managing committee were conducting its affairs.</p>
-
-<p>Another subject which occupied much of Boulton’s
-attention about the same time, was the improvement
-of engine boilers. At an early period he introduced
-tubes in them, through which the heated air of the
-furnace passed, thereby greatly increasing the heating
-surface and enabling steam to be raised more easily and
-rapidly. We find him in correspondence with Watt
-on the subject, while residing at Redruth in the autumn
-of 1780. He first suggested iron tubes; but Watt
-wrote, “I cannot advise iron for the tubes of boilers, but
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_283">[283]</span>
-they may be thought of.”<a name="Anchor-201" id="Anchor-201" href="#Footnote-201" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 201.">[201]</a> Next Boulton suggested
-the employment of copper tubes; to which Watt replied,
-“I approve of what you observe about making copper
-flanches to the boiler pipes in future, and Ale and Cakes
-can easily be converted to that way whenever they put
-up a second boiler.” We find Boulton introducing four
-copper tubes 20 inches in diameter into the Wheal Busy
-boiler, which was 26 feet in length,&mdash;the fire passing
-through two of the tubes, and returning through the
-other two. Here, therefore, we have Boulton anticipating
-the invention of the tubular boiler, and clearly adopting
-it in practice, before the existence of the locomotive,
-for which it was afterwards re-invented. In fact, the
-multitubular boiler is but a modification and extension
-of Boulton’s principle, as applied by him at so early
-a period in the Cornish boilers.</p>
-
-<p>The numerous MS. books left by Boulton show the
-care with which he made his experiments, and the scrupulousness
-with which he recorded the results. Copies
-of his observations and experiments on boilers were
-sent to Watt, to be entered by him in “the calculation
-book,” in which was recorded the tabulated experience
-of the firm. Boulton was also an excellent mechanical
-draughtsman, as appears from his tablets, which contain
-a number of beautifully executed drawings of engines
-and machinery, with very copious and minutely-written
-instructions for erecting them. Some of the drawings
-of sugar-mills are especially well executed, and delicately
-coloured. A rough sketch is given in one of the books,
-with a written explanation in Boulton’s hand, of a
-mode of applying power in taking canal-boats through
-tunnels. It consists of an engine-boat, with toothed
-claws attached to it for the purpose of catching metal
-racks fastened along the sides of the tunnel, such being
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_284">[284]</span>
-his design for working boats upon canals. While in
-Cornwall, he occupied his evenings in drawing sections
-of various mines, showing the adits, and the method of
-applying the pumping machinery, to which were also
-added numerous elaborate calculations of the results of
-engine working. He also continued to devise improvements
-in the construction and working of the steam-engine,
-on which subject he exchanged his views with
-Watt at great length. In one of his letters he says:
-“I like your plan of making all the principal wearing
-parts of tempered steel, and the racks of best Swedish
-iron, with the teeth cut out. Query: Would it not be
-worth while to make <em>a machine</em> for dividing and cutting
-the teeth in good form out of sectors? The iron would
-be less strained by that mode of cutting.” At other
-times, when the steam-engine subject seemed exhausted,
-he proceeded with the designing of road-carriages, in
-which he was an adept, filling a quarto drawing-book,
-entitled ‘Thoughts on Carriages,’ with sketches of
-different kinds of vehicles, some in pencil and Indian
-ink, and others in colours, beautifully finished. Such
-were the leisure employments of this indefatigably
-industrious man.</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_305" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_305.png" width="450" height="232" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">ENTRANCE TO COSGARNE HOUSE.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_285">[285]</span></p>
-
-
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_306" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_306.png" width="450" height="277" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">THE ‘WAGGON AND HORSES,’ HANDSWORTH.</p>
-</div>
-
-
-
-
-<h3>CHAPTER XV.<br />
-
-<small><span class="smcap">Watt again visits Cornwall&mdash;Invention of the Rotary
-Motion&mdash;The Patent Right again assailed.</span></small></h3>
-
-
-<p><span class="smcap">Watt’s</span> presence being much wanted in Cornwall, he
-again proceeded thither, accompanied by his wife and
-family, and arrived at Cosgarne towards the end of
-June, 1781. He found that many things had gone
-wrong for want of the master’s eye, and it was some
-time before he succeeded in putting affairs in order.
-The men had been neglecting their work, “going
-a-drinking.” Cartwright had “contracted a fever in
-his working arm, and been swallowing ale for a cure,”
-until he heard Watt had come, when the fever left him.
-Mrs. Watt also found occasion to complain of sundry little
-grievances, and favoured Boulton with a long catalogue
-of them. Gregory and Jessy had caught cold on the
-journey, and workmen were hammering about the house
-making repairs. There was, however, one gleam of
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_286">[286]</span>
-brightness in her letter: “James’s spirits were surprisingly
-mended since his arrival.”</p>
-
-<p>Watt was a most voluminous correspondent. He wrote
-Boulton several times a week great folio sheets, written
-close, in small hand. The letters must have occupied
-much of his time to write, and of Boulton’s to read.
-The latter, seeing his partner’s tendency to indulge in
-“worrit” about petty troubles, advised him in a kindly
-spirit not to vex himself so much about such matters,
-but to call philosophy to his aid. Why should he not
-occupy some of his spare time in writing out a history
-of all his steam-engine contrivances, to be dedicated to
-Sir Joseph Banks, and published in the ‘Transactions of
-the Royal Society’? But Watt was extremely averse
-to writing anything for publication, and the suggestion
-was not acted on. Then, knowing Watt’s greatest
-pleasure to be in inventing, Boulton in a subsequent
-letter advised him to take up afresh, and complete a
-plan which they had often discussed, of producing rotary
-motion, by which the engine might be applied to work
-mills and drive machinery.</p>
-
-<p>Watt had from the first regarded the employment of
-the steam-engine in producing continuous rotary motion
-as one of its most useful applications, and with this
-object he invented his original wheel-engine. No steps
-were taken to introduce the invention to practical use;
-but it occurred to Watt that the same object might be
-better effected by employing the ordinary engine for
-the purpose, with certain modifications.<a name="Anchor-202" id="Anchor-202" href="#Footnote-202" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 202.">[202]</a> The subject
-had partially occupied his attention during his first visit
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_287">[287]</span>
-to Cornwall; for we find him writing Boulton from
-Chacewater, in 1779, “As to the circular motion, I will
-apply it as soon as I can, but foresee that I shall be very
-busy shortly, and much out of doors.” On his subsequent
-return to Birmingham, after frequent conferences with
-his partner on the subject, he proceeded to prepare
-a model, in which he made use of a crank connected
-with the working beam of the engine to produce
-the rotary motion. There was no originality in the
-employment of the crank, which was an expedient that
-Watt had long before made use of.<a name="Anchor-203" id="Anchor-203" href="#Footnote-203" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 203.">[203]</a> The crank was,
-indeed, one of the most common of mechanical appliances.
-It was in daily use in every spinning-wheel,
-in every grindstone turned by hand, in every turner’s
-and knife-grinder’s foot-lathe, and in every potter’s wheel.
-It was one of the commonest,
-as it must have been one of
-the oldest, of mechanical expedients.
-“The true inventor
-of the crank rotative
-motion,” said Watt, “was
-the man who first contrived
-the common foot-lathe: applying
-it to the engine was
-like taking a knife to cut
-cheese which had been made to cut bread.”</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_308" style="width: 250px;">
-<img src="images/i_308.png" width="250" height="191" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">THE CRANK AS APPLIED IN THE
-FOOT-LATHE.</p>
-</div>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_309" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_309.png" width="450" height="289" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">INTERIOR OF THE “WAGGON AND HORSES.”</p>
-<p class="caption">[By Percival Skelton.]</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Though Watt had become very reserved, especially to
-strangers, about his inventions, he could not altogether
-keep from the knowledge of his workmen the contrivances
-on which his thoughts were occupied. He
-was under the necessity of employing them to make
-patterns after his drawings, from which any ingenious
-man might readily apprehend what he was aiming at.
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_288">[288]</span>
-The Soho workmen were naturally curious about the
-new inventions and adaptations which Watt was constantly
-producing, and these usually formed the subject
-of conversation at their by-hours. While the model of
-the crank engine was under construction at Soho in
-the summer of 1780, a number of the workmen met
-one Saturday evening, according to custom, to drink
-together at the “Waggon and Horses,” a little old-fashioned,
-low-roofed, roadside public-house, still standing
-in the village of Handsworth. The men were seated
-round the little kitchen-parlour, talking about their
-work, and boasting, as men will do over their beer, of
-the new and wonderful things which they were carrying
-forward in the shops. Dick Cartwright, the pattern
-maker, was one of the loudest of the party. He was
-occupied upon a model for the purpose of producing
-rotary motion, which he declared would prove one of
-the best things Mr. Watt had ever brought out. The
-other men were curious to know all about it, and to
-illustrate the action of the machine, Cartwright proceeded
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_289">[289]</span>
-to make a rude sketch of the crank upon the
-wooden table with a bit of chalk. A person who sat in
-the kitchen corner in the assumed garb of a workman,
-drank in greedily all that the men had been saying;
-for there were many eavesdroppers constantly hanging
-about Soho, some for the purpose of picking up surreptitious
-information, and others to decoy away skilled workmen
-who were in the secrets of the manufacture. Watt
-himself had never thought of taking out a patent for
-the crank, not believing it to be patentable; but the
-stranger aforesaid had no such hesitation, and it is said
-he posted straight to London and anticipated Watt by
-securing a protection for the contrivance.<a name="Anchor-204" id="Anchor-204" href="#Footnote-204" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 204.">[204]</a></p>
-
-<p>Watt was exceedingly wroth when he discovered the
-trick which had been played him, and he suspected that
-Matthew Washborough was at the bottom of it. Washborough
-was a Bristol mechanic, who carried on several
-branches of mechanical trade, amongst others that of
-clock-making on a large scale. Watt had employed
-Washborough to make nozzles for several of the Cornish
-engines, but was not satisfied with his work; for we find
-him writing to his partner, “If Washborough makes no
-better engines than he does eduction-pipes, he will soon
-be blown: the Wheal Union pipe is the worst job you
-ever saw, being worse than Forbes’s, which was very bad;
-I scarce know what to do with it.” It would appear from
-this that Washborough had begun to make engines,
-thereby turning to account the knowledge he had
-acquired in Cornwall. One of the first he made was for
-the purpose of driving the lathes of his own manufactory
-at Bristol; and it affords a clear proof of Washborough’s
-ingenuity that in this engine he employed
-both the fly-wheel and the crank. He has been styled
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_290">[290]</span>
-the inventor of the fly-wheel, but he was no more its
-inventor than he was of the crank; the Irish Professor
-Fitzgerald having proposed to employ it as part of a
-Papin’s engine as early as the year 1757. Washborough
-shortly after erected an engine after the same plan for
-a manufacturer on Snow Hill, Birmingham; and then
-it was that Watt learned that he had been “bolted out,”
-as he termed it, from making use of the crank.</p>
-
-<p>At first he was puzzled what to do to overcome the
-difficulty, but his prolific mind was rarely at a loss, and
-before many months were over he had contrived several
-other methods for effecting rotary motion. “I dare
-not, however,” he wrote to Boulton, “<em>make</em> my new
-scheme, lest we be betrayed again; I believe we had
-best take the patent first.” At the same time Watt
-was persuaded that no contrivance could surpass the
-crank<a name="Anchor-205" id="Anchor-205" href="#Footnote-205" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 205.">[205]</a> for directness, simplicity, and efficiency. He was
-therefore desirous, if possible, of making use of it in his
-rotative engine, as originally proposed; and he wrote to
-Boulton, then at Redruth, “I think you ought to call
-upon Washborough as you return, and let him know that
-we will dispute his having an exclusive right to those
-cranks.”<a name="Anchor-206" id="Anchor-206" href="#Footnote-206" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 206.">[206]</a> Boulton called upon Washborough accordingly,
-and gave him notice to this effect. But Watt
-hesitated to use the crank after all. Although the contrivance
-was by no means new, its application to the
-steam-engine was new; and, notwithstanding the unfair
-way in which Pickard had anticipated him, Watt
-did not like to set the example of assailing a patent,
-however disputable, as it might furnish a handle to
-those who were at the time seeking to attack his
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_291">[291]</span>
-own. The proposal was made to him that he should
-allow the Washborough Company to use his steam-engine
-in exchange for their allowing him to use the
-crank; but this he positively refused to agree to, as he
-felt confident in yet being able to produce a circular
-motion without employing the crank at all.</p>
-
-<p>Thus matters stood until the beginning of the year
-1781, when Washborough, having entered into an arrangement
-with the Commissioners of the Navy to
-erect an engine for grinding flour at the Deptford
-Victualling Yard,<a name="Anchor-207" id="Anchor-207" href="#Footnote-207" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 207.">[207]</a> a formal application was made to
-Boulton and Watt to apply their engine for the purpose.
-Watt protested that he could not bring himself to
-submit to such an indignity. If the Commissioners
-thought proper to employ him to erect the necessary
-engine, rotative motion, and machinery, he would exert
-every faculty which God had given him in doing so,
-but he “would never consent to hold the candle to
-Washborough.”</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“Had I esteemed him,” he wrote to Boulton, “a man of ingenuity
-and the real inventor of the thing in question, I should not have
-made any objection; but, when I know that the contrivance is my
-own, and has been stolen from me by the most infamous means, and,
-to add to the provocation, a patent been surreptitiously obtained
-for it, I think it would be descending below the character of <em>a man</em>
-to be found in any way aiding or assisting him in his pretended
-invention.... I think, therefore, that you should propose to the
-Honourable Board to undertake the direction of the whole; and,
-provided you can agree with them about the customary premium
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_292">[292]</span>
-for the savings by our engine, you should do the whirligig part [the
-rotative motion] for love. If this proposal should not be accepted,
-I beg of you to decline having any concern with it, and leave the
-field clear to Washborough. We may perhaps gain more by so
-doing than we can lose, as I assure you I have a very mean opinion
-of the mechanical abilities of our opponents. They have committed
-many gross errors in such of their works as I have had occasion to
-know about, and we may get honour by rectifying their mistakes.
-Perhaps this may seem to you to savour of vanity. If it does,
-excuse it on account of the very provoking circumstances which
-have extorted the confession. If these engineers had let us alone, I
-should not have meddled with them; but, as it is, I think we should
-be wanting in common prudence if we suffered a marriage between
-our machine and theirs, and if we did not do all we could to strip
-them of their borrowed feathers, which I hope there is justice
-enough left in England to enable us to do.”<a name="Anchor-208" id="Anchor-208" href="#Footnote-208" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 208.">[208]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Boulton acted on his partner’s advice, and declined
-the proposed connexion. The Navy Board were placed
-in a dilemma by this decision. They then referred
-the matter to Mr. Smeaton, and requested him to report
-to them as to the most suitable plan of a flour-mill,
-and the steam-engine best calculated to drive it. To
-the great surprise of Watt as well as Washborough,
-Smeaton reported that both their engines were alike
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_293">[293]</span>
-unsuited for such a purpose. “I apprehend,” he said,
-“that no motion communicated from the reciprocating
-lever of a fire-engine can ever produce a perfect circular
-motion, like the regular efflux of water in turning
-a water-wheel!” This report relieved the Commissioners.
-They abandoned their scheme, and the order for
-Washborough’s engine was at once countermanded.<a name="Anchor-209" id="Anchor-209" href="#Footnote-209" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 209.">[209]</a></p>
-
-<p>So soon as Watt had got fairly settled at Cosgarne,
-in the summer of 1781, he proceeded to work out the
-plan of a rotary-working engine. Boulton was making
-experiments with the same object at Soho, communicating
-to him the results from day to day. He was stimulated
-to prosecute the inquiry by the applications which
-he received from many quarters for steam-engines
-suitable for driving mills. He therefore urged Watt
-to complete the invention, and to prepare the drawings
-and specification, declaring his readiness at any time to
-provide the money requisite for taking out a patent.
-“The people in London, Manchester, and Birmingham,”
-said he, “are <em>steam-mill mad</em>. I don’t mean to hurry
-you, but I think that in the course of a month or two
-we should determine to take out a patent for certain
-methods of producing rotative motion from the vibrating
-or reciprocating motion of the fire-engine,&mdash;remembering
-that we have four months in which to describe the particulars
-of the invention.”<a name="Anchor-210" id="Anchor-210" href="#Footnote-210" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 210.">[210]</a></p>
-
-<p>Watt proceeded to put his ideas in a definite shape as
-fast as his bad health and low spirits would allow.
-Every now and then a fit of despair came upon him
-about his liability to the bankers, and so long as it lasted
-he was unmanned, and could do nothing. At the very
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_294">[294]</span>
-time that Boulton was writing the letter last quoted,
-Watt was thus bewailing his unhappy lot:&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“When I executed the mortgage,” said he, “my sensations were
-such as were not to be envied by any man who goes to death in a
-just cause; nor has time lessened the acuteness of my feelings....
-I thought I was resigning in one hour the fruits of the labour of my
-whole life,&mdash;and that if any accident befell you or me, I should have
-left a wife and children destitute of the means of subsistence, by
-throwing away the only jewel Fortune had presented me with....
-These transactions have been such a burden upon my mind that I
-have become in a manner indifferent to all other things, and can take
-pleasure in nothing until my mind is relieved from them; and
-perhaps, from so long a disuse of entertaining pleasing ideas, never
-may be capable of receiving them any more.”<a name="Anchor-211" id="Anchor-211" href="#Footnote-211" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 211.">[211]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Boulton made haste to console his partner, and promised
-to take immediate steps to relieve his mind of the
-anxiety that weighed so heavy upon it; and he was
-as good as his word. At the same time he told Watt
-that he must not suppose he was the only man in the
-world who had cares and troubles to endure. Boulton
-himself had, perhaps, more than his share, but he
-tried to bear them as lightly as he could. With
-his heavy business engagements to meet, his large concerns
-to keep going, he was not a man much to be
-envied; yet he continued to receive his visitors as
-usual at Soho, and to put on a cheerful countenance.
-“I am obliged,” he wrote, “to smile, to laugh, to be
-good-humoured, sometimes to be merry, and even go to
-the play! Oh, that I were at the Land’s End!” Such
-was his playful way of reminding Watt of the necessity
-of cheerfulness to enable one to get through work
-pleasantly.<a name="Anchor-212" id="Anchor-212" href="#Footnote-212" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 212.">[212]</a> But Watt’s temperament was wholly different.
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_295">[295]</span>
-His philosophy never rose to the height of
-taking things easy. He could not cast his cares behind
-him, nor lose sight of them; but carried them about
-with him by day, and took them to bed with him at
-night; thus making life a sort of prolonged vexation&mdash;a
-daily and nightly misery.</p>
-
-<p>But a new and still more alarming source of anxiety
-occurred to disturb the mind of poor Watt, and occasion
-him many more sleepless nights. The movement to
-abolish the patent by repeal of the Act of Parliament
-having broken down, attempts were now made in many
-quarters to evade it by ingenious imitations, in which
-the principle of Watt’s engine was adopted in variously
-disguised forms. But to do this successfully would have
-required an inventive faculty almost as potent as that of
-Watt himself; and he had drawn the specification of his
-patent too carefully to be easily broken through by
-the clumsy imitators who made the attempt. It was,
-however, only natural that the success of the new engine
-should draw the attention of ingenious mechanics to
-the same subject. Watt had drawn a great prize,
-and why should not they? though they little knew the
-burden of sorrow which his prize had brought upon
-him. They only knew of the large annual dues&mdash;probably
-exaggerated by the tongue of rumour&mdash;which
-were being paid to the patentees for the use of their
-engines; and they not unnaturally sought to share in the
-good fortune. There might possibly be other mechanical
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_296">[296]</span>
-methods by which the same objects were to be accomplished,
-without borrowing from Watt; at all events it
-was worth trying. Hence the number of mechanical
-schemers who made their appearance almost simultaneously
-in all parts of the country, and the number of
-new methods of various kinds contrived by them for
-the production of motive power.</p>
-
-<p>Watt was very soon informed of the schemes which
-were on foot in his immediate neighbourhood&mdash;much
-too soon for his peace of mind. He at once wrote to
-his partner: “Some Camborne gentlemen (supposed
-to be Bonze and Trevithick) have invented a new
-engine which they say beats ours two-thirds, and one of
-the partners has gone to London to procure a patent
-for it. A Mr. Vice says he has also invented a new
-engine, and that they have stolen his and compounded
-it with ours; he intends to take out a caveat against
-them.”<a name="Anchor-213" id="Anchor-213" href="#Footnote-213" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 213.">[213]</a> Though Bonze was an excellent engineer,
-and elicited the admiration of Watt himself, it turned
-out that he had no concern with the new invention.
-Its projectors proved to be the Hornblowers, also engineers
-of considerable local repute. Watt had befriended
-the family, and employed them in erecting his engines,
-by which means they became perfectly familiar with
-their construction and mode of action. Jonathan Hornblower
-had a large family of sons, of whom Jabez,
-Jesse, Jethro, and Jonathan were engineers, like their
-father. Jabez, one of the cleverest, had spent some
-time in Holland, from whence he had returned with
-some grand scheme in his head for carrying out an
-extensive system of drainage in that country. Like his
-father and the other sons, he was employed in erecting
-Watt’s engines,<a name="Anchor-214" id="Anchor-214" href="#Footnote-214" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 214.">[214]</a> which had the effect of directing his
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_297">[297]</span>
-attention to the invention of a new power which should
-supersede that of his employer.</p>
-
-<p>It was for some time doubtful what was the precise
-character of the new engine. Indeed the Hornblowers
-themselves long remained undecided about its
-actual form, being still in the throes of invention.
-They knew that they must copy discreetly, so as not to
-lay themselves too open to attack; and though they
-urged the superiority of their engine so strongly as
-to induce several of the mining companies to believe
-in them, and even to withhold orders from Boulton
-and Watt, they refrained as yet from publishing
-their invention. Watt wrote to his partner that he
-understood the Hornblowers’ engine was on some new
-principle, and the only novelty he could think of
-was a caloric air-engine. He therefore asked Boulton
-to make all the inquiries he could as to the respective
-bulks and prices per 1000 feet of all possible kinds
-of air in their most expanded states. “I am much
-vexed,” he continued, “by this affair. Jabez does
-not want abilities: the rest are fools. If they have
-really found a prize, it will ruin us.... Bankruptcy
-might ensue to both. But I don’t fear getting
-my bread independent of engines, though much easier
-with them.”<a name="Anchor-215" id="Anchor-215" href="#Footnote-215" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 215.">[215]</a> Watt was, however, in error as to the
-nature of the Hornblowers’ engine, which he discovered
-three days later, when he wrote Boulton,&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“The matter is this: Ever since the ungrateful, idle, insolent
-Hornblowers knew anything about our engines, they have laboured
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_298">[298]</span>
-to evade our Act, and for that purpose have long been possessed of
-a copy of our specification. They made an attempt at Wheal Maid
-two years ago, by connecting two cylinders together and injecting
-into one of them, which did not succeed, although they had gathered
-together numbers of their friends in order to make a great exhibition.
-Since that, Jonathan the coppersmith, who, like Alexander of the
-like trade, hath done me much evil, has laboured close at some more
-successful evasion, which he says he has now completed and taken
-a patent for,&mdash;concerning which I hear as follows from public
-reports, propagated by Jethro’s confidants:&mdash;1st. That Jonathan
-Hornblower is the inventor and patentee; that Winwood, Jones and
-Company, of Bristol, are his partners and supporters with money (that
-Winwood was lately in this country on a sleeveless errand is certain);
-that they have made their model work to 14 lbs. on the inch, and
-expect it will work to 18 lbs. 2ndly. That they press the piston down
-by steam, and maintain they have a right to do so, because, say
-they, it can be proved that such was done before my patent.
-I suppose by this they allude to Gainsborough’s bauble, which, by-the-by,
-was <em>after</em> the patent. If they do not mean this I am at a
-loss, as I now declare that I do not know of any one having done it
-before the patent except myself. However, it behoves us to inquire
-into this, and if the exhibition was not a public one it avails not.
-3rdly. That they pretend to condense the steam in the cylinder;
-but I have heard that they do it in a separate vessel within the
-cylinder, or close to it. 4thly. That they do not use an air or
-water pump, from which I conjecture that they let the hot water
-down the shaft by a pipe more than 30 feet long, as you know I
-proposed but had several objections to. You will remember, and
-I dare say Joseph and Peploe also do, that we made the 18-inch
-Soho cylinder work by blowing the hot water out of the eduction-pipe
-and used no air-pump, but found a waste of steam by so doing.
-There is also some confused report about a wheel being employed
-on their engine, which makes me suspect that M. Washborough may
-be the Bristol man concerned with them.”<a name="Anchor-216" id="Anchor-216" href="#Footnote-216" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 216.">[216]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Two days later Watt wrote,&mdash;“My principal hope is
-that almighty Nature will prove Lord Chancellor, and
-put a negative on their scheme. Amen, so be it! I
-abhor lawsuits, and reckon a cause half lost that is
-litigated.”</p>
-
-<p>On the 23rd of July he returned to the subject:&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“The Horners,” said he, “continue bragging of what they are to
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_299">[299]</span>
-do, and I hear the country in general takes part with them, as even
-the aversion they have to the Horners does not equal the pleasure
-they would feel at our undoing.... The Horners say they can
-make a common engine equal to ours, but that their new engine is
-one-third better. We must now attend to making use of all the
-elastic power of the steam, which, unless I am much deceived, will
-save one-half over our best engines, and at any rate it may easily
-be applied to work the condenser, which will save about one-eighth.
-I will not conceal from you that I am rendered very unhappy by
-one thing and another, but fight with it all I can.”</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>In the mean time Boulton continued to urge Watt to
-complete the specification and drawings of his rotative
-engine, informing him of the success of the model
-which he had now completed at Soho:&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“Though you studied a thousand years,” said he, “I do not
-think you could make one ten per cent. better than a small model
-with two cones which Joseph has executed after my drawings. It
-has little friction, goes sweeter than anything of the kind you have
-yet touched, and has not the least shake. It is so perfect that I
-don’t consider it worth while even to think of any other for horizontal
-motions. I am therefore positively decided in my mind as
-to the necessity of taking out a patent and including in it all the
-principles and constructions you please; for if it be not secured
-soon we may lose it.”<a name="Anchor-217" id="Anchor-217" href="#Footnote-217" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 217.">[217]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>In the same letter, Boulton communicated to Watt the
-rumours that had reached him from Scotland of more
-inventions of engines that were to beat Watt’s out of the
-field. “The cry is still, they come!” said he. “Hatley
-from Scotland is going with Lord Dunmore to Virginny;
-says that he and somebody else in Scotland have invented
-an engine that is three times better than yours.”
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_300">[300]</span>
-Boulton recommended that a search should be made at
-the Patent-Office, to ascertain what was going on in
-new engine patents. Watt entirely approved of this,
-and urged that the search should be made at once. “I
-do not think we are safe a day to an end,” he wrote,
-“in this enterprising age. One’s thoughts seem to be
-stolen before one speaks them. It looks as if Nature
-had taken an aversion to monopolies, and put the same
-thing into several people’s heads at once to prevent
-them; and I begin to fear that she has given over
-inspiring me, as it is with the utmost difficulty that I
-can hatch anything new.”</p>
-
-<p>Notwithstanding this confession on the part of Watt,
-his inventive faculties were really never at any period
-of his life more vigorous than now; for he was rapidly
-maturing his rotative engine, with its various ingenious
-methods for securing circular motion; and working out
-the details of the double-cylinder expansion engine, with
-its many admirable contrivances hereafter to be described.
-Boulton continued to receive applications at
-Soho, from various quarters, for engines capable of
-working flour-mills and other machinery, and Watt
-himself was urged by like inquiries from manufacturers
-in Cornwall. “Mr. Edwards,” he wrote Boulton, “waits
-impatiently the success of our rotative machine. He
-wants a power able to lift a hammer of 700 lbs., 2 feet
-high, 120 times per minute.... In relation to the
-circular engine, an experiment should be made on a
-large scale, and to work a hammer. I want your ideas
-on that head.”<a name="Anchor-218" id="Anchor-218" href="#Footnote-218" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 218.">[218]</a> A fortnight later, Watt had matured
-his own ideas, and made the necessary declaration of
-his invention before a magistrate, preliminary to making
-the usual application for a patent.<a name="Anchor-219" id="Anchor-219" href="#Footnote-219" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 219.">[219]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_301">[301]</span></p>
-
-<p>Watt was exceedingly busy about this time in superintending
-the erection of new engines. No fewer than
-twelve were in progress in different parts of the county.
-As he travelled about from one mine to another on
-horseback, and spent a good deal of his time in the open
-air, his mind was diverted from preying upon itself
-according to his ordinary habit, and his health and
-spirits improved accordingly. Boulton was equally busy
-at Soho, where he was erecting a powerful engine for
-blowing the furnaces at Walker’s ironworks at Rotherham,
-and another for Wilkinson’s forges at Bradley, in
-which he proposed to employ a double cylinder, with a
-double crank<a name="Anchor-220" id="Anchor-220" href="#Footnote-220" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 220.">[220]</a> and a pair of fly-wheels. At intervals
-he went into Yorkshire, Lancashire, and Shropshire, to
-look after various other engines in progress; writing
-Watt cheerful letters as to the improving prospects of
-the firm. He found the steam-engine everywhere
-gaining in public estimation. “The more it is known,”
-he wrote, “the more it will be in demand. As to the
-scheme of the Hornblowers, they shall sooner press me
-down into the earth than they shall press down a piston
-with steam.” And again, “Give yourself no uneasiness
-about the Horners’ engine. Our title to the invention is
-as clear as can be; and it is as well secured as an Act of
-Parliament can make it&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
-<div class="i00 leading-q">“Doubt that the sun is fire,</div>
-<div class="i00">Doubt all the powers of sight,</div>
-<div class="i00">Doubt truth to be a lyer,</div>
-<div class="i00">But never doubt our right.”</div>
-</div></div>
-
-<p>Watt’s first surmise, that the Hornblowers intended
-to work their engine by heated air or gas, had set
-Boulton upon a series of inquiries and experiments on
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_302">[302]</span>
-the subject, in which he was assisted by Dr. Priestley,
-who had shortly before settled in Birmingham, and was
-a willing co-operator in all investigations of this nature.
-Their object was to ascertain whether it was practicable
-to produce mechanical power by the absorption and
-condensation of gas on the one hand, and by its disengagement
-and expansion on the other.</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“What you propose,” Watt wrote, “is exceeding probable, and
-akin to what I have long contemplated&mdash;the use of mixed air
-and steam, which have a wonderful expansion and contraction.
-Nevertheless, I fear that there is in all such cases a proportional
-assumption of latent heat; but be it tried though it be beginning a
-new series of vexations and expense.... I suspect that a forcible
-compression would hinder the gas from separating from the water,
-and on the contrary any tolerable degree of vacuum would hinder
-the water from attracting it; but perhaps part of both may be used....
-My greatest hope is in the expansive engine with double or
-single cylinder, which I consider as proved by many facts, and
-shall send you my ideas of the execution of it very soon. At the
-same time I am clear to take the air patent, which, as I have worded
-the petition, may include some other improvements on the steam-engine....
-I hope my last letters have relieved you, as the
-knowledge of the Horners’ being a steam-engine working on our
-principle relieved me. I have some trust in the judges, though I
-have little in the law; and I think impartial people will regard us
-as injured persons, and not suffer the thief of our horse to escape
-because he has painted him of another colour.”<a name="Anchor-221" id="Anchor-221" href="#Footnote-221" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 221.">[221]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Watt’s fears for his patent were about this time
-excited anew by the great Arkwright trial, in which
-Arkwright was nonsuited, and compelled to forego the
-rights derived from his improvements and combinations
-of spinning-machinery. The principal ground on which
-the patent was set aside was that the specification was
-unintelligible. On this, Watt observed,&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“Though I do not love Arkwright, I don’t like the precedent of
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_303">[303]</span>
-setting aside patents through default of specification. I fear for our
-own. The specification is not perfect according to the rules lately
-laid down by the judges. Nevertheless, it cannot be said that we
-have hid our candle under a bushel. We have taught all men to
-erect our engines, and are likely to suffer for our pains.... I begin
-to have little faith in patents; for, according to the enterprising
-genius of the present age, no man can have a profitable patent but
-it will be pecked at, and no man can write a specification of a fire-engine
-that cannot be evaded, if the words and not the true intent
-and meaning be attended to. As kissing goes by favour, and as, in
-dubious cases, men are actuated by their prejudices, so, where a blue
-is very like a green they may decide either way.”<a name="Anchor-222" id="Anchor-222" href="#Footnote-222" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 222.">[222]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Watt continued to be alarmed by the rumours of
-the forthcoming Hornblowers’ engine. “I have heard,”
-he wrote, “that a female confidant of Jonathan’s has
-seen the engine, and says that they evaporate half
-a hogshead of water with <em>one ounce</em> of coals! ...
-that in a few days they are to publish in print what
-their invention is, illustrated with a copper-plate.
-Then we shall see and admire, if God pleaseth; I hope
-we shall not believe and tremble.” Later he wrote,&mdash;“Our
-cause is good, and yet it has a bad aspect.
-We are called monopolists, and exactors of money from
-the people for nothing. Would to God the money and
-price of the time the engine has cost us were in our
-pockets again, and the devil might then have the
-draining of their mines in place of me. Yet all are not
-alike. Some are just, and I believe do not grudge us,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_304">[304]</span>
-and some are friendly. All this is to no purpose. The
-law must decide whether we have property in this affair
-or not, and we must submit to what we cannot help.”<a name="Anchor-223" id="Anchor-223" href="#Footnote-223" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 223.">[223]</a></p>
-
-<p>At length Watt learnt the precise nature of the Hornblowers’
-invention. “It is no less,” he wrote Boulton,
-“than our double-cylinder engine, worked upon our
-principle of expansion.” This was an old idea of Watt’s,
-which he had pursued while labouring upon his model
-at Kinneil. “It is fourteen years,” he said, “since I
-thought of the double-cylinder engine, and I think that
-I mentioned it to Mr. Smeaton, when I explained the
-expansion engine to him in your parlour, some years
-ago. Wm. Murdock and Mr. Henderson can testify to
-my having mentioned it to them; but this of the
-Horners seems to be a different thing, being hung on
-the same beam.”<a name="Anchor-224" id="Anchor-224" href="#Footnote-224" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 224.">[224]</a> As early as May, 1769, he had communicated
-to Dr. Small a clear and explicit description
-of his method of working steam expansively; and he
-adopted the principle in the Soho engine, in 1778, as
-well as in the Shadwell engine erected in the same year.
-He was, however, prevented carrying it out extensively
-in practice by the inexpertness of the workmen.
-“Though the effect of the steam,” he explained to a correspondent,
-“is thereby increased 50 per cent. (by theory
-100 per cent.), it cannot be done without rendering the
-machine more complicated than we wish; and simplicity
-is a most essential point in mechanics. There are other
-contrivances known to us which would increase the
-effect in an inferior degree, say from one-fourth to one-sixth,
-but they are all attended with peculiar inconveniences
-which forbid their use until the illiterate and
-obstinate people who are intrusted with the care of the
-engines become more intelligent and better acquainted
-with the machine.”<a name="Anchor-225" id="Anchor-225" href="#Footnote-225" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 225.">[225]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_305">[305]</span></p>
-
-<p>Though suffering much from his usual headaches,
-which frequently disabled him from thinking, Watt
-finished the drawings of the rotary engine in a week,
-and forwarded them to Boulton at Soho. “I believe,”
-he said in a later letter, “a well-regulated expansive-engine
-is the <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">ne plus ultra</i> of our art.” But he intimated
-that a new trouble had come upon him in the shape of
-another inventor of a steam-engine in which all the distinctive
-principles of his own invention were embodied.
-“If he be engine mad,” said Watt, “and if it be agreeable
-to you, he shall have my share of them, provided
-he will come to my price. I wish to retire, and eat my
-cake in peace, but will not go without the cake. All
-mankind seem to have resolved to rob us. Right or
-wrong, they <em>will</em> pluck the meal from our mouths.”<a name="Anchor-226" id="Anchor-226" href="#Footnote-226" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 226.">[226]</a>
-Boulton, on his next journey to London, called upon the
-alleged inventor, a Mr. Ewer, and declared to Watt that
-the invention, so far as it was new, was not worth a
-farthing, and that all that was good in it was borrowed
-from their engine. “Though the white marks on your
-cow or your horse,” said he, “may be changed to black,
-the cow and horse are not the less your property.” He
-therefore counselled Watt to relieve himself of all
-anxiety on this account. Watt replied, “Ewer seems to
-have a genius more capable of inventing than of prudently
-examining the merits of his invention. Poets
-lose half the praise they would otherwise get did they
-but tell us what they discreetly blot. We must publish
-a book of blots.”</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_327" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_327.png" width="450" height="341" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">OLD ENGINE-HOUSE AT DALCOATH.</p>
-<p class="caption">[By R. P. Leitch.]</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Meanwhile Watt went on inventing, even while he
-was complaining of his inability to invent, and of the
-uselessness of inventing. Invention had grown into a
-habit with him, which he could not restrain. In the
-very letter in which he wrote “It is of no use inventing&mdash;everybody
-is seizing upon our schemes,” he communicated
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_306">[306]</span>
-to Boulton that he had contrived a machine, then
-erecting at Dalcoath, for the purpose of stopping the
-engine when at full speed, when any accident happened
-to the rods or outside chains,&mdash;first taking away the
-power, and then holding the bob fast whenever it might
-be at the turn.<a name="Anchor-227" id="Anchor-227" href="#Footnote-227" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 227.">[227]</a> A few days later he communicated
-that he had contrived a new way of opening the regulators.
-He was also finishing his plan of the new
-equalising beam, and the double expansion engine,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_307">[307]</span>
-which he requested might be proceeded with at once.
-“I have shown the equalising beam,” said he, “to no
-person whatever. Please push it on. It is our <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">dernier
-ressort</i>, and may perhaps be all that villany will leave
-us, and that not long.”<a name="Anchor-228" id="Anchor-228" href="#Footnote-228" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 228.">[228]</a> Boulton wrote back, bidding
-his partner to be of good heart. “If our spirits don’t
-fail us,” said he, “I think our engine won’t.”</p>
-
-<p>At the same time Watt was inventing his new
-jointed top-working gear, which he reported answered
-exceedingly well with the Dalcoath engine; and, in
-pursuance of an idea thrown out by Boulton, he perfected
-the model of a horizontal-axled elliptical with one
-pulley, which he described as performing <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">à merveille</i>,
-being free from all untoward frictions. He was also
-busy inventing a new method of an equalising beam,
-by causing the gudgeon to change its place; and
-another by means of a roller acting upon a curve in
-the nature of the working gear. Besides his experiments
-in mechanics, he was prosecuting investigations
-as to the properties of nutgalls in combination with
-various chemical substances, for the purpose of obtaining
-the best kind of ink for use with his copying machines;
-and at another time we find him contriving various
-iron cements for joints, confessing that he had “lost all
-faith in putty;” the result of which was his discovery of
-the well-known metallic cement.</p>
-
-<p>In the correspondence between the partners on these
-various topics, we seem to see the ideas out of which so
-many inventions grew, in their various stages of birth,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_308">[308]</span>
-growth and development. They concealed nothing
-from each other, but wrote with the most perfect
-unreserve. Each improved on the other’s ideas,&mdash;Watt
-upon Boulton’s, and Boulton upon Watt’s; both experimenting
-on the same subject at the same time, and
-communicating the results in the most elaborate detail.
-The phrase often occurs in their letters: “I write thus
-fully <em>that you may see exactly what is passing in my
-mind</em>.” The letters were sometimes of extraordinary
-length, one of Boulton’s (dated 25th September, 1781)
-extending to eight pages folio, closely written, containing
-upwards of 4000 words. Scarcely a day passed
-without their spending several hours in writing to each
-other. Boulton also kept up a correspondence with
-Mrs. Watt, in addition to his elaborate letters to her
-husband. The lady entered into various matters of personal
-interest, describing her occupations and domestic
-pursuits, and communicating the state of her husband’s
-health, which was a matter of no less interest to Boulton
-than to herself.</p>
-
-<p>As the autumn set in with its fogs and rains, Watt’s
-headaches returned with increased severity, and he
-repeatedly complained to Boulton of being “stupid and
-ill, and scarcely able to think.” “I tremble,” said he,
-“at the thought of making a complete set of drawings.
-I wish you could find me out a draughtsman of abilities;
-as I cannot stand it much longer.”<a name="Anchor-229" id="Anchor-229" href="#Footnote-229" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 229.">[229]</a> Watt’s temper was
-also affected by the state of his health; and he confessed
-that he felt himself not at all cut out for the
-work he had to do, so far as related to business: “I am
-not philosopher enough,” he said, “to despise the ills of
-life; and when I suffer myself to get into a passion,
-I observe it hurts me more than it does anybody else.
-I never was cut out for business, and wish nothing so
-much as not to be obliged to do any; which perhaps
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_309">[309]</span>
-will never fall to my lot; therefore I must drag on a
-miserable existence the best way I can.”<a name="Anchor-230" id="Anchor-230" href="#Footnote-230" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 230.">[230]</a></p>
-
-<p>Watt was very busy at this time in preparing the
-specification and drawings of the circular motion, which
-he said he found an extremely difficult job owing to the
-distracted state of his head. The letters patent for
-the invention had been secured on the 25th October,
-1781, and he had four months allowed him in which to
-prepare and lodge the full description. He laboured at
-his work late and early, his mind being for months in the
-throes of invention. In the beginning of November we
-find him writing to Boulton, sending him the “first three
-yards of the specification,” written out on folio sheets
-joined together. Watt’s letters to his partner at this
-time contain numerous rough sketches of his proposed
-methods for securing circular motion without using the
-crank, from which he conceived himself to be in a
-measure precluded by Pickard’s patent. He devised
-no fewer than five distinct methods by which this object
-might be accomplished, by means of wheels of various
-sorts rotating round an axis.
-The method eventually preferred
-was the one invented
-by Wm. Murdock, and commonly
-known as the sun and
-planet motion.<a name="Anchor-231" id="Anchor-231" href="#Footnote-231" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 231.">[231]</a> “It has the
-singular property,” said Watt,
-“of going twice round for each
-stroke of the engine, and may
-be made to go oftener round
-if required without additional
-machinery.”</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_330" style="width: 200px;">
-<img src="images/i_330.png" width="200" height="239" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">SUN AND PLANET MOTION.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Rough sketches of these various
-methods were forwarded to Soho in order that the
-requisite careful drawings of them might be prepared in
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_310">[310]</span>
-time to be lodged with the specification; but when they
-reached Watt in Cornwall, he declared them to be so
-clumsily executed that he could not for very shame send
-them in; and though greatly pressed by mining business,
-and suffering from “backache, headache, and lowness
-of spirits,” he set to work to copy them with his own
-hands. He worked up his spare time so diligently,
-that in ten days he had the plans finished and returned
-to Boulton, whom he wrote saying that he had improved
-the construction of several of the machines,
-and “got one copy of the specification drawing finished
-in an elegant manner upon vellum, being the neatest
-drawing he had ever made.”<a name="Anchor-232" id="Anchor-232" href="#Footnote-232" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 232.">[232]</a> The necessary measures
-being then taken to perfect the patent, it was duly
-enrolled on the 23rd February, 1782.</p>
-
-<p>During the time that Watt was busy completing the
-above specification and drawings, his mind was full of
-other projects, one of which was the perfecting of his
-new expansive engine.<a name="Anchor-233" id="Anchor-233" href="#Footnote-233" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 233.">[233]</a> It is curious to find him, in
-his letters to Boulton, anticipating the plan of superheating
-the steam before entering the cylinders, which
-has since been carried into effect with so much success.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_311">[311]</span></p>
-
-<p>By the middle of March he had sufficiently matured
-his ideas of a reciprocating expansive engine to enable
-him to take out letters patent, and the invention was
-enrolled on the 4th of July in the same year. It
-included the double engine and double-acting engine
-(steam pressing the piston upwards as well as downwards),
-the employment of steam on the expansive
-principle, various methods of equalising the power of
-the engine, the toothed rack and sector for guiding
-the piston-rod, and a rotative engine or steam-wheel.
-While perfecting these beautiful adaptations, Watt was
-often plunged in the depths of distress through many
-causes,&mdash;by sickness, headaches, and low spirits; by
-the pecuniary difficulties of the firm; by the repeated
-attempts of the Cornish miners to lower their dues; and
-by threatened invasions of his patent from all quarters.
-Another of his worries was the unsteadiness of his
-workmen. His letters to Boulton were full of complaints
-on this score. Excepting Wm. Murdock, who
-was in constant demand, there was scarcely one of them
-on whom he could place reliance. “We have very
-little credit, indeed,” said he, “in our Soho workmen.
-James Taylor has taken to dram-drinking at a most
-violent rate,&mdash;is obstinate, self-willed, and dissatisfied.”
-And again, “Cartwright’s engine has been a continued
-scene of botching and blunders. J. Smith and the rest
-are ignorant, and all of them must be looked at daily,
-or worse follows. Had I had any one man of common
-prudence and experience, who would have attended
-from morning till night, these things might have been
-avoided, and my life would have been more comfortable.
-As things are, it is much otherwise.”<a name="Anchor-234" id="Anchor-234" href="#Footnote-234" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 234.">[234]</a> Three months
-later, matters had not mended. J. Smith is pronounced
-“a very slow hand,” and “J. Taylor is sometimes three
-days together at the alehouse, except when he judged I
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_312">[312]</span>
-should be going my rounds.... Dick Cartwright
-also continues too much devoted to beer.... I have
-read all our men lectures upon industry and good
-hours, though I fear it will not be to much purpose;
-idleness is ingrained in their constitution.”<a name="Anchor-235" id="Anchor-235" href="#Footnote-235" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 235.">[235]</a> Boulton
-wrote to him to “send home the most rascally of the
-Sohoites;” but this was impracticable, as better men to
-replace them were not at that time to be had. Things
-were quite as bad at Soho itself; for early in 1782 we
-find Boulton writing thus: “The forging-shop wants a
-total reformation; Peploe and others constantly drunk;
-spoke mildly to them at first, then threatened, and am
-now looking out for good hands, which are very
-scarce.”<a name="Anchor-236" id="Anchor-236" href="#Footnote-236" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 236.">[236]</a></p>
-
-<p>William Murdock was by far the ablest and most
-efficient of the Soho men, and won golden opinions
-in all quarters; so much so, that he was in constant
-request. We find him described as “flying from mine
-to mine,” putting the engines to rights. If anything
-went wrong, Murdock was immediately sent for. He
-was active, quick-sighted, shrewd, indefatigable, and an
-excellent workman. His wages, down to 1780, were
-only 20<i>s.</i> a week, and, thinking himself worth more, he
-asked for an advance to two guineas. Boulton, instead
-of refusing, adroitly managed to obtain a present of ten
-guineas from the owners of the United Mines, to which
-he added other ten, in acknowledgment of the admirable
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_313">[313]</span>
-manner in which he had erected their new engine; Mr.
-Beauchamp, the Chairman of the Company, having
-publicly declared that “he regarded William as the
-most obliging and industrious workman he had ever
-known.” Though Murdock’s wages were not then
-raised, and though Bonze, the Cornish engineer&mdash;a man
-of means as well as of skill and experience&mdash;invited
-him to join in an engineering partnership, William
-remained loyal to the Boulton and Watt firm, and in
-due time he had his reward.</p>
-
-<p>Murdock’s popularity with the Cornishmen increased
-so much that Watt seems to have grown somewhat
-jealous of him, for when William was to be had, they
-preferred him to Watt himself.<a name="Anchor-237" id="Anchor-237" href="#Footnote-237" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 237.">[237]</a> At Wheal Virgin,
-the adventurers insisted upon having him all to themselves;
-but this was not practicable, as there were other
-engines in progress requiring constant attention,&mdash;Wheal
-Crenver, which Watt described as “in the
-enemy’s country, Pool hardly completed yet, and Dalcoath
-in its childhood.”</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“I cannot now leave Wheal Virgin a single day,” wrote Watt,
-“without running the risk of some vile blunder, particularly as the
-boilers are now setting. Wm. Murdock was at Wheal Virgin one
-day this week, and that day was taken up with Mr. Wedgwood,<a name="Anchor-238" id="Anchor-238" href="#Footnote-238" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 238.">[238]</a> so
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_314">[314]</span>
-that it was partly lost. Yesterday he was taken away by Crenver
-people and is not returned. I fear I cannot get much of his help,
-and I assure you I need it much, for there cannot be a greater
-plague than to have five engines making by ignorant men and no
-helpmate to look after them. I have been tolerably well these few
-days, but cannot get up my spirits, from having too much to think
-upon.”</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Combined with the troubles arising out of the perversities,
-blunderings, and bad conduct of his workmen,
-Watt had also to struggle against torment of mind and
-body, aggravated by bad news from home. Boulton
-was in the crisis of his troubles with his partner
-Fothergill, from which he was desperately struggling
-to shake himself free.<a name="Anchor-239" id="Anchor-239" href="#Footnote-239" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 239.">[239]</a></p>
-
-<p>Watt was made additionally miserable by the state of
-the bankers’ account, which was still overdrawn to a
-very large amount. The bankers were urgent for
-repayment, but neither of the partners saw where the
-money was to come from. Watt again thought of
-giving up altogether, and selling his share of the
-business as the only means of relief which presented
-itself.</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“I am almost moved,” he wrote, “if Lowe, Vere, and Williams
-will free me from any demands on my future industry, to give up
-my present property altogether, and trust to Providence for my
-support. I cannot live as I am with any degree of comfort. The
-want of the superfluities of life is a trifle compared with continual
-anxiety. I do not see how you can pay L. V. &amp; W. 1000<i>l.</i> per
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_315">[315]</span>
-quarter; I am sure it cannot be from the engine business, unless
-we can reduce the amount of our general expenses to 0 and live
-upon air ourselves.... Though you and I should entirely lose this
-business and all its profits, you will get quit of a burdensome debt;
-and as both of us lived before it had a being, so we may do afterwards.
-Therefore consider what can be done, and do it without
-reluctance, or with as little as you can; and depend upon it that I
-am sincerely your friend, and shall push you to nothing that I do
-not think to be for your advantage.”<a name="Anchor-240" id="Anchor-240" href="#Footnote-240" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 240.">[240]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Two days later, while still in a heavily desponding
-humour, he wrote thus:&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“If matters were to come to the worst, many methods may be
-fallen upon whereby we may preserve some consequence in the
-world. A hundred hours of melancholy will not pay one farthing
-of debt. Summon up your <ins title="Transcriber's Note: original reads 'fortitute'" id="Corr-315">fortitude</ins> and try to turn your attention
-to business, and to correct the abuses at Soho.... All the idlers
-should be told that in case they persevere in want of attention, then
-dismission must ensue.... The Soho part of the business has been
-somehow a perpetual drain to us, and if it cannot be put on a better
-footing, must be cut off altogether by giving out the work to be
-done by others.”<a name="Anchor-241" id="Anchor-241" href="#Footnote-241" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 241.">[241]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>To add to their troubles, a fire broke out in the house
-of Boulton and Watt’s London agent for the sale of their
-copying machines, and the building, with its contents,
-was burnt to the ground, thereby causing a loss to the
-firm of above a thousand pounds. The mining trade
-was also wretchedly bad in Cornwall, several of the
-more important mines being unproductive, while ore
-was selling at low prices. The adventurers were
-accordingly urging Watt to abate the agreed dues for
-the use of their engines, and in several cases threatened
-to close the mines unless he did so. The United Mines
-asked to be reduced 50<i>l.</i> a month. Watt having refused
-to make the abatement, the mine was ordered to be
-stopped, on which he consented to give up the dues
-altogether for a period of six months. “There seemed,”
-he wrote to Boulton, “to be no other course, if we
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_316">[316]</span>
-would maintain our right, and at the same time do
-justice to the poor people, who must otherwise absolutely
-starve, and are already riotously disposed through the
-stopping of Wheal Virgin.”<a name="Anchor-242" id="Anchor-242" href="#Footnote-242" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 242.">[242]</a> “In short,” said he,
-“almost the whole county is against us, and look upon
-us as oppressors and tyrants, from whose power they
-believe the horned imps of Satan are to relieve them.”
-Watt was indeed thoroughly sick of Cornwall, and
-longed to get back to Birmingham. He confessed he
-did not see how, under the present state of things, he
-could be of any more use there. The weather was very
-tempestuous, and he felt the fatigue of travelling from
-mine to mine too much for him to endure. On the 4th
-of April he wrote,&mdash;“I returned from the coast to Cosgarne
-last night with an aching head, after a peregrination
-of two days in very stormy weather.” “Upon the
-whole,” he wrote to Boulton, “I look upon our present
-Cornish prospects as very bad, and would not have you
-build too much upon them nor upon the engine business,
-without some material change. I shall think it prudent
-to look out for some other way of livelihood, as I expect
-that this will be swallowed up in merely paying its
-burdens.”<a name="Anchor-243" id="Anchor-243" href="#Footnote-243" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 243.">[243]</a> Watt, accordingly, finding that he could
-do no more good in Cornwall, left it about the middle
-of April, and returned with an aching head and heavy
-heart to Birmingham.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_317">[317]</span></p>
-
-
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-<h3>CHAPTER XVI.<br />
-
-<small><span class="smcap">More Difficulties and more Inventions&mdash;Boulton again
-in Cornwall.</span></small></h3>
-
-
-<p><span class="smcap">The</span> battle of the firm had hitherto been all up-hill.
-Nearly twenty years had passed since Watt had made
-his invention. His life since then had been a constant
-struggle, and it was a struggle still. Thirteen years
-had passed since the original patent had been taken
-out, and seven since the Act had been passed for its
-extension. But the engine had as yet yielded no
-profit, and the outlay of capital continued. Notwithstanding
-Boulton’s energy and resources, the partners
-were often in the greatest straits for money, and sometimes,
-as Saturday nights came round, they had to beat
-about among their friends for the means of paying the
-workmen’s wages.</p>
-
-<p>Though Watt continued to imagine himself on the
-brink of ruin, things were not really so gloomy as
-he supposed. We find Boulton stating in a confidential
-letter to Matthews, that the dues payable on
-the pumping-engines actually erected in 1782 amounted
-to 4320<i>l.</i> a year; and that when all the engines in
-progress had been finished, they would probably amount
-to about 9000<i>l.</i> It is true, the dues were paid with
-difficulty by the mining interest, still in a state of
-great depression, but Boulton looked forward with confidence
-to better days coming round. Indeed, he already
-saw his way through the difficulties of the firm, and
-encouraged his doleful partner to hope that in the course
-of a very few years more, they would be rid of their
-burdens.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_318">[318]</span></p>
-
-<p>As Cornwall was, however, now becoming well supplied
-with pumping-engines, it became necessary to open
-up new branches of business to keep the Soho manufactory
-in full work. With this object, Boulton became more
-and more desirous of applying the engine to the various
-purposes of rotary motion. In one of his visits to
-Wales, in 1781, he had seen a powerful copper-rolling
-mill driven by water, and when told that its defect was
-that it was liable to be stopped in summer during drought,
-he immediately asked&mdash;“Why not use our engine? It
-goes night and day, summer and winter, and is
-altogether unaffected by drought.” Immediately on his
-return home, he made a model of a steam rolling-mill,
-with two cylinders and two beams, connecting the
-power by a horizontal axis; and by the end of the year
-he had a steam forge erected at Soho on this plan.
-“It answers very well,” he wrote to Matthews, “and
-astonishes all the ironmasters; for, although it is a
-small engine, it draws even more steel per day than
-a large rolling-mill in this neighbourhood draws by
-water.” Mr. Wilkinson was so much pleased with it
-that he ordered one to be made on a large scale for the
-Bradley ironworks; and another was shortly after
-ordered for Rotherham. But the number of iron mills
-was exceedingly limited, and Boulton did not anticipate
-any large extension of business in that quarter. If, however,
-he could once get the rotary engine introduced as
-the motive power for corn and flour mills, he perceived
-that the demand would be considerable. Writing to
-Watt on the subject, he said, “When Wheal Virgin is
-at work, and all the Cornish business is in good train,
-we must look out for orders, as all our treaties are
-seemingly at an end, having none now upon the tapis.
-There is no other Cornwall to be found, and the most
-likely line for increasing the consumption of our engines
-is the application of them to mills, which is certainly an
-extensive field.”</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_319">[319]</span></p>
-
-<p>Watt, on his return to Birmingham from Cornwall,
-proceeded to embody his plan for securing rotary motion
-in a working engine, so that he might be enabled to
-exhibit the thing in actual work. He was stimulated to
-action by the report which reached his ears that a
-person in Birmingham had set agoing a self-moving
-steam rotator, in imitation of his, on which he exclaimed,
-“Surely the Devil of Rotations is afoot! I hope he
-will whirl them into Bedlam or Newgate.”<a name="Anchor-244" id="Anchor-244" href="#Footnote-244" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 244.">[244]</a> Boulton,
-who had by this time gone to Cornwall for the winter,
-wrote to him from Cosgarne, “It is certainly expensive;
-but nevertheless I think, as we have so much at stake, that
-we should proceed to execute such rotatives as you have
-specified.... You should get a good workman or two
-to execute your ideas with despatch, lest they perish.
-The value of their wages for a year might be 100<i>l.</i>, but
-it would be the means of our keeping the start that we
-now have of all others. But above all, there is nothing
-of more importance than the perfect completion of the
-double expansive reciprocating engine as soon as may
-be.”<a name="Anchor-245" id="Anchor-245" href="#Footnote-245" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 245.">[245]</a> Watt replied that he was busily occupied in getting
-the rotative motion applied to one of the Soho engines.
-“These rotatives,” said he, “have taken up all my time
-and attention for months, so that I can scarcely say that
-I have done anything which can be called business.
-Our accounts lie miserably confused. We are going on
-in a very considerable weekly expense at Soho, and I
-can see nothing likely to be produced from it which will
-be an equivalent.” Speaking of the prospect of further
-improvements, he added, “It is very possible that,
-excepting what can be done in improving the mechanics
-of the engine, nothing much better than we have
-already done will be allowed by Nature, who has fixed
-a <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">ne plus ultra</i> in most things.”<a name="Anchor-246" id="Anchor-246" href="#Footnote-246" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 246.">[246]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_320">[320]</span></p>
-
-<p>While thus hopelessly proceeding with the rotative
-engine, Watt was disquieted by the intelligence which
-reached him from Boulton, as to the untoward state of
-affairs in Cornwall. At some of the most important
-mines, in which Boulton and Watt held shares, the
-yield had considerably fallen off, and the price of the
-ores being still very low, they had in a great measure
-ceased to be remunerative. Hence appeals were made
-to Boulton on all sides for an abatement of the engine
-dues. Unwilling to concede this, the adventurers proceeded
-to threaten him with the Hornblowers, whose
-engine they declared their intention of adopting. As,
-however, Boulton and Watt’s engines were all going
-exceedingly well, and as the Hornblowers had not yet
-been able to get one of their boasted engines to work
-satisfactorily,<a name="Anchor-247" id="Anchor-247" href="#Footnote-247" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 247.">[247]</a> the adventurers hesitated for the present
-to take any overt steps in the matter.</p>
-
-<p>Boulton had a long and disagreeable battle to fight
-with the adventurers on this point, which lasted for
-many months, during which the Hornblowers continued
-to stimulate them with the agreeable prospect of
-getting rid of the dues payable in respect of the savings
-of fuel by the condensing engines. Boulton resisted
-them at every point single-handed; the battle being, as
-he said, “Boulton and Watt against all Cornwall.”<a name="Anchor-248" id="Anchor-248" href="#Footnote-248" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 248.">[248]</a> He
-kept Watt fully informed from day to day of all that
-passed, and longed for more rapid means of communication,&mdash;the
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_321">[321]</span>
-postal service being then so defective that no
-less than thirteen days elapsed before Boulton, at Truro,
-could receive an answer from Watt at Birmingham.
-On one occasion we find Watt’s letter eleven days on
-the road between the two places. The partners even
-had fears that their letters were tampered with in
-transit; and, in order to carry on their correspondence
-confidentially, Watt proposed to employ a shorthand
-alphabet, which he had learnt from Dr. Priestley, in
-which to write at least the names of persons, “as our
-correspondence,” he observed, “ought to be managed
-with all possible secrecy, especially as to names.”</p>
-
-<p>Boulton, as usual, led a very active life in Cornwall.
-Much of his time was occupied in riding from
-mine to mine, inspecting the engines at work, and
-superintending the erection of others. The season
-being far advanced, the weather was bad, and the
-roads miry; but, wet or dry, he went his rounds. In
-one of his letters he gives an account of a miserable
-journey home on horseback, on a certain rainy, windy,
-dark night in November, when he was “caught in water
-up to 12 hands.” “It is very disagreeable,” he adds, “that
-one cannot stay out till dark upon the most emergent
-business without risking one’s life.” But once at home
-he was happy. “The greatest comfort I find here,” he
-says, “is in being shut out from the world, and the
-world from me. At the same time I have quite as
-much visiting as I wish for.” One of his favourite
-amusements was collecting and arranging fossils, some
-for his friend Wedgwood, and others for his own “fossilry”
-at Soho. Boulton was well supported out of
-doors by William Murdock, now regarded as “the right
-hand” of the concern in Cornwall.</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“Murdock hath been indefatigable,” he wrote Watt, “ever since
-they began [at Wheal Virgin new Engine]. He has scarcely been
-in bed or taken necessary food.... After slaving day and night on
-Thursday and Friday, a letter came from Wheal Virgin that he
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_322">[322]</span>
-must go instantly to set their engine to work or they would let out
-the fire. He went and set the engine to work: it worked well for
-the five or six hours he remained. He left it and returned to the
-Consolidated Mines about eleven at night, and was employed about
-the engines till four this morning, and then went to bed. I found
-him at ten this morning in Poldice Cistern, seeking for pins and
-casters that had jumped out, when I insisted on his going home to
-bed.”<a name="Anchor-249" id="Anchor-249" href="#Footnote-249" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 249.">[249]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>On one occasion, when an engine superintended by
-Murdock stopped through some accident occurring to
-it, the water rose in the mine, and the miners were
-drowned out. Upon this occurring, they came “roaring
-at him” for having thrown them out of work, and
-threatened to tear him to pieces. Nothing daunted, he
-went through the midst of the men, and proceeded to
-the invalided engine, which he succeeded in very shortly
-repairing and setting to work again. The miners were
-so rejoiced that they were carried by their feelings
-into the opposite extreme; and when he came out of
-the engine-house they cheered him vociferously, and
-insisted upon carrying him home on their shoulders
-in triumph!</p>
-
-<p>About this time, Boulton became increasingly anxious
-to ascertain what the Hornblowers were doing. They
-continued to brag of the extraordinary powers of the
-engine erected by them at Radstoke, near Bristol,
-whither he proposed to go, to ascertain its construction
-and qualities, as well as to warn the persons who
-were employing them as to the consequences of their
-infringing the existing patent. But he was tied to
-Cornwall by urgent business, and could not leave his
-post for a day. “During the forking of these two great
-mines,” said he, “I dare not stir two miles from the
-spot, and it will yet be six weeks before I regain my
-liberty.”<a name="Anchor-250" id="Anchor-250" href="#Footnote-250" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 250.">[250]</a> He determined, therefore, to send over
-James Law, a Soho man on whom he could rely, to
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_323">[323]</span>
-ascertain, if possible, the character of the new engine,
-and he also asked his partner Watt to wait upon the
-proprietors of Radstoke so soon as he could make it
-convenient to do so. Law accordingly proceeded to
-Radstoke, and soon found out where the engine was;
-but as the Horners were all in the neighbourhood,
-keeping watch and ward over it turn and turn about,
-he was unable to see it except through the engine-house
-window, when it was not working. He learnt, however,
-that there was something seriously wrong with
-it, and that the engineers were considerably crestfallen
-about its performances.</p>
-
-<p>Watt proceeded to Bristol, as recommended by his
-partner, for the purpose of having a personal interview
-with Hornblower’s employers. On his arrival, he
-found that Major Tucker, the principal partner, was
-absent; and though he succeeded in seeing Mr. Hill,
-another of the partners, he could get no satisfactory
-reply from him as to the intentions of the firm with
-respect to the new engine. Having travelled a hundred
-miles on his special errand, Watt determined not to
-return to Birmingham until he had seen the principal
-partner. On inquiry he found that Major Tucker had
-gone to Bath, and thither Watt followed him. At Bath
-he found that the Major had gone to Melcompton. Watt
-took a chaise and followed him. The Major was out
-hunting; and Watt waited impatiently at a little alehouse
-in the village till three o’clock, when the Major
-returned&mdash;“a potato-faced, chuckle-headed fellow, with
-a scar on the pupil of one eye. In short,” said Watt,
-“I did not like his physiog.” After shortly informing
-the Major of the object of his visit, who promised to
-bring the subject under the notice of his partners at a
-meeting to be held in about three weeks’ time, Watt,
-finding that he could do no more, took his leave; but,
-before he left Bristol, he inserted in the local papers an
-advertisement, prepared by Boulton, cautioning the
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_324">[324]</span>
-public against using the Hornblowers’ engine, as being
-a direct infringement of their patent. For the present,
-indeed, there seemed but little reason to apprehend
-danger from the Hornblowers, whose engine was still
-undergoing alterations in detail, if not in principle; and
-it appeared doubtful, from the trials which had been
-made of it, whether it would ever prove an economical
-working engine.</p>
-
-<p>Watt then returned to Birmingham, to proceed with
-the completion of his rotary motion. Boulton kept
-urging that the field for pumping-engines was limited,
-that their Cornish prospects were still gloomy, and that
-they must very soon look out for new fields. One of
-his schemes was the applying of the steam-engine to
-the winding of coals. “A hundred engines at 100<i>l.</i>
-a year each,” he said, “would be a better thing than all
-Cornwall.” But the best field of all, he still held, was
-mills. “Let us remember,” said he, “the Birmingham
-motto, to ‘strike while the iron is hot.’”</p>
-
-<p>Watt, as usual, was not so sanguine as his partner,
-and rather doubtful of the profit to be derived from
-this source. From a correspondence between him and
-Mr. William Wyatt, of London, on the subject, we
-find him discouraging the scheme of applying steam-engines
-to drive corn-mills; on which Boulton wrote
-to Wyatt,&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“You have had a correspondence with my friend Watt, but I
-know not the particulars.... You must make allowance in what
-Mr. Watt says ... he <em>under</em> values the merits of his own works....
-<em>I</em> will take all risks in erecting an engine for a corn-mill....
-I think I can safely say our engine will grind <em>four</em> times the quantity
-of corn per bushel of coal compared with any engine hitherto
-erected.”<a name="Anchor-251" id="Anchor-251" href="#Footnote-251" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 251.">[251]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>About the same time we find Boulton writing to
-Watt,&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“You seem to be fearful that mills will not answer, and that you
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_325">[325]</span>
-cannot make Reynolds’s amount to more than 20<i>l.</i> a year. For my
-part, I think that mills, though trifles in comparison with Cornish
-engines, present a field that is boundless, and that will be more
-permanent than these transient mines, and more satisfactory than
-these inveterate, ungenerous, and envious miners and mine lords.
-As to the trouble of small engines, I would curtail it by making a
-pattern card of them (which may be done in the course of next year),
-and confine ourselves to those sorts and sizes until our convenience
-admits of more.”<a name="Anchor-252" id="Anchor-252" href="#Footnote-252" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 252.">[252]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>In the mean time Watt, notwithstanding his doubts,
-had been proceeding with the completion of his rotative
-machine, and by the end of the year applied it with
-success to a tilt-hammer, as well as to a corn-mill at
-Soho. Some difficulties presented themselves at first,
-but they were speedily surmounted. The number of
-strokes made by the hammer was increased from 18 per
-minute in the first experiment, to 25 in the second;
-and Watt contemplated increasing the speed to even
-250 or 300 strokes a minute, by diminishing the height
-to which the hammer rose before making its descending
-blow. “There is now no doubt,” said he, “that fire-engines
-will drive mills; but I entertain some doubts
-whether anything is to be got by them, as by any computation
-I have yet made of the mill for Reynolds
-[recently ordered] I cannot make it come to more than
-20<i>l.</i> per annum, which will do little more than pay
-trouble. Perhaps some others may do better.”<a name="Anchor-253" id="Anchor-253" href="#Footnote-253" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 253.">[253]</a></p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_347" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_347.png" width="450" height="415" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">“OLD BESS.”<a name="Anchor-254" id="Anchor-254" href="#Footnote-254" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 254.">[254]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>The problem of producing rotary motion by steam-power
-was thus solved to the satisfaction even of Watt
-himself. But though a boundless field for the employment
-of the engine now presented itself, Watt was
-anything but elated at the prospect. For some time
-he doubted whether it would be worth the while of the
-Soho firm to accept orders for engines of this sort.
-When Boulton went to Dublin to endeavour to secure
-a patent for Ireland, Watt wrote to him thus:&mdash;“Some
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_326">[326]</span>
-people at Burton are making application to us for an
-engine to work a cotton-mill; but from their letter and
-the man they have sent here, I have no great opinion
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_327">[327]</span>
-of their abilities.... If you come home by way of
-Manchester, please not to seek for orders for cotton-mill
-engines, because I hear that there are so many mills
-erecting on powerful streams in the north of England,
-that the trade must soon be overdone, and consequently
-our labour may be lost.” Boulton, however, had no
-such misgivings. He foresaw that before long the
-superior power, regularity, speed, and economy, of
-the steam-engine, must recommend it for adoption in
-all branches of manufacture in which rotative motion
-was employed; and he had no hesitation in applying
-for orders notwithstanding the opposition of his partner.
-The first rotary engine was made for Mr. Reynolds, of
-Ketley, towards the end of 1782, and was used to drive
-a corn-mill. It was some time before another order was
-received, though various inquiries were made about
-engines for the purpose of polishing glass, grinding
-malt, rolling iron, and such like.<a name="Anchor-255" id="Anchor-255" href="#Footnote-255" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 255.">[255]</a> The first engine of
-the kind erected in London was at Goodwyn and Co.’s
-brewery; and the second, still working, though in an
-altered form, at the Messrs. Whitbread’s. These were
-shortly followed by other engines of the same description,
-until there was scarcely a brewery in London
-that was not supplied with one.</p>
-
-<p>In the mean time, the works at Soho continued to be
-fully employed in the manufacture of pumping-engines.
-But as the county of Cornwall was becoming well
-supplied,&mdash;no fewer than twenty-one having now been
-erected there, only one of the old Newcomen construction
-continuing in work,&mdash;it was probable that before
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_328">[328]</span>
-long the demand from that quarter must slacken, if
-not come to an end. There were, however, other
-uses to which the pumping-engine might be applied;
-and one of the most promising was the drainage of
-the Fen lands. Some adventurers at Soham, near
-Cambridge, having made inquiries on the subject, Watt
-wrote to his partner, “I look upon these Fens as
-the only trump card we have left in our hand.”<a name="Anchor-256" id="Anchor-256" href="#Footnote-256" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 256.">[256]</a> The
-adventurers proposed that Boulton and Watt should
-take an interest in their scheme by subscribing part of
-the necessary capital. But Watt decidedly objected
-to this, as he did not wish to repeat his Cornish difficulties
-in the Fens. He was willing to supply engines
-on reasonable terms, but as for shares he would have
-none of them. The conclusion he eventually arrived at
-with respect to his proposed customers was this,&mdash;“Consider
-Fen men as Cornish men, only more cunning.”</p>
-
-<p>In the midst of his great labours, Boulton was reminded
-that he was human. He had for years been
-working at too high pressure, and the tear and wear
-began to tell upon his health. Watt expostulated with
-him, telling him that he was trying to do half-a-dozen
-men’s work; but in vain. He was committed to so
-many important enterprises&mdash;he had so much at stake&mdash;the
-liabilities he had to meet from day to day were so
-heavy&mdash;that he was in a measure forced to be active.
-To his friend Matthews he lamented that he was under
-the necessity of “slaving from morning till night,
-working fourteen hours a day, in the drudgery of a Birmingham
-manufacturer and hardware merchant.” But
-this could not last, and before long he was threatened
-with a break-down. His friends Drs. Withering and
-Darwin urged him at once to “knock off” and take a
-long holiday&mdash;to leave Soho and its business, its correspondence,
-and its visitors, and get as far away from it
-as possible.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_329">[329]</span></p>
-
-<p>Acting on their advice, he resolved on making a long-promised
-visit to Scotland, and he set out on his tour
-in the autumn of 1783. He went by Newcastle, where
-he visited the principal coal mines, and from thence to
-Edinburgh, where he had some pleasant intercourse
-with Dr. Black and Professor Robison. It is evident
-from his letters that he did not take much ease during
-his journey, for he carried about with him his steam-engine&mdash;at
-least in his head. “I talked with Dr. Black
-and another chemical friend,” he wrote, “respecting my
-plan for saving alkali at such bleach-grounds as our fire-engines
-are used at instead of water-wheels: the Doctor
-did not start any objections, but, on the contrary, much
-approved it.” From Edinburgh he proceeded to the
-celebrated ironworks at Carron, a place in which he
-naturally felt a peculiar interest. There his friend
-Roebuck had started his great enterprise, and there
-Watt had erected his first engine. His visit there,
-however, was not so much for curiosity or pleasure, but
-for business and experiment. “During my residence in
-Scotland,” said he, “one month of my time was closely
-employed at Carron Ironworks in settling accounts, but
-principally in making a great number of experiments
-on all their iron ores, and in putting them into the train
-of making good bar-iron, in which I succeeded to my
-wishes, although they had never made a single bar of
-tough iron at Carron before.”<a name="Anchor-257" id="Anchor-257" href="#Footnote-257" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 257.">[257]</a> In the course of his
-journey he made a large collection of fossils for his
-museum, and the weight of his bags sensibly increased
-almost daily. On his way through Ayrshire he called
-on Lord Dundonald, a kindred spirit in chemical and
-mechanical scheming, and examined his mineral tar
-works. He wrote to Mr. Gilbert, the Duke of Bridgewater’s
-manager at Worsley, that “the tar is better for
-the bottoms of vessels than the vegetable tar; and the
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_330">[330]</span>
-coal-oil hath many uses. Query&mdash;if such a work might
-not be a useful appendage to your colliery and canal.”</p>
-
-<p>Boulton returned to Soho greatly improved in health,
-and was shortly immersed as before in the business of
-the factory. He found considerable arrears of correspondence
-requiring to be brought up. Several of the
-letters waiting for him were from schemers of new
-inventions connected with the steam-engine. Whenever
-an inventor thought he had discovered anything new,
-he at once rushed to Boulton with it. He was looked
-upon as the lord and leader of steam power. His reputation
-for enterprise and business aptitude, and the
-energetic manner in which he had pushed Watt’s invention,
-were now so widely known, that every new
-schemer saw a fortune within his reach could he but
-enlist Boulton on his side. Hence much of his time
-was occupied in replying to letters from schemers,&mdash;from
-inventors of perpetual motion, of flying-machines,
-of locomotion by steam, and of various kinds of rotary
-motion. In one of his letters we find him complaining
-of so much of his time being “taken up in answering
-great numbers of letters he had lately been plagued
-with from eccentric persons of no business;” for it was
-his practice never to leave a letter unanswered, no
-matter how insignificant or unreasonable his correspondent
-might be.<a name="Anchor-258" id="Anchor-258" href="#Footnote-258" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 258.">[258]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_331">[331]</span></p>
-
-<p>After a short visit to London, Boulton proceeded into
-Cornwall to look after the engines there, and watch the
-progress of the mining operations in which by this time
-he had become so largely interested. He found the
-adventurers in a state of general grumble at the badness
-of the times, the lowness of prices, the losses incurred
-in sinking for ore that could not be found, and the
-heaviness of the dues for engine-power payable to
-Boulton and Watt. At such times, the partners were
-usually beset with applications for abatement, to which
-they were under the necessity of submitting to prevent
-the mines being altogether closed. Thus the dues at
-Chacewater were reduced from 2500<i>l.</i> to 1000<i>l.</i> a year,
-and the adventurers were still pressing for further
-reductions.<a name="Anchor-259" id="Anchor-259" href="#Footnote-259" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 259.">[259]</a> What provoked Boulton most, however,
-was, not the loss of dues so much as the threats which
-were constantly held out to him that unless the demands
-of the adventurers were complied with, they would
-employ the Hornblowers.</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“It is a disagreeable thing,” he wrote, “to live amongst one’s
-enemies, and all the adventurers are so, except Phillips and the Foxes,
-who are fair men although they would rather have engines free. I
-have had many hints given me that the Trumpeters were reviving
-their mischief, and many causes for uneasiness, but I did not wish
-you to partake of them, and therefore have been silent; but they
-are now striking at the root of us, and therefore we must defend
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_332">[332]</span>
-ourselves or fall.... I think if we could but keep up our spirits
-and be active we might vanquish all the host. But I must own
-that I have been low-spirited ever since I have been here&mdash;have
-been indolent, and feel as if the springs of life were let down.”</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>It does not, however, appear from the letter to Watt
-in which this complaint occurs, that Boulton had been
-at all indolent, as he speaks of being in almost daily
-attendance at the miners’ meetings; one day at Poldice,
-the next at Consolidated Mines, and so on. Of the
-latter meeting he says,&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“There was a full attendance; Jethro looked impudent, but
-mortified to see the new little engine drawing kibbles from two pits
-exceedingly well and very manageable, and afterwards it worked
-six stamps each 2½ = 14 cwt., lifted twice at each revolution, or
-four times for every stroke of the engine. I suppose there were a
-thousand people present to see the engine work.”</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Watt was, on his part, rather opposed to making
-further concessions, which only seemed to have the effect
-of inviting demands for more.</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“People,” said he, “do not employ us out of personal regard, but
-to serve themselves; and why should not we look after ourselves
-in like manner.... John Taylor died the other day worth 200,000<i>l.</i>,
-without ever doing one generous action. I do not mean that we
-should follow <em>his</em> example. I should not consent to oppression or to
-take any unfair advantage of my neighbour’s necessity, but I think
-it blameable to exercise generosity towards men who display none
-towards us. It is playing an unfair game when the advantage is
-wholly on their side. If Wheal Virgin threatened to stop unless
-we abated one-half, they should stop for me; but if it appeared that,
-according to the mode settled in making the agreement, we had
-too high a premium, I should voluntarily reduce it to whatever was
-just.”</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>While Boulton was fighting for dues in Cornwall,
-and labouring as before to improve the business
-management of the mines in which he was interested
-as a shareholder, Watt was busily occupied at Soho in
-turning out new engines for various purposes, as well
-as in perfecting several long-contemplated inventions.
-The manufactory, which had for a time been unusually
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_333">[333]</span>
-slack, was again in full work. Several engines
-were in hand for the London brewers. Wedgwood had
-ordered an engine to grind flints;<a name="Anchor-260" id="Anchor-260" href="#Footnote-260" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 260.">[260]</a> and orders were
-coming in for rotative engines for various purposes,
-such as driving saw-mills in America and sugar-mills in
-the West Indies. Work was, indeed, so plentiful that
-Watt was opposed to further orders for rotatives being
-taken, as the drawings for them occupied so much time,
-and they brought in but small profit. “I see plainly,”
-said he, “that every rotation engine will cost twice the
-trouble of one for raising water, and will in general pay
-only half the money. Therefore I beg you will not
-undertake any more rotatives until our hands are clear,
-which will not be before 1785. We have already more
-work in hand than we have people to execute it in the
-interval.”<a name="Anchor-261" id="Anchor-261" href="#Footnote-261" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 261.">[261]</a></p>
-
-<p>One reason why Watt was more than usually economical
-of his time was, that he was then in the throes of
-the inventions patented by him in the course of this
-year. Though racked by headaches which, he complained,
-completely “dumfounded” him and perplexed
-his mind, he could not restrain his irrepressible instinct
-to invent; and the result was the series of inventions
-embodied in his patent of 1784, including, among other
-things, the application of the steam-engine to the
-working of a tilt-hammer for forging iron and steel, to
-driving wheel-carriages for carrying persons and goods,
-and for other purposes. The specification also included
-the beautiful invention of the parallel motion, of which
-Watt himself said, “Though I am not over anxious after
-fame, yet I am more proud of the parallel motion than of
-any other mechanical invention I have ever made.” Watt
-was led to meditate this contrivance by the practical
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_334">[334]</span>
-inconvenience which he experienced in communicating
-the direct vertical motion of the piston-rod by means of
-racks and sectors, to the
-angular motion of the
-working beam. He was
-gradually led to entertain
-the opinion that some
-means might be contrived
-for accomplishing this object
-by motions turning
-upon centres; and, working
-upon this idea, he
-gradually elaborated his
-invention. So soon as he
-caught sight of the possible means of overcoming the
-difficulty, he wrote to Boulton in Cornwall,&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“I have started a new hare. I have got a glimpse of a method of
-causing a piston-rod to move up and down perpendicularly by only
-fixing it to a piece of iron upon the beam, without chains or
-perpendicular guides or untowardly friction, arch heads, or other
-pieces of clumsiness; by which contrivance it answers fully to
-expectation. About 5 feet in the height of her house may be saved
-in 8-feet strokes, which I look upon as a capital saving, and it will
-answer for double engines as well as for single ones. I have only
-tried it in a slight model yet, so cannot build upon it, though I
-think it a very probable thing to succeed. It is one of the most
-ingenious, simple pieces of mechanism I have ever contrived, but I
-beg nothing may be said on it till I specify.”<a name="Anchor-262" id="Anchor-262" href="#Footnote-262" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 262.">[262]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_355" style="width: 250px;">
-<img src="images/i_355.png" width="250" height="235" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">THE PARALLEL MOTION.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>He immediately set to work to put his idea to the
-practical proof, and only eleven days later he wrote,&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“I have made a very large model of the new substitute for racks
-and sectors, which seems to bid fair to answer. The rod goes up
-and down quite in a perpendicular line without racks, chains,
-or guides. It is a perpendicular motion derived from a combination
-of motions about centres&mdash;very simple, has very little friction, has
-nothing standing higher than the back of the beam, and requires
-the centre of the beam to be only half the stroke of the engine
-higher than the top of the piston-rod when at lowest, and has
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_335">[335]</span>
-no inclination to pull the piston-rod either one way or another, only
-straight up and down.... However, don’t pride yourself on it&mdash;it
-is not fairly tried yet, and may have unknown faults.”<a name="Anchor-263" id="Anchor-263" href="#Footnote-263" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 263.">[263]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_356" style="width: 150px;">
-<img src="images/i_356.png" width="150" height="331" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">THE GOVERNOR.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Another of Watt’s beautiful inventions of the same
-period, was the Governor, contrived for the purpose of
-regulating the speed of the engine. This was a point
-of great importance in all cases where steam-power was
-employed in processes of manufacture. To modify the
-speed of the piston in the single-acting pumping-engine,
-Watt had been accustomed to use what is called a
-throttle valve, which was regulated by hand as occasion
-required. But he saw that to ensure perfect uniformity
-of speed, the action of the engine must be made automatic
-if possible, and with this object he contrived the
-Governor, which has received no improvement since it
-left his hand. Two balls are fixed to the ends of arms
-connected with the engine by a moveable socket, which
-plays up and down a vertical rod revolving
-by a band placed upon the
-axis or spindle of the fly-wheel. According
-to the centrifugal force with
-which the balls revolve, they diverge
-more or less from the central fixed
-point, and push up or draw down the
-moveable collar; which, being connected
-by a crank with the throttle-valve,
-thereby regulates with the most
-perfect precision the passage of the
-steam between the boiler and the
-cylinder. When the pressure of steam
-is great, and the tendency of the engine
-is to go faster, the governor
-shuts off the steam; and when it is less, the governor
-opens the throttle-valve and increases the supply. By
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_336">[336]</span>
-this simple and elegant contrivance the engine is made
-to regulate its own speed with the most beautiful precision.</p>
-
-<p>Among the numerous proposed applications of the
-steam-engine about this time, was its employment as
-a locomotive in driving wheel-carriages. It will be
-remembered that Watt’s friend Robison had, at a very
-early period, directed his attention to the subject; and
-the idea had since been revived by Mr. Edgeworth,
-who laboured with great zeal to indoctrinate Watt with
-his views. The latter, though he had but little faith in
-the project, nevertheless included a plan of a locomotive
-engine in his patent of 1784; but he took no steps to
-put it in execution, being too much engrossed with
-other business at the time. His plan contemplated the
-employment of steam either in the form of high-pressure
-or low-pressure, working the pistons by the force of
-steam only, and discharging it into the atmosphere
-after it had performed its office, or discharging it into
-an air-tight condenser made of thin plates or pipes, with
-their outsides exposed to the wind or to an artificial
-current of air, thereby economising the water which
-would otherwise be lost.</p>
-
-<p>Watt did not carry his design into effect; and, so far
-as he was concerned, the question of steam locomotion
-would have gone no further. But the subject had
-already attracted the attention of William Murdock,
-who had for some time been occupied during his leisure
-hours in constructing an actual working model of a
-locomotive. When his model was finished, he proceeded
-to try it in the long avenue leading to the parsonage at
-Redruth, in the summer of 1784; and in so doing
-nearly frightened out of his wits the village pastor,
-who encountered the hissing, fiery little machine, while
-enjoying his evening walk.<a name="Anchor-264" id="Anchor-264" href="#Footnote-264" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 264.">[264]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_337">[337]</span></p>
-
-<p>When Watt heard of this experiment, he wrote to
-Boulton, advising that Murdock should be gently counselled
-to give up his scheme, which might have the
-effect of withdrawing him from the work of the firm,
-in which he had become increasingly useful.</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“As to my own part,” wrote Watt, “I shall form no obstacle to
-the scheme. My only reasons against it were that I feared it would
-deprive us of a valuable man; that it would, if we were to be concerned
-in it, divert us from more valuable business, and perhaps
-prove a sinking fund; and lastly, that I did not like that a scheme
-which I had revolved in my mind for years and hoped to be able at
-some favourable time to bring to perfection, if capable of it, should
-be wrested from me, or that I should be compelled to go into it as a
-secondary person. But I have now made the latter objection give
-way. And as to the first, I think it will take place at any rate, so
-we must make the best of it.”<a name="Anchor-265" id="Anchor-265" href="#Footnote-265" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 265.">[265]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Boulton was accordingly recommended in the first
-place to endeavour to dissuade Murdock from pursuing
-the subject further, but if he could not succeed in that,
-rather than lose him, he was to let him have an advance
-to the extent of 100<i>l.</i>, to enable him to prosecute his
-experiments; and if within a year he succeeded in
-making an engine capable of drawing a postchaise
-carrying two ordinary persons and the driver, with
-200 lbs. of luggage, fuel for four hours, and water for
-two hours, going at the rate of four miles an hour, then
-a partnership was to be entered into, in which Boulton
-and Watt were to find the capital, and Murdock was to
-conduct the business and take his share of the profits.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_338">[338]</span></p>
-
-<p>Murdock, however, had so many urgent matters to
-attend to, that, sanguine though he continued to be as
-to the success of his scheme, he could not find time
-to pursue it. He was a man after Boulton’s own heart,
-unsparing of himself and indefatigable in whatsoever
-he undertook; nor was Boulton sparing of praises of
-him in his confidential letters to Watt.</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“We want more Murdocks,” he wrote on one occasion, “for, of all
-our men he is the most active. He is the best engine erector I ever
-saw, and of his energy I had one of the best proofs this day. They
-stopped Poldice lower engine last Monday and took her all to pieces;
-took out the condenser, took up out of the shaft the greatest part of
-the pumps, took the nozzles to pieces, cut out the iron seatings and
-put in brass ones with new valves, mended the eduction-pipe,
-and did a great number of repairs about the beam and engine; put
-the pumps down into the new engine shaft, did much work at the
-new engine; and this done, about noon both the engines, new and
-old, were set to work again complete. When I look at the work
-done it astonishes me, and is entirely owing to the spirit and
-activity of Murdock, who hath not gone to bed for three nights,
-and I expect the mine will be in full fork again by Wednesday
-night. I have got him into good humour again without any
-coaxing, have prevailed on him not to give up Wheal Virgin
-engine, which he had been resolved to do from the ungenerous
-treatment he received from the captains. I have also prevailed on
-him to put off his determined journey to Scotland until North
-Downs engines are got to work, and have quieted his mind about
-wheel carriages till then.”<a name="Anchor-266" id="Anchor-266" href="#Footnote-266" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 266.">[266]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Notwithstanding Watt’s fears of a falling off, the
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_339">[339]</span>
-engine business still continued to prosper in Cornwall.
-Although the mining interests were suffering from
-continued depression, new mines were being opened
-out, for which pumping-engines were wanted; and
-Boulton and Watt’s continued to maintain their superiority
-over all others. None of their threatened rivals
-had yet been able to exhibit an engine in successful
-work; and those of the old construction had been
-almost completely superseded. In 1784, new engines
-were in course of erection at Poldice, New Poldory,
-Wheal Maid, Polgooth, and other mines. Almost the
-last of the Newcomen engines in Cornwall had been
-discarded at Polgooth in favour of one of Boulton and
-Watt’s 58-inch cylinder engines.</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_360" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_360.png" width="450" height="336" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">POLGOOTH.</p>
-<p class="caption">[By R. P. Leitch.]</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>The dues paid yearly in respect of these and other
-engines previously erected were very considerable;
-Boulton estimating that, if duly paid, they would
-amount to about 12,000<i>l.</i> a year. There seemed, therefore,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_340">[340]</span>
-every reasonable prospect of the financial difficulties
-of the firm at last coming to an end.</p>
-
-<p>Boulton’s visit to Cornwall on this occasion was enlivened
-by the companionship of his wife, and her friend
-Miss Mynd. Towards midsummer he looked forward with
-anticipations of increased pleasure to the visit of his two
-children&mdash;his son Matt and his daughter Nancy&mdash;during
-their school holidays. It was a source of much regret to
-him, affectionate as his nature was, that the engrossing
-character of his business prevented him enjoying the
-society of his family so much as he desired. But he
-endeavoured to make up for it by maintaining a regular
-correspondence with them when absent. His letters to
-his children were full of playfulness, affection, and good
-advice. To his son at school he wrote telling him of
-his life in Cornwall, describing to him the house at
-Cosgarne, the garden and the trees he had planted
-in it, the pleasant rides in the neighbourhood, and the
-visit he had just been paying to the top of Pendennis
-Castle, from which he had seen about a hundred sail of
-ships at sea, and a boundless prospect of land and water.
-He proceeded to tell him of the quantity of work he did
-connected with the engine business, how he had no
-clerk to assist him, but did all the writing and drawing
-of plans himself: “When I have time,” said he, “I
-pick up curiosities in ores for the purpose of assays, for
-I have a laboratory here. There is nothing would so
-much add to my pleasure as having your assistance in
-making solutions, precipitates, evaporations, and crystallisations.”
-After giving his son some good advice as
-to the cultivation of his mind, as calculated to render
-him an intelligent and useful member of society, he proceeded
-to urge upon him the duty of cultivating polite
-manners, as a means of making himself agreeable to
-others, and at the same time of promoting his own
-comfort. “But remember,” he added, “I do not wish
-you to be polite at the expense of honour, truth, sincerity,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_341">[341]</span>
-and honesty; for these are the props of a manly
-character, and without them politeness is mean and
-deceitful. Therefore, be always tenacious of your honour.
-Be honest, just, and benevolent, even when it appears
-difficult to be so. I say, cherish those principles, and
-guard them as sacred treasures.”</p>
-
-<p>At length his son and daughter joined him and took
-part in his domestic and out-door enjoyments. They
-accompanied him in his drives and rides, and Matt took
-part in his chemical experiments. One of their great
-delights was the fabrication of an immense paper balloon,
-and the making of the hydrogen gas to fill it
-with. After great preparations the balloon was made and
-filled, and sent up in the field behind the house, to the
-delight of all concerned. To Mrs. Watt he wrote
-expressing to her how much pleasanter his residence in
-Cornwall had become since his son and daughter’s visit.
-“I shall be happier,” he said, “during the remainder of
-my residence here than in the former part of it; for I
-am ill calculated to live alone in an enemy’s country,
-and to contest lawsuits. Besides, the only source of
-happiness I look for in my future life is in my children.
-Matt behaves extremely well, is active and good-humoured;
-and my daughter, too, has, I think, good
-dispositions and sentiments, which I shall cherish, and
-prevent as much as possible from being sullied by
-narrow and illiberal-minded companions.” After a few
-months’ pleasant social intercourse with his family at
-Cosgarne, varied by occasional bickerings with the
-adventurers out of doors about dues, Boulton returned
-to Birmingham, to enter upon new duties and undertake
-new enterprises.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_342">[342]</span></p>
-
-
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-<h3>CHAPTER XVII.<br />
-
-<small><span class="smcap">Commercial Politics&mdash;The Albion Mills&mdash;Riots in
-Cornwall&mdash;Prosperity of Boulton and Watt.</span></small></h3>
-
-
-<p><span class="smcap">When</span> Boulton returned to Birmingham, he was urgently
-called upon to take part in a movement altogether foreign
-to his habits. He had heretofore been too much engrossed
-by business to admit of his taking any active part in
-political affairs. Being, however, of an active temperament,
-and mixing with men of all classes, he could not
-but feel an interest in the public movements of his time.
-Early in 1784, we find him taking the lead in getting
-up a loyal address to the King on the resignation of the
-Portland Administration and the appointment of Mr.
-Pitt as Prime Minister. It appears, however, that Pitt
-disappointed his expectations. One of his first projects
-was a scheme of taxation, which he introduced for the
-purpose of remedying the disordered state of the finances,
-but which, in Boulton’s opinion, would, if carried, have
-the effect of seriously damaging the national industry.
-The Minister proposed to tax coal, iron, copper, and
-other raw materials of manufacture, to the amount of
-about a million a year. Boulton immediately bestirred
-himself to oppose the adoption of the scheme. He held
-that for a manufacturing nation to tax the raw materials
-of wealth was a suicidal measure, calculated, if
-persevered in, to involve the producers of wealth in
-ruin. “Let taxes,” he said, “be laid upon luxuries, upon
-vices, and if you like upon property; tax riches when
-got, and the expenditure of them, but not the means of
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_343">[343]</span>
-getting them; of all things, don’t cut open the hen that
-lays the golden eggs.”<a name="Anchor-267" id="Anchor-267" href="#Footnote-267" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 267.">[267]</a></p>
-
-<p>Petitions and memorials were forthwith got up in the
-midland counties, and presented against the measure;
-and Boulton being recognised as the leader of the
-movement in his district, was summoned by Mr. Pitt to
-London to an interview with him on the subject. He
-then took the opportunity of pressing upon the Minister
-the necessity of taking measures to secure reciprocity of
-trade with foreign nations, as being of vital importance
-to the trade of England. Writing to his partner
-Scale, he said, “Surely our Ministers must be bad politicians,
-to suffer the gates of nearly every commercial
-city in the world to be shut against us.” “There is no
-doubt,” he wrote to his friend Garbett, “but the edicts,
-prohibitions, and high duties laid upon our manufacturers
-by foreign powers will be severely felt, unless
-some new commercial treaties are entered into with
-such powers. I fear our young Minister is not sufficiently
-aware of the importance of the subject, and I
-likewise fear he will pledge himself before Parliament
-meets to carry other measures in the next session that
-will be as odious to the country as his late attempts.”</p>
-
-<p>As Boulton had anticipated, the Ministry introduced
-several important measures, calculated to have a highly
-injurious effect upon English industry, and he immediately
-bestirred himself, in conjunction with Josiah
-Wedgwood, of Etruria, to organise a movement in
-opposition to them. Wedgwood and Boulton met at
-Birmingham in February, 1785, and arranged to
-assemble a meeting of delegates from the manufacturing
-districts, who were to meet and sit in London
-“all the time the Irish commercial affairs were pending.”
-A printed statement of the objects of the movement
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_344">[344]</span>
-was circulated, and Boulton and Wedgwood wrote to
-their friends in all quarters to meet and appoint delegates
-to the central committee in London. Boulton was
-unanimously appointed the delegate for Birmingham,
-and he proceeded to London furnished with a bundle of
-petitions from his neighbourhood. The delegates proceeded
-to form themselves into a Chamber of Manufacturers,
-over the deliberations of which Wedgwood,
-Boulton, or John Wilkinson usually presided.</p>
-
-<p>The principal object of these meetings and petitionings
-was to prevent, if possible, the imposition of the proposed
-taxes on coal, iron, and raw materials generally,
-as well as the proposed export duties on manufactured
-articles. At a time when foreign governments
-were seeking to exclude English manufactures
-from their dominions by heavy import duties, it was felt
-that this double burden was more than English industry
-could bear. The Irish Parliament were at the same time
-legislating in a hostile spirit towards English commerce;
-imposing taxes upon all manufactures imported into
-Ireland from England, while Irish manufactures were
-not only sent into England duty free, but their own
-parliament encouraged them by a bounty on exportation.
-The committee strongly expostulated against the partial
-and unjust spirit of this legislation, and petitioned for
-free interchange on equal terms. So long as such a
-state of things continued, the petitioners urged that
-“every idea of reciprocity in the interchange of manufactures
-between Britain and Ireland was a mere
-mockery of words.”</p>
-
-<p>Although Watt was naturally averse to taking any
-public part in politics, his services were enlisted in the
-cause, and he drew up for circulation “An answer to the
-Treasury Paper on the Iron Trade of England and
-Ireland.” The object of his statement was to show that
-the true way of encouraging manufactures in Ireland
-was, not by bounties, not by prohibitions, but by entire
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_345">[345]</span>
-freedom of industry. It was asserted by the supporters
-of the propositions, that the natives of Ireland were
-ignorant, indolent, and poor. “If they be so,” said Watt,
-“the best method of giving them vigour is to have
-recourse to British manufacturers, possessed of capital,
-industry, and knowledge of trade.” The old covenanting
-spirit of his race fairly breaks out in the following
-passage:&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“It is contemptible nonsense to argue that because Ireland has
-never had iron manufactories she cannot soon have them.... One
-hundred years ago the Irish had no linen manufacture; they
-imported linen; and now they sell to us to the amount of a million
-annually. How came this about? The civil wars under Charles I.,
-and the tyranny of the Scotch Privy Council under Charles II.,
-chased the people out of Scotland, because they were Presbyterians.
-Ireland received and protected them; they peopled the northern
-provinces; many of them were weavers; they followed their
-business in Ireland, and taught others. Philip II. chased the
-inhabitants out of Flanders, on account of religion; Queen Elizabeth
-received and protected them; and England learnt to manufacture
-woollen cloth. The persecutions of Lewis XIV. occasioned the
-establishment of a colony in Spitalfields. And the Parliament
-of Britain, under the auspices of &mdash;&mdash; and &mdash;&mdash;, and others, imposed
-oppressive duties on glass; and &mdash;&mdash;’s Act gave the Irish liberty to
-export it to our Colonies; the glass-makers fled from the tyranny
-of the Excise; Ireland has now nine glass-houses. Britain has lost
-the export trade of that article! More examples of the migrations
-of manufactures could be adduced, but it seems unnecessary; for it
-cannot be denied that men will fly from tyranny to liberty, whether
-Philip’s Priests, Charles’s Dragoons, or our Excisemen be the
-instruments of the tyranny. And it must also be allowed that
-even the Inquisition itself is not more formidable than our Excise
-Laws (as far as property is concerned) to those who unhappily are
-subjected to them.”</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Towards the end of the statement he asks, “Would it
-not be more manly and proper at once to invite the Irish
-to come into a perfect union with Britain, and to pay
-the same duties and excises that we do? Then every
-distinction of country might with justice be done away
-with, and they would have a fair claim to all the
-advantages which we enjoy.”</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_346">[346]</span></p>
-
-<p>The result of the agitation was that most of the proposals
-to impose new taxes on the raw materials of
-manufacture were withdrawn by the Ministry, and the
-Irish resolutions were considerably modified. But the
-relations of British and Irish industry were by no means
-settled. The Irish Parliament might refuse to affirm
-the resolutions adopted by the British Parliament, in
-which case it might be necessary again to oppose the
-Ministerial measures; and to provide for this contingency,
-the delegates separated, with the resolution to
-maintain and extend their organisation in the manufacturing
-districts. Watt did not, however, like the
-idea of his partner becoming engrossed in political
-agitation, even in matters relating to commerce. He
-accordingly wrote to Boulton in London, “I find myself
-quite unequal to the various business now lying behind,
-and wish much you were at home, and that you would
-direct your attention solely to your own and to Boulton
-and Watt’s business until affairs can be brought into
-reasonable compass.”<a name="Anchor-268" id="Anchor-268" href="#Footnote-268" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 268.">[268]</a> Later he wrote,&mdash;“At Manchester
-they are busy making a collection for the Chamber of
-Manufacturers, which I fancy will be in vogue again
-next winter. But I hope that neither you nor I will be
-mad enough to be demagogues then. Let us leave that
-to those who can defy Ministers, and get our property
-secured, which may be done in the confusion.”</p>
-
-<p>Watt was at this time distressed by an adverse decision
-against the firm in one of the Scotch courts. “I have
-generally observed,” he wrote, “that there is a tide in
-our affairs. We have had peace for some time, but now
-cross accidents have begun, and more are to be feared.”
-His anxieties were increased by the rumour which
-reached his ears from several quarters of a grand combination
-of opulent manufacturers to make use of every
-beneficial patent that had been taken out, and cut them
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_347">[347]</span>
-down by <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">scire facias</i>, as they had already cut down
-Arkwright’s. It was said that subscriptions had
-been obtained by the association amounting to 50,000<i>l.</i>
-Watt was requested to join a counter combination of
-patentees to resist the threatened proceedings. To this,
-however, he objected, on the ground that the association
-of men to support one another in lawsuits was
-illegal, and would preclude the members from giving
-evidence in support of each other’s rights. “Besides,”
-said he, “the greater number of patentees are such as
-we could not associate with, and if we did it would do
-us more harm than good.”<a name="Anchor-269" id="Anchor-269" href="#Footnote-269" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 269.">[269]</a></p>
-
-<p>Towards the end of 1785 the engines which had been
-in hand were nearly finished, and work was getting
-slacker than usual at Soho. Though new orders gave
-Watt trouble, and occasioned him anxiety, still he would
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_348">[348]</span>
-rather not be without them. “It will be well,” he
-wrote to his partner, “if we can get some orders now
-for engines worth while. What we have been doing
-lately has been very trifling, and if we don’t get orders
-soon, our men will be idle. As it happens at present,
-we have at least three engineers too few here, there
-being eight engines to be done in two or three months,
-and only three engineers.”<a name="Anchor-270" id="Anchor-270" href="#Footnote-270" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 270.">[270]</a> It was matter of gratification
-to Watt to be able to report that the engines
-last delivered had given great satisfaction. The
-mechanics were improving in skill, and their workmanship
-was becoming of a superior character. “Strood
-and Curtis’s engine,” said he, “has been at work some
-time, and does very well. Whitbread’s has also been
-tried, and performs exceedingly well.” The success of
-Whitbread’s engine was such that it had the honour
-of a visit from the King, who was greatly pleased with
-its performances. Not to be outdone, “Felix Calvert,”
-wrote Watt, “has bespoken one, which is to outdo
-Whitbread’s in magnificence.”</p>
-
-<p>The slackness of work at Soho was not of long continuance.
-Orders for rotative engines came in gradually;
-one from Harris, of Nottingham; another from Macclesfield,
-to drive a silk-mill; a third from Edinburgh,
-for the purposes of a distillery; and others from different
-quarters. The influx of orders had the effect at the
-same time of filling Soho with work, and plunging
-Watt into his usual labyrinth of perplexity and distress.
-In September we find him writing to Boulton,&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“My health, is so bad that I do not think I can hold out much
-longer, at least as a man of business, and I wish to consolidate
-something before I give over.” ... Again, “I cannot help being
-dispirited, because I find my head fail me much, business an
-excessive burden to me, and little prospect of my speedy release
-from it. Were we both young and healthy, I should see no reason
-to despair, but very much the contrary. However, we must do the
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_349">[349]</span>
-best we can, and hope for quiet in heaven when our weary bones
-are laid to rest.”<a name="Anchor-271" id="Anchor-271" href="#Footnote-271" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 271.">[271]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>A few months later, so many more orders had come
-in, that Watt described Soho as “fast for the next four
-months,” but the additional work only had the effect of
-increasing his headaches. “In the anguish of my mind,”
-he wrote, “amid the vexations occasioned by new and
-unsuccessful schemes, like Lovelace I ‘curse my inventions,’
-and almost wish, if we could gather our money
-together, that somebody else should succeed in getting
-our trade from us. However, all may yet be well.
-Nature can be conquered if we can but find out her
-weak side.”</p>
-
-<p>We return to the affairs of the Cornish copper-miners,
-which were now in a very disheartening condition.
-The mines were badly and wastefully worked; and the
-competition of many small companies of poor adventurers
-kept the copper trade in a state of permanent
-depression. In this crisis of their affairs it was determined
-that a Copper Company should be formed, backed
-by ample capital, with the view of regulating this important
-branch of industry, and rescuing the mines and
-miners from ruin. Boulton took an active part in its
-formation, and induced many of his intimate friends in
-the north to subscribe largely for shares. An arrangement
-was entered into by the Company with the adventurers
-in the principal mines, to buy of them the whole
-of the ore raised, at remunerative prices, for a period of
-eleven years. At the first meeting, held in September,
-1785, for the election of Governor, Deputy-Governor,
-and Directors, Boulton held in his hands the power of
-determining the appointments, representing, as he did
-by proxy, shares held by his northern friends to the
-amount of 86,000<i>l.</i> The meeting took place in the
-Town-hall at Truro, and the proceedings passed off
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_350">[350]</span>
-satisfactorily; Boulton using his power with due discretion.
-“We met again on Friday,” he wrote to
-Matthews, “and chose the assayers and other subordinate
-officers, after which we paid our subscriptions,
-and dined together, all in good humour; and thus this
-important revolution in the copper trade was finally
-settled for eleven years.”</p>
-
-<p>Matters were not yet, however, finally settled, as
-many arrangements had to be made for setting the
-Company to work, in which Boulton took the leading
-part; the Governor and Directors pressing him not to
-leave Cornwall until they were definitely settled. It
-happened to suit his convenience to remain until the
-Wheal Fortune engine was finished&mdash;one of the most
-formidable engines the firm had yet erected in Cornwall.
-In the mean time he entered into correspondence
-with various consumers of copper at home and abroad,
-with the object of finding a vend for the metal. He
-succeeded in obtaining a contract through Mr. Hope, of
-Amsterdam, for supplying the copper required for the
-new Dutch coinage; and he opened out new markets for
-the produce in other quarters. Being a large holder of
-mining shares, Boulton also tried to introduce new and
-economical methods of working the mines; but with
-comparatively little result. To Wilkinson he wrote,&mdash;“Poldice
-is in a desponding way, and must give up
-unless better managed. North Downs is managed as
-badly by incapable, ignorant, drunken captains, who
-hold their posts not by merit, but by their cousinship to
-some of the adventurers.... I should spend a great
-part of next year in Cornwall, and make myself master
-of the minutiæ. I think I could then accomplish many
-necessary regulations.”<a name="Anchor-272" id="Anchor-272" href="#Footnote-272" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 272.">[272]</a></p>
-
-<p>Though actively bestirring himself for the good of
-the mining interest, Boulton had but small thanks for
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_351">[351]</span>
-his pains. The prominence of his position had this
-disadvantage, that if the price of the ore went down,
-or profits declined, or the yield fell off, or the mines
-were closed, or anything went wrong, the miners were
-but too ready to identify him in some way with the evil;
-and the services which he had rendered to the mining
-interest<a name="Anchor-273" id="Anchor-273" href="#Footnote-273" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 273.">[273]</a> were in a moment forgotten. On one occasion
-the discontent of the miners broke out into open revolt,
-and Boulton was even threatened with personal violence.
-The United Mines having proved unprofitable in the
-working, notice was given by the manager of an intended
-reduction of wages, this being the only condition
-on which the mines could be carried on. If this could
-not be arranged, the works must be closed, as the
-adventurers declined to go on at a loss. On the announcement
-of the intended lowering of wages being
-made, there was great excitement and discontent among
-the workpeople. Several hundreds of them hastily
-assembled at Redruth, and took the road for Truro, to
-pull down the offices of the Copper Mining Company,
-and burn the house of the manager. They were especially
-furious with Boulton, vowing vengeance on him, and
-declaring that they would pull down every pumping-engine
-he had set up in Cornwall. When the rioters
-reached Truro, they found a body of men, hastily armed
-with muskets taken from the arsenal, stationed in front
-of the Copper Mining Company’s premises, supported
-by six pieces of cannon. At sight of this formidable demonstration
-the miners drew back, and, muttering threats
-that they would repeat their visit, returned to Redruth
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_352">[352]</span>
-as they had come. Two companies of soldiers and two
-of local militia were brought into the town immediately
-after; and the intended assault was not made. When
-Watt was informed of the violence with which his
-partner had been threatened, he wrote,&mdash;“In my opinion
-nothing can be more ungrateful than the behaviour of
-those people who endeavour to make you the object
-of the resentment of the mob, at a time when (setting
-aside former services) you are doing all that lies in your
-power to serve them.... If you still find the same
-spirit continue, for God’s sake leave them immediately.
-The law can reach the adventurers, if it cannot the
-miners.”</p>
-
-<p>This was, however, but the wild and unreasoning
-clamour of misguided and ignorant men. Boulton was
-personally much esteemed by all who were able to
-appreciate his character, and to understand the position
-of himself and his partner with reference to the engine
-patent. The larger mining owners invited him to
-their houses, and regarded him as their friend. The
-more intelligent of the managers were his strenuous
-supporters. First and foremost among these was Mr.
-Phillips, manager of the Chacewater mines, of whom he
-always spoke with the highest respect, as a man of the
-most scrupulous integrity and honour. Mr. Phillips
-was a member of the Society of Friends, and his wife
-Catherine was one of the most celebrated preachers of
-the body. Boulton and Watt occasionally resided with
-them before the house at Cosgarne was taken, and
-conceived for both the warmest friendship. If Watt was
-attracted by the Cornish Anabaptists, Boulton was equally
-so by the Cornish Quakers. We find him, in one of his
-letters to Mrs. Boulton, describing to her a great meeting
-of Friends at Truro which he had attended, “when,”
-he said, “I heard our friend Catherine Phillips preach
-with great energy and good sense for an hour and a
-half, although so weak in body that she was obliged to
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_353">[353]</span>
-lie abed for several days before.” Boulton afterwards
-dined with the whole body of Friends at the principal
-inn, being the only person present who was not of the
-Society; and he confessed to have spent in their company
-a very pleasant evening.<a name="Anchor-274" id="Anchor-274" href="#Footnote-274" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 274.">[274]</a></p>
-
-<p>We return to the progress of the engine business at
-Soho. The most important work in hand about this
-time was the double-acting engine intended for the
-Albion Mill, in Southwark.<a name="Anchor-275" id="Anchor-275" href="#Footnote-275" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 275.">[275]</a> This was the first rotative
-with a parallel motion erected in London; and as
-the more extended use of the engine would in a great
-measure depend upon its success, the firm naturally
-looked forward with very great interest to its performances.
-The Albion Mill scheme was started by Boulton
-as early as 1783. Orders for rotatives were then
-coming in very slowly, and it occurred to him that if he
-had but the opportunity of exhibiting the powers of the
-new engine in its best form, and in connexion with
-the best machinery, the results would be so satisfactory
-and conclusive as to induce manufacturers generally
-to follow the example. On applying to the London
-capitalists, Boulton found them averse to the undertaking;
-and at length Boulton and Watt became persuaded
-that if the concern was to be launched at all, they
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_354">[354]</span>
-must themselves find the principal part of the capital.
-A sufficient number of shareholders was got together to
-make a start, and application was made for a charter of
-incorporation in 1784; but it was so strongly opposed by
-the millers and mealmen, on the ground that the application
-of steam-power to flour-grinding would throw wind
-and water mills out of work, take away employment
-from the labouring classes, and reduce the price of
-bread,<a name="Anchor-276" id="Anchor-276" href="#Footnote-276" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 276.">[276]</a> that the charter was refused; and the Albion
-Mill Company was accordingly constituted on the ordinary
-principles of partnership.</p>
-
-<p>By the end of the year the Albion Mill engines, carefully
-designed by Watt, were put in hand at Soho; the
-building was in course of erection, after the designs of
-Mr. Wyatt, the architect; while John Rennie, the
-young Scotch engineer, was engaged to design and fit
-up the flour-grinding and dressing machinery. “I am
-glad,” wrote Boulton to Watt, “you have agreed with
-Rennie. Mills are a great field. Think of the crank&mdash;of
-Wolf, Trumpeter, Wasp, and all the ghosts we
-are haunted by.” The whole of the following year
-was occupied in the erection of the buildings and machinery;
-and it was not until the spring of 1786 that
-the mill was ready to start. Being the first enterprise
-of the kind, on an unprecedented scale, and comprising
-many novel combinations of machinery, there
-were many “hitches” before it could be got to work
-satisfactorily. After the first trial, at which Boulton
-was present, he wrote his partner expressing his dissatisfaction
-with the working of the double-acting
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_355">[355]</span>
-engine, expressing the opinion that it would have been
-better if they had held by the single-acting one.<a name="Anchor-277" id="Anchor-277" href="#Footnote-277" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 277.">[277]</a> Watt
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_356">[356]</span>
-was urged to run up to town himself and set matters to
-rights; but he was up to the ears in work at Soho, and
-could not leave for a day.</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_376" style="width: 400px;">
-<img src="images/i_376.png" width="400" height="515" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">DOUBLE-ACTING ENGINE, ALBION MILL.</p>
-</div>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“I can by no means leave home at present,” he wrote, “otherwise
-we shall suffer much greater losses than <em>can</em> come from the Albion
-Mill. The work for Cornwall which must be planned and put in
-train is immense, and there will more come from that quarter.
-Besides, I am pulled to pieces by demands for forwardness from
-every side. I have lost ten days by William Murdock, Wilson,
-Wilkinson, and headaches, and I have neither health nor spirits to
-make the necessary exertions. If I went to London I should be in
-torment all the while with the thoughts of what was lying behind
-here.”</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>After pointing out what course should be taken to
-discover and remedy the faults of the engine, he proceeded:&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“Above all, patience must be exercised and things coolly
-examined and put to rights, and care be taken not to blame
-innocent parts. Everything must, as much as possible, be tried
-separately. Remind those who begin to growl, that in new, complicated,
-and difficult things, human foresight falls short&mdash;that time
-and money must be given to perfect things and find out their defects,
-otherwise they cannot be remedied.”<a name="Anchor-278" id="Anchor-278" href="#Footnote-278" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 278.">[278]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Not being able to persuade Watt to come to his help,
-Boulton sent to Cornwall for Murdock, always ready to
-lend a hand on an emergency, and in the course of a
-few weeks he was in town at work upon the engines.
-The result is best told in Wyatt’s letter to Boulton, who
-had by this time returned to Birmingham:&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“Mr. Murdock has just set the engine to work. All the rods are
-altered. I think he has done more good than all the doctors
-we have had before; and his manner of doing it has been very
-satisfactory&mdash;so different from what we have been used to. He
-has been through all the flues himself, and really takes uncommon
-pains. Pray write to him; thank him for his attention. He will
-not have left town before he gets your letter, and press him to stay
-as long as he can be essentially serviceable.”</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>There was, however, so great a demand for Murdock’s
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_357">[357]</span>
-presence in Cornwall, that he could not be spared for
-another day, and he hurried back again to his multifarious
-duties at the mines.</p>
-
-<p>The cost of erecting the mill proved to be considerably
-in excess of the original estimate, and Watt early
-feared that it would turn out a losing concern. He had
-no doubt about the engines or the machinery being
-able to do all that had been promised; but he feared
-that the absence of business capacity on the part of the
-managers would be fatal to its commercial success.<a name="Anchor-279" id="Anchor-279" href="#Footnote-279" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 279.">[279]</a> He
-was especially annoyed at finding the mill made a
-public show of, and that it was constantly crowded with
-curious and frivolous people, whose presence seriously
-interfered with the operations of the workmen. It
-reached his ears that the managers of the mill even
-intended to hold a masquerade in it, with the professed
-object of starting the concern with eclat! Watt
-denounced this as sheer humbug. “What have Dukes,
-Lords, and Ladies,” said he, “to do with masquerading
-in a flour-mill? You must take steps to curb the
-vanity of &mdash;&mdash;, else it will ruin him. As for ourselves,
-considering that we are much envied at any rate,
-everything which contributes to render us conspicuous
-ought to be avoided. Let us content ourselves with
-<em>doing</em>.”<a name="Anchor-280" id="Anchor-280" href="#Footnote-280" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 280.">[280]</a> It was also found that the mill was becoming
-a nest for schemers and speculators occupied in devising
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_358">[358]</span>
-all manner of new projects. Boulton bestirred himself
-to put matters in a more business-like train. Steps
-were taken to close the mill against the crowd of idle
-visitors; and Boulton shortly after reported that “the
-manufacturing of Bubbles and new schemes is removed
-from the Mill to a private Lodging.”</p>
-
-<p>When the mill was at length set to work, it performed
-to the entire satisfaction of its projectors. The
-engine, on one occasion, ground as much as 3000
-bushels of wheat in twenty-four hours. The usual rate
-of work per week of six days was 16,000 bushels of
-wheat, cleaned, ground, and dressed into fine flour
-(some of it being ground two or three times over); or
-sufficient, according to Boulton’s estimate, for the weekly
-consumption of 150,000 people. The important uses of
-the double rotative engine were thus exhibited in the
-most striking manner; and the fame of the Albion Mill
-extended far and wide. It so far answered the main
-purpose which Boulton and Watt had in view in originally
-embarking in the enterprise; but it must be
-added that the success was accomplished at a very
-serious sacrifice. The mill never succeeded commercially.
-It was too costly in its construction and its
-management, and though it did an immense business it
-was at a loss. The concern was, doubtless, capable of
-great improvement, and, had time been allowed, it
-would probably have come round. When its prospects
-seemed to be brightening,<a name="Anchor-281" id="Anchor-281" href="#Footnote-281" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 281.">[281]</a> it was set on fire in several
-places by incendiaries on the night of the 3rd of March,
-1791. The villains had made their arrangements with
-deliberation and skill. They fastened the main cock of
-the water-cistern, and chose the hour of low tide for
-firing the building, so that water could not be got to
-play upon the flames, and the mill was burnt to the
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_359">[359]</span>
-ground in a few hours. A reward was offered for
-the apprehension of the criminals, but they were never
-discovered. The loss sustained by the Company was
-about 10,000<i>l.</i> Boulton and Watt were the principal
-sufferers; the former holding 6000<i>l.</i>, and the latter
-3000<i>l.</i> interest in the undertaking.<a name="Anchor-282" id="Anchor-282" href="#Footnote-282" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 282.">[282]</a></p>
-
-<p>Meanwhile orders for rotative engines were coming
-in apace at Soho,&mdash;engines for paper-mills and cotton-mills,
-for flour-mills and iron-mills, and for sugar-mills in
-America and the West Indies. At the same time pumping-engines
-were in hand for France, Spain, and Italy.
-The steam-engine was becoming an established power,
-and its advantages were every day more clearly recognised.
-It was alike docile, regular, economical, and
-effective, at all times and seasons, by night as by day,
-in summer and in winter. While the wind-mills were
-stopped by calms and the water-mills by frosts, the
-steam-mill worked on with untiring power. “There
-is not a single water-mill now at work in Staffordshire,”
-wrote Boulton to Wyatt in December; “they are all
-frozen up, and were it not for Wilkinson’s steam-mill,
-the poor nailers must have perished; but his mill goes
-on rolling and slitting ten tons of iron a day, which is
-carried away as fast as it can be bundled up; and thus
-the employment and subsistence of these poor people
-are secured.”</p>
-
-<p>As the demand for rotative engines set in, Watt
-became more hopeful as to the prospects of this branch
-of manufacture. He even began to fear lest the firm
-should be unable to execute the orders, so fast did
-they follow each other. “I have no doubt,” he wrote
-to Boulton, “that we shall soon so methodize the rotative
-engines as to get on with them at a great pace.
-Indeed, that is already in some degree the case. But
-we must have more men, and these we can only have
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_360">[360]</span>
-by the slow process of breeding them.”<a name="Anchor-283" id="Anchor-283" href="#Footnote-283" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 283.">[283]</a> A fortnight
-later he wrote, “Orders for rotative engines are coming
-in daily; but, if we part with any more men here, we
-must stop taking them in.” Want of skilled workmen
-continued to be one of Watt’s greatest difficulties. When
-the amount of work to be executed was comparatively
-small, and sufficient time was given to execute it, he
-was able to turn out very satisfactory workmanship;<a name="Anchor-284" id="Anchor-284" href="#Footnote-284" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 284.">[284]</a>
-but when the orders came pouring in, new hands were
-necessarily taken on, who proved a constant source of
-anxiety and trouble. Even the “old hands,” when sent
-to a distance to fit up engines, being left, in a great
-measure, to themselves, were apt to become careless and
-ill-conditioned. With some, self-conceit was the stumbling-block,
-with others temper, but with the greater
-number, drink. “I am very sorry to hear,” wrote
-Watt to Boulton, “that Malcolm Logan’s disease increases.
-I think you should talk to him roundly upon
-it, and endeavour to procure him to make a solemn
-resolution or oath against drinking for some given
-term.” Another foreman sent to erect an engine in
-Craven was afflicted with a distemper of a different
-sort. He was found to have put the engine very badly
-together, and, instead of attending to his work, had
-gone a-hunting in a pig-tail wig! “If the half of this
-be true,” wrote Watt, “as I fear it is, he will not do to
-be sent to New River Head [where an engine was about
-to be erected], and I have at present nobody else here....
-I suppose I shall be obliged to send Joseph over,
-for we must not have a bad engine if it can be helped....
-We seem to be getting into our old troubles
-again.”<a name="Anchor-285" id="Anchor-285" href="#Footnote-285" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 285.">[285]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_361">[361]</span></p>
-
-<p>William Murdock continued, as before, an admirable
-exception. He was as indefatigable as ever, always
-ready with an expedient to remedy a defect, and willing
-to work at all hours. A great clamour had been raised
-in Cornwall during his stay in London while setting
-the Albion Mill to rights, as there was no other person
-there capable of supplying his place, and fulfilling his
-numerous and responsible duties. Boulton deplored
-that more men such as Murdock were not to be had;&mdash;“He
-is now flying from mine to mine,” he wrote,
-“and hath so many calls upon him that he is inclined
-to grow peevish; and if we take him from North
-Downs, Chacewater, and Towan (all of which engines
-he has the care of), they will run into disorder and
-ruin; they have not a man at North Downs that is
-better than a stoker.”</p>
-
-<p>Towards the end of 1786 the press of orders increased
-at Soho. A rotative engine of forty-horse power was
-ordered by the Plate Glass Company to grind glass.
-A powerful pumping-engine was in hand for the Oxford
-Canal Company. Two engines, one of twenty and the
-other of ten horse power, were ordered for Scotch distilleries,
-and another order was shortly expected from
-the same quarter. The engine supplied for the Hull
-paper-mill having been found to answer admirably,
-more orders for engines for the same purpose were
-promised. At the same time pumping-engines were
-in hand for the great French waterworks at Marli.
-“In short,” said Watt, “I foresee I shall be driven
-almost mad in finding men for the engines ordered here
-and coming in.” Watt was necessarily kept very full
-of work by these orders, and we gather from his letters
-that he was equally full of headaches. He continued to
-give his personal attention to the preparation of the
-drawings of the engines, even to the minutest detail.
-On an engine being ordered by Mr. Morris, of Bristol,
-for the purpose of driving a tilt-hammer, Boulton wrote
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_362">[362]</span>
-to him,&mdash;“Mr. Watt can never be prevailed upon to
-begin any piece of machinery until the plan of the
-whole is settled, as it often happens that a change in
-one thing puts many others wrong. However, he has
-now settled the whole of yours, but waits answers to
-certain questions before the drawings for the founder
-can be issued.”<a name="Anchor-286" id="Anchor-286" href="#Footnote-286" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 286.">[286]</a></p>
-
-<p>At an early period his friend Wedgwood had strongly
-urged upon Watt that he should work less with his own
-head and hands, and more through the heads and hands
-of others.<a name="Anchor-287" id="Anchor-287" href="#Footnote-287" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 287.">[287]</a> Watt’s brain was too active for his body,
-and needed rest; but rest he would not take, and persisted
-in executing all the plans of the new engines
-himself. Thus in his fragile, nervous, dyspeptic state,
-every increase of business was to him increase of brain-work
-and increase of pain; until it seemed as if not only
-his health, but the very foundations of his reason must
-give way. At the very time when Soho was beginning
-to bask in the sunshine of prosperity, and the financial
-troubles of the firm seemed coming to an end, Watt
-wrote the following profoundly melancholy letter to
-a friend:&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“I have been effete and listless, neither daring to face business,
-nor capable of it, my head and memory failing me much; my stable
-of hobby-horses pulled down, and the horses given to the dogs for
-carrion.... I have had serious thoughts of laying down the
-burden I find myself unable to carry, and perhaps, if other
-sentiments had not been stronger, should have thought of throwing
-off the mortal coil; but, if matters do not grow worse, I may
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_363">[363]</span>
-perhaps stagger on. Solomon said that in the increase of knowledge
-there is increase of sorrow; if he had substituted <em>business</em> for knowledge,
-it would have been perfectly true.”<a name="Anchor-288" id="Anchor-288" href="#Footnote-288" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 288.">[288]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>As might be expected, from the large number of
-engines sold by the firm to this time, and the increasing
-amounts yearly payable as dues, their income from the
-business was becoming considerable, and promised,
-before many years had passed, to be very large. Down
-to the year 1785, however, the outlay upon new foundries,
-workshops, and machinery had been so great, and
-the large increase of business had so completely
-absorbed the capital of the firm, that Watt continued
-to be paid his household expenses, at the rate of so
-much a year, out of the hardware business, and no division
-of profits upon the engines sold and at work had
-as yet been made, because none had accrued. After the
-lapse of two more years, matters had completely changed;
-and after long waiting, and indescribable distress of mind
-and body, Watt’s invention at length began to be productive
-to him. During the early part of his career,
-though his income had been small, his wants were
-few, and easily satisfied. Though Boulton had liberally
-provided for these from the time of his settling at
-Birmingham, Watt continued to feel oppressed by the
-thought of the debt to the bankers for which he and
-his partner were jointly liable. In his own little business
-he had been accustomed to deal with such small
-sums, that the idea of being responsible for the repayment
-of thousands of pounds appalled and unnerved him;
-and he had no peace of mind until the debt was discharged.
-Now at last he was free, and in the happy
-position of having a balance at his bankers. On the
-7th of December, 1787, Boulton wrote to Matthews,
-the London agent,&mdash;“As Mr. Watt is now at Mr. Macgregor’s,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_364">[364]</span>
-in Glasgow, I wish you would write him a
-line to say that you have transferred 4000<i>l.</i> to his
-own account, that you have paid for him another
-1000<i>l.</i> to the Albion Mill, and that about Christmas
-you suppose you shall transfer 2007<i>l.</i> more to him, to
-balance.”</p>
-
-<p>But while Watt’s argosies were coming into port
-richly laden, Boulton’s were still at sea. Though the
-latter had risked, and often lost, capital in his various
-undertakings, he continued as venturesome, as enterprising
-as ever. When any project was started calculated
-to bring the steam-engine into notice, he was
-immediately ready with his subscription. Thus he
-embarked 6000<i>l.</i> in the Albion Mill, a luckless adventure
-in itself, though productive in other respects. But
-he sadly missed the money, and as late as 1789, feelingly
-said to Matthews, “Oh that I had my Albion Mill
-capital back again!” When any mining adventure
-was started in Cornwall for which a new engine was
-wanted, Boulton would write, “If you want a stopgap,
-put me down as an adventurer;” and too often
-the adventure proved a failure. Then, to encourage
-the Cornish Copper Mining Company, he bought large
-quantities of copper, and had it sent down to Birmingham,
-where it lay long on his hands without a
-purchaser. At the same time we find him expending
-5000<i>l.</i> in building and rebuilding two mills and a warehouse
-at Soho, and an equal amount in “preparing for
-the coinage.” These large investments had the effect of
-crippling his resources for years to come; and when the
-commercial convulsion of 1788 occurred, he felt himself
-in a state of the most distressing embarrassment. The
-circumstances of the partners being thus in a measure
-reversed, Boulton fell back upon Watt for temporary
-help; but, more cautious than his partner, Watt had
-already invested his profits elsewhere, and could not
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_365">[365]</span>
-help him.<a name="Anchor-289" id="Anchor-289" href="#Footnote-289" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 289.">[289]</a> He had got together his store of gains with
-too much difficulty to part with them easily; and he was
-unwilling to let them float away in what he regarded as
-an unknown sea of speculation.</p>
-
-<p>To add to his distresses, Boulton’s health began to fail
-him. To have seen the two men, no one would have
-thought that Boulton would have been the first to break
-down; but so it was. Though Watt’s sufferings from
-headaches, and afterwards from asthma, seem to have
-been almost continuous, he struggled on, and even grew
-in strength and spirits. His fragile frame bent before
-disease, as the reed bends to the storm, and rose erect
-again; but it was different with Boulton. He had
-toiled too unsparingly, and was now feeling the effects.
-The strain upon him had throughout been greater than
-upon Watt, whose headache had acted as a sort of safety-valve
-by disabling him from pursuing further study
-until it had gone off. Boulton, on the other hand, was
-kept in a state of constant anxiety by business that
-could not possibly be postponed. He had to provide the
-means for carrying on his many businesses, to sustain
-his partner against despondency, and to keep the whole
-organisation of the firm in working order. While
-engaged in bearing his gigantic burden, disease came
-upon him. In 1784 we find him writing to his wine-merchant,
-with a cheque in payment of his account,&mdash;“We
-have had a visit from a new acquaintance&mdash;the
-gout.” The visitor returned, and four years later we
-find him complaining of violent pain from gravel and
-stone, to which he continued a martyr to the close of his
-life. “I am very unwell indeed,” he wrote to Matthews
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_366">[366]</span>
-in London; “I can get no sleep; and yet I have been
-obliged to wear a cheerful face, and attend all this week
-on M. l’Abbé de Callone and his friend Brunelle.”<a name="Anchor-290" id="Anchor-290" href="#Footnote-290" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 290.">[290]</a> He
-felt as if life was drawing to an end with him: he asked
-his friend for a continuance of his sympathy, and promised
-to exert himself, “otherwise,” said he, “I will lay
-me down and die.” He was distressed, above all things,
-at the prospect of leaving his family unprovided for,
-notwithstanding all the labours, anxieties, and risks
-he had undergone. “When I reflect,” he said, “that I
-have given up my extra advantage of one-third on all
-the engines we are now making and are likely to make,<a name="Anchor-291" id="Anchor-291" href="#Footnote-291" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 291.">[291]</a>&mdash;when
-I think of my children, now upon the verge of
-that time of life when they are naturally entitled to
-expect a portion of their patrimony,&mdash;when I feel the
-consciousness of being unable to restore to them the property
-which their mother intrusted to me,&mdash;when I see
-all whom I am connected with growing rich, whilst I
-am groaning under a load of debt and annuities that
-would sink me into the grave if my anxieties for my
-children did not sustain me,&mdash;I say, when I consider all
-these things, it behoves me to struggle through the small
-remaining fragment of my life (being now in my 60th
-year), and do my children all the justice in my power by
-wiping away as many of my incumbrances as possible.”</p>
-
-<p>It was seldom that Boulton wrote in so desponding a
-strain as this; but it was his “darkest hour,” and
-happily it proved the one “nearest the dawn.” Yet,
-we shortly after find him applying his energies, apparently
-unabated, in an entirely new direction&mdash;that of
-coining money&mdash;which, next to the introduction of the
-steam-engine, was the greatest enterprise of his life.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_367">[367]</span></p>
-
-
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-<h3>CHAPTER XVIII.<br />
-
-<small><span class="smcap">Friends of Boulton and Watt&mdash;The Lunar Society.</span></small></h3>
-
-
-<p><span class="smcap">As</span> men are known by the friends they make and the
-books they read, as well as by the recreations and pursuits
-of their leisure hours, it will help us to an appreciation
-of the characters of Boulton and Watt if we
-glance briefly at the social life of Soho during the
-period we have thus rapidly passed under review.</p>
-
-<p>Boulton was of a thoroughly social disposition, and
-made friends wherever he went. He was a favourite
-alike with children and philosophers, with princely
-visitors at Soho, and with quiet Quakers in Cornwall.
-When at home, he took pleasure in gathering about
-him persons of kindred tastes and pursuits, in order at
-the same time to enjoy their friendship, and to cultivate
-his nature by intercourse with minds of the highest culture.
-Hence the friendships which he early formed for
-Benjamin Franklin, Dr. Small, Dr. Darwin, Josiah
-Wedgwood, Thomas Day, Lovell Edgeworth, and others
-equally eminent; out of which eventually grew the
-famous Lunar Society.</p>
-
-<p>Towards the close of last century, there were many
-little clubs or coteries of scientific and literary men
-established in the provinces, the like of which do not
-now exist,&mdash;probably because the communication with
-the metropolis is so much easier, and because London
-more than ever absorbs the active intelligence of England,
-especially in the higher departments of science,
-art, and literature. The provincial coteries of which
-we speak, were usually centres of the best and most
-intelligent society of their neighbourhoods, and were
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_368">[368]</span>
-for the most part distinguished by an active and liberal
-spirit of inquiry. Leading minds attracted others of
-like tastes and pursuits, and social circles were formed
-which proved in many instances the source of great
-intellectual activity as well as enjoyment. At Liverpool,
-Roscoe and Currie were the centres of one such
-group; at Warrington, Aikin, Enfield, and Priestley, of
-another; at Bristol, Dr. Beddoes and Humphry Davy
-of a third; and at Norwich, the Taylors and Martineaus
-of a fourth. But perhaps the most distinguished of
-these provincial societies was that at Birmingham, of
-which Boulton and Watt were among the most prominent
-members.</p>
-
-<p>From an early period, the idea of a society, meeting
-by turns at each other’s houses, seems to have been
-entertained by Boulton. It was probably suggested in
-the first place by his friend Dr. Small. The object of
-the proposed Society was to be at the same time friendly
-and scientific. The members were to exchange views
-with each other on topics relating to literature, art, and
-science; each contributing his quota of entertainment
-and instruction. The meetings were appointed to be
-held monthly at the full of the moon, to enable distant
-members to drive home by moonlight; and this was
-the more necessary as some of them&mdash;such as Darwin
-and Wedgwood&mdash;lived at a considerable distance from
-Birmingham.</p>
-
-<p>When Watt visited Soho in 1768, on his way home
-from London to Glasgow, some of the members of the
-Society&mdash;Dr. Small, Dr. Darwin, and Mr. Keir&mdash;were
-invited to meet him at <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">l’hôtel de l’amitié sur Handsworth
-Heath</i>, as Boulton styled his hospitable mansion. The
-Society must, however, have been in a somewhat undefined
-state at even a considerably later period, as we
-find Boulton writing to Watt in 1776, after the latter
-had settled in Birmingham, “Pray remember that the
-celebration of the third full moon will be on Saturday,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_369">[369]</span>
-March 3rd. Darwin and Keir will both be at Soho.
-I then propose to submit many motions to the members
-respecting new laws and regulations, such as will tend
-to prevent the decline of a Society which I hope will
-be lasting.” The principal members, besides those
-above named, were Thomas Day, R. Lovell Edgeworth,
-Samuel Galton, Dr. Withering, Baskerville the printer,
-Dr. Priestley, and James Watt. Each member was at
-liberty to bring a friend with him, and thus many
-visitors of distinction were present at the meetings of
-the Society, amongst whom may be named Mr. Smeaton,
-Dr. Parr, Sir Joseph Banks, Sir William Herschel,
-Dr. Solander, De Luc, Dr. Camper, and occasional
-scientific foreigners.</p>
-
-<p>Dr. Darwin was regarded as the patriarch of the
-Society. His fame as a doctor, philosopher, and poet,
-was great throughout the Midland Counties. He was
-extremely speculative in all directions, even in such matters
-as driving wheel-carriages by steam,&mdash;also a favourite
-subject of speculation with Mr. Edgeworth.<a name="Anchor-292" id="Anchor-292" href="#Footnote-292" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 292.">[292]</a> Dr. Darwin’s
-time, however, was so much engrossed by his
-practice at Lichfield, that he was not very regular in
-his attendance at the meetings, but would excuse himself
-for his absence by such a letter as the following:&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“<span class="smcap">Dear Boulton</span>,&mdash;I am sorry the infernal divinities who
-visit mankind with diseases, and are therefore at perpetual
-war with Doctors, should have prevented my seeing all your great
-men at Soho to-day. Lord! what inventions, what wit, what
-rhetoric, metaphysical, mechanical, and pyrotechnical, will be on
-the wing, bandied like a shuttlecock from one to another of your
-troop of philosophers! while poor I, I by myself I, imprison’d in a
-postchaise, am joggled, and jostled, and bump’d, and bruised along
-the King’s high-road, to make war upon a stomach-ache or a
-fever!”<a name="Anchor-293" id="Anchor-293" href="#Footnote-293" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 293.">[293]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_370">[370]</span></p>
-
-<p>While Dr. Darwin and Mr. Edgeworth were amongst
-the oldest members of the Society, Dr. Priestley, the
-discoverer of oxygen and other gases, was one of
-the most recent. We find Boulton corresponding
-with him in 1775,<a name="Anchor-294" id="Anchor-294" href="#Footnote-294" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 294.">[294]</a> principally on chemical subjects,
-and supplying him with parcels of fluor spar for purposes
-of experiment. Five years later, in 1780, he was
-appointed minister of the Presbyterian Congregation
-assembling in the New Meeting-house, Birmingham;
-and from that time forward he was one of the most
-active members of the Lunar Society, by whom he was
-regarded as a great acquisition.</p>
-
-<p>Dr. Priestley was a man of extraordinary gifts and
-accomplishments. He had mastered many languages
-before he was twenty years old. He was well versed
-in mechanical philosophy and metaphysics, a skilled
-dialectician, and the most expert chemist of his time.
-Possessed by an irrepressible activity and untiring perseverance,
-he became an enthusiast on whatever subject
-he undertook, whether it was an inquiry into history,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_371">[371]</span>
-theology, or science. He himself likened experimental
-philosophy to hunting, and in his case it was the <em>pursuit</em>
-of facts that mainly concerned him. He was cheerful,
-hopeful, and buoyant; possessed of a most juvenile temperament;
-happiest when fullest of work; ranging from
-subject to subject with extraordinary versatility; laying
-aside metaphysics to pursue experiments in electricity,
-next taking up history and politics, and resting from
-these to experiment on gases,&mdash;all the while carrying on
-some public controversy on a disputed point in religion
-or politics. For it is a curious fact; that gentle, affectionate,
-and amiable though Priestley was,&mdash;devout
-in temperament, and single-minded in the pursuit of
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_372">[372]</span>
-truth,<a name="Anchor-295" id="Anchor-295" href="#Footnote-295" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 295.">[295]</a>&mdash;he was almost constantly involved in paper
-wars. He described himself, and truly, as “one of the
-happiest of men;” yet wherever he went, in England or
-America, he stirred up controversy and exasperated
-opponents, seeming to be the very Ishmael of polemics.</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_392" style="width: 400px;">
-<img src="images/i_392.png" width="400" height="501" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">DR. PRIESTLEY.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>At the time when he settled at Birmingham,
-Priestley was actively engaged in prosecuting inquiries
-into the constitution of bodies. He had been occupied
-for several years before in making investigations as
-to the gases. The discovery of carbonic acid gas
-by Dr. Black of Edinburgh, had attracted his attention;
-and, living conveniently near to a brewery at
-Leeds, where he then was, he proceeded to make experiments
-on the fixed air or carbonic acid gas evolved
-during fermentation. From these he went on to other
-experiments, making use of the rudest apparatus,&mdash;phials,
-tobacco-pipes, kitchen utensils, a few glass tubes,
-and an old gun-barrel. The pursuit was a source of
-constant pleasure to him. He had entered upon an
-almost unexplored field of science. Then was the childhood
-of chemistry, and he gazed with large-eyed wonder
-at the marvels which his investigations brought to light.
-He had no teacher to guide him&mdash;nothing but experiment;
-and he experimented constantly, carefully noting
-the results. Observation of facts was his great object;
-the interpretation of the facts he left to others. Such
-was Priestley, and such were his pursuits, when he
-settled at Birmingham in 1780.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_373">[373]</span></p>
-
-<p>There can be little doubt that his enthusiasm as an
-experimenter in chemistry exercised a powerful influence
-on the minds of both Boulton and Watt, who, though
-both full of work, anxiety, and financial troubles,
-were nevertheless found taking an active interest from
-this time forward in the progress of chemical science.
-Chemistry became the chief subject of discussion at
-the meetings of the Lunar Society, and chemical experiments
-the principal recreation of their leisure
-hours.</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“I dined yesterday at the Lunar Society (Keir’s house),” wrote
-Boulton to Watt; “there was Blair, Priestley, Withering, Galton,
-and an American ‘rebel,’ Mr. Collins. Nothing new except that
-some of my white Spathos Iron ore was found to contain more air
-than any ore Priestley had ever tried, and, what is singular, it
-contains no common air, but is part fixable and part inflammable.”<a name="Anchor-296" id="Anchor-296" href="#Footnote-296" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 296.">[296]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>To Henderson, in Cornwall, Boulton wrote, two
-months later,&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“Chemistry has for some time been my hobby-horse, but I am
-prevented from riding it by cursed business, except now and then
-of a Sunday. However, I have made great progress since I saw you,
-and am almost an adept in metallurgical moist chemistry. I have
-got all <em>that</em> part of Bergmann’s last volume translated, and
-have learnt from it many new facts. I have annihilated Wm.
-Murdock’s bedchamber, having taken away the floor, and made
-the chicken kitchen into one high room covered over with shelves,
-and these I have filled with chemical apparatus. I have likewise
-set up a Priestleyan water-tub, and likewise a mercurial tub for
-experiments on gases, vapours, &amp;c., and next year I shall annex
-to these a laboratory with furnaces of all sorts, and all other utensils
-for dry chemistry.”<a name="Anchor-297" id="Anchor-297" href="#Footnote-297" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 297.">[297]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>The “Priestleyan water-tub” and “mercurial tub,”
-here alluded to, were invented by Priestley in the course
-of his investigations, for the purpose of collecting and
-handling gases; and the pneumatic trough, with glass
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_374">[374]</span>
-retorts and receivers, shortly became part of the furniture
-of every chemical laboratory.</p>
-
-<p>Josiah Wedgwood was another member of the Lunar
-Society who was infected by Dr. Priestley’s enthusiasm
-for chemistry; and, knowing that the Doctor’s income
-from his congregation was small, he and Boulton took
-private counsel together as to the best means of providing
-him with funds so as to place him in a position of comparative
-ease, and enable him freely to pursue his investigations.
-The correspondence which took place on
-the subject is creditable to all parties concerned; and
-the more so to Boulton, as he was embarrassed at the
-time by financial difficulties of the most distressing kind,
-as has been already explained in a preceding chapter.
-Wedgwood had undertaken to sound Dr. Priestley, and
-he thus communicated the result to Boulton:&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“The Doctor says he never did intend or think of making any
-pecuniary advantage from any of his experiments, but gave them to
-the public with their results, just as they happened, and so he should
-continue to do, without ever attempting to make any private
-emolument from them to himself.</p>
-
-<p>“I mentioned this business to our good friend, Dr. Darwin,
-who agrees with us in sentiment, that it would be a pity that
-Dr. Priestley should have any cares or cramps to interrupt him in
-the fine vein of experiments he is in the midst of, and is willing
-to devote his time to the pursuit of, for the public good. The
-Doctor will subscribe, and has thought of some friends who, he is
-persuaded, will gladly do the same....</p>
-
-<p>“You will see by the enclosed list that one cannot decently
-exceed ten guineas unless it be under the cover of a friend’s name,
-which method I shall take if I think it necessary to write more
-than ten; but that is the subscription I shall begin with, and for
-three years certain.</p>
-
-<p>“Dr. Darwin will be very cautious who he mentions this affair
-to, for reasons of delicacy which will have equal weight with us all.
-I mentioned <em>your</em> generous intention to Dr. P., and that we thought
-of 20<i>l.</i> each; but that, you will perceive, cannot be, and the Doctor
-says much less will suffice, as he can go on very well with 100<i>l.</i> per
-annum.”<a name="Anchor-298" id="Anchor-298" href="#Footnote-298" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 298.">[298]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_375">[375]</span></p>
-
-<p>Boulton wrote Wedgwood in reply, requesting that
-the money subscribed should be collected and paid to
-Dr. Priestley in such a way as not to wound his sensitive
-feelings. He suggested that in order to avoid this,
-it might be better if, instead of an annual subscription, a
-dozen gentlemen were found willing to give a hundred
-pounds each for the purpose of buying an annuity, or
-investing the amount in stock for the Doctor’s benefit.</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“I have never yet spoken to him on the subject,” he added; “I
-wish to avoid it, and so doth my neighbour Galton. Therefore
-I beg you will manage the affair so that we may contribute our
-mites to so laudable a plan, without the Doctor knowing anything of
-the matter, and favour us with a line on the subject at your leisure.”<a name="Anchor-299" id="Anchor-299" href="#Footnote-299" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 299.">[299]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>In a subsequent part of the same letter he indicated
-the subject of Priestley’s experiments at the time:&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“We have long talked,” said he, “of Phlogiston without knowing
-what we talked about; but now that Dr. Priestley hath brought the
-matter to light, we can pour that element out of one vessel into
-another, can take it out of one metal and put it into another,
-can tell how much of it, by accurate measurement, is necessary
-to reduce a calx to a metal, which is easily done, and without
-putting that calx into contact with any visible thing. In short,
-this goddess of levity can be measured and weighed like other matter.
-For the rest, I refer you to the Doctor himself.”</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>The discussions at the Lunar Society were not, however,
-exclusively chemical, but were varied according to
-the visitors who from time to time honoured the
-members with their presence. Thus, in the autumn of
-1782, the venerable Smeaton, having occasion to be in
-Birmingham upon canal business, was invited to attend
-a meeting of the Society held in Watt’s house at Harper’s
-Hill. Watt thus described the evening’s proceedings in
-a letter to Boulton, then in London:&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“He [Smeaton] grows old, and is rather more talkative than
-he was, but retains in perfection his perspicuity of expression
-and good sense. He came to the Philosophers’ Meeting at my
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_376">[376]</span>
-house on Monday, and we were receiving an account of his experiments
-on rotatives and some new ones he has made, when unluckily
-his facts did not agree with Dr. Moyes the blind philosopher’s
-theories, which made Moyes contradict Smeaton, and brought
-on a dispute which lost us the information we hoped for, and
-took away all the pleasure of the meeting, as it lasted two hours
-without coming half an inch nearer to the point.”<a name="Anchor-300" id="Anchor-300" href="#Footnote-300" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 300.">[300]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>A few days later, we find De Luc paying his first
-visit to Watt at Birmingham, accompanied by Baron
-Reden, who desired to inspect the Soho works. “M.
-De Luc,” wrote Watt, “is a modest ingenious man.
-On Wednesday, Wilkinson, Reden, and he sent for me
-to ‘The Castle’ after dinner, and kept me to supper.
-On the following day De Luc came to breakfast, and
-spent the whole forenoon, insensing<a name="Anchor-301" id="Anchor-301" href="#Footnote-301" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 301.">[301]</a> himself with steam
-and steam-engines. He is making a book, and will
-mention us in it. Dr. Priestley came also to dinner,
-and we were all good company till six o’clock, when
-Wilkinson set off for Broseley, and they for London.”</p>
-
-<p>Meanwhile Priestley continued to pursue his investigations
-with indefatigable zeal, discovering one gas
-after another,<a name="Anchor-302" id="Anchor-302" href="#Footnote-302" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 302.">[302]</a> and immediately proclaiming the facts
-which he brought to light, so that other minds might be
-employed on them besides his own. He kept nothing
-secret. Perhaps, indeed, he was too hasty in publishing
-the results of experiments still unfinished, as it occasionally
-led him into contradictions which a more cautious
-method of procedure would have enabled him to avoid.
-But he was thoroughly honest, ingenuous, and single-minded
-in all his proceedings, entertaining the conviction
-that in the end truth would vindicate itself, and
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_377">[377]</span>
-that all that was necessary was to inquire ardently, to
-experiment incessantly, and to publish freely.</p>
-
-<p>One of the most interesting speculations to which
-Priestley’s experiments gave rise was the composition of
-water. The merit of discovering the true theory has
-been variously attributed to Watt, to Cavendish, and
-to Lavoisier; and perhaps no scientific question has been
-the subject of more protracted controversy. It had
-been known for some years that a certain mixture of
-inflammable and dephlogisticated air (hydrogen and
-oxygen), or common air and hydrogen, could be fired
-by the electric spark. The experiment had been made
-by Volta and Macquer in 1776&ndash;7; and in the spring
-of 1781 Priestley made what he called a “random experiment”
-of the same kind, to entertain some philosophical
-friends. He exploded a mixture of common air
-and hydrogen in a glass globe by sending an electric
-spark through it, and when the explosion had taken
-place it was observed that the sides of the glass were
-bedewed with moisture. Mr. Warltire, a lecturer on
-Natural Philosophy at Birmingham,<a name="Anchor-303" id="Anchor-303" href="#Footnote-303" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 303.">[303]</a> was present at the
-experiment, and afterwards repeated it in a copper flask
-for the purpose of trying “whether heat is heavy or
-not.” In the mean time, Mr. Cavendish, who had for
-some years been occupied in the special study of pneumatic
-chemistry, and satisfactorily solved the question of
-the true composition of atmospheric air, having had his
-attention directed to Mr. Warltire’s experiment, repeated
-it in London, in the summer of 1781, employing a
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_378">[378]</span>
-glass vessel instead of a copper one; and again the
-deposit of dew was observed on the sides of the glass.
-This phenomenon, which Priestley had disregarded,
-appeared to him to be of considerable importance, and
-“likely to throw great light” upon the subject of the
-disappearance of oxygen during combustion, which he
-had been pursuing experimentally by means of his
-well-known eudiometer. “The liquid which resulted
-from the detonations was very carefully analysed, and
-proved in all the experiments with hydrogen and air,
-and in some of those with hydrogen and oxygen, to be
-pure water; but in certain of the latter it contained a
-sensible quantity of nitric acid. Till the source of this
-was ascertained, it would have been premature to conclude
-that hydrogen and oxygen could be turned into
-pure water.”<a name="Anchor-304" id="Anchor-304" href="#Footnote-304" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 304.">[304]</a> These experiments, however, were not
-published, being still regarded as inconclusive. But
-with the communicativeness which distinguishes the
-true man of science, Cavendish made them known to
-Priestley, and, through his friend Dr. Blagden, to Lavoisier.
-It was not until January, 1784, that he communicated
-the results of his long series of experiments
-on the subject to the Royal Society.</p>
-
-<p>In the mean time Watt’s attention had been directed
-to the same subject by the experiments of Priestley, and
-he was led to the same conclusions as Cavendish, though
-altogether independent of him, and by means of a different
-class of experiments. We find him writing to
-Boulton, then at Cosgarne, as follows, in 1782:&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“You may remember that I have often said that if water could
-be heated red hot, or something more, it would probably be
-converted into some kind of air, because steam would in that case
-have lost all its latent heat, and that it would have been turned
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_379">[379]</span>
-wholly into sensible heat, and probably a total change of the
-nature of the fluid would ensue. Dr. Priestley has proved this by
-experiment. He took lime and chased out all the fixed air, and
-made it exceedingly caustic by long-continued and violent heat.
-He then added to it two ounces of water, and as expeditiously
-as possible subjected it again to a strong heat, and he obtained two
-ounces’ <em>weight</em> of air; and, what is most surprising, a balloon which
-he interposed between the retort and receiver was not sensibly
-moistened, nor at all heated that could be observed. The air
-produced was but very little more than common air, and contained
-scarce any fixed air. So here is a plain account of where the
-atmospheric air comes from. The Doctor does me justice as to
-the theory.”<a name="Anchor-305" id="Anchor-305" href="#Footnote-305" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 305.">[305]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>The results of this experiment were by no means conclusive.
-That water was composed, at least in part, of
-air or gas of some kind was obvious; but what the gas
-was, and whether it existed in combination with other
-gases, was still a matter of conjecture. But Priestley,
-having proceeded to repeat Cavendish’s experiment<a name="Anchor-306" id="Anchor-306" href="#Footnote-306" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 306.">[306]</a> of
-exploding a mixture of oxygen and hydrogen in a glass
-vessel, which was followed by the usual deposit of water,
-communicated the fact to Watt, and this at once put
-him on the track of the true theory. In a letter to
-Dr. Black, he communicated the result of Dr. Priestley’s
-experiments, stating that “when quite dry pure inflammable
-air (hydrogen) and quite dry pure dephlogisticated
-air (oxygen) are fired by the electric spark in
-a close vessel, he finds, after the vessel is cold, a
-quantity of water adhering to the vessel equal, or very
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_380">[380]</span>
-nearly equal, to the weight of the whole air.... Are
-we not then authorised to conclude, that water is
-composed of dephlogisticated and inflammable air or
-phlogiston deprived of part of their latent heat; and
-that dephlogisticated or pure air is composed of water
-deprived of its phlogiston and united to heat and light;
-and if light be only a modification of heat, or a
-component part of phlogiston, then pure air consists of
-water deprived of its phlogiston or latent heat?”<a name="Anchor-307" id="Anchor-307" href="#Footnote-307" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 307.">[307]</a>
-At the same time Watt wrote to Priestley,&mdash;who did not
-himself see the force of the experiments as establishing
-the true composition of water,&mdash;demonstrating the conclusions
-which they warranted, and which were identical
-with those already drawn by Cavendish.</p>
-
-<p>Whether Priestley had communicated to Watt the
-theory of Cavendish does not appear; but it is probable
-that both arrived at the same conclusions independently
-of each other; Cavendish from the result of his own
-experiments, and Watt from those of Priestley. Each
-was quite competent to have made the discovery; nor is
-it necessary for the fame of either to strip a leaf of
-laurel from the brow of the other. Moreover, we are
-as unwilling to believe that Cavendish would have
-knowingly appropriated to himself the idea of Watt, as
-that Watt would have knowingly appropriated the idea
-of Cavendish. As it was, however, Cavendish and
-Watt both claimed priority in the discovery; the
-advocates of Watt’s claim resting their case mainly on
-the fact of his having first stated his views on the
-subject in writing, in a letter which he wrote to Dr.
-Priestley for the purpose of being read to the Royal
-Society in April, 1783. Before that letter was read,
-Watt asked that it should be withheld until the results
-of some new experiments of Dr. Priestley could be
-ascertained. These proving delusive, Watt sent a
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_381">[381]</span>
-revised edition of the letter to his friend De Luc, in
-November, but the reading of it was delayed until the
-29th April, 1784, before which time, on the 15th
-January, Cavendish’s paper on the same subject had
-been communicated to the Society. Watt was much
-annoyed at the circumstance, and alleged that Cavendish
-had been guilty of “plagiarism.”<a name="Anchor-308" id="Anchor-308" href="#Footnote-308" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 308.">[308]</a> At a late period
-of his life, when all bitter feelings on the subject had
-subsided, Watt declared himself indifferent to the
-subject of controversy: “After all,” said he, “it matters
-little whether Cavendish or I discovered the composition
-of water; the great thing is, that it <em>is</em> discovered.”</p>
-
-<p>Pneumatic chemistry continued to form the principal
-subject of discussion at the Lunar Society, as we find
-from numerous references in Boulton and Watt’s letters.
-“The Lunar Society,” wrote Watt to his partner, “was
-held yesterday at Mr. Galton’s at Barr. It was rather
-dull, there having been no philosophical news lately
-except Mr. Kirwan’s discovery of an air from phosphorus,
-which takes fire of itself on being mixed with
-common or dephlogisticated air.”<a name="Anchor-309" id="Anchor-309" href="#Footnote-309" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 309.">[309]</a> Among Watt’s
-numerous scientific correspondents was M. Berthollet,
-the eminent French chemist, who communicated to
-him the process he had discovered of bleaching by
-chlorine. Watt proceeded to test the value of the discovery
-by experiment, after which he recommended his
-father-in-law, Mr. Macgregor, of Glasgow, to make trial
-of it on a larger scale. This, however, was postponed
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_382">[382]</span>
-until Watt himself could find time to superintend it in
-person. At the end of 1787, we find him on a visit
-to Glasgow for the purpose, and writing Boulton that
-he is making ready for the trial. “I mean,” he writes,
-“to try it to-morrow, though I am somewhat afraid
-to attack so fierce and strong a beast. There is almost
-no bearing the fumes of it. After all, it does not appear
-that it will prove a <em>cheap</em> way of bleaching, and it
-weakens the goods more than could be wished, whatever
-good it may do in the way of expedition.”<a name="Anchor-310" id="Anchor-310" href="#Footnote-310" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 310.">[310]</a> The experiment
-succeeded, and we find Mr. Macgregor, in the
-following February, “engaged in whitening 1500 yards
-of linen by the process.” The discovery, not being
-protected by a patent, was immediately made use of by
-other firms; but the offensive odour of the chlorine was
-found exceedingly objectionable, until it was discovered
-that chlorine could be absorbed by slaked lime, the
-solution of which possessed great bleaching power, and
-this process in course of time superseded all the old
-methods of bleaching by chlorine.</p>
-
-<p>It has been recently surmised that the action of light
-upon nitrate of silver formed the subject of discussion at
-the Lunar Society, and of experiments by Boulton and
-Watt; but we find no indications of this in their correspondence.
-They were so unreserved with each other
-on all matters of business as well as science that, had
-any phenomena of so remarkable a character as those
-which have issued in the art of photography become
-known to either Boulton or Watt, we feel confident that
-they must have formed the subject of much personal
-discussion, and of many written communications. But
-both correspondents are alike entirely silent on the
-subject; and we infer that no such experiments were
-made by them, or, if made, that they led to no results!<a name="Anchor-311" id="Anchor-311" href="#Footnote-311" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 311.">[311]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_383">[383]</span></p>
-
-<p>Among the many foreigners who were attracted
-by this distinguished circle of scientific men, we find
-M. Faujas-Saint-Fond, who visited Birmingham in the
-course of his tour in England in 1785, while the circle
-was as yet unbroken, and Watt, Boulton, Priestley, and
-the rest, were in the full tide of business, invention,
-and inquiry. Saint-Fond had the pleasure of dining
-one day with Watt when Dr. Priestley was present,
-and describes in glowing terms the interest of their
-conversation. “Watt,” he says, “joins to the frankness
-of a Scotchman the amiability and kindness of a man of
-the world. Surrounded by charming children, well
-educated and full of talent, he enjoys in their midst the
-happiness of regarding them as his friends, while he
-is almost worshipped by them as the best of fathers.”
-A subsequent visit which he paid to Dr. Priestley in
-company with Dr. Withering, leads him to describe the
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_384">[384]</span>
-philosopher’s house at Fairhill, then about a mile and a
-half from Birmingham. “It is,” he says, “a charming
-residence, with a fine meadow on one side, and a beautiful
-garden on the other. There was an air of perfect
-neatness about the place within and without.” He
-describes the Doctor’s laboratory, in which he conducted
-his experiments, as “situated at the extremity of a
-court, and detached from the house to avoid the danger
-of fire.”</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“It consists of several apartments on the ground floor. On
-entering it, I was struck with the sight of a simple and ingenious
-apparatus for making experiments on inflammable gas extracted
-from iron and water reduced to vapour. It consisted of a tube,
-tolerably long and thick, made out of one piece of copper to avoid
-soldering. The part exposed to the fire was thicker than the rest.
-He introduced into the tube cuttings or filings of iron, and instead
-of letting the water fall into it drop by drop, he preferred
-introducing it as vapour. The furnace was fired by coke instead of
-coal, this being the best of combustibles for intensity and equality
-of heat.... Dr. Priestley kindly allowed me to make a drawing of
-his apparatus for the purpose of communicating it to the French
-chemists who are engaged in the same investigations as himself....
-The Doctor has embellished his rural retreat with a philosophical
-cabinet, containing all the instruments necessary for his
-scientific labours; as well as a library, containing a store of the most
-valuable books. He employs his time in a variety of studies.
-History, moral philosophy, and religion, occupy his attention by
-turns. An active, intelligent mind, and a natural avidity for
-knowledge, draw him towards the physical sciences; but a soft and
-impressible heart again leads him to religious and philanthropic
-inquiries.... I had indeed the greatest pleasure in seeing this
-amiable savant in the midst of his books, his furnaces, and his
-philosophical instruments; at his side an educated wife, a lovely
-daughter, and in a charming residence, where everything bespoke
-industry, peace, and happiness.”<a name="Anchor-312" id="Anchor-312" href="#Footnote-312" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 312.">[312]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Only a few years after the date of this visit, while
-Priestley was still busied with his chemical investigations,
-his house at Fairhill, thus described by Saint-Fond,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_385">[385]</span>
-was invaded by a brutal mob, who ruthlessly
-destroyed his library, his apparatus, and his furniture,
-and forced him to fly from Birmingham, glad to escape
-with his life.</p>
-
-<p>The Lunar Society continued to exist for some years
-longer. But one by one the members dropped off.
-Dr. Priestley emigrated to America; Dr. Withering,
-Josiah Wedgwood, and Dr. Darwin, died before the
-close of the century; and, without them, a meeting
-of the Lunar Society was no longer what it used to
-be. Instead of an assembly of active, inquiring men,
-it was more like a meeting of spectres with a Death’s
-head in the chair. The associations connected with the
-meeting&mdash;reminding the few lingering survivors of
-the losses of friends&mdash;became of too painful a character
-to be kept alive; and the Lunar Society, like the members
-of which it was composed, gradually expired. Its
-spirit, however, did not die. The Society had stimulated
-inquiry, and quickened the zeal for knowledge of all
-who had come within the reach of its influence; and
-this spirit diffused and propagated itself in all directions.
-Leonard Horner, who visited Soho in 1809, thus referred
-to the continued moral influence of the association:&mdash;“The
-remnant of the Lunar Society,” he says, “and the
-fresh remembrance in others of the remarkable men who
-composed it, are very interesting. The impression
-which they made is not yet worn out, but shows itself,
-to the second and third generation, in a spirit of scientific
-curiosity and free inquiry, which even yet makes
-some stand against the combined forces of Methodism,
-Toryism, and the love of gain.”<a name="Anchor-313" id="Anchor-313" href="#Footnote-313" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 313.">[313]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_386">[386]</span></p>
-
-
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-<h3>CHAPTER XIX.<br />
-
-<small><span class="smcap">Boulton’s Application of the Steam-engine to Coining.</span></small></h3>
-
-
-<p><span class="smcap">The</span> manufacture of counterfeit money was very common
-at Birmingham about the middle of last century,&mdash;so
-common, indeed, that it had become an almost recognised
-branch of trade. The machinery which was capable of
-making a button with a device and letters stamped upon
-one side of a piece of metal, was capable, with a few
-modifications, of making a coin with a device and letters
-stamped upon both sides. It was as easy to counterfeit
-one kind of coin as another&mdash;gold and silver, as well as
-copper; the former only requiring a little extra skill in
-manipulation, to which the button-makers were found
-fully equal.</p>
-
-<p>The profits of this illegal trade were of course very
-large; and so long as the coiners could find a vend for
-their productions, they went on producing. But at
-length the public, smarting from many losses, acquired
-sufficient experience to detect the spurious issues of the
-Birmingham mints; and when an unusually bright
-shilling or guinea was offered, they had little difficulty
-in pronouncing upon its “Brummagem”<a name="Anchor-314" id="Anchor-314" href="#Footnote-314" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 314.">[314]</a> origin. But
-though profitable, the prosecution of this branch of
-business was by no means unattended with risks. While
-some who pursued it on a large scale contrived to
-elevate themselves among the moneyed class, others,
-less fortunate, secured an elevation of a very different
-kind,&mdash;one of the grimmest sights of those days being
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_387">[387]</span>
-the skeletons of convicted coiners dangling from gibbets
-on Handsworth Heath.<a name="Anchor-315" id="Anchor-315" href="#Footnote-315" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 315.">[315]</a></p>
-
-<p>The production of counterfeit gold and silver coins
-came to be avoided as too dangerous; but the production
-of counterfeit copper money continued active at
-Birmingham down to the middle of last century, when
-numerous illegal mints were found in active operation.
-A Royal proclamation was issued on the 12th July,
-1751, warning the coiners against the consequences of
-their illegal proceedings; and shortly after, the Solicitor
-for the Mint went down to Birmingham, and had many
-of the more noted offenders tried, convicted, and sentenced
-to two years’ imprisonment. The principal
-manufacturers and traders of the town met and passed
-strong resolutions, condemning the practice of illegal
-coining; but the evil still continued; and in 1753 it
-was estimated that not less than half the copper coin
-in circulation was counterfeit. This disgraceful state of
-the coinage suggested, and partly justified, companies,
-firms, and local bodies, in circulating copper coinages of
-their own. These were followed by provincial pence
-and halfpence, which were, in their turn, counterfeited
-by pieces of baser metal. Most of the new copper coins
-of all sorts, good and bad, were executed at Birmingham;
-and thus coining shortly became one of the leading
-branches of business there.</p>
-
-<p>Boulton, as the owner of the largest and best-equipped
-manufactory in the neighbourhood, might have done
-any amount of coining that he desired; but the disreputable
-character of the business deterred him from
-entering upon it, and he refused all orders for counterfeit
-money, whether for home or abroad.<a name="Anchor-316" id="Anchor-316" href="#Footnote-316" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 316.">[316]</a> He took
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_388">[388]</span>
-an active part in the measures adopted by the leading
-manufacturers to prevent illegal coining; and the
-interest which he felt in commercial questions generally
-continued to keep his attention directed to the
-subject. One of the greatest evils of debased coinage,
-in his opinion, consisted in the serious losses that
-it occasioned to the labouring people; many of the
-lower classes of traders and manufacturers buying counterfeit
-money from the coiners at half its current value,
-and paying it in wages at full value, thereby wronging
-and defrauding the workmen of their hire. He came
-to the conclusion that the public interest imperatively
-required that the whole of the so-called copper coinage
-in circulation should be swept away and superseded
-by the issue of new coins, the intrinsic value and superior
-workmanship of which should be so palpable as
-effectually to suppress counterfeiting and its numerous
-evils. He had many interviews with the ministers of
-state on the subject; and we find him alleging in one
-of his letters to a friend that “his principal reason for
-turning coiner was to gratify Mr. Pitt in his wishes
-to put an end to the counterfeiting of money.”<a name="Anchor-317" id="Anchor-317" href="#Footnote-317" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 317.">[317]</a></p>
-
-<p>Other circumstances, doubtless, concurred in keeping
-his attention directed to the subject. Thus, he had
-become largely interested in the copper-trade of Cornwall
-through the shares he held in the mines as well as
-in the Copper Mining Company; and he was himself a
-large holder of copper, which he had purchased from
-that Company at a time when they could not dispose of
-it elsewhere. It was also one of his favourite ideas to
-apply the power of the steam-engine to the stamping
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_389">[389]</span>
-of money,&mdash;an idea of which he has the exclusive merit.
-As early as 1774, Watt says Boulton had many conversations
-with him on the subject; but it was not until
-the year 1786 that he successfully applied the engine
-for the first time in executing his contract with the East
-India Company for above a hundred tons of copper
-coin. James Watt, in his MS. memoir of his friend
-Boulton, gives the following account of the origin of
-his connexion with the coining business:&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“When the new coinage of gold took place in 178–, Mr. Boulton
-was employed to receive and exchange the old coin, which served to
-revive his ideas on the subject of coinage, which he had long
-considered to be capable of great improvement. Among other
-things, he conceived that the coin should all be struck in collars, to
-make it exactly round and of one size, which was by no means
-the case with the ordinary gold pieces; and that, if thus made, and
-of one thickness, the purity of the gold might be tested by passing
-it through a gauge or slit in a piece of steel made exactly to fit a
-properly made coin. He had accordingly a proof guinea made, with
-a raised border, and the letters <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">en creux</i>, somewhat similar to the
-penny pieces he afterwards coined for Government. This completely
-answered his intention, as any piece of baser metal which
-filled the gauge was found to be considerably lighter; or, if made
-to the proper weight, then it would not go through the gauge.
-Such money was also less liable to wear in the pocket than the
-common coin, where all the impression was prominent. The
-proposals on this head were not however approved by those
-who then had the management of His Majesty’s Mint, and there
-the matter rested for the time.</p>
-
-<p>“In 1786 Mr. Boulton and I were in France, where we saw a
-very fine crown-piece executed by Mr. P. Droz in a new manner.
-It was coined in a collar split into six parts, which came together
-when the dies were brought in contact with the blank, and formed
-the edge and the inscription upon it. Mr. Droz had also made
-several improvements in the coining-press, and pretended to
-others in the art of multiplying the dies. As, to his mechanical
-abilities, Droz joined that of being a good die-sinker, Mr. Boulton
-contracted with him to come over to England at a high salary and
-work at Soho, Mr. B. having then the prospect of an extensive
-copper coinage for the East India Company as well as a probability
-of one from Government. In anticipation of this contract, a number
-of coining-presses were constructed, and a steam-engine was applied
-to work them.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_390">[390]</span></p>
-
-<p>“Mr. Droz was found to be of a very troublesome disposition.
-Several of his contrivances, being found not to answer, were obliged
-to be better contrived or totally changed by Mr. Boulton and his
-assistants. The split collar was found to be difficult of execution,
-and being subject to wear very soon when in use, it was consequently
-unfit for an extensive coinage. Other methods were therefore
-invented and applied by Mr. Boulton, and the use of Droz’s collar
-was entirely given up.”<a name="Anchor-318" id="Anchor-318" href="#Footnote-318" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 318.">[318]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Although the machinery of the “Hôtel de Monnaie,”
-which Boulton erected at Soho, was found sufficient for
-the execution of his contract with the East India Company,
-its action was “violent and noisy,” and did not
-work to his satisfaction. He accordingly, with his usual
-determination to reach the highest degree of mechanical
-perfection, proceeded to remodel the whole of his coining
-machinery, in the course of which he introduced many
-entirely new contrivances and adaptations. In this he
-was ably assisted by William Murdock, Peter Ewart,
-James Lawson, and John Southern; but he himself was
-throughout the leading spirit, and took the principal
-part of the work. He originated numerous essential
-improvements in the rolling, annealing, and cleaning
-of the metal,&mdash;in the forging, multiplying, and tempering
-of the dies,&mdash;and in the construction of the
-milling and cutting-out machines,&mdash;which were worked
-out in detail by his assistants, after various trials,
-examined and tested by himself; while the arrangement
-and methodising of the system of coining&mdash;in a word,
-the organisation of the mint&mdash;was entirely his own
-work. “To his indefatigable energy and perseverance,”
-wrote Murdock many years later, “in pursuit of this,
-the favourite and nearly the sole object of the last
-twenty years of the active part of Mr. Boulton’s life,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_391">[391]</span>
-is, in a great measure, to be attributed the perfection to
-which the art of coining has ultimately attained.”<a name="Anchor-319" id="Anchor-319" href="#Footnote-319" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 319.">[319]</a></p>
-
-<p>While thus labouring at the improvement of his
-presses, dies, and the application of the steam-engine
-to the process of coining, Boulton was actively engaged
-in stirring up public opinion on the subject of an
-improved copper coinage. Six presses were fitted and
-ready for work at Soho by the end of 1788;<a name="Anchor-320" id="Anchor-320" href="#Footnote-320" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 320.">[320]</a> but the
-only considerable orders which had as yet been executed
-were the copper coinage of the East India Company,
-another for the American Colonies, and a silver coinage
-for the Sierra Leone Company; so that the Soho mint,
-notwithstanding the capital, skill, and labour bestowed
-upon it, remained comparatively idle. Boulton continued
-to stir up the Government through his influential
-friends;<a name="Anchor-321" id="Anchor-321" href="#Footnote-321" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 321.">[321]</a> and he was at length called before the Privy
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_392">[392]</span>
-Council and examined as to the best means of preventing
-the issue of counterfeit money. He stated
-his views to them at great length; and the members
-were so much impressed by his statements that they
-authorised him to prepare and submit to them a model
-penny, halfpenny, and farthing. This he at once
-proceeded to do, and forwarded them to the Privy
-Council, accompanied by an elaborate report, setting
-forth the superiority of the new coins over those then
-issued from the Mint; demonstrating that their adoption
-would effectually prevent counterfeiting of base copper
-money, and offering to guarantee the execution of a
-contract for a new coinage, at “not exceeding half
-the expense which the common copper coin hath always
-cost at his Majesty’s Mint.”<a name="Anchor-322" id="Anchor-322" href="#Footnote-322" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 322.">[322]</a></p>
-
-<p>Although the specimens submitted by Boulton to the
-Privy Council were approved and eventually adopted,
-the officials of the Mint were enabled, by mere passive
-resistance, to delay the adoption of the new copper
-coinage for more than ten years. With their lumbering
-machinery they could not execute one-third part of the
-copper coin required for the ordinary purposes of
-currency; but they could not brook the idea of inviting
-a private individual to do that which they were found
-unable to do with all the powers of the State at their
-back. Rather than thus publicly confess their incompetency,
-they were satisfied to execute only one-third
-of the copper coinage, leaving it to the forgers and
-private coiners to supply the rest.</p>
-
-<p>Boulton began to fear that the coining presses which
-he had erected with so much labour, contrivance, and
-expenditure of money, in anticipation of the expected
-Government contract, would remain comparatively idle
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_393">[393]</span>
-after all. But he did not readily give up the idea of
-executing the new coinage. “Of all the mechanical
-subjects I ever entered upon,” he wrote Mr. Garbett,
-“there is none in which I ever engaged with so much
-ardour as that of bringing to perfection the art of
-coining in the reign of George III., as well as of checking
-the injurious and fatal crime of counterfeiting.”
-It occurred to him that it might be possible to overcome
-the obstructiveness of officialism by means of
-public opinion; and he proceeded with his usual vigour
-to rouse the trading interests throughout the country
-on the subject. He had a statement printed and extensively
-circulated among the leading merchants and
-manufacturers, to whom he also sent specimens of his
-model penny and halfpenny, the superiority of which
-to the rubbishy government and counterfeit coin then
-in circulation, was made apparent at a glance. He
-also endeavoured to act upon the Ministry through
-the influence of the King, to whom he presented copies
-of his model gold, silver, and copper coins; but though
-his Majesty expressed himself highly pleased with them,
-the question of their adoption still remained as much in
-suspense as ever. The appeals to the public were followed
-by numerous petitions to Parliament and memorials
-to the Privy Council against counterfeit money,
-and in favour of the proposed Boulton coinage.<a name="Anchor-323" id="Anchor-323" href="#Footnote-323" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 323.">[323]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_394">[394]</span></p>
-
-<p>In the mean time, to find employment for the coining
-presses he had set up, Boulton sought for orders from
-foreign and colonial governments. In 1790 and 1792
-he executed a large quantity of beautiful copper coin<a name="Anchor-324" id="Anchor-324" href="#Footnote-324" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 324.">[324]</a>
-for the revolutionary government of France while we
-remained at peace with that country. The coin was
-afterwards suppressed when the government was overturned,
-to the great loss of the French contractors, who,
-nevertheless, honourably fulfilled their engagement with
-Mr. Boulton. In 1791 he executed for the colony of
-Bermuda a penny coinage; about the same time he
-turned out a large number of provincial halfpenny
-tokens;<a name="Anchor-325" id="Anchor-325" href="#Footnote-325" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 325.">[325]</a> and in 1794 he supplied the Madras Presidency
-with its four-faluce and two-faluce coinage. By way
-of exhibiting the artistic skill of Soho, and its ability to
-turn out first-class medal work, Boulton took advantage
-of the King’s recovery in 1789, to execute a very fine
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_395">[395]</span>
-medal commemorative of the event. He sent the first
-specimen to his friend M. De Luc, the Queen’s Librarian
-at Windsor, for presentation to her Majesty, who
-expressed herself much pleased with the medal. In his
-letter to De Luc, Boulton stated that he had been the
-more desirous of turning out a creditable piece of workmanship,
-as the art of medalling was one of the most
-backward in England, and had made the least progress
-of any during the reign of his present Majesty. In
-preparing this medal, he had the co-operation of
-Benjamin West, President of the Royal Academy,
-who rendered him valuable assistance in supplying the
-best models and portraits of the King from which
-a satisfactory likeness could be made, and he also inspected
-and corrected the engraving of the dies.</p>
-
-<p>The success of the medal commemorative of the
-King’s preservation was such as to induce Boulton to
-prosecute this department of business,&mdash;not that it was
-attended with profit, for some of his most costly medals
-were produced for presentation to individuals, and not
-for sale,&mdash;but that it increased the reputation of Soho,
-and reflected new credit upon the art manufacture of
-England.</p>
-
-<p>In preparing the dies for his various coins and
-medals, we find Boulton seeking and obtaining the
-assistance of Nollekens, Flaxman, Bacon, and Wilton
-(sculptors); Mayer (King’s miniature painter); Gossett
-(modeller); but above all, he was mostly indebted for
-friendly help to Benjamin West, who cordially entered
-into his views of “establishing elegant records of the
-medallic arts in the reign of George III.” Boulton also
-executed a series of medals commemorative of the great
-events of the French Revolution, for which there must
-have been a considerable demand, as we find him
-sending at one time not less than twenty tons of historical
-medals to Messrs. Monneron his Paris agents.
-Amongst these, we may mention his medals of the
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_396">[396]</span>
-following subjects:&mdash;The Emperor of Russia; Assassination
-of the King of Sweden; Restoration of the King
-of Naples; Final Interview of the King of France;
-Execution of the King of France; Execution of the
-Queen of France; Serment du Roi; Lafayette; J. J.
-Rousseau; and Respublica Gallica.<a name="Anchor-326" id="Anchor-326" href="#Footnote-326" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 326.">[326]</a></p>
-
-<p>The Boulton MS. contains a brief description, in
-Mr. Boulton’s handwriting, of the Soho Mint in 1792,
-from which we make the following extract:&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“This Mint consists of eight large coining-machines, which are
-sufficiently strong to coin the largest money in current use, or even
-medals; and each machine is capable of being adjusted in a few
-minutes, so as to strike any number of pieces of money from fifty to
-one hundred and twenty per minute, in proportion to their diameter
-and degree of relief; and each piece being struck in a steel collar,
-the whole number are perfectly round and of equal diameter.
-Each machine requires the attendance of one boy of only twelve
-years of age, and he has no labour to perform. He can stop his
-press one instant, and set it going again the next. The whole of
-the eight presses are capable of coining, at the same time, eight
-different sizes of money, such as English crowns, 6-livre pieces,
-24-sous pieces, 12-sous, or the very smallest money that is used in
-France. The number of blows at each press is proportioned to the
-size of the pieces, say from fifty to one hundred and twenty blows
-per minute, and if greater speed is wanted, he has smaller machines
-that will strike 200 per minute.</p>
-
-<p>“As the blows given by Mr. B.’s machinery are much more
-uniform than what are given by the strength of men’s arms when
-applied to the working of the common press, the dies are not so
-liable to break, nor the spirit of the engraving to be so soon
-injured; yet nevertheless, from the natural imperfections of steel,
-and other unavoidable causes, some time will be lost in changing the
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_397">[397]</span>
-dies and other interruptions. However, it is decided by experience
-that Mr. Boulton’s new machinery works with less friction, less
-wear, less noise, is less liable to be out of order, and can strike very
-much more than any apparatus ever before invented; for it is
-capable of striking at the rate of 26,000 écus or English crowns,
-or 50,000 of half their diameter, in one hour, and of working night
-and day without fatigue to the boys, provided two sets of them work
-alternately for ten hours each.”</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>When Boulton’s eight presses were in full work,
-the quantity of copper coin they turned out was very
-large. They could work off with ease twelve hundred
-tons of coin annually. The quantity of copper thus
-consumed was so great that a difficulty began to be
-experienced in keeping up the supply. Instead of
-being glutted with the metal, as Boulton had been
-before the Mint was started, he had now considerable
-difficulty in obtaining sufficient for his purposes.
-He seems to have been, in some measure, the
-victim of a combination to keep him out of a supply;
-for when the holders of copper found out that his
-contract with the East India Company required him
-to deliver the coin within a given time, and that he
-must have the metal, they raised the prices upon him,
-and copper went up about 6<i>l.</i> a ton. On this, the Birmingham
-white metal button-makers lowered the wages
-of their workmen, alleging as the cause the rise in
-the price of copper, “for which they must thank Mr.
-Boulton.” The usual strikes followed, with meetings
-of trades delegates and street commotions. Though
-Boulton had confidence in the Birmingham workmen
-generally, among whom he had the reputation of being
-a good master, he feared that, in their excited state,
-malice might stir them to mischief; and he apprehended
-an attack upon his manufactory. For this he
-accordingly made due preparation, placing a strong
-armed guard of his own workmen upon Soho, having
-the fullest confidence in their fidelity. Writing to his
-friend Wilson in Cornwall, he said,&mdash;</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_398">[398]</span></p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>... “From the misrepresentations that have been made by the
-delegates, this town has been greatly misguided, and I expect every
-hour riots of a serious nature.</p>
-
-<p>“Workmen are parading the streets with cockades in their hats.
-They are assembled by beat of drum, and headed by Ignorance and
-Envy, with their eyes turned towards Soho.</p>
-
-<p>“Yet I am no competitor with the Birmingham trades. I follow
-no business but what I have been myself the father of, and I have
-done much more for the Birmingham manufactures than any other
-individual. I have declined the trade of White Metal Buttons,
-which is the article so much affected by the rise of metals, and
-that in which the rioters are employed.</p>
-
-<p>“I mix with no clubs, attend no public meetings, am of no party,
-nor am I a zealot in religion; I do not hold any conversation with
-any Birmingham persons; and therefore I know no grounds but
-what may be suggested by wicked and envious hearts for supposing
-me to be the cause of the late rise of copper.</p>
-
-<p>“However, I am well guarded by justice, by law, by men, and
-by arms.”<a name="Anchor-327" id="Anchor-327" href="#Footnote-327" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 327.">[327]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>The danger, however, shortly passed, and the threatened
-attack was not made.</p>
-
-<p>It was not until the year 1797 that Boulton was
-employed to execute a copper coinage for Britain.
-Ten years before, encouraged by the Lords of the
-Treasury, he had fitted up the Mint machinery at a
-heavy cost, in anticipation of this very order; and
-now, after executing coinages for many foreign governments,
-the order came at last. The new coins consisted
-of twopenny, penny, halfpenny, and farthing pieces.
-Altogether, about 4200 tons of these coins were issued
-from the Soho Mint between 1797 and 1806. So
-sensible were the authorities at the Royal Mint of
-the advantages of Mr. Boulton’s improvements in
-coining machinery, that they employed him to erect the
-new Mint on Tower Hill, one of the most complete
-establishments of the kind until then in existence.
-The plans of the new Mint, as regarded the distribution
-of the buildings connected with the mechanical department,
-were arranged by him; and the coining machinery
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_399">[399]</span>
-and steam-engines were executed at Soho under
-his immediate direction, though he was at the time
-labouring under the infirmities of age as well as
-suffering under the pressure of a painful disease. He
-had also the honour of supplying Royal Mints for
-the Russian, Spanish, and Danish governments; and
-at a later period for Mexico, Calcutta, and Bombay.
-“In short,” said Mr. Watt, in the MS. memoir from
-which we have already quoted, “had Mr. Boulton done
-nothing more in the world than he has accomplished in
-improving the coinage, his name would deserve to be
-immortalised; and if it be considered that this was done
-in the midst of various other important avocations, and
-at enormous expense,&mdash;for which, at the time, he could
-have had no certainty of an adequate return,&mdash;we shall
-be at a loss whether most to admire his ingenuity, his
-perseverance, or his munificence. He has conducted
-the whole more like a sovereign than a private manufacturer;
-and the love of fame has always been to him
-a greater stimulus than the love of gain. Yet it is
-to be hoped that, even in the latter point of view, the
-enterprise answered its purpose.”</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_420" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_420.png" width="450" height="290" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">SITE OF THE SOHO MINT, NOW REMOVED.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_400">[400]</span></p>
-
-
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-<h3>CHAPTER XX.<br />
-
-<small><span class="smcap">Prosperity of Soho&mdash;Young Boulton and Watt&mdash;The Riots&mdash;William
-Murdock.</span></small></h3>
-
-
-<p><span class="smcap">The</span> steam-engine had now become firmly established
-as a working power. Beginning as a water pumper
-for miners, it had gradually been applied to drive corn
-and cotton mills, to roll and hammer iron, to coin
-money, to work machinery, and to perform the various
-labour in which the power of men and horses, of wind
-and water, had before been employed. The numerous
-orders for new engines which came in at Soho kept the
-works increasingly busy. Many skilled workmen had
-by this time been trained into expertness and dexterity;
-and, being kept to their special departments of work,&mdash;fathers
-training their sons to work with them at the
-same benches,&mdash;a degree of accuracy and finish was
-reached which contributed to establish and maintain
-the prestige of the manufactory. The prosperity of
-the firm was also materially promoted by the able
-assistants who had been trained at Soho, and were in
-due time promoted to superintend special departments
-of the business. Among these were Murdock, Walker,
-Southern, Ewart, and Lawson, who enjoyed the fullest
-confidence of their chiefs, and repaid it with unswerving
-loyalty.</p>
-
-<p>When the concern had become thoroughly organised
-under these able heads of departments, Boulton and
-Watt began to breathe more freely. Their financial
-difficulties had now disappeared, and instead of laying
-out capital, they had begun to accumulate it. They
-had laboured hard for their reward and richly earned
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_401">[401]</span>
-it; and after their long up-hill struggle, they well
-deserved rest and peace at last. They now began to
-take occasional journeys of recreation, with which they
-varied their journeys of business. Thus, in the autumn
-of 1789, we find Boulton making a tour in Derbyshire,
-during which he was overtaken at Buxton by a letter
-from the Lords of the Privy Council on coining business,
-giving him “marching orders for London;” but a
-party having been formed to visit the Peak Cavern, he
-decided “to obey the Ladies rather than the Lords.”
-Three days later, however, we find him in London,
-“writing in a full chattering coffee-house at Charing
-Cross,” and desiring his friend Mr. Barrow to pay his
-respects to the ladies whom he had so hurriedly left.
-While in London, he received a letter inviting him to
-pay a visit to Holland and stand godfather to his friend
-Mr. Hoofletter’s son; to which he replied, that he would
-be glad to stand godfather to the boy and have the
-name of Boulton associated with an honest race, but
-was sorry that he could not assist at the christening or
-at the dinner. “But pray act for me,” he added; “do
-everything that’s proper (as is the custom in the
-country); give the nurse five guineas from me, and I
-will repay you. My best respects to Mrs. Hoofletter,
-and my blessing on the young Christian.”</p>
-
-<p>Watt’s troubles and anxieties also were in course
-of gradual abatement. Though still suffering from
-headaches, asthma, and low spirits, he seems on the
-whole to have become more satisfied with his lot.
-Prosperity agreed with him as it does with most people.
-It is a condition easy to bear, and Watt took to it
-kindly. As years passed over his head, he became
-placid, contented, and even cheerful. His health
-improved, and he enjoyed life in his old age as he had
-never done in his youth. He ceased longing for the
-rest of the grave, and gave over “cursing his inventions.”
-On the other hand, he took pleasure in looking
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_402">[402]</span>
-back over the long and difficult road he had traversed,
-and in recounting the various steps by which he had
-perfected his great inventions. Nor did he cease to
-invent; for he went on inventing new things to the
-close of his life; but he followed the pursuit as a
-recreation and delight, and not as a business and a
-drudgery.</p>
-
-<p>Watt too, like his partner, began to make tours of
-pleasure, for the purpose at the same time of gathering
-health and seeing the beauties of nature. In August,
-1789, he wrote Boulton from Cheltenham, that he had
-been making a delightful journey through the Western
-Counties, by way of Worcester, Malvern, Hereford, and
-Chepstow, and that he felt in better health and spirits
-than he had been for a very long time. Occasional
-letters reached him from Birmingham about orders
-received for engines, nothing being done without first
-consulting him. That the concern was thriving, may
-be inferred from the comparative indifference with
-which he now regarded such orders. An engine having
-been ordered by a doubtful person, Watt wrote&mdash;“I
-look upon such orders as of little value. They are so
-precarious in their duration, and in this case there is
-risk of bad payment or swindling. Whatever care we
-take, he is like a shaved pig with a soaped tail.” On a
-demand being made upon him for abatement of dues, he
-wrote&mdash;“We have never made concessions to anybody
-but they have been attended with loss to us and half a
-dozen more; and it would appear that, if our patent
-lasted long enough, the power of a horse would grow
-to that of an elephant.”<a name="Anchor-328" id="Anchor-328" href="#Footnote-328" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 328.">[328]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_403">[403]</span></p>
-
-<p>In the course of the following summer, Watt visited
-the pleasantest spots in the neighbourhood of London,
-and amongst other places took Windsor in his way,
-where he had the honour of an interview with the
-King. He had already met his Majesty at Whitbread’s
-brewery in the early part of 1787, for the purpose of
-explaining to him the action of the new rotary engine;
-and the King had expressed the desire to see him again
-when in the neighbourhood of Windsor. The following
-is Watt’s brief account of the visit:&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“At Windsor I had a short conversation with the King. He never
-mentioned you nor the coinage, nor anything that led to it;
-therefore I could not bring it on; nor do I believe it could have
-been of any service. He asked about engines, and how the Albion
-mill was going on?&mdash;<i>Answer</i>: Very well in respect to grinding, but
-not so well in regard to the trade. <i>Asked</i>: Who was the manager?&mdash;<i>Answer</i>:
-Mr. J. Wyatt, who made the wooden hospitals. He
-observed, that Wyatt was not bred to the milling business; how
-had he learnt it?&mdash;<i>Answer</i>: That he was a man of ability and
-observation. <i>Asked</i>: What sort of engines were we making?&mdash;<i>Answer</i>:
-For almost everything, but at present principally for
-brewers, distillers, cotton-spinners, iron-men, &amp;c.&mdash;<i>Asked</i>: How we
-were paid for them?&mdash;<i>Answer</i>: By horses power, 5<i>l.</i> a year in the
-country, and that we made none under four-horses power.&mdash;<i>Asked</i>:
-If these premiums afforded sufficient profit?&mdash;<i>Answer</i>: That they did
-in large engines, but not in small.”<a name="Anchor-329" id="Anchor-329" href="#Footnote-329" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 329.">[329]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>As Boulton and Watt advanced in years they looked
-forward with pleasure to the prospect of their two
-eldest sons&mdash;Matthew Robinson Boulton and James
-Watt, junior&mdash;joining them in the business they had
-established, and relieving them of the greater part
-of their anxieties and labours in connexion with it.
-Both were young men of intelligence and character,
-carefully educated, good linguists, and well versed in
-practical science. We find many references to the
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_404">[404]</span>
-education of the two young men in the letters of
-Boulton; few or none in those of Watt. The former
-alike attracted young people and was attracted by
-them, entering heartily into their pursuits; the latter
-was too much absorbed by study, by inventions, and by
-business, to spare time for the purpose. Besides, he
-was, like his countrymen generally, reserved and undemonstrative
-in all matters relating to the feelings and
-affections.</p>
-
-<p>Both boys were trained and educated so as to follow
-in their fathers’ steps. Every <ins title="Transcriber's Note: original reads 'pains'" id="Corr-404">pain</ins> was taken to give
-them the best culture, and to imbue them with the
-soundest principles. The two boys usually spent their
-holidays together at Soho; and, growing up together,
-they learnt to think, and feel, and work together.</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“Jim returns to school this evening,” wrote Boulton, to Watt in
-Cornwall; “he has behaved exceedingly well, and not a single bill
-of indictment has been found against him. He had got it into
-his head that he would not be an engineer, which I did not
-contradict, but I gave him and Matt the small wooden water-wheel,
-which they proceeded to erect below my duck-pond, and
-there worked a forge; but not having water enough, necessity
-has put them upon erecting a Savery’s engine, which is not yet
-finished, though they are both exceedingly keen upon it. We have
-killed many poor robins by pouring fixable air upon them, and had
-some amusement in our electrical and chemical hobby-horsery,
-which the young ones like much better than dry Latin. Jim
-desires me to ask you to give him leave to learn French.”</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>At the same time Boulton’s own son was making good
-progress under the Rev. Mr. Stretch, to whom Boulton
-wrote,&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“Baron Reden has gone to the North. On his return, he will
-leave his son with you for a year or two, and then invites Matt to
-return with him to Germany. Youth is the time to learn languages,
-and the Baron’s offer is certainly a great temptation ... let him
-[Matt] not neglect the present, but apply himself so as to become
-well grounded in Grammar and Latin ... he is capable, but not
-of close application, to which he must be inured, as no proficiency
-of any kind can be acquired without it.”</p>
-</div>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_405">[405]</span></p>
-
-<p>The Baron’s offer was not, however, accepted; but
-desirous that his son should acquire proficiency in
-French, Boulton took him over to Paris, towards the
-end of 1786, and placed him under a competent master.
-Many kindly letters passed between father and son
-during the latter’s stay at Paris. The young man
-spent rather more money than his father thought could
-do him good. He therefore asked him to keep an
-account of his personal expenses, which “must balance
-exactly,” and implored him above all things to “keep
-out of bad company.”</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“The future reputation and happiness of your life,” wrote the
-anxious father, “depend upon your present conduct. I must
-therefore insist that you do not go strolling about Sodom and
-Gomorrah under any pretence whatever.... It will not be
-pleasant to you to read this, but I must do my duty to you or I
-shall not satisfy my own conscience. I therefore hope you will
-do your duty to yourself, or you cannot do it to me. There is
-nothing on earth I so much wish for as to make you <em>a man</em>, a good
-man, a useful man, and consequently a happy man.”<a name="Anchor-330" id="Anchor-330" href="#Footnote-330" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 330.">[330]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>The father’s anxieties abated with time; the son
-applied himself assiduously to French and German, and
-gave promise of becoming a man of ability and character.
-Writing to his friend Matthews, Boulton said&mdash;“Matt
-is a tolerable good chemist.... He hath
-behaved very well, and I shall be glad when the time
-arrives for him to assist me in the business.” In the
-summer of 1788, young Boulton paid his father a
-holiday visit at Soho, returning again to Paris to finish
-his studies. Writing of his departure, to Matthews in
-London, the father said&mdash;“I hope that my son is set off
-for Dover: my heart overflows with blessings and love
-to him.”<a name="Anchor-331" id="Anchor-331" href="#Footnote-331" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 331.">[331]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_406">[406]</span></p>
-
-<p>The education of young Watt was equally well cared
-for. After leaving school at Birmingham, his father
-sent him for a year to Mr. Wilkinson’s ironworks at
-Bersham, to learn carpentry in the pattern shop.<a name="Anchor-332" id="Anchor-332" href="#Footnote-332" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 332.">[332]</a> He
-then returned to his father’s, from whence he was sent
-to school at Geneva, where he remained for three years
-perfecting himself in the modern languages. On his
-return to England in 1788, we find Boulton writing
-to Mr. Barrow of Manchester, asking him to obtain a
-position for young Watt in some respectable counting-house,
-with a view to his acquiring a thorough commercial
-training. He was eventually placed in the
-house of Messrs. Taylor and Maxwell, where he remained
-for about two years, improving himself in his
-knowledge of business affairs. His father’s reputation
-and standing, as well as his own education and accomplishments,
-served to introduce the young gentleman
-to many friends in Manchester; and, although far from
-extravagant in his habits, he shortly found that the
-annual sum allowed him by his father was insufficient
-to pay for his board, clothing, and lodging, and at the
-same time enable him to keep clear of debt. Knowing
-Boulton’s always open hand and heart, and his sympathy
-for young people, the embarrassed youth at once applied
-to him for help. Why he did not apply to his father
-will be best understood from his own letter:&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“I am at this moment,” he explained, “on the best footing
-possible with my father, but were I to inform him of my necessities,
-I do not know what would be the consequence. Not that I suppose
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_407">[407]</span>
-the money in itself would be an object to him, but because he would
-look upon it in the light of encouraging what he would call my
-extravagances. Never having been a young man himself, he is
-unacquainted with the inevitable expenses which attend my time
-of life, when one is obliged to keep good company, and does not
-wish to act totally different from other young men. My father’s
-reputation, and his and my own station in life, require that I should
-live at least on a decent footing. I am not conscious of having
-committed any foolish extravagances, and I have avoided company
-as much as possible; but I have also constantly avoided the
-reputation of avarice, or of acting meanly on any occasion. My
-father, unfortunately for me, measures the present times and circumstances
-by those when he was of my age, without making the
-proper allowances for their immense disparity; consequently it is
-in vain for me to endeavour to convince him of the necessity of my
-conduct.”<a name="Anchor-333" id="Anchor-333" href="#Footnote-333" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 333.">[333]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>He concluded by expressing his sense of Mr. Boulton’s
-many friendly acts towards him, and confessing that
-there was no other person on whom he could so
-confidently rely for help in his emergency. The reply
-of Boulton was all that he could desire. With sound
-fatherly advice,<a name="Anchor-334" id="Anchor-334" href="#Footnote-334" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 334.">[334]</a> such as he would have given to his
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_408">[408]</span>
-own son under similar circumstances, he sent him a
-draft for 50<i>l.</i>, the amount required by young Watt to
-clear him of his debts.</p>
-
-<p>Among the friendships which he formed at Manchester,
-was one of an intimate character with Mr.
-Cooper, a gentleman engaged in an extensive business,
-fond of books, and a good practical chemist. We find
-young Watt requesting Boulton to recommend to Mr.
-Cooper “a person to keep his library in order and to
-make experiments for him, he not having time enough
-to attend to the details of them himself.”<a name="Anchor-335" id="Anchor-335" href="#Footnote-335" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 335.">[335]</a> Cooper was
-besides a keen politician, and took an active interest
-in the discussion of the important questions then agitating
-the public mind. Watt was inflamed by the
-enthusiasm of his friend, and with the ardour of youth
-entered warmly into his views as to the regeneration of
-man and the reconstruction of society.</p>
-
-<p>Mrs. Schimmelpenninck has, in her autobiography,
-given a vivid picture of the interest excited in the circle
-of friends amongst whom she moved, by the thrilling
-events then occurring in France, and which extended
-even to the comparatively passionless philosophers
-of the Lunar Society. At one of the meetings held
-at her father’s house in the summer of 1788 “Mr.
-Boulton,” she says, “presented to the company his son,
-just returned from a long sojourn at Paris. I well
-remember my astonishment at his full dress in the
-highest adornment of Parisian fashion; but I noticed,
-as a remarkable thing, that the company (which consisted
-of some of the first men in Europe) all with one
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_409">[409]</span>
-accord gathered round him, and asked innumerable
-questions, the drift of which I did not fully understand.
-It was wonderful to me to see Dr. Priestley, Dr. Withering,
-Mr. Watt, Mr. Boulton himself, and Mr. Keir,
-manifest the most intense interest, each according to his
-prevailing characteristics, as they almost hung upon his
-words; and it was impossible to mistake the indications
-of deep anxiety, hope, fear, curiosity, ardent zeal, or
-thoughtful gravity, which alternately marked their
-countenances, as well as those of my own parents. My
-ears caught the words ‘Marie Antoinette,’ ‘The Cardinal
-de Rohan,’ ‘diamond necklace,’ ‘famine,’ ‘discontent
-among the people,’ ‘sullen silence instead of shouts of
-“Vive le Roi!”’ All present seemed to give a fearful
-attention. Why, I did not then well know, and, in a
-day or two, these things were almost forgotten by me;
-but the rest of the party heard, no doubt, in this young
-man’s narrative, the distant, though as yet faint rising
-of the storm which, a year later, was to burst upon
-France and, in its course, to desolate Europe.”<a name="Anchor-336" id="Anchor-336" href="#Footnote-336" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 336.">[336]</a> A few
-short months passed, and the reign of brotherhood
-began. “One evening, towards the end of July,”
-continues Mrs. Schimmelpenninck, “we saw at a
-distance a vehicle (usually employed to carry servants
-to town or church) returning at more than its usual
-speed. After some minutes the door of the drawing-room
-opened, and in burst Harry Priestley, a youth of
-sixteen or seventeen, waving his hat, and crying out,
-‘Hurrah! Liberty, Reason, brotherly love for ever!
-Down with kingcraft and priestcraft. The majesty of
-the people for ever! France is free, the Bastille is
-taken!’”<a name="Anchor-337" id="Anchor-337" href="#Footnote-337" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 337.">[337]</a> “I have seen,” she adds, “the reception of
-the victory of Waterloo and of the carrying of the
-Reform Bill; but I never saw joy comparable in its
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_410">[410]</span>
-intensity and universality to that occasioned by the
-early promise of the French Revolution.”</p>
-
-<p>The impressionable mind of Dr. Priestley was moved
-in an extraordinary degree by the pregnant events which
-followed each other in quick succession at Paris; and
-he entered with zeal into the advocacy of the doctrines
-of liberty, equality, and fraternity, so vehemently promulgated
-by the French “friends of man.” His chemical
-pursuits were for a time forgotten, and he wrote and
-preached like one possessed, of human brotherhood, and
-of the downfall of tyranny and priestcraft. He hailed
-with delight the successive acts of the National Assembly
-abolishing monarchy, nobility, church, corporations, and
-other long established institutions. He had already
-been long and hotly engaged in polemical discussions
-with the local clergy on disputed points of faith; and
-now he addressed a larger audience in a work which he
-published in answer to Mr. Burke’s famous attack on the
-‘French Revolution.’ Burke, in consequence, attacked
-him in the House of Commons; while the French Revolutionists
-on the other hand hailed him as a brother, and
-admitted him to the rights of French citizenship.<a name="Anchor-338" id="Anchor-338" href="#Footnote-338" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 338.">[338]</a></p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_432" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_432.png" width="450" height="410" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">BURNING OF DR. PRIESTLEY’S HOUSE AT FAIRHILL.<a name="Anchor-339" id="Anchor-339" href="#Footnote-339" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 339.">[339]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>These proceedings concentrated on Dr. Priestley an
-amount of local exasperation that shortly after burst forth
-in open outrage. On the 14th of July, 1791, a public
-dinner was held at the principal hotel to celebrate the
-second anniversary of the French Revolution. About
-eighty gentlemen were present, but Priestley was not of
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_411">[411]</span>
-the number. A mob collected outside, and after shouting
-“Church and King,” they proceeded to demolish the
-inn windows. The magistrates shut their eyes to the
-riotous proceedings, if they did not actually connive at
-them. A cry was raised, “To the New Meeting-house,”
-the chapel in which Priestley ministered; and
-thither the mob surged. The door was at once burst
-open, and the place set on fire. They next gutted the
-old Meeting-house, and made a bonfire of the pews and
-bibles in the burying-ground. It was growing dusk,
-but the fury of the mob had not abated. They made
-at once for Dr. Priestley’s house at Fairhill, about a
-mile and a half distant. The Doctor and his family had
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_412">[412]</span>
-escaped about half an hour before their arrival; and
-the house was at their mercy. They broke in at once,
-emptied the cellars, smashed the furniture, tore up the
-books in the library, destroyed the philosophical and
-chemical apparatus in the laboratory, and ended by
-setting fire to the house. The roads for miles round
-were afterwards found strewed with shreds of the
-valuable manuscripts in which were recorded the results
-of twenty years labour and study,&mdash;a loss which
-Priestley continued bitterly to lament until the close of
-his life.</p>
-
-<p>Thus an utter wreck was made of the philosopher’s
-dwelling at Fairhill. The damage done was estimated
-at upwards of 4000<i>l.</i>, of which the victim recovered
-little more than one-half from the county. The next
-day, and the next, and the next, the mob continued to
-run riot, burning and destroying. On the second day,
-about noon, they marched to Easyhill and attacked and
-demolished the mansion of Mr. Ryland, one of the most
-munificent benefactors of the town. Bordesley Hall, the
-mansion of Mr. Taylor, the banker, was next sacked
-and fired. The shop of the estimable William Hutton,
-the well-known bookseller and author, was next broken
-open and stripped of everything that could be carried
-away; and from his shop in the town they proceeded
-to his dwelling-house at Bennett’s Hill in the country,
-and burnt it to the ground.<a name="Anchor-340" id="Anchor-340" href="#Footnote-340" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 340.">[340]</a> On the third day, six
-other houses were sacked and destroyed; three of them
-were blazing at the same time. On the fourth day,
-which was a Sunday, the rioters dispersed in bands
-over the neighbourhood, levying contributions in
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_413">[413]</span>
-money and drink; one body of them burning on their
-way the Dissenting chapel-house and minister’s dwelling-house
-at Kingswood, seven miles off. Other Dissenters,
-of various persuasions, farmers, shopkeepers, and
-others, had their houses broken into and robbed in open
-day. It was not until the Sunday evening that three
-troops of the Fifteenth Light Dragoons entered Birmingham
-amidst the acclamations of the inhabitants,
-who welcomed them as deliverers. At the instant of
-their arrival, the mob had broken into Dr. Withering’s
-house at Edgbaston Hall, and were rioting in his wine-cellars,
-but when they heard that “the soldiers” had
-come at last, they slunk away in various directions.</p>
-
-<p>The members of the Lunar Society, or “the Lunatics,”
-as they were popularly called, were especially marked
-for attack during the riots. A common cry among the
-mob was “No philosophers&mdash;Church and King for
-ever!” and some persons, to escape their fury, even
-painted “No philosophers” on the fronts of their
-houses! There could be no doubt as to the meaning of
-this handwriting on the wall. Priestley’s house had
-been sacked, and Withering’s plundered. Boulton and
-Watt were not without apprehensions that an attack
-would be made upon them, as the head and front of the
-“Philosophers” of Birmingham. They accordingly
-prepared for the worst; called their workmen together,
-pointed out to them the criminality of the rioters’ proceedings,
-and placed arms in their hands on their
-promising to do their utmost to defend the premises if
-attacked. In the mean time everything portable was
-packed up and ready to be removed at a moment’s
-notice. Thus four days of terror passed, but the mob
-came not; Watt attributing the safety of Soho to the
-fact that most of the Dissenters lived in another direction.<a name="Anchor-341" id="Anchor-341" href="#Footnote-341" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 341.">[341]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_414">[414]</span></p>
-
-<p>Many of the rioters were subsequently apprehended,
-and several of them were hanged; but the damage
-inflicted on those whose houses had been sacked was
-irreparable, and could not be compensated. As for
-Dr. Priestley, he shook the dust of Birmingham from
-his feet, and fled to London; from thence emigrating
-to America, where he died in 1804.</p>
-
-<p>While such was the blind fury of the populace
-of Birmingham, the principles of the French Revolution
-found adherents in all parts of England. Clubs
-were formed in London and the principal provincial
-towns, and a brisk correspondence was carried on between
-them and the Revolutionary leaders of France.
-Among those invested with the rights of French
-citizenship were Dr. Priestley, Mr. Wilberforce, Thomas
-Tooke, and Mr. (afterwards Sir) James Mackintosh.
-Thomas Paine and Dr. Priestley were chosen members
-of the National Convention; and though the former
-took his seat for Calais, the latter declined, on the
-ground of his inability to speak the language sufficiently.
-Among those carried away by the political
-epidemic of the time, were young James Watt
-and his friend Mr. Cooper of Manchester. In 1792
-they were deputed, by the “Constitutional Society”
-of that town, to proceed to Paris and present an
-address of congratulation to the Jacobin Club, then
-known as the “Société des Amis de la Constitution.”<a name="Anchor-342" id="Anchor-342" href="#Footnote-342" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 342.">[342]</a>
-While at Paris, young Watt seems to have taken an
-active part in the fiery agitation of the time. He was
-on intimate terms with the Jacobin leaders. Southey
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_415">[415]</span>
-says that he was even the means of preventing a duel
-between Danton and Robespierre, to the former of
-whom he acted as second.<a name="Anchor-343" id="Anchor-343" href="#Footnote-343" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 343.">[343]</a> Robespierre afterwards
-took occasion to denounce both Cooper and Watt as
-secret emissaries of Pitt, on which young Watt sprang
-into the tribune, pushing Robespierre aside, and defended
-himself in a strain of vehement eloquence, which completely
-carried the assembly with him. From that
-moment, however, he felt his life to be unsafe, and he
-fled from Paris without a passport, never resting until
-he had passed the frontier and found refuge in Italy.</p>
-
-<p>The public part he had taken in French Revolutionary
-politics could not fail to direct attention to him
-on this side of the channel. His appearance at a
-public procession, in which he carried the British
-colours, to celebrate the delivery of some soldiers
-released from the galleys, was vehemently denounced
-by Mr. Burke in the House of Commons. The
-notoriety which he had thus achieved, gave his father
-great anxiety; and after young James’s return to
-England in 1794, he was under considerable apprehensions
-for his safety. Several members of the London
-political Societies had been apprehended and lodged in
-the Tower, and Watt feared lest his son might in some
-way be compromised by his correspondence with those
-societies. Boulton, then in London, informed him of
-the severe measures of the Government, and of the
-intended suspension of the Habeas Corpus Act; to which
-Watt replied,&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“I thank you for your intelligence, which I have communicated
-with due caution to Mr. S. and my son. The former says he has
-had no correspondence whatever with any of these societies,
-nor has frequented any here,&mdash;that he may have uttered unguarded
-or foolish words in private companies, but that he knows nothing of,
-nor is he concerned in, any plot or political scheme whatsoever.
-The latter says he never corresponded with any of them at any
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_416">[416]</span>
-time, though he once executed a commission for one of them, and
-sent his answer to Mr. Tr.,&mdash;that for these two years he has had no
-sort of connexion with any of them, and for more than a year all
-his correspondence has been recommending his friends not to
-intermeddle with public affairs. As he proposes to see you to-morrow,
-he will explain himself, and I need not bid you council him for the
-best.”<a name="Anchor-344" id="Anchor-344" href="#Footnote-344" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 344.">[344]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>A few days later, his apprehensions of danger to his
-son not being removed, he wrote Boulton again as
-follows:&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“I am made very uneasy on account of James by this Bastille Act<a name="Anchor-345" id="Anchor-345" href="#Footnote-345" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 345.">[345]</a>
-now (I fancy) passed, and which I cannot help thinking <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">un peu trop</i>.
-I submit whether it might not be best for you to endeavour to make
-his peace with M[inist]ry by a candid avowal of his errors, and
-of his subsequent change of sentiment and renunciation of all
-correspondence with these traitors. In the mean time he had better
-make the best of his way to here, Liverpool, or Scotland; from
-either of the latter he might find his way to America if necessary.
-In any case let him not go in company with any of the persons who
-have laid themselves open to suspicion. I would not, however,
-have him rashly run out of the country. M[inist]ry must know
-who have been the active abettors of the plot, and, if they act
-wisely, will not molest those who have seen their error or have had
-the good sense to resist all temptations of engaging in plots against
-the peace of the country, whatever their opinions about parliamentary
-representation might be.... Query, whether Denmark,
-Hamburg, or Norway, might not be preferable to America, lest
-we go to war with the latter. If you find he is obnoxious, his
-letters to me should be directed by another hand, and not
-signed.”<a name="Anchor-346" id="Anchor-346" href="#Footnote-346" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 346.">[346]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Four days later, Watt’s alarm was not abated by the
-appearance in Birmingham of king’s messengers making
-seizures of persons concerned in seditious correspondence.
-“They have taken up,” he wrote, “one Pare,
-who kept a reforming club at his house, and one or two
-others. The soldiers were ordered under arms to
-prevent tumult. I hear also that Wilkinson has been
-threatened with a mob at Bradley, and has prepared to
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_417">[417]</span>
-defend himself with cannon, pikes, &amp;c., but that matters
-are now quiet there. In respect to James, <em>you</em> must
-advise him, I cannot; but I think he would be better
-at home, following his business, than elsewhere.”<a name="Anchor-347" id="Anchor-347" href="#Footnote-347" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 347.">[347]</a>
-James eventually returned to Birmingham, where we
-find him from this time forward taking an increasingly
-active part in the affairs of the concern. He took
-entire charge of the manufacture of the letter-copying
-machines, now become a considerable branch of
-the business; and he shortly after entered the engine
-firm as a partner, in conjunction with Mr. Boulton’s
-eldest son, Matthew Robinson.</p>
-
-<p>The infusion of young blood had the effect of imparting
-new vigour to all the branches of manufacture
-at Soho, and at the same time of relieving the senior
-partners from a considerable amount of labour and
-anxiety. The business was now in a very thriving
-state; there was abundance of orders for engines
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_418">[418]</span>
-coming in; and the principal difficulty of the firm
-was in finding skilled workmen enough to execute
-them. Thus we find Watt junior writing to Boulton
-junior in January, 1795,&mdash;“We must have additional
-men, rather too many than too few, until we have got
-the start of our orders, for without that we shall always
-feel ourselves embarrassed and clogged. I shall therefore
-desire Rennie to renew his applications at Lancaster,
-which appear as yet to have been unsuccessful.”</p>
-
-<p>The junior members of the firm were also useful
-in protecting the engine patent right, the infringement
-of which had become general all over the country.
-This was a disagreeable part of their business; but, if
-not attended to, the patent must be given up as worthless.
-The steam-engine was now regarded as an indispensable
-power in manufacturing operations. It
-had become employed in all important branches of
-industry; and it was, of course, the interest of the manufacturers
-to avoid the payment of dues wherever they
-could. An instance of this evasion was detected at the
-Bowling Ironworks near Bradford, and notice was
-given of proceedings against the Company for recovery
-of dues. On this the Bowling Company offered to
-treat, and young Watt went down to Leeds for the
-purpose of meeting the representatives of the Bowling
-Company on the subject. On the 24th February, 1796,
-he wrote his friend Matthew Robinson Boulton as
-follows:&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“Inclosed you have a copy of the treaty of peace, not amity,
-concluded at Leeds, on Saturday last, between me, Minister
-Plenipotentiary to your Highnesses on the one part, and the Bowling
-Pirates in person on the other part. I hope you will ratify the
-terms, as you will see they are founded entirely upon the principle
-of indemnity for the past and security for the future. The diameter
-and length of stroke of their different engines, four in number,
-I have; the times of their commencing to work will be sent you by
-Mr. Paley; and the amounts of the premiums may be definitively
-calculated upon my arrival, which will be about the latter end of
-this week.”</p>
-</div>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_419">[419]</span></p>
-
-<p>Another engine constructed after Watt’s patent was
-discovered working at a mill at Carke, in Cartmel,
-Lancashire. Mr. Stockdale, son of the proprietor, tells
-the following story of its detection. He states that the
-first engine employed at the works was one on Newcomen’s
-construction, which was used to pump water
-into the reservoir which supplied the water-power by
-which the mill was driven. It was then determined
-to apply the steam-power direct to the machinery,
-and a new engine was ordered from Manchester,
-without communicating with the patentees. The mill
-was in full work when a stranger called, representing
-that he belonged to the concern of Boulton and Watt,
-and requesting to inspect the engine. The request
-was complied with, and Mr. Stockdale afterwards
-invited him to stay to dinner; but it was the dearest
-dinner he ever gave, as only a few weeks later a claim
-for 1800<i>l.</i> was made by Boulton and Watt for dues
-upon the engine, which was, however, eventually compromised
-by the payment of 400<i>l.</i></p>
-
-<p>The most unscrupulous pirates, however, were the
-Cornishmen who, emboldened by the long quiescence
-of Boulton and Watt, and knowing that the patent
-had only five or six more years to run, believed
-that they might set the patentees at open defiance,
-which they proceeded to do. Notwithstanding the
-agreements entered into and ratified on both sides,
-they refused point blank to pay further dues; and
-Boulton and Watt were thus at last driven to have
-recourse to the powers of the law. Had they remained
-passive, it might have been construed into a tacit
-admission that the patent right had from the first been
-indefensible, and that the sums which they had up to
-that time levied for the use of their engine had been
-wrongfully paid to them. But neither had ceased to
-have perfect faith in the validity of their patent, and
-both determined, even at this late stage, to defend it.
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_420">[420]</span>
-“The rascals,” wrote Watt to Boulton, “seem to have
-been going on as if the patent were their own.... We
-have tried every lenient means with them in vain; and
-since the fear of God has no effect upon them, we must
-try what the fear of the devil can do.”<a name="Anchor-348" id="Anchor-348" href="#Footnote-348" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 348.">[348]</a> Legal proceedings
-were begun accordingly. The two actions
-on which the issues were tried were those of Boulton
-and Watt <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">v.</i> Bull, and Boulton and Watt <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">v.</i> Hornblower
-and Maberley; and they were fought on both
-sides with great determination. The proceedings extended
-over several years, being carried from court to
-court; but the result was decisive in both cases in favour
-of Boulton and Watt. It was not until January, 1799,
-that the final decision of the judges was given;<a name="Anchor-349" id="Anchor-349" href="#Footnote-349" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 349.">[349]</a> almost
-on the very eve of expiry of the patent, which had not
-then a full year to run. It was not, however, with
-a view to the future that these costly, anxious, and protracted
-legal proceedings had been carried on, but
-mainly for the recovery of dues under existing agreements,
-and for dues on engines erected in various
-quarters in infringement of the patent. Most of the
-Cornish adventurers had paid nothing for years. Thus
-Poldice had paid nothing since October, 1793, and was
-in arrear 2330<i>l.</i> Wheal Gons had paid nothing since
-May, 1793, and was in arrear 4290<i>l.</i> The Wheal
-Treasure adventurers, and many others, had set Boulton
-and Watt at open defiance, and paid nothing at all.</p>
-
-<p>On the issue of the proceedings against Bull, Boulton
-and Watt called upon the Mining Companies to “cash
-up,” and arrears were shortly collected, though with
-considerable difficulty, to the amount of about 30,000<i>l.</i>
-Young Boulton went into Cornwall for the purpose
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_421">[421]</span>
-of arranging the settlements, and managed the business
-with great ability. “I am now to congratulate you,”
-Watt wrote to his partner from Glasgow, whither he
-had gone on a visit, “on the success of Mr. R. Boulton’s
-very able transactions in Cornwall; and I hope that at
-last we may be freed from the anxiety of the issue of
-law which has so long attended us, and enjoy in peace
-the fruits of our labours. When you write to Mr. B.
-I beg you will present my best wishes and best respects
-to him, expressing my warmest approbation of his
-exertions.” On another occasion, while the cause was
-in progress before the courts of law, Watt wrote,&mdash;“In
-the whole affair, nothing was so grateful to me
-as the zeal of our friends and the activity of our young
-men, which was unremitting.”</p>
-
-<p>The senior members of the firm had for some time
-been gradually withdrawing from the active management
-of the concern. We find Watt writing to Dr.
-Black in 1798,&mdash;“In regard to the engine business, I
-now take little part in it, but it goes on successfully.”
-Four years later he wrote,&mdash;“Our engine trade thrives;
-the profits per cent. are, however, very, very moderate;
-it is by the great capital and expensive establishment of
-engineers, &amp;c., that we keep it up; without our tools
-and men very little could be done, as we have many
-competitors, some of whom are men of abilities.” But
-the business was now safe in the hands of the young
-and active partners, who continued to carry it on for
-many years, with even greater success than their fathers
-had done. They reaped the harvest of which the
-others had sown the seed. The patent right expired in
-1800; but the business of the firm, nevertheless, became
-larger and more remunerative than it had ever been
-before. The superior plant which they had accumulated,
-their large and increasing capital, the skilled
-workmen whom they had trained, and the first-class
-character of the work which they turned out, gave the
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_422">[422]</span>
-establishment of Boulton and Watt a prestige which
-they long continued to maintain.</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_443" style="width: 400px;">
-<img src="images/i_443.png" width="400" height="490" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">WILLIAM MURDOCK.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>The young partners had also the great advantage
-of the skilled heads of the different departments, who
-had been trained by long and valuable experience.
-For many years William Murdock was the Mentor
-of the firm. Though tempting offers of partnerships
-were made to him, he remained loyal to Boulton and
-Watt to the last. They treated him generously, and he
-was satisfied to spend his life in their service. He had
-gradually worked his way to the foremost place in their
-establishment, besides achieving reputation as an inventor
-and a man of practical science. His model
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_423">[423]</span>
-locomotive of 1784 was the first machine of the kind
-made in this country; and it is to be regretted that he
-did not pursue the subject. But Murdock was a very
-modest, unambitious man, content to keep in the background,
-and not possessed by that “pushing” quality
-which helps so many on to fortune. We have already
-stated that he invented the sun and planet motion,
-which was eventually adopted by Watt in preference to
-his own method of securing rotary motion. His daily
-familiarity with pumping-engines in Cornwall also led
-him to suggest and introduce many improvements in
-their details, which Boulton and Watt were always
-ready to adopt. He was a great favourite in Cornwall,
-and not less esteemed for his estimable and manly
-qualities than for his mechanical skill. When the
-adventurers heard of his intention to return to Soho,
-in 1798, they offered him 1000<i>l.</i> a year to continue at
-the mines, but he could not be tempted to remain.</p>
-
-<p>Returned to Soho, Murdock was invested with the
-general supervision and management of the mechanical
-department, in which he proved of essential value. He
-was regarded as “the right hand” of Boulton and
-Watt. He proceeded to introduce great improvements
-in the manufacture of the engines, contriving numerous
-machines for casting, boring, turning, and fitting the
-various parts together with greater precision. His
-plan of boring cylinders by means of an endless screw
-(turned by the moving power) working into a toothed
-wheel, whose axis carried the cutter head, instead of by
-spur gear, was found very useful in practice, and produced
-a much more smooth and steady motion of the
-machine. As early as 1785, he invented the first
-oscillating engine,<a name="Anchor-350" id="Anchor-350" href="#Footnote-350" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 350.">[350]</a> which still continues in use in
-various improved forms. His invention of the double
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_424">[424]</span>
-D slide valve, in place of the four poppet valves in Watt’s
-double engine,<a name="Anchor-351" id="Anchor-351" href="#Footnote-351" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 351.">[351]</a> was also found of great value; saving
-steam, and ensuring greater simplicity in the construction
-and working of the engine. In his oscillating engine
-the motion is given to the slide valve by the oscillation
-of the cylinder, and engines of small power still continue
-to be worked in this manner. Another of his improvements
-in engine construction was his method of casting
-the steam cases for cylinders in one piece, instead of
-in separate segments bolted together, according to the
-previous practice. He also invented a rotary engine
-of an ingenious construction; but though he had one
-erected to drive the machines in his private workshop,
-where it continued employed for about thirty years, it
-never came into general use.<a name="Anchor-352" id="Anchor-352" href="#Footnote-352" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 352.">[352]</a> Murdock had a good
-deal of the temperament of Watt: he was always
-scheming improvements, and was most assiduous in
-carrying them out. In such cases he would not
-trust to subordinates, but executed his designs himself
-wherever practicable; and he sometimes carried his
-labours so far into the night that the rising sun found
-him at his anvil or his turning lathe.</p>
-
-<p>Murdock is also entitled to the merit of inventing
-lighting by gas. The inflammable qualities of the air
-obtained by distillation of coal had long been known,<a name="Anchor-353" id="Anchor-353" href="#Footnote-353" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 353.">[353]</a>
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_425">[425]</span>
-but Murdock was the first to apply the knowledge to
-practical uses. The subject engaged much of his attention
-in the year 1792, when he resided at Redruth.
-As his days were fully occupied in attending to his
-employers’ engine business, it was only in the evenings,
-after the day’s work was over, that he could pursue the
-subject. It is not improbable that he was led to undertake
-the investigation by Mr. Boulton’s chemical enthusiasm,
-which communicated itself to all with whom he
-came in contact. It will be remembered that the latter
-occupied much of his leisure at Cosgarne in analysing
-earths, minerals, and vegetable substances, trying to
-find out the gases they contained; and Murdock was
-his zealous assistant on these occasions. In the paper
-which he communicated to the Royal Society on the
-subject of lighting by coal-gas in 1808, for which they
-awarded him their large Rumford Gold Medal, he observed,&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“It is now nearly sixteen years since (1792), in the course of
-experiments I was making at Redruth, in Cornwall, upon the
-quantities and qualities of the gas produced by distillation from
-different mineral and vegetable substances, that I was induced by
-some observations I had previously made upon the burning of coal,
-to try the combustible property of the gases produced from it, as
-well as from peat, wood, and other inflammable substances; and
-being struck with the great quantities of gas which they afforded,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_426">[426]</span>
-as well as the brilliancy of the light, and the facility of its
-production, I instituted several experiments with a view of
-ascertaining the cost at which it might be obtained, compared with
-that of equal quantities of light yielded by oils and tallow. My
-apparatus consisted of an iron retort, with tinned iron and copper
-tubes, through which the gas was conducted to a considerable
-distance; and there, as well as at intermediate points, was burnt
-through apertures of various forms and dimensions. The experiments
-were made upon coal of different qualities, which I procured
-from different parts of the kingdom for the purpose of ascertaining
-which would give the most economical results. The gas was also
-washed with water, and other means were employed to purify it.”<a name="Anchor-354" id="Anchor-354" href="#Footnote-354" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 354.">[354]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Murdock put his discovery to the best practical test
-by lighting up his house and offices at Redruth with
-gas; and he had a gas lantern constructed, with a jet
-attached to the bottom of the lantern and a bladder of
-gas underneath, with which he lighted himself home
-at night across the moors when returning from his
-work to his house at Redruth.<a name="Anchor-355" id="Anchor-355" href="#Footnote-355" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 355.">[355]</a> On the occasion of
-a visit which he made to Soho in 1794, he took the
-opportunity of mentioning to Mr. Watt the experiments
-he had made, and their results; expressing
-his conviction of the superior economy, safety, and
-illuminating qualities of coal-gas, compared with oils
-and tallow. He then suggested that a patent should
-be taken out for the application, and at various subsequent
-periods he urged the subject upon the attention
-of his principals. But they were at the time so harassed
-by litigation in connexion with their own steam-engine
-patent, that they were unwilling to enter upon any
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_427">[427]</span>
-new enterprise which might possibly lead them into
-fresh embroilments; and nothing was done to protect
-the invention.</p>
-
-<p>On Murdock’s return to Soho in 1798, he proceeded
-with his investigations, and contrived an apparatus
-for making, purifying, and storing the gas
-on a large scale; and several of the offices in the
-building were regularly lighted by its means. On
-the general illumination which took place in celebration
-of the Peace of Amiens in 1802, the front of Soho
-Manufactory was brilliantly illuminated with gas, to
-the astonishment and admiration of the public. The
-manageableness, the safety, the economy, and the brilliancy
-of the new light being thus proved, Boulton and
-Watt in 1803 authorised Murdock to proceed with the
-general fitting up of the manufactory with pipes and
-burners, and, from that date, it continued to be regularly
-lit up with coal-gas. Several large firms followed
-their example; amongst others Phillips and Lee, Burley,
-and Kennedy, at Manchester, and Gott and Sons, at
-Leeds; and the manufacture of gas-making apparatus
-became one of the regular branches of business at Soho.
-Several years later, in 1805, when Watt went down to
-Glasgow, he found gas in pretty general use.</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“The new lights,” he wrote to Boulton, “are much in vogue
-here; many have attempted them, and some have succeeded tolerably
-in lighting their shops with them. I also hear that a cotton-mill
-in this neighbourhood is lighted up with gas. A long account of
-the new lights was published in the newspapers some time ago, in
-which they had the candour to ascribe the invention to Mr. Murdock.
-From what I have heard respecting these attempts, I think there is
-full room for the Soho improvements,<a name="Anchor-356" id="Anchor-356" href="#Footnote-356" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 356.">[356]</a> though, when once they see
-one properly executed, it will have numerous imitations.”</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Several years after the introduction of the new light,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_428">[428]</span>
-a German, named Wintzer or Winsor, brought out (in
-1809) a scheme similar to one projected in Paris by
-Le Bon, for lighting the streets by gas. He proposed
-a Joint Stock Company, with a capital of 300,000<i>l.</i>,
-and held forth to subscribers the prospect of a profit
-of ten thousand per cent.!<a name="Anchor-357" id="Anchor-357" href="#Footnote-357" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 357.">[357]</a> He applied to Parliament
-for a Bill, against which Murdock petitioned,
-and was examined before the Committee. Though
-they were staggered by the crudities of Winsor, they
-had some difficulty even in accepting the more modest
-averments of Murdock as to the uses of coal-gas for
-lighting purposes. “Do you mean to tell us,” asked
-one member, “that it will be possible to have a light
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_429">[429]</span>
-<em>without a wick</em>?” “Yes, I do, indeed,” answered Murdock.
-“Ah, my friend,” said the legislator, “you are
-trying to prove too much.” It was as surprising and
-inconceivable to the honourable member as George
-Stephenson’s subsequent evidence before a Parliamentary
-Committee to the effect that a carriage might be drawn
-upon a railway at the rate of twelve miles an hour
-<em>without a horse</em>.</p>
-
-<p>No wonder that strange notions were entertained
-about gas in those early days. It seemed so incredible
-a contrivance, to make air that could be sent
-along pipes for miles from the place at which it was
-made to the place at which it issued as jets of fire, that
-it ran entirely counter to all preconceived notions on
-the subject of illumination. Even Sir Humphry Davy
-ridiculed the idea of lighting towns with gas, and asked
-one of the projectors if it were intended to take the
-dome of St. Paul’s for a gasometer; and Sir Walter
-Scott made many clever jokes about the absurdity of
-lighting London with smoke, though he shortly after
-adopted the said “smoke” for lighting up his own
-house at Abbotsford. It was popularly supposed that
-the gas was carried along the pipes on fire, and that
-hence the pipes must be intensely hot. Thus, when the
-House of Commons was first lighted up with gas,
-the architect insisted on the pipes being placed several
-inches from the wall for fear of fire, and members might
-be seen applying their gloved hands to them to ascertain
-their temperature, expressing the greatest surprise
-on their being found as cool as the adjoining walls.<a name="Anchor-358" id="Anchor-358" href="#Footnote-358" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 358.">[358]</a></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_430">[430]</span></p>
-
-<p>The advantages of the new light, however, soon
-became generally recognised; and gas companies were
-established in most of the large towns. Had Murdock
-patented the invention, it must have proved exceedingly
-remunerative to him; but he derived no advantage
-from the extended use of the new system of lighting
-except the honour of having initiated it,&mdash;though of
-this more than one attempt was made to deprive him.
-As he himself modestly said, in his paper read before
-the Royal Society, “I believe I may, without presuming
-too much, claim both the first idea of applying, and
-the first actual application of this gas to economical
-purposes.”</p>
-
-<p>Murdock’s attention was, however, diverted from
-prosecuting his discovery of the uses of gas to a profitable
-issue by his daily business, which was of a very
-engrossing character. He continued, nevertheless, an
-almost incessant contriver, improver, and inventor;
-following, like his master Watt, the strong bent of
-his inclinations. One of his most cherished schemes
-was the employment of compressed air as a motive
-power. He contrived to work a little engine of
-12-inch cylinder and 18-inch stroke, which drove the
-lathe in the pattern-shop, by means of the compressed
-air of the blast-engine employed in blowing the cupolas
-at the Soho Foundry; and this arrangement continued
-in use for a period of about thirty-five years. He also
-constructed a lift worked by compressed air, which
-raised and lowered the castings from the Boring-mill
-to the level of the Foundry and the Canal Bank.<a name="Anchor-359" id="Anchor-359" href="#Footnote-359" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 359.">[359]</a> He
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_431">[431]</span>
-used the same kind of power to ring the bells in his
-house at Sycamore Hill; and the contrivance was afterwards
-adopted by Sir Walter Scott at Abbotsford.<a name="Anchor-360" id="Anchor-360" href="#Footnote-360" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 360.">[360]</a> He
-experimented on the power of high-pressure steam in
-impelling shot, and contrived a steam-engine in 1803,
-with which he made many trials at Soho, in anticipation
-of Perkins’s apparatus. He was the inventor of the well-known
-cast-iron cement so extensively used in engine
-and machine work; and the manner in which he was
-led to it affords a striking illustration of his quickness of
-observation. Finding that some iron-borings and sal-ammoniac
-had got accidentally mixed together in his
-tool-chest and rusted his saw-blade nearly through, he
-took note of the circumstance, mixed the articles in
-various proportions, and at last arrived at the famous
-cement, which eventually became an article of extensive
-manufacture at the Soho works, completely superseding
-the cement invented by Watt. In 1810 he took out
-a patent for boring stone pipes for water, and cutting
-columns out of solid blocks by one operation. In 1815
-he invented an apparatus for heating the water for the
-Baths at Leamington by the circulation of water
-through pipes from a boiler,&mdash;a method since extensively
-adopted for heating buildings and garden-houses.
-While occupied in erecting the apparatus at Leamington,
-a heavy cast-iron plate fell upon his leg and severely
-crushed it, laying him up for many months.</p>
-
-<p>His ingenuity was constantly at work, even upon
-matters which lay entirely outside his special calling.
-Mr. Fairbairn informs us that he contrived a variety
-of curious machines for consolidating peat moss, finely
-ground and pulverised, under immense pressure, and
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_432">[432]</span>
-moulding it into beautiful medals, armlets, and necklaces,
-which took the most brilliant polish, and had the appearance
-of the finest jet. Observing that fish-skins might
-be used as an economical substitute for isinglass, he went
-up to London to explain to the brewers the best method
-of preparing and using them.<a name="Anchor-361" id="Anchor-361" href="#Footnote-361" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 361.">[361]</a> While in town on this
-errand, it occurred to him that there was an enormous
-waste of power in the feet of men and animals treading
-the streets of London, which might be economised and
-made productive; and he conceived the idea of using
-the streets as a grand treadmill, under which the waste
-power was to be stored up by mechanical methods,
-and turned to account! Another of his ingenious
-schemes&mdash;though then thought equally impracticable
-with that last mentioned&mdash;was his proposed method
-of transmitting letters and packages through a tube
-exhausted by an air-pump. This idea seems to have
-led to the projection of the Atmospheric Railway, the
-success of which, so far as it went, was again due to
-the practical ability of Murdock’s pupil Samuel Clegg.
-Though the atmospheric railway was eventually abandoned,
-it is remarkable that Murdock’s original idea
-has since been revived, and practised with success, by
-the London Pneumatic Despatch Company.</p>
-
-<p>Such is a brief sketch of the life and works of this
-estimable and ingenious mechanic, for so many years
-the mainstay of the Soho works. Mr. Fairbairn, who
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_433">[433]</span>
-first made his friendship at Manchester in 1816, speaks
-of him as one of the most distinguished veterans in
-mechanical engineering then living,&mdash;“tall and well-proportioned
-in figure, with a most intelligent and
-benevolent expression of countenance.” He was a man
-of robust constitution, and though he sorely taxed it, he
-lived to an old age, surviving the elder Boulton and
-Watt by many years.<a name="Anchor-362" id="Anchor-362" href="#Footnote-362" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 362.">[362]</a></p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_454" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_454.png" width="450" height="284" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">MURDOCK’S HOUSE, SYCAMORE HILL, HANDSWORTH.<a name="Anchor-363" id="Anchor-363" href="#Footnote-363" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 363.">[363]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_434">[434]</span></p>
-
-
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-<h3>CHAPTER XXI.<br />
-
-<small><span class="smcap">Application of Steam-power to Navigation&mdash;Miller and
-Symington&mdash;Boulton and Watt’s Engine adopted by
-Fulton.</span></small></h3>
-
-
-<p><span class="smcap">It</span> will be remembered that one of the early speculations
-of Roger Bacon related to the employment of engines of
-navigation without oarsmen, “so that the greatest river
-and sea ships, with only one man to steer them, may
-sail swifter than if they were fully manned,”&mdash;that one
-of the uses to which Papin proposed to apply the steam-engine
-was to “propel ships against the wind and
-tide,” in illustration of which he constructed his model
-steamboat,&mdash;and that, shortly after Newcomen’s engine
-had become generally introduced as a pumping power,
-Jonathan Hulls took out a patent with the object of
-applying it to tow ships into and out of harbours.
-Hulls was followed, after a long interval, by Jouffroy
-in France and by Fitch in America, but none of their
-experiments proved successful; and it was not until
-Watt invented the condensing engine that it was found
-practicable to employ steam as a regular propelling
-power in navigation.</p>
-
-<p>It was natural that the extraordinary success of Watt’s
-invention should direct attention anew to the subject.
-The engine, in the powerful, compact, economical, and
-manageable form, into which he had brought it, was
-found able to effect rotary motion in the various processes
-of manufacture; and, in a maritime country like
-England, the thought that would naturally occur to
-many minds would be this: If the steam-engine can
-drive mill-wheels, why may it not in like manner be
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_435">[435]</span>
-employed to drive the wheels of carriages by land and
-the paddle-wheels of vessels by sea? The subject was,
-indeed, often brought under the notice of both Boulton
-and Watt; but the anxiety, annoyance and expense
-to which they had been subjected in defending their
-original patent, deterred them from venturing on this
-new field of enterprise. Watt never made his proposed
-locomotive engine for running on common roads; and
-the model constructed by Murdock at Redruth in 1784,
-remained a model still.</p>
-
-<p>The subject was, however, shortly after taken up
-by William Symington, at Wanlockhead, in Scotland,
-where his father was employed as engineman in superintending
-the working of one of Boulton and Watt’s
-pumping-engines. The sight of this engine, and his
-father’s employment upon it, had probably the effect
-of first directing his attention to steam-power and its
-extended uses; and having heard of Murdock’s ingenious
-design from Boulton and Watt’s men, who were constantly
-visiting and inspecting the pumping-engine,<a name="Anchor-364" id="Anchor-364" href="#Footnote-364" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 364.">[364]</a> it
-occurred to him to try whether he could not himself
-construct the model of a steam-carriage for use on
-common roads. He succeeded in making his model, and
-when it was finished, Mr. Meason, the manager of the
-Wanlockhead Lead Mines, was so much pleased with it
-that he asked the young man to accompany him to
-Edinburgh, to show it to the leading men of science
-in that city. Mr. Meason allowed it to be exhibited
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_436">[436]</span>
-at his own house, Symington being in attendance to
-give explanations. Some of the Edinburgh professors,
-who came to see the model, were so much pleased with
-the youthful inventor (then only about twenty years of
-age), and the indications of mechanical genius which
-his machine displayed, that they strongly recommended
-Mr. Meason to enter him as a student at the University,
-which he readily assented to, and Symington accordingly
-matriculated at Edinburgh College in 1786, and, amongst
-other lectures, attended those of Dr. Black on Chemistry
-in the following session.</p>
-
-<p>The Scotch roads were in too bad a condition at the
-time to admit of their being run over by a locomotive,
-and Symington eventually abandoned his proposed
-scheme. But he had also an idea that the steam-engine
-might be economically applied to the working of boats
-on canals, or ships at sea; and with that object he
-invented an engine specially adapted for the purpose.
-This clearly appears from his correspondence with
-Thomas Gilbert, M.P., brother to the Duke of Bridgewater’s
-land steward. Mr. Gilbert had inspected the
-model of the steam-carriage while on a visit to Edinburgh,
-and at the same time had some conversation with
-Symington as to the employment of the steam-engine
-in hauling canal-boats, the result of which was that
-Symington promised to write him more fully on both
-topics. He proceeded to do so in a letter dated Wanlockhead,
-24th September, 1786; in which, after describing
-the dimensions, power, mode of working, and the probable
-price (about 70<i>l.</i>) of a full-sized locomotive, he proceeded&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“But an engine of the same power and apparatus for working
-boats on canals, will only coast about fifty pounds, and will only
-weight 110 st. Each strock of the engine will have a force equall to
-160 st. weight when applied, which undoubtedly will be able to drag
-a great weight upon water, when we run the proportion between
-it and what a man can do in a boat with common oars, whose
-exertion does not exceed more than 7 stones; but of this you will
-be a better judge than me. The engine we propose for working
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_437">[437]</span>
-the land-carriage is Mr. Watt’s, with some very material alterations;
-and before we can use it we must make an agreement with him,
-which we intend to propose immediately. But the engine we
-propose to work boats or ships with is an engine intirely of our own
-invention, and more powerful and better adapted for the purpose
-than Mr. Watt’s engine. This engine of our own we have presently
-at worke here is a large moddle, by which we have properly ascertained
-its power, and found it exceed Mr. Watt’s engine nearly two
-pounds upon each square inch on the piston, without any greater
-consumpt of coals. Another advantage attending our engine is its
-being little more complicated than the old engine that works with
-an atmospheric pressure. We are to use our endeavours immediately
-for a patent for this engine as well as our carriage; your assistance,
-when we get application made, will be of great service to us, and
-thankfully received by, Sir, &amp;c. &amp;c., <span class="smcap">William Symington</span>.”<a name="Anchor-365" id="Anchor-365" href="#Footnote-365" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 365.">[365]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>About the same time that Symington was exhibiting
-his model carriage in Edinburgh, Mr. Miller of Dalswinton
-was trying experiments at Leith in propelling boats
-by paddle-wheels worked by men at a capstan. He
-had a triple vessel built, with wheels placed inside, on
-turning which the vessel was impelled forward. It
-will be observed that this was but a repetition of the
-old experiment of Blasco Garay at Barcelona, and
-of Savery on the
-Thames. The experiments
-were on
-the whole successful,
-but the power
-employed in propelling
-the vessel
-was felt to be defective,
-and the
-turning of the capstan
-was very hard work, at which men could not be
-brought to work continuously for any long period.</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_458" style="width: 300px;">
-<img src="images/i_458.png" width="300" height="172" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">MILLER’S TRIPLE VESSEL.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_438">[438]</span></p>
-
-<p>Mr. Miller, being curious as to all mechanical novelties,
-went, amongst others, to see Symington’s model
-locomotive; and in the course of conversation with the
-inventor informed him of his own project, describing
-the difficulty he had experienced in getting his paddles
-turned for lack of power. The immediate remark of
-Symington was, <ins title="Transcriber's Note: changed single quote to double quote" id="Corr-438">“Why</ins> don’t you use the steam-engine?”
-He proceeded to show how easily the engine might be
-connected with the wheels of the boat, using the model
-of the steam-carriage before him to explain his meaning.
-Mr. Miller appeared to have been struck by the suggestion,
-and in the pamphlet which he shortly after
-published describing his new vessel, he referred to the
-probable employment of steam-power for the purpose of
-driving the paddles. “I have reason to believe,” he
-said, “that the power of the steam-engine may be
-applied to work the wheels, so as to give them a quicker
-motion, and consequently to increase that of the ship.
-In the course of this summer, I intend to make the
-experiment; and the result, if favourable, shall be communicated
-to the public.”<a name="Anchor-366" id="Anchor-366" href="#Footnote-366" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 366.">[366]</a></p>
-
-<p>Mr. Miller subsequently contrived and constructed a
-double vessel, 60 feet in length, worked by a paddle-wheel
-placed amidships between the two halves of the
-ship, with a clear waterway in the middle in which
-the paddle was worked, propelling the vessel. An
-experiment with this new ship was tried in June, 1787,
-which was considered successful. “The vessel being
-put in motion by the water-wheel, wrought by five
-men at the capstern, was steered so as to keep the wind
-right ahead, and her rate of going was found by the
-log to be three and a half miles in the hour.”<a name="Anchor-367" id="Anchor-367" href="#Footnote-367" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 367.">[367]</a> A sailing-match
-was arranged by Mr. Miller, in which he was
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_439">[439]</span>
-to run his vessel from Inchcolm (a small island in the
-Frith of Forth) to Leith, against a Custom-house wherry
-which was reckoned a fast sailer. In this race the
-double vessel beat by a few minutes. A young man
-named James Taylor, who officiated in Mr. Miller’s
-family as tutor to his two younger sons, was on board
-the vessel, and took his turn in working the wheels,
-which he found to be “very severe exercise.” In consequence
-of this trial and its results, Taylor became persuaded
-that unless a more commanding power than that
-of men could be applied, the invention of the paddle-ship
-would prove of little use; and on turning the matter
-over in his mind, he suggested to Mr. Miller the use
-of the steam-engine. This, however, was no new
-idea, as, from what we have already stated, it is clear
-that it had already occurred to Symington, who had
-even contrived an engine for the express purpose of
-propelling ships. As Taylor was intimate with Symington,
-and a fellow-student with him at Edinburgh College
-in the session of 1786&ndash;7, it is probable that Taylor
-obtained from him his first idea of the application of the
-steam-engine to Mr. Miller’s paddle-boat.</p>
-
-<p>The result of Symington’s and Taylor’s suggestion
-was, that Mr. Miller resolved to make a further experiment;
-and he ordered a double boat to be built and
-fitted with a steam-engine for trial on Dalswinton Loch,
-near his country-seat in Dumfriesshire, in the course
-of the following summer. Symington prepared the
-plans of the engine, the castings of which were executed
-by George Watt, an Edinburgh founder; and when the
-parts were ready, Symington and Taylor went together
-to Wanlockhead, in the summer of 1788, to have the
-engine erected and placed in the boat in readiness for
-the proposed trial.</p>
-
-<p>In the mean time, other projects of a similar kind
-were afoot; and Boulton and Watt continued to be
-solicited from different quarters on the subject of engines
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_440">[440]</span>
-for sailing ships. To these they continued to turn
-a deaf ear. They were willing to execute engines to
-order, but they declined to undertake them as speculations.
-Thus, in the spring of 1788, we find Sir John
-Dalrymple, one of the barons of the Court of Exchequer
-at Edinburgh, addressing Boulton on the subject of
-the proposed application of the steam-engine to the
-propulsion of ships, and the reply of the latter clearly
-shows what were then the views of the Soho firm on
-the subject:&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“<span class="smcap">Sir</span>,&mdash;I have just received the honour of your letter of the
-23rd inst., by which I observe you are intent upon applying
-the power of steam to the navigation of ships, boats, &amp;c.</p>
-
-<p>“It is one of the applications of our engine which Mr. Watt and
-I have often talked of, but we were deterred from the prosecution
-of it more from political than mechanical difficulties, as well as from
-some prudential reasons; besides which, we thought we could be
-more useful to the public and to ourselves by confining our attention
-to such subjects as were within the limits of our own powers and
-our own country. We still continue of that opinion, and are
-persuaded that it would be folly in us (who have our hands and
-heads full of solid and important business) to engage in any set of
-new experiments, or, like Charles XII., go in quest of conquest
-in foreign kingdoms, and leave our own to be conquered.</p>
-
-<p>“If you or your friends want any of our steam-engines for any
-purpose you may think proper to apply them to, we shall be
-very glad to serve you upon the usual terms; although I must
-confess that I should be sorry to see them applied to <em>one</em> purpose
-which perhaps may be of as much importance to this country
-some time or other as Admiral Drake’s fire-ship was on a former
-emergency.</p>
-
-<p>“I beg the favour of you not to consider me or Mr. Watt as
-schemers or projectors, but as men who are following their regular
-established trade and manufactures of great extent,&mdash;amongst
-others that of steam-engines,&mdash;and engineers, in which capacity we
-shall always be found attentive to your commands.”<a name="Anchor-368" id="Anchor-368" href="#Footnote-368" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 368.">[368]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Symington had many difficulties to encounter in
-erecting his engine at Leadhills. Though it was of
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_441">[441]</span>
-very small size, being of only about two horses power,
-with a four-inch cylinder, it required as much skill to
-construct as a much larger engine would have done.
-The arrangement of the power was new, as well as the
-application; and, as in the case of every new machine,
-where unforeseen defects were brought to light, new
-expedients had to be contrived for the purpose of overcoming
-them. Mr. Miller became impatient for its completion,
-and repeatedly wrote from Edinburgh urging
-despatch, fearing lest some other projector should get
-the start of him in applying the steam-engine to the
-driving of ships. Taylor, who managed the corresponding
-part of the enterprise, replied, “You need be under
-very little apprehension as to any person getting
-before you in this. It is easy in conversation, but very
-different in execution. However, as such a circumstance
-would be equally unpleasant to us, to prevent it you may
-depend upon the greatest expedition being used.”<a name="Anchor-369" id="Anchor-369" href="#Footnote-369" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 369.">[369]</a></p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_462" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_462.png" width="450" height="196" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">SYMINGTON’S FIRST STEAMBOAT ENGINE.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Taylor being further urged by his employer, again
-wrote from Leadhills on the 12th September, 1788,&mdash;“Mr.
-Symington and I are as busy here as we possibly
-can be. We work from six o’clock in the morning
-till dark in the evening, without losing a moment; also,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_442">[442]</span>
-to forward us the more, we have called in the aid
-of a watchmaker here, who works along with us. We
-are now in great forwardness, and will not be long
-of finishing. I could not ascertain to a day when it
-will happen, but believe we shall have it at Dalswinton
-some time before the end of the month.”<a name="Anchor-370" id="Anchor-370" href="#Footnote-370" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 370.">[370]</a></p>
-
-<p>The engine was shortly after finished, mounted in a
-strong oak frame, and taken to Dalswinton. It was
-then placed on the deck of Mr. Miller’s double pleasure-boat,
-twenty-four feet long and seven broad, which had
-been prepared for its reception.</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_463" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_463.png" width="450" height="240" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">MR. MILLER’S EXPERIMENTAL STEAMBOAT.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>The engine was placed on one side of the boat, the
-boiler on the other side to balance it, and the paddle-wheels
-in the middle; the rotary motion being obtained
-from the engine by chains, ratchet-wheels, and catches.
-The first experiment was tried on the 14th of October,
-1788, and proved successful, the engine being propelled
-at the rate of five miles an hour.<a name="Anchor-371" id="Anchor-371" href="#Footnote-371" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 371.">[371]</a> Among the persons
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_443">[443]</span>
-present on the occasion, besides Miller, Symington, and
-Taylor, were Alexander Nasmyth, the landscape painter,
-and Robert Burns, the poet, then a tenant of Mr. Miller
-on the neighbouring farm of Ellisland. After a few
-further experiments the engine was taken out of the
-boat and carried into Mr. Miller’s house, where it
-remained for many years, and was eventually deposited
-in the Museum of Patents at Kensington, where it is
-now to be seen.</p>
-
-<p>The experiments made with this first steamboat were
-so satisfactory that Mr. Miller resolved to try one upon
-a larger scale. By this time Messrs. Allen and Stewart,
-of Leith, had built for him another double vessel, ninety
-feet in length; and he wrote to Symington, requesting
-his estimate of the cost of fitting it with a suitable
-steam-engine. Symington’s reply was to the effect
-that a proper-sized engine for such a vessel would,
-in his opinion, be about 250<i>l.</i>, including the float-wheels.
-The necessary order was given, and Symington
-proceeded to the Carron Ironworks for the purpose of
-constructing it. The vessel arrived at Carron on the
-24th June, and by the month of November following
-the engine was finished and put on board ready for
-trial.<a name="Anchor-372" id="Anchor-372" href="#Footnote-372" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 372.">[372]</a> The result was not so satisfactory as in the case
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_444">[444]</span>
-of the experiment on Dalswinton Loch. The paddle-wheels
-were too weak; first one float and then another
-broke off; and the trial had to be suspended until the
-defects were remedied. The next trial was, however,
-more satisfactory. The vessel reached a speed of seven
-miles an hour; and this was repeated with the same
-result. There must, however, have been some defect
-in the engine performances; for, in a letter written by
-Miller to Taylor, who was present throughout, he
-expressed the opinion that Symington’s engine was
-altogether unsuitable for giving motion to a vessel.<a name="Anchor-373" id="Anchor-373" href="#Footnote-373" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 373.">[373]</a>
-He accordingly ordered the engine to be taken out
-and placed in the Carron Works, and the vessel itself
-to be laid up at Bruce Haven.</p>
-
-<p>Thus matters remained until the spring of the following
-year, when Mr. Miller decided on applying to
-Boulton and Watt for an engine of a proper construction,
-offering at the same time to associate them with
-him in his enterprise. The negotiation was opened by
-Robert, afterwards Lord Cullen, who addressed Watt
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_445">[445]</span>
-on the subject; but his reply was not encouraging.
-Like his partner, Watt was averse to new speculations;
-and he had had too much anxiety and worry in connexion
-with his original enterprise to enter upon any
-new one. It will also be observed that he entertained
-doubts as to the eventual success of ocean navigation by
-steam. The following was his reply:&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“<span class="smcap">Dear Sir</span>,&mdash;We have heard of Mr. Miller’s ingenious experiments
-on double ships from Sir John Dalrymple, and also some
-vague accounts of the experiments with the steam-engine, from which
-we could gather nothing conclusive, except that the vessel did move
-with a considerable velocity.</p>
-
-<p>“From what we heard of Mr. Symington’s engines, we were
-disposed to consider them as attempts to evade our exclusive
-privilege; but as we thought them so defective in mechanical
-contrivance as not to be likely to do us immediate hurt, we thought
-it best to leave them to be judged by Dame Nature first before we
-brought them to any earthly court.</p>
-
-<p>“We are much obliged to Mr. Miller for his favourable opinion
-of us and of our engines, which we hope experience would more and
-more justify. We are also fully sensible of his kind intentions in
-offering to associate us with him in his scheme; but the time of life
-we have both arrived at, and the multiplicity of business we are at
-present engaged in, must plead our excuse for entering into any
-new concern whatever as partners; but as engineers and engine-makers
-we are ready to serve him to the best of our abilities, at our
-customary prices, for rotative engines, and to assist in anything we
-can do to bring the scheme to perfection.</p>
-
-<p>“We conceive that there may be considerable difficulty in making
-a steam-engine to work regularly in the open sea, on account of the
-undulating motion of the vessel affecting the <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">vis inertiæ</i> of the matter;
-however, this we should endeavour to obviate as far as we could.</p>
-
-<p>“It may not be improper to mention that Earl Stanhope has
-lately taken a patent for moving a vessel by steam, but not by
-wheels. His Lordship has also applied to us for engines; but we
-believe we are not likely to agree with him, as he lays too much
-stress upon his own ingenuity.</p>
-
-<p>“We cannot conclude without observing, that were we disposed
-to enter into any new concern whatever, there is no person we
-should prefer to Mr. Miller as an associate, being fully apprised
-of his worth and honour, and admirers of the ingenuity and industry
-with which he has pursued this scheme.</p>
-
-<p>“Permit me now, Sir, to return you my thanks for your obliging
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_446">[446]</span>
-attention to me, and for the trouble you have taken in this affair,
-and to ask the favour of your presenting Boulton and Watt’s
-respectful compliments to Mr. Miller.&mdash;I remain, dear Sir, &amp;c. &amp;c.,</p>
-
-
-<p class="sig">“<span class="smcap">James Watt</span>.”<a name="Anchor-374" id="Anchor-374" href="#Footnote-374" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 374.">[374]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Mr. Miller proceeded no further with his experiments,
-on which he had already expended a large sum of
-money. He seems to have lost faith in the applicability
-of the steam-engine to the propulsion of ships, and
-reverted to his original idea, as we find him taking out
-a patent in 1796 for a new kind of flat-bottomed ship,
-which he proposed to impel during calms by means of
-wheels worked by capstans; but he makes no mention
-whatever of the use of the steam-engine.</p>
-
-<p>Symington was greatly disappointed with the result
-of his experiments. Being without the means of carrying
-the steamboat further, he feared that all his past
-labours would prove in vain, and that some more
-fortunate speculator would carry off the prize that
-seemed almost within his grasp. The subject was not,
-however, allowed to sleep. Fitch and Evans were
-pursuing the invention in America; Rumsey, another
-American, came over to England in 1788, with a scheme
-for propelling boats by steam; and Fourness and Earl
-Stanhope were making experiments in the same direction;
-but none of them had yet succeeded in constructing
-a practicable working steamboat. Thus ten
-more years passed, during which other inventors came
-forward, took out patents, made their trials, failed, and
-disappeared.</p>
-
-<p>In the year 1801 Symington had another chance.
-Lord Dundas, Governor of the Forth and Clyde Canal
-Company, had been revolving in his mind whether
-some more expeditious and economical method than
-horse-power might not be contrived for hauling the
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_447">[447]</span>
-boats along the canal; and, being aware of the experiments
-made by Miller and Symington ten years before,
-he determined to give Symington’s engine another trial.
-A boat was accordingly built for the purpose of the
-experiment, and named the ‘Charlotte Dundas,’ after
-his Lordship’s daughter. For this vessel Symington
-contrived a steam-engine of a greatly improved character.
-It was a direct-acting engine, the steam acting
-on each side of the piston, after the method invented
-by Watt, whose patent had now expired; the rotary
-motion of the paddle-wheels being secured by means of
-a connecting-rod and crank, instead of by chains and
-<ins title="Transcriber's Note: original reads 'ratched'" id="Corr-447">ratchet</ins>-wheels, as in the first two boats.</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_468" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_468.png" width="450" height="195" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">MACHINERY OF THE ‘CHARLOTTE DUNDAS.’</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>The first trial of the vessel was perfectly satisfactory.
-After making a trip to Glasgow, she was employed in
-towing vessels along the canal. She was also occasionally
-sent down the Frith to bring up ships detained
-by contrary winds to the canal entrance at Grangemouth.<a name="Anchor-375" id="Anchor-375" href="#Footnote-375" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 375.">[375]</a></p>
-
-<p>Fortune at length seemed to smile on poor Symington,
-and his spirits were proportionately <ins title="Transcriber's Note: original reads 'elate'" id="Corr-447b">elated</ins> at the
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_448">[448]</span>
-result of these important experiments. He had, in
-fact, achieved a decided success in the ‘Charlotte
-Dundas,’&mdash;in which he combined together, for the first
-time, those improvements which constitute the present
-system of Steam Navigation. Indeed Mr. Woodcroft,
-a competent judge, says that “the vessel might, from
-the simplicity of its machinery, have been at work at
-this day with such ordinary repairs as are now occasionally
-required to all steamboats.”<a name="Anchor-376" id="Anchor-376" href="#Footnote-376" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 376.">[376]</a></p>
-
-<p>Lord Dundas was so well satisfied with the performances
-of the vessel that he proposed to introduce the
-inventor to the Duke of Bridgewater, the great canal
-proprietor, who had expressed to him his wish to
-employ some method of hauling his boats more effective
-than horse-power. His Lordship accordingly directed
-Symington to have a model of his steamboat constructed
-for the purpose of showing it to the Duke.
-Symington went up to London himself to explain its
-mechanical arrangements, and the Duke was so much
-pleased with it that he ordered eight boats of the same
-construction to be made as speedily as possible for use
-upon his canal. Symington returned to Scotland to
-proceed with the execution of this important order.</p>
-
-<p>But in the moment of his apparent triumph fate
-again proved hostile to the inventor. Though Lord
-Dundas was fully satisfied with the performances of
-the ‘Charlotte Dundas,’ and hailed the use of steam
-as the beginning of a new era in navigation, the
-proprietors of the canal became seriously alarmed
-lest the banks should be washed away by the waves
-which the steamboat raised in its wake, and they
-came to the resolution of prohibiting all further experiments.
-To add to Symington’s vexation, the very
-same day on which this adverse decision of the canal
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_449">[449]</span>
-managers reached him, he received intelligence of
-the death of the Duke of Bridgewater, and an order
-to suspend the erection of the eight steamboats until
-fresh instructions had been given. By this time Lord
-Dundas had expended about 7000<i>l.</i> on his experiments,
-and was not disposed to proceed any further with them.
-The ‘Charlotte Dundas,’ the first successful steamboat,
-was accordingly laid up at Bainsford, in a creek of the
-canal; and the attempt to introduce steam navigation
-on canals was from that time suspended.<a name="Anchor-377" id="Anchor-377" href="#Footnote-377" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 377.">[377]</a></p>
-
-<p>Symington’s experiments, though they proved most
-unfortunate as respected himself, nevertheless led to the
-adoption of the system of navigation by steam both in
-America and Scotland. Among the many visitors who
-inspected the ‘Charlotte Dundas’ were Fulton the
-American artist, and Andrew Bell the engineer, of
-Glasgow. Fulton was on board the first vessel in the
-month of July, 1801, when she made a run of eight
-miles on the Forth and Clyde Canal in an hour and
-twenty minutes; on which occasion he narrowly inquired
-into the action of the engine and paddle-wheels, and
-made careful sketches of the vessel and her machinery.<a name="Anchor-378" id="Anchor-378" href="#Footnote-378" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 378.">[378]</a>
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_450">[450]</span>
-Andrew Bell also made frequent visits to the ‘Charlotte
-Dundas,’ as well as to the pattern shop where the
-models of the machinery were kept; and there is little
-doubt that, like Fulton, he obtained his ideas of steam
-navigation principally from what Symington had accomplished.
-Fulton and Bell were well acquainted with
-each other,<a name="Anchor-379" id="Anchor-379" href="#Footnote-379" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 379.">[379]</a> and kept up a correspondence on the subject
-of steamboats. Bell, according to his own account,
-supplied Fulton with information and drawings of
-steamboat machinery; and it was by his recommendation
-that Fulton ordered the engine for his first successful
-steamboat from Boulton and Watt.</p>
-
-<p>With the information obtained at Grangemouth, Fulton
-proceeded to Paris, where we shortly find him in
-communication with Mr. Livingstone, the United States’
-envoy, who, like Fulton, took much interest in the subject
-of steam navigation. They had a model steamboat
-built for trial on the Seine; but when on the
-point of making the first experiment, the weight of
-the machinery broke the boat in two, and the whole
-went down together. Fulton’s greatest difficulty, as was
-to be expected, consisted in finding a suitable engine to
-propel his proposed boat, and he wrote to his friends
-in England on the subject. In March, 1802, we find
-him addressing Dr. Cartwright, who had invented an improvement
-in the steam-engine, which he thought would
-render it more suitable for driving vessels, requesting to
-be informed of the cost of one of six horse power, with
-particulars of its size and weight. Fulton communicated
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_451">[451]</span>
-to his correspondent that, besides his proposed
-steamboat, he was experimenting on his ‘Nautilus’ or
-diving-boat for navigating under water; the object of
-this invention being to blow up the English ships
-of war which were then blockading the French ports.
-The experiments with the ‘Nautilus’ under water were
-said to have proved tolerably successful, though it had not
-yet succeeded in blowing up any of the English ships.</p>
-
-<p>Not being able to obtain any satisfactory information
-from Dr. Cartwright, Fulton addressed a letter to
-James Watt, jun., of Soho, requesting to be informed
-of the price of a light and compact engine for his
-proposed vessel. “The object of my investigation,”
-he said, “is to find whether it is possible to apply
-the engine to working boats up our long rivers in
-America. The persons who have made such attempts
-have commenced by what they call improving Watt’s
-engine, but without having an idea of the physics which
-lie hid in it from common observers; but such improvements
-have appeared to me like the improvements of
-the preceptor of Alcibiades, who corrected Homer for
-the use of his scholars. Their ill success, and their
-never having found a good mode of taking a purchase
-in the water, are the reasons why they have all failed.
-Having, during the course of my experiments on submersive
-navigation, found an excellent mode of taking
-a purchase on the water, I wish to apply the engine to
-the movement. The only thing wanting is to arrange
-the engine as light and compact as possible.”<a name="Anchor-380" id="Anchor-380" href="#Footnote-380" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 380.">[380]</a></p>
-
-<p>The information asked for was duly communicated to
-Fulton, and a few months later he sent Boulton and
-Watt the drawings of parts of an engine which he
-requested them to make for him. By this time the
-rumour had gone abroad of the destructive powers of
-the ‘Nautilus,’ and Lord Stanhope publicly called
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_452">[452]</span>
-attention to the subject in the House of Lords, representing
-the dangerous character of the invention. On
-Fulton’s order reaching Soho, Boulton suspected that it
-might really be intended for the ‘Nautilus,’ and he at
-once communicated with Government on the subject.
-To Lord Hawkesbury he wrote,&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“I presume your Lordship is not unacquainted with the name
-of Fulton. I mean Fulton the engineer and pretended inventor of
-an infernal machine for destroying the British Navy. He is the
-same person whom Lord Stanhope alluded to in some of his speeches
-in the House of Peers.</p>
-
-<p>“I never had any transaction or acquaintance with him.
-However, he has written to my house (Boulton and Watt) from
-Paris, and has transmitted drawings of sundry parts of a steam-engine.
-The remainder, he says, is to be executed under his own
-directions, and though he orders them to be shipped for America,
-it is not impossible but they may be transhipped before they reach
-there.</p>
-
-<p>“The drawings and letter were delivered to my house in London-street
-by a Mr. Barlow; and as he refers to Sir Francis Baring for
-payment, I directed my agent (Mr. John Woodward) to call upon
-Sir Francis, and in consequence thereof he wrote to my house a letter,
-of which I enclose a correct copy as well as of Mr. Fulton’s.</p>
-
-<p>“Whatever doubts we may have of his project, we have none
-respecting the propriety of acquainting your Lordship with every
-particular as to this matter that has come to our knowledge.”<a name="Anchor-381" id="Anchor-381" href="#Footnote-381" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 381.">[381]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Boulton concluded by requesting instructions how to
-act; but all necessity for further caution was shortly
-after removed by Fulton coming over to England and
-imparting his secret to the British Government. An
-old Danish brig was placed at his disposal in Walmer
-Roads, and after two days’ effort, during which he
-was assisted by Sir Home Popham, he eventually succeeded
-in blowing up the vessel; but he accomplished
-his purpose with so much difficulty, that from that time
-no further fears were entertained of the much dreaded
-‘Nautilus.’</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_453">[453]</span></p>
-
-<p>In the following year the steam-engine ordered by
-Fulton for his proposed boat was proceeded with at
-Soho. It was of about nineteen horse power. The
-cylinder was 24 inches in diameter, and the stroke
-four feet. The dimensions were as nearly as possible
-the same as those of Symington’s ‘Charlotte Dundas’
-engine; and Mr. Woodcroft pertinently remarks that
-“such similarity in the dimensions cannot easily be
-imagined to have been accidental.” The engine, when
-finished, was sent to America early in 1805. She was
-there fitted on board the vessel which had been prepared
-for her reception; and the first voyage of Fulton
-and Livingstone’s ‘Clermont’ was made in August,
-1807, when a speed of nearly four miles an hour was
-attained. This was the first vessel that ran regularly
-for commercial purposes and for the benefit of her
-owners; and though Fulton neither invented the ship,
-nor the engine by which she was driven, nor the combination
-of the two, he was entitled to every merit for
-the perseverance and ability with which he carried his
-important enterprise to a successful issue.</p>
-
-<p>A few years later Henry Bell, in like manner, introduced
-steam navigation on the Clyde. He had at an
-early period pressed the subject on the consideration
-of the Government, but failed to induce them to take
-up the scheme.<a name="Anchor-382" id="Anchor-382" href="#Footnote-382" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 382.">[382]</a> He then resolved himself to start a
-steamboat, as the best and most practical method of
-exhibiting its powers; and the ‘Comet,’ of thirty tons
-burthen, was built to his order by Messrs. John Wood
-and Company, of Port Glasgow. The vessel began
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_454">[454]</span>
-to ply regularly between Glasgow and Greenock in
-August, 1812;<a name="Anchor-383" id="Anchor-383" href="#Footnote-383" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 383.">[383]</a> and before long Clyde steamers were
-known all over the world.</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_475" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_475.png" width="450" height="238" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">THE ‘COMET’ PASSING DUMBARTON.</p>
-<p class="caption">[By R. P. Leitch.]</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>It will thus be observed how very gradual has been
-the invention of the steamboat. It has been made step
-by step, by many men living in many ages. First, we
-have Blasco Garay making experiments with paddle-wheels
-in the harbour of Barcelona three hundred years
-ago, the revival probably of some old and half-forgotten
-method of propelling ships; then the repetition of
-the experiment by Prince Rupert and Savery in the
-Thames more than a hundred and fifty years later; next
-Savery’s invention of his steam-engine, followed by
-Papin’s idea of combining the engine with the paddles,
-and his construction of a model to illustrate its practicability.
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_455">[455]</span>
-Later, we have Jonathan Hulls’s patent
-for his steamboat, in which the engine was worked
-by atmospheric pressure, followed by numerous experiments
-with a like object, in England, France, and
-America. The invention of the condensing engine of
-Watt, and its application to rotary motions, was the
-next great step. Miller’s revival of the experiments
-with paddle-wheels led to the application by Symington
-of Papin’s idea of combining the steam-engine with the
-paddles, which he at length successfully worked out in
-the ‘Charlotte Dundas.’ And finally the invention was
-applied to practical purposes by Fulton and Livingstone
-in America, and by Bell in Scotland.</p>
-
-<p>And thus became established, in the eloquent words
-of George Canning, “the new and mighty power, new
-at least in the application of its might, which walks
-the waters like a giant rejoicing in its course, stemming
-alike the tempest and the tide, accelerating intercourse,
-shortening distances, creating, as it were, unexpected
-neighbourhoods, and new combinations of social and
-commercial relations, and giving to the fickleness of
-winds and the faithlessness of waves the certainty and
-steadiness of a highway upon the land.” But it is a
-noteworthy fact, that it was not until the invention of
-James Watt was applied to the purposes of steam
-navigation that its practicability was established and
-its success secured. Until then, all the experiments
-which had been made were regarded as comparatively
-fruitless, though they were leading step by step to the
-great result; and to this day the engines constructed
-after Watt’s principle continue to be the great motive
-power alike of river and ocean navigation.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_456">[456]</span></p>
-
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_477" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_477.png" width="450" height="421" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">WATT’S HOUSE, HEATHFIELD.</p>
-<p class="caption">[By Percival Skelton.]</p>
-</div>
-
-
-<h3>CHAPTER XXII.<br />
-
-<small><span class="smcap">Declining Years of Boulton and Watt&mdash;Bereavements&mdash;Gregory
-Watt&mdash;Death of Boulton.</span></small></h3>
-
-
-<p><span class="smcap">On</span> the dissolution of the original partnership between
-Boulton and Watt at the expiry of the patent in 1800,
-Boulton was seventy-two years old, and Watt sixty-four.
-The great work of their life had been done, and
-the time was approaching when they must needs resign
-into other hands the great branches of industry which
-they had created. Watt, though the younger of the
-two, was the first to withdraw from an active share in
-the concerns of Soho. He could scarcely be said to
-taste the happiness of life until he had cast business
-altogether behind him.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_457">[457]</span></p>
-
-<p>It was far different with Boulton, to whom active
-occupation had become a second nature. For several
-years, indeed, his constitution had been showing signs
-of giving way, and nature was repeating her warnings,
-at shorter recurring intervals, that it was time to retire.
-But in the case of men such as Boulton, with whom
-business has become a habit and necessity, as well as a
-pleasure and recreation, to retire is often to die. He
-himself was accustomed to say that he must either
-“rub or rust;” and as the latter was contrary to his
-nature, he rubbed on to the end, continuing to take
-an active interest in the working of the great manufactory
-which it had been the ambition of his life to
-build up.</p>
-
-<p>The department of business that most interested him
-in his later years was the coinage. His chief pleasure consisted
-in seeing his new and beautiful pieces following each
-other in quick succession from the Soho Mint. Nor did
-he cease occupying himself with new inventions; for we
-find him as late as 1797 taking out a patent for raising
-water by impulse, somewhat after the manner of Montgolier’s
-Hydraulic Ram, to which he added many
-ingenious improvements. His house at Soho continued
-to be the resort of distinguished visitors; and his
-splendid hospitality never failed. But, as years advanced
-and his infirmities increased, we find him
-occasionally expressing a desire for quiet. He would
-then retire to Cheltenham for the benefit of the waters,
-requesting his young partners to keep him advised
-from time to time of the proceedings at Soho. Thus
-we find young Watt writing him during his absence on
-one occasion,&mdash;“Everything is going on well here: the
-Mint works six presses at present with ease; but,
-unless you have secured a supply of copper, I fear
-they will soon work out the present stock.” In the
-same letter his young friend advised him that he had
-duly despatched the chemical apparatus; for even at
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_458">[458]</span>
-Cheltenham Boulton could not be idle, but undertook
-a careful analysis of all the waters of the place, the
-results of which he entered, in minute detail, in his
-memorandum-books.</p>
-
-<p>An alarming incident occurred at Soho towards the
-end of 1800, which is worthy of passing notice, as
-illustrative of Boultons vigour and courage even at
-this advanced period of his life. A large gang of
-Birmingham housebreakers, knowing the treasures
-accumulated in the silver-plate house, determined to
-break into it and carry off the silver, as well as
-the large sum of money usually accumulated in the
-counting-house for the purpose of paying the wages
-of the workmen, upwards of 600 in number, on Christmas
-Eve. They had provided false keys for most of
-the doors, and bribed the watchman, who communicated
-the plot to Boulton, to admit them within the gates.
-He took his steps accordingly, arming a number of men,
-and stationing them in different parts of the building.</p>
-
-<p>The robbers made the attempt on three several occasions.
-On the first night they tried their keys on the
-counting-house door, but failed to open it, on which
-they shut their dark lantern and retired. Boulton sent
-an account of the proceedings each night to his daughter
-in London. On the first attempt being made, he wrote,&mdash;“The
-best news I can send you is that we are all alive;
-but I have lost my voice and found a troublesome
-cough by the agreeable employment of thief-watching.”
-Two nights after, the burglars came again, with altered
-keys, but still they could not open the counting-house
-door. The third night they determined to waive
-art, and break in by force. They were allowed to
-break in and seize their booty, and were making off
-with 150 guineas and a load of silver, when Boulton
-gave the word to seize them. A quantity of tow soaked
-with turpentine was instantly set fire to, numerous
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_459">[459]</span>
-lights were turned on, and the robbers found themselves
-surrounded on all sides by armed men. Four of them
-were taken after a desperate struggle; but the fifth,
-though severely wounded, contrived to escape over
-the tops of the houses in Brook-row.</p>
-
-<p>Writing to his friend Dumergue, in London, of the
-exploit, Boulton said,&mdash;“You know I seldom do things
-by halves; so I have sent the four desperate wolves to
-Stafford Gaol, and I believe the fifth is much wounded.
-If I had made my attack with a less powerful army
-than I did, we should probably have had a greater list
-of killed and wounded.”<a name="Anchor-384" id="Anchor-384" href="#Footnote-384" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 384.">[384]</a> It was in allusion to this
-exploit that Sir Walter Scott said of Boulton to Allan
-Cunningham, “I like Boulton; he is a brave man, and
-who can dislike the brave?”<a name="Anchor-385" id="Anchor-385" href="#Footnote-385" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 385.">[385]</a> The incident, when
-communicated to Scott during one of his visits to Soho,
-is said to have suggested the scene in ‘Guy Mannering,’
-in which the attack is made on Dirk Hatterick in the
-smuggler’s cave.</p>
-
-<p>With Watt, occupation in business was not the necessity
-that it was to Boulton; and he was only too glad
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_460">[460]</span>
-to get rid of it and engage in those quiet pursuits in
-which he found most pleasure. In the year 1790, he
-removed from the house he had so long occupied on
-Harper’s Hill, to a new and comfortable house which
-he had built for himself at Heathfield in the parish of
-Handsworth, where he continued to live until the close
-of his life. The land surrounding the place was, until
-then, common, and he continued to purchase the lots
-as they were offered for sale, until, by the year 1794,
-he had enclosed about forty acres. He took pleasure
-in laying out the grounds, planting many of the trees
-with his own hands; and in course of time, as the
-trees reached maturity, the formerly barren heath became
-converted into a retreat of great rural beauty.</p>
-
-<p>Annexed to the house, in the back yard, he built
-a forge, and upstairs, in his “Garret,” he fitted up
-a workshop, in which he continued to pursue his
-mechanical studies and experiments for many years.
-While Watt was settling himself for the remainder of
-his life in the house at Heathfield, Boulton was erecting
-his large new Mint at Soho, which was completed
-and ready for use in 1791.</p>
-
-<p>When the lawsuits, which had given Watt so much
-anxiety, were satisfactorily disposed of, an immense
-load was removed from his mind; and he indulged in
-the anticipation of at last enjoying the fruits of his
-labour in peace. Being of frugal habits, he had already
-begun to save money, and indeed accumulated as much
-as he desired. But when the heavy arrears of Cornish
-dues were collected, about the period of expiry of the
-patent, a considerable sum of money necessarily fell
-to Watt’s share; and then he began to occupy himself
-in the pleasant recreation of looking out for an investment
-of it in land. He was, however, hard to please,
-and made many journeys before he succeeded in buying
-his estate.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_461">[461]</span></p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“I have yet met with nothing to my mind,” he wrote from
-Somerton; “Lord Oxford has some very considerable estates to sell
-near Abergavenny, but the roads to them are execrable, and it
-seemed that it would be a sort of banishment to live at them,
-though the parts I saw are in themselves pleasant. I am to-day
-informed of one with a house near Dorchester, which I have sent to
-inquire about, though I have my doubts that it will prove like the
-rest. I propose, if nothing hinders, to be at Taunton to-morrow
-night, and shall then visit the Wedgwoods, who at present live at
-Upcot, near that place. Afterwards, I propose making a tour
-through the eastern part of Devonshire, and returning by Dorsetshire
-to Bath; but my resolves may be altered by the attractions of
-various magnets, so that I cannot tell you where to write to me till
-I get some fixed residence.”<a name="Anchor-386" id="Anchor-386" href="#Footnote-386" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 386.">[386]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>A fortnight later he was at Exmouth, but still undecided.</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“In respect to estates,” he writes,&mdash;“I have seen nothing that
-pleases me. Most of them, as you know by experience, are
-surrounded with bad roads, beggarly villages, or some other
-nuisance, and one need not purchase plagues. On the whole,
-something nearer home seems more suitable to me than anything
-in these western counties, which, though they have more luxuriant
-vegetation, and perhaps a milder climate, are not exempt from cold,
-as I experience here colder weather than we had last autumn in
-Scotland. But the greatest drawback is the absence of such society
-as one is used to, and their abominably hilly roads, as they never
-flinch, but go straight up any hill which comes in their way, and
-Nature has bestowed plenty upon them.”<a name="Anchor-387" id="Anchor-387" href="#Footnote-387" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 387.">[387]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Eventually Watt made several purchases of land at
-Doldowlod, on the hanks of the Wye, between Rhayader
-and Newbridge, in Radnorshire. There was a pleasant
-farmhouse on the property, in which he occasionally
-spent some pleasant months in summer time amidst
-beautiful scenery; but he had by this time grown too
-old to root himself kindly in a new place; and his
-affections speedily drew him back again to the neighbourhood
-of Soho, and to his comfortable home at
-Heathfield.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_462">[462]</span></p>
-
-<p>During the short peace of Amiens in the following
-year, he made the longest journey in his life. Accompanied
-by Mrs. Watt, he travelled through Belgium,
-up the banks of the Rhine to Frankfort, and home by
-Strasburg and Paris. While absent, Boulton wrote
-him many pleasant letters, telling him of what was
-going on at Soho. The brave old man was still at the
-helm there, and wrote in as enthusiastic terms as ever
-of the coins and medals he was striking at his Mint.
-Though strong in mind, he was, however, growing
-feebler in body, and suffered much from attacks of his
-old disease. “It is necessary for me,” he wrote, “to
-pass a great part of my time in or upon the bed; nevertheless,
-I go down to the manufactory or the Mint
-once or twice a day, without injuring myself as heretofore,
-but not without some fatigue. However, as
-I am now taking bark twice a day, I find a daily
-increase of strength, and flatter myself with the pleasure
-of taking a journey to Paris in April or May next.”<a name="Anchor-388" id="Anchor-388" href="#Footnote-388" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 388.">[388]</a></p>
-
-<p>On Watt’s arrival in London, a letter of hearty
-welcome from Boulton met him; but it conveyed, at
-the same time, the sad intelligence of the death of
-Mrs. Keir, a lady beloved by all who knew her, and
-a frequent inmate at Soho and Heathfield. One by
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_463">[463]</span>
-one the members of the circle were departing, leaving
-wide gaps, which new friends could never fill up. The
-pleasant associations which are the charm of old friendships,
-were becoming mingled with sadness and regret.
-The grave was closing over one after another of the
-Soho group; and the survivors were beginning to live
-for the most part upon the memories of the past. But it
-is one of the penalties of old age to suffer a continuous
-succession of such bereavements; and that state would
-be intolerable but for the comparative deadening of
-the feelings which mercifully accompanies the advance
-of years. “We cannot help feeling with deep regret,”
-wrote Watt, “the circle of our old friends gradually
-diminishing, while our ability to increase it by new
-ones is equally diminished; but perhaps it is a wise
-dispensation of Providence so to diminish our enjoyments
-in this world that when our turn comes we
-may leave it without regret.”<a name="Anchor-389" id="Anchor-389" href="#Footnote-389" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 389.">[389]</a></p>
-
-<p>One of the deaths most lamented by Watt was that
-of Dr. Black of Edinburgh, which occurred in 1799.
-Black had watched to the last with tender interest
-the advancing reputation and prosperity of his early
-protégé. They had kept up a continuous and confidential
-correspondence on subjects of mutual interest
-for a period of about thirty years. Watt, though
-reserved to others, never feared unbosoming himself to
-his old friend, telling him of the new schemes he had on
-foot, and freely imparting to him his hopes and fears,
-his failures and successes. When Watt visited Scotland
-he rarely failed to take Edinburgh on his way, for
-the purpose of spending a few days with Black and
-Robison. The latter went express to London, for the
-purpose of giving evidence in the suit of Watt against
-the Hornblowers, and his testimony proved of essential
-service. “Our friend Robison,” Watt wrote to Black,
-“<span class="pagenum" id="Page_464">[464]</span>
-exerted himself much; and, considering his situation,
-did wonders.” When Robison returned to Edinburgh,
-his Natural Philosophy class received him with three
-cheers. He proceeded to give them a short account
-of the trial, which he characterised as “not more
-the cause of Watt <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">versus</i> Hornblower, than of science
-against ignorance.” “When I had finished,” said he, “I
-got another plaudit, that Mrs. Siddons would have
-relished.”<a name="Anchor-390" id="Anchor-390" href="#Footnote-390" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 390.">[390]</a></p>
-
-<p>No one was more gratified at the issue of the trial
-than Dr. Black, who, when Robison told him of it, was
-moved even to tears. “It’s very foolish,” he said, “but
-I can’t help it when I hear of anything good to Jamie
-Watt.” The Doctor had long been in declining health,
-but was still able to work. He was busy writing another
-large volume, and had engaged the engraver to come
-to him for orders on the day after that on which he
-died. His departure was singularly peaceful. His
-servant had delivered to him a basin of milk, which
-was to serve for his dinner, and retired from the room.
-In less than a minute he returned, and found his master
-sitting where he had left him, but dead, with the basin
-of milk unspilled in his hand. Without a struggle, the
-spirit had fled. As the servant expressed it, “his poor
-master had given over living.” He had twice before
-said to his doctor that “he had caught himself forgetting
-to breathe.” On hearing of the good old man’s
-death, Watt wrote to Robison,&mdash;“I may say that to
-him I owe, in a great measure, what I am; he taught
-me to reason and experiment in natural philosophy,
-and was a true friend and philosopher, whose loss
-will always be lamented while I live. We may all
-pray that our latter end may be like his; he has truly
-gone to sleep in the arms of his Creator, and been spared
-all the regrets attendant on a more lingering exit.
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_465">[465]</span>
-I could dwell longer on this subject; but regrets are
-unavailing, and only tend to enfeeble our own minds,
-and make them less able to bear the ills we cannot
-avoid. Let us cherish the friends we have left, and
-do as much good as we can in our day!”<a name="Anchor-391" id="Anchor-391" href="#Footnote-391" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 391.">[391]</a></p>
-
-<p>Lord Cockburn, in his ‘Memorials,’ gives the following
-graphic portrait of the father of modern chemistry:&mdash;“Dr.
-Black was a striking and beautiful person; tall,
-very thin, and cadaverously pale; his hair carefully
-powdered, though there was little of it except what was
-collected into a long thin queue; his eyes dark, clear,
-and large, like deep pools of pure water. He wore
-black speckless clothes, silk stockings, silver buckles,
-and either a slim green silk umbrella, or a genteel brown
-cane. His general frame and air was feeble and slender.
-The wildest boy respected Black. No lad could be
-irreverent towards a man so pale, so gentle, so elegant,
-and so illustrious. So he glided, like a spirit, through
-our rather mischievous sportiveness, unharmed.”<a name="Anchor-392" id="Anchor-392" href="#Footnote-392" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 392.">[392]</a></p>
-
-<p>Of the famous Lunar Society, Boulton and Watt now
-remained almost the only surviving members. Day
-was killed by a fall from his horse in 1789. Josiah
-Wedgwood closed his noble career at Etruria in 1795,
-in the sixty-fifth year of his age. Dr. Withering, distinguished
-alike in botany and medicine, died in 1799,
-of a lingering consumption. Dr. Darwin was seized by
-his last attack of angina pectoris in 1802, and, being
-unable to bleed himself, as he had done before, he called
-upon his daughter to apply the lancet to his arm; but,
-before she could do so, he fell back in his chair and
-expired. Dr. Priestley, driven forth into exile,<a name="Anchor-393" id="Anchor-393" href="#Footnote-393" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 393.">[393]</a> closed
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_466">[466]</span>
-his long and illustrious career at Northumberland in
-Pennsylvania in 1803. The Lunar Society was thus all
-but extinguished by death; the vacant seats remained
-unfilled; and the meetings were no longer held.</p>
-
-<p>But the bereavements which Watt naturally felt the
-most, were the deaths of his own children. He had two
-by his second wife, a son and a daughter, both full of
-promise, who had nearly grown up to adult age, when
-they died. Jessie was of a fragile constitution from her
-childhood, but her health seemed to become re-established
-as she grew in years. But before she had
-entered womanhood, the symptoms of an old pulmonary
-affection made their appearance, and she was carried
-off by consumption. Mr. Watt was much distressed
-by the event, confessing that he felt as if one of the
-strongest ties that bound him to life was broken, and
-that the acquisition of riches availed him nothing when
-unable to give them to those he loved. In a letter to
-a friend, he thus touchingly alluded to one of the most
-sorrowful associations connected with the deaths of
-children:&mdash;“Mrs. Watt continues to be much affected
-whenever anything recalls to her mind the amiable child
-we have parted with; and these remembrances occur
-but too frequently,&mdash;her little works of ingenuity, her
-books and other objects of study, serve as mementoes of
-her who was always to the best of her power usefully
-employed even to the last day of her life. With me,
-whom age has rendered incapable of the <em>passion</em> of grief,
-the feeling is a deep regret; and, did nature permit, my
-tears would flow as fast as her mother’s.”</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_467">[467]</span></p>
-
-<p>To divert and relieve his mind, as was his wont,
-he betook himself to fresh studies and new inquiries.
-It is not improbable that the disease of which his
-daughter had died, as well as his own occasional sufferings
-from asthma, gave a direction to his thoughts,
-which turned on the inhalation of gas as a remedial
-agent in pulmonary and other diseases. Dr. Beddoes
-of Bristol had started the idea, which Watt now took
-up and prosecuted with his usual zeal. He contrived
-an apparatus for extracting, washing, and collecting
-gases, as well as for administering them by inhalation.
-He professed that he had taken up the subject not
-because he understood it, but because nobody else did,
-and that he could not withhold anything which might
-be of use in prompting others to do better. The result
-of his investigations was published at Bristol under the
-title of ‘Considerations on the Medicinal use of Fictitious
-Airs,’ the first part of which was written by
-Dr. Beddoes, and the second part by Watt.</p>
-
-<p>But a still heavier blow than the loss of his only
-daughter, was the death of his son Gregory a few years
-later. He was a young man of the highest promise,
-and resembled Watt himself in many respects&mdash;in mind,
-character, and temperament. Those who knew him
-while a student at Glasgow College, spoke of him long
-after in terms of the most glowing enthusiasm. Among
-his fellow-students were Francis, afterwards Lord Jeffrey,
-and the poet Campbell. Both were captivated not
-less by the brilliancy of his talents than by the charming
-graces of his person. Campbell spoke of him as
-“a splendid stripling&mdash;literally the most beautiful youth
-I ever saw. When he was only twenty-two, an eminent
-English artist&mdash;Howard, I think&mdash;made his head the
-model of a picture of Adam.” Campbell, Thomson, and
-Gregory Watt, were class-fellows in Greek, and avowed
-rivals; but the rivalry only served to cement their
-friendship. In the session of 1793&ndash;4, after a brilliant
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_468">[468]</span>
-competition which excited unusual interest, the prize
-was awarded to Thomson; but, with the exception of
-the victor himself, Gregory was the most delighted
-student in the class. “He was,” says the biographer of
-Campbell, “a generous, liberal, and open-hearted youth;
-so attached to his friend, and so sensible of his merit,
-that the honours conferred on Thomson obliterated all
-recollections of personal failure.”<a name="Anchor-394" id="Anchor-394" href="#Footnote-394" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 394.">[394]</a> Francis Jeffrey was
-present at the commemoration of the first of May, two
-years later, and was especially struck with the eloquence
-of young Watt, “who obtained by far the greatest
-number of prizes, and degraded the prize-readers most
-inhumanly by reading a short composition of his own,
-a translation of the Chorus of the Medea, with so much
-energy and grace, that the verses seemed to me better
-perhaps than they were in reality. He is a young man
-of very eminent capacity, and seems to have all the
-genius of his father, with a great deal of animation and
-ardour which is all his own.”<a name="Anchor-395" id="Anchor-395" href="#Footnote-395" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 395.">[395]</a></p>
-
-<p>Campbell thought him born to be a great orator,
-and anticipated for him the greatest success in Parliament
-or at the Bar. His father had, however,
-already destined him to follow his own business. Indeed,
-Gregory was introduced a partner into the Soho
-concern about the same time as Mr. Boulton, jun., and
-his elder brother James. But he never gave much
-attention to the business. Scarcely had he left college,
-before symptoms of pulmonary affection showed themselves;
-and, a physician having been consulted, Mr. Watt
-was recommended to send his son to reside in the
-south of England. He accordingly went to Penzance
-for the benefit of its mild climate, and, by a curious
-coincidence, he took up his abode as boarder and lodger
-in the house of Humphry Davy’s mother. The afterwards
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_469">[469]</span>
-brilliant chemist was then a boy some years
-younger than Gregory. He had already made experiments
-in chemistry, with sundry phials and kitchen
-utensils, assisted by an old glyster apparatus presented
-to him by the surgeon of a French vessel wrecked on
-the coast. Although Gregory possessed great warmth
-of heart, there was a degree of coldness in his manner
-to strangers, which repelled any approach to familiarity.
-When his landlady’s son, therefore, began talking to
-him of metaphysics and poetry, he was rather disposed
-to turn a deaf ear; but when Davy touched upon
-the subject of chemistry, and made the rather daring
-boast for a boy, that he would undertake to demolish
-the French theory in half an hour, Gregory’s curiosity
-was roused. The barrier of ice between them was at once
-removed; and from thenceforward they became attached
-friends.<a name="Anchor-396" id="Anchor-396" href="#Footnote-396" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 396.">[396]</a> Young Davy was encouraged to prosecute
-his experiments, which the other watched with daily
-increasing interest; and in the course of the following
-year, Gregory communicated to Dr. Beddoes, of Bristol,
-then engaged in establishing his Pneumatic Institution,
-an account of Davy’s experiments on light and heat,
-the result of which was his appointment as superintendent
-of the experiments at the Institution, and the
-subsequent direction of his studies and investigations.</p>
-
-<p>Gregory’s health having been partially re-established
-by his residence at Penzance, he shortly after returned
-to his father’s house at Birmingham, whither Davy frequently
-went, and kept up the flame of his ambition
-by intercourse with congenial minds. Gregory heartily
-co-operated with his father in his investigations on air,
-besides inquiring and experimenting on original subjects
-of his own selection. Among these may be mentioned
-his inquiries into the gradual refrigeration of basalt, his
-paper on which, read before the Royal Society, would
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_470">[470]</span>
-alone entitle him to a distinguished rank among experimentalists.<a name="Anchor-397" id="Anchor-397" href="#Footnote-397" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 397.">[397]</a></p>
-
-<p>By the kindness of his elder brother James, Gregory
-Watt was relieved of his share of the work at Soho,
-and was thereby enabled to spend much of his time in
-travelling about for the benefit of his health. Early
-in 1801, we find him making excursions in the western
-counties in company with Mr. Murdock, jun.; and
-looking forward with still greater anticipations of
-pleasure to the tour which he subsequently made
-through France, Germany, and Austria. We find him
-afterwards writing his father from Freiburg, to the
-effect that he was gradually growing stronger, and
-was free from pulmonary affection. From Leipzig he
-sent an equally favourable account of himself, and gave
-his father every hope that on his return he would find
-him strong and sound.</p>
-
-<p>These anticipations, however, proved delusive, for
-the canker was already gnawing at poor Gregory’s
-vitals. Returned home, he busied himself with his
-books, his experiments, and his speculations; assisting
-his father in recording observations on the effects of
-nitrous oxide and other gases. But it was shortly found
-necessary to send him again to the south of England
-for the benefit of a milder climate. In the beginning of
-1804, his father and mother went with him to Clifton,
-where he had an attack of intermittent fever, which left
-him very weak. From thence they removed to Bath,
-and remained there for about a month, the invalid
-being carefully attended by Dr. Beddoes. During their
-stay at Bath, Gregory’s brother paid him a visit, and
-was struck by his altered appearance. The fever had
-left him, but his cough and difficulty of breathing were
-very distressing to witness. As usual in such complaints,
-his mind was altogether unaffected. “Indeed,”
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_471">[471]</span>
-wrote his brother, “he is as bright, clear, and vigorous,
-upon every subject as I ever knew him to be. His
-voice, too, is firm and good, and when he enters into
-conversation I should lose the recollection of his complaint
-if his appearance did not so forcibly remind me of
-it. It is fortunate that he does not suffer much bodily
-pain, or, so far as I can discover, any mental anxiety as
-to the issue of his complaint.”<a name="Anchor-398" id="Anchor-398" href="#Footnote-398" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 398.">[398]</a></p>
-
-<p>When Gregory was sufficiently recovered from the
-debilitating effects of his fever, he was moved to Sidmouth,
-where he appeared to improve; but he himself
-believed the sea air to be injurious to him, and insisted
-on being again removed inland. During all this time
-his father’s anxiety may be imagined, though he bore
-up with as much equanimity as was practicable under
-circumstances so distressing. “Ever since we left
-Bath,” he wrote to Mr. Boulton at Soho, “ours has
-been a state of anxiety very distressing to us, and the
-communication of which would not have been pleasing
-to our friends. To add to this, I have myself been
-exceedingly unwell, though I am now much better.
-Gregory suffered very much from the journey, which
-was augmented by his own impatience; and though he
-seemed to recover a little from his fatigue during the
-first week, his breath became daily worse, until we
-were obliged to remove him, on Thursday last, to the
-neighbourhood of Exeter, where he now is with his
-aunt.”<a name="Anchor-399" id="Anchor-399" href="#Footnote-399" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 399.">[399]</a> The invalid became rapidly worse, and survived
-his removal only a few days. “This day,” wrote
-the sorrowing father to Boulton, “the remains of poor
-Gregory were deposited in a decent, though private
-manner, in the north aisle of the cathedral here, near
-the transept.... I mean to erect a tablet to his
-memory on the adjoining wall; but his virtues and
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_472">[472]</span>
-merits will be best recorded in the breasts of his friends....
-As soon as we can settle our accounts, we shall
-all return homewards, with heavy hearts.”<a name="Anchor-400" id="Anchor-400" href="#Footnote-400" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 400.">[400]</a></p>
-
-<p>Davy was deeply affected by Gregory Watt’s death;
-and in the freshness of his grief he thus unbosomed
-himself to his friend Clayfield:&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“Poor Watt! He ought not to have died. I could not persuade
-myself that he would die; and until the very moment when I was
-assured of his fate, I would not believe he was in any danger. His
-letters to me, only three or four months ago, were full of spirit, and
-spoke not of any infirmity of body, but of an increased strength of
-mind. Why is this in the order of Nature,&mdash;that there is such
-a difference in the duration and destruction of his works? If the
-mere stone decays it is to produce a soil which is capable of
-nourishing the moss and the lichen; when the moss and the lichen
-die and decompose, they produce a mould which becomes the bed of
-life to grass, and to a more exalted species of vegetables. Vegetables
-are the food of animals,&mdash;the less perfect animals of the more
-perfect; but in man, the faculties and intellect are perfected,&mdash;he
-rises, exists for a little while in disease and misery, and then would
-seem to disappear, without an end, and without producing any
-effect.</p>
-
-<p>“We are deceived, my dear Clayfield, if we suppose that the
-human being who has formed himself for action, but who has been
-unable to act, is lost in the mass of being; there is some arrangement
-of things which we can never comprehend, but in which his
-faculties will be applied.... We know very little; but, in my
-opinion, we know enough to hope for the immortality, the individual
-immortality of the better part of man. I have been led into all
-this speculation, which you may well think wild, in reflecting upon
-the fate of Gregory! My feeling has given wings to my mind.
-He was a noble fellow, and would have been a great man. Oh!
-there was no reason for his dying&mdash;he ought not to have died.”<a name="Anchor-401" id="Anchor-401" href="#Footnote-401" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 401.">[401]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>More deaths! A few years later, and Watt lost
-his oldest friend, Professor Robison of Edinburgh, his
-companion and fellow-worker at Glasgow College
-nearly fifty years before. Since then, their friendship
-had remained unchanged, though their respective
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_473">[473]</span>
-pursuits kept them apart. Robison continued busily
-and usefully occupied to the last. He had finished
-the editing of his friend Black’s lectures, and was
-occupied in writing his own ‘Elements of Mechanical
-Philosophy,’ when death came and kindly released him
-from a lingering disorder which had long oppressed
-his body, though it did not enervate his mind. A few
-years before his death he wrote Watt, informing him
-that he had got an addition to his family in a fine little
-boy, a grandchild, healthy and cheerful, who promised
-to be a source of much amusement to him. “I find this
-a great acquisition,” said he, “notwithstanding a serious
-thought sometimes stealing into my mind. I am infinitely
-delighted with observing the growth of its little
-soul, and particularly with the numberless instincts,
-which formerly passed unheeded. I thank the French
-theorists for more forcibly directing my attention to the
-finger of God, which I discover in every awkward
-movement and every wayward whim. They are all
-guardians of his life, and growth, and powers. I regret
-that I have not time to make infancy, and the development
-of its powers, my sole study.”<a name="Anchor-402" id="Anchor-402" href="#Footnote-402" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 402.">[402]</a> In 1805 he was
-taken from his little playfellow, and from the pursuit
-of his many ingenious speculations.<a name="Anchor-403" id="Anchor-403" href="#Footnote-403" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 403.">[403]</a> Watt said of him,
-“he was a man of the clearest head and the most science
-of anybody I have ever known, and his friendship to
-me ended only with his life, after having continued for
-nearly half a century.... His religion and piety,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_474">[474]</span>
-which made him patiently submit without even a
-fretful or repining word in nineteen years of unremitting
-pain,&mdash;his humility, in his modest opinion
-of himself,&mdash;his kindness, in labouring with such industry
-for his family during all this affliction,&mdash;his
-moderation for himself, while indulging an unbounded
-generosity to all about him,&mdash;joined to his talents,
-form a character so uncommon and so noble, as can
-with difficulty be conceived by those who have not,
-like me, had the contemplation of it.”</p>
-
-<p>Little more remains to be recorded of the business
-life of Boulton and Watt. The former, notwithstanding
-his declining health and the frequent return of his
-malady, continued to take an active interest in the
-Soho coinage. Watt often expostulated with him, but
-in vain, urging that it was time for him to retire
-wholly from the anxieties of business. On Boulton
-bringing out his Bank of England silver dollar, with
-which he was himself greatly pleased, he sent some
-specimens to Watt, then staying at Clifton, for his
-inspection. Watt replied,&mdash;“Your dollar is universally
-admired by all to whom we have shown it, though your
-friends fear much that your necessary attention to the
-operation of the coinage may injure your health.”<a name="Anchor-404" id="Anchor-404" href="#Footnote-404" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 404.">[404]</a> And
-again he wrote from Sidmouth,&mdash;“We are all glad to
-hear of your amendment, which we hope will be progressive,
-and possibly it might be better if you could
-summon up resolution enough to rid yourself of some
-of those plagues you complain of; but while you suffer
-yourself to be intruded upon in the manner you do, you
-can never enjoy that quiet which is now so necessary
-to your health and comfort.”<a name="Anchor-405" id="Anchor-405" href="#Footnote-405" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 405.">[405]</a> Mrs. Watt joined her
-entreaties to those of her husband, expressing the wish
-that, for Mr. Boulton’s sake, it might rain every day,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_475">[475]</span>
-to prevent his fatiguing himself by walking to and
-from the works, and there occupying himself with the
-turmoils of business. Why should he not do as Mr.
-Watt had done, and give up Soho altogether, leaving
-business and its anxieties to younger and stronger
-men? But business, as we have already explained,
-was Boulton’s habit, and pleasure, and necessity. Moreover,
-occupation of some sort served to divert his
-attention from the ever-present pain within him; and,
-so long as his limbs were able to support him, he
-tottered down the hill to see what was going forward at
-Soho.</p>
-
-<p>As for Watt, we find that he had at last learnt
-the art of taking things easy, and that he was trying
-to make life as agreeable as possible in his old age.
-Thus at Cheltenham, from which place Mrs. Watt
-addressed Boulton in the letter of advice above referred
-to, we find the aged pair making pleasant excursions in
-the neighbourhood during the day, and reading novels
-and going to the theatre occasionally in the evening.
-“As it is the fashion,” wrote Mrs. Watt,&mdash;“and wishing
-to be very fashionable people, we subscribe to the library.
-Our first book was Mrs. Opie’s ‘Mother and Daughter,’
-a tale so mournful as to make both Mr. Watt and myself
-cry like schoolboys that had been whipped; ... and
-to dispel the gloom that poor Adeline hung over us,
-we went to the theatre last night to see the ‘Honeymoon,’
-and were highly pleased.”</p>
-
-<p>Towards the end of 1807 Boulton had a serious
-attack of his old disease, which fairly confined him to
-his bed; and his friends feared lest it should prove his
-last illness. He was verging upon his eightieth year,
-and his constitution, though originally strong, was
-gradually succumbing to confinement and pain. He
-nevertheless rallied once more, and was again able
-to make occasional visits to the works as before. He
-had promised to send a box of medals to the Queen, and
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_476">[476]</span>
-went down to the Mint to see them packed. The box
-duly reached Windsor Castle, and De Luc acknowledged
-its reception:&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“As no words of mine,” he said, “could have conveyed your
-sentiments to Her Majesty so well as those addressed to me in your
-name, I contented myself with putting the letter into her hands.
-Her Majesty expressed her sensibility for the sufferings you had
-undergone during the period of your silence, and at your plentiful
-gift, for which she has charged me to thank you; and as, at the
-same time that you have placed the whole at her own disposal, you
-have mentioned the Princesses, Her Majesty will make them partakers
-in the present.”</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>De Luc concluded by urging Mr. Boulton to abstain
-from further work and anxiety, and reminded him that
-after a life of such activity as his had been, both body
-and mind required complete rest.</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“Life,” said he, “in this world is a state of trial, and as long as
-God gives us strength we are not to shun even painful employments
-which are duties. But in the decline of life, when the strength
-fails, we ought to drop all thought of objects to which we are no
-longer equal, in order to preserve the serenity and liberty of mind
-with which we are to consider our exit from this world to a better.
-May God prolong your life without pain for the good you do
-constantly, is the sincere wish of your very affectionate friends (father
-and daughter),</p>
-
-
-<p class="sig">“<span class="smcap">De Luc</span>.”<a name="Anchor-406" id="Anchor-406" href="#Footnote-406" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 406.">[406]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Boulton’s life was, indeed, drawing to a close. He
-had for many years been suffering from an agonising
-and incurable disease&mdash;stone in the kidneys and bladder&mdash;and
-waited for death as for a friend. The strong
-man was laid low; and the night had at length come
-when he could work no more. The last letter which he
-wrote was to his daughter, in March, 1809; but the
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_477">[477]</span>
-characters are so flickering and indistinct as to be
-scarcely legible. “If you wish to see me living,” he
-wrote, “pray come soon, for I am very ill.” Nevertheless,
-he suffered on for several months longer. At last
-he was released from his pain, and peacefully expired
-on the 17th of August, 1809, at the age of eighty-one.
-Though he fell like a shock of corn in full season, his
-death was lamented by a wide circle of relatives and
-friends. A man of strong affections, with an almost
-insatiable appetite for love and sympathy, he inspired
-others with like feelings towards himself; and when he
-died, they felt as if a brother had gone. He was alike
-admired and beloved by his workmen; and when he
-was carried to his last resting-place in Handsworth
-Church, six hundred of them followed the hearse, and
-there was scarcely a dry eye among them.<a name="Anchor-407" id="Anchor-407" href="#Footnote-407" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 407.">[407]</a></p>
-
-<p>Matthew Boulton was, indeed, a man of truly noble
-nature. Watt, than whom none knew him better,
-was accustomed to speak of him as “the princely
-Boulton.” He was generous and high-souled, a lover
-of truth, honour, and uprightness. His graces were
-embodied in a manly and noble person. We are
-informed through Dr. Guest that on one occasion, when
-Mr. Boulton’s name was mentioned in his father’s
-presence, he observed, “<em>the ablest man</em> I ever knew.”
-On the remark being repeated to Dr. Edward Johnson,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_478">[478]</span>
-a courtly man, he said,&mdash;“As to his ability, other persons
-can better judge. But I can say that he was <em>the best
-mannered man</em> I ever knew.” The appreciation of both
-was alike just and characteristic, and has since been confirmed
-by Mrs. Schimmelpenninck. She describes with
-admiration his genial manner, his fine radiant countenance,
-and his superb munificence: “He was in person
-tall, and of a noble appearance; his temperament was
-sanguine, with that slight mixture of the phlegmatic
-which gives calmness and dignity; his manners were
-eminently open and cordial; he took the lead in conversation;
-and, with a social heart, had a grandiose manner,
-like that arising from position, wealth, and habitual
-command. He went about among his people like a
-monarch bestowing largesse.”</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_499" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_499.png" width="450" height="310" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">BOULTON’S MONUMENT IN HANDSWORTH CHURCH.<a name="Anchor-408" id="Anchor-408" href="#Footnote-408" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 408.">[408]</a></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Boswell was equally struck by Boulton’s personal
-qualities when he visited Soho in 1776, shortly after
-the manufacture of steam-engines had been begun there.
-“I shall never forget,” he says, “Mr. Boulton’s expression
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_479">[479]</span>
-to me when surveying the works. ‘I sell here,
-sir, what all the world desires to have, <span class="smcap">Power</span>.’ He
-had,” continues Boswell, “about seven hundred people
-at work. I contemplated him as an iron chieftain, and
-he seemed to be a father of his tribe. One of the men
-came to him complaining grievously of his landlord for
-having distrained his goods. “Your landlord is in the
-right, Smith,” said Boulton; “but I’ll tell you what&mdash;find
-a friend who will lay down one half of your rent,
-and I’ll lay down the other, and you shall have your
-goods again.””</p>
-
-<p>It would be a mistake to suppose that there was any
-affectation in Boulton’s manner, or that his dignified
-bearing in society was anything but natural to him.
-He was frank, cheerful, and affectionate, as his letters
-to his wife, his children, and his friends, amply demonstrate.
-None knew better than he how to win hearts,
-whether of workmen, mining adventurers, or philosophers.
-“I have thought it but respectful,” he wrote
-Watt from Cornwall, “to give our folks a dinner at
-a public-house near Wheal Virgin to-day. There were
-present William Murdock, Lawson, Pearson, Perkins,
-Malcolm, Robert Muir, all Scotchmen, and John Bull,
-with self and Wilson,&mdash;for the engines are all now
-finished, and the men have behaved well, and are
-attached to us.” At Soho he gave an entertainment
-on a much larger scale upon his son coming of age in
-1791, when seven hundred persons sat down to dinner.
-Boswell’s description of him as the father of his tribe is
-peculiarly appropriate. No well-behaved workman was
-ever turned adrift. On the contrary, fathers introduced
-their sons into the factory, and brought them up under
-their own eye, watching over their conduct and their
-mechanical training. Thus generation after generation
-of workmen followed in each other’s footsteps at Soho.</p>
-
-<p>There was, no doubt, good business policy in this;
-for Boulton knew that by attaching the workmen to
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_480">[480]</span>
-him, and inspiring them with pride in the concern,
-he was maintaining that prestige which, before the
-days of machine tools, would not have been possible
-without the aid of a staff of carefully-trained and
-highly-skilled mechanics. Yet he had many scapegraces
-amongst them&mdash;hard drinkers, pugilists,<a name="Anchor-409" id="Anchor-409" href="#Footnote-409" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 409.">[409]</a> cock-fighters,
-and scamps. Watt often got wholly out of
-patience with them, and urged their dismissal, whatever
-might be the consequence. But though none knew
-so well as Watt how to manage machines, none
-knew so ill how to manage men. Boulton’s practical
-wisdom usually came to the rescue. He would
-tolerate any moral shortcoming save treachery and
-dishonesty. But he knew that most of the men
-had been brought up in a bad school, often in no
-school at all. “Have pity on them, bear with them,
-give them another trial,” he would say; “our works
-must not be brought to a standstill because perfect men
-are not yet to be had.” “True wisdom,” he observed
-on another occasion, “directs us, when we can, to turn
-even evils into good. We must take men as we find
-them, and try to make the best of them.”</p>
-
-<p>Still further to increase the attachment of the workmen
-to Soho, and keep together his school of skilled industry,
-as he called it, Boulton instituted a Mutual Assurance
-Society in connexion with the works; the first of the
-kind, so far as we are aware, established by any large
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_481">[481]</span>
-manufacturer for the benefit of his workmen. Every
-person employed in the manufactory, in whatsoever condition,
-was required to be a member. Boys receiving
-2<i>s.</i> 6<i>d.</i> a week paid a halfpenny weekly to the box;
-those receiving 5<i>s.</i> paid a penny a week, and so on, up
-to men receiving 20<i>s.</i> a week, who contributed 4<i>d.</i>;
-payments being made to them out of the fund during
-sickness and disablement, in proportion to their contributions
-during health. The effects of the Society were
-most salutary; it cultivated habits of providence and
-thoughtfulness amongst the men; bound them together
-by ties of common interest; and it was only in the
-cases of irreclaimable drunkards that any members of
-the Soho Friendly Society ever came upon the parish.</p>
-
-<p>But this was only a small item in the constitution
-of the Soho manufactory. Before its establishment,
-comparatively little attention had been given to the
-organisation of labour on a large scale. Workshops
-were so small that everything went on immediately
-under the master’s eye, and workmen got accustomed
-to ply at their work diligently, being well watched.
-But when manufacturing was carried on upon so large
-a scale as at Soho, and separate processes were conducted
-in different rooms and workshops, it was impossible
-that the master’s eye should be over all his
-workers, or over even any considerable portion of
-them at the same time. It was therefore necessary
-to introduce a new system. Hence the practice of
-inspection by deputy, and the appointment of skilled
-and trustworthy foremen for the purpose of enforcing
-strict discipline in the various shops, and at the same
-time economising labour and ensuring excellence of
-workmanship. In carrying out this arrangement,
-Boulton proved remarkably successful: and Soho came
-to be regarded as a model establishment. Men came from
-all parts to see and admire its organisation; and when
-Wedgwood proceeded to erect his great pottery works at
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_482">[482]</span>
-Etruria, he paid many preliminary visits to Soho for the
-purpose of ascertaining how the difficulties occasioned
-by the irregular habits of the workpeople had been so
-successfully overcome by his friend, and applying the
-results of his experience in the organisation of his own
-manufactory.</p>
-
-<p>Though Boulton could not keep his eye directly on
-the proceedings in the shops, he was quick to discern
-when anything was going wrong. While sitting in
-the midst of his factory, surrounded by the clang of
-hammers and the noise of engines, he could usually
-detect when any stoppage occurred, or when the
-machinery was going too fast or too slow, and issue
-his orders accordingly. The sound of the tools going,
-and the hammers clanging, which to strangers was
-merely an intolerable noise, was an intelligible music
-in his ears; and, like the leader of an orchestra, who
-casts his eye at once in the direction of the player of a
-wrong note, so Boulton was at once conscious of the
-slightest dissonance in the performances of his manufactory,
-and took the necessary steps immediately to
-correct it.</p>
-
-<p>From what we have already said, it will be sufficiently
-clear that Boulton was a first-rate man of
-business. He had a hearty enthusiasm for his calling,
-and took a just pride in it. In conducting it, he was
-guided by fine tact, great knowledge of character, and
-sound practical wisdom. When fully satisfied as to the
-course he should pursue, he acted with remarkable
-vigour and promptitude, bending his whole mind to
-the enterprise which he had taken in hand. It was
-natural that he should admire in others the qualities
-he himself desired to possess. “I can’t say,” he wrote
-to Watt, “but that I admire John Wilkinson for his
-decisive, clear, and distinct character, which is, I think,
-a first-rate one of its kind.” Like Wilkinson, Boulton
-was also distinguished for his indomitable pluck; and
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_483">[483]</span>
-in no respect was this more strikingly displayed than in
-his prosecution of the steam-engine enterprise.</p>
-
-<p>Playfair has truly said, that had Watt searched
-all Europe over, he could not have found another
-person so fitted to bring his invention before the public
-in a manner worthy of its merits and importance. Yet
-Boulton was by no means eager to engage in the
-scheme. Watt could with difficulty persuade him to
-take it up; and it was only in exchange for a bad debt
-that he at length became a partner in it. But when
-once fairly committed, he threw himself into the enterprise
-with an extraordinary degree of vigour. He
-clearly recognised in the steam-engine a power destined
-to revolutionise the industrial operations of the world.
-To M. Argand, the famous French lamp inventor, he
-described it as “the most certain, the most regular,
-the most durable, and the most effective machine in
-Nature, so far as her powers have yet been revealed
-to mortal knowledge;” and he declared to him that,
-finding he could be of more use to manufactures and to
-mankind in general by employing all his powers in the
-capacity of an engineer, than in fabricating any kind
-of clincaillerie whatsoever, he would thenceforward devote
-himself wholly to his new enterprise.</p>
-
-<p>But it was no easy work he had undertaken. He
-had to struggle against prejudices, opposition, detraction,
-and difficulties of all kinds. Not the least difficulty
-he had to strive against was the timidity and faint-heartedness
-of his partner. For years Watt was on the
-brink of despair. He kept imploring Boulton to relieve
-him from his troubles; he wished to die and be at rest;
-he “cursed his inventions;” indeed he was the most
-miserable of men. But Boulton never lost heart. He
-was hopeful, courageous, and strong&mdash;Watt’s very backbone.
-He felt convinced that the invention must
-eventually succeed, and he never for a moment lost faith
-in it. He braved and risked everything to “carry the
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_484">[484]</span>
-thing through.” He mortgaged his lands to the last
-farthing; borrowed from his personal friends; raised
-money by annuities; obtained advances from bankers;
-and had invested upwards of 40,000<i>l.</i> in the enterprise
-before it began to pay.</p>
-
-<p>During this terrible struggle he was more than once
-on the brink of insolvency, but continued as before to
-cheer and encourage his fainting partner. “Keep your
-mind and your heart pleasant if possible,” he wrote to
-Watt, “for the way to go through life sweetly is not
-to regard rubs.” To those about Watt he wrote, “Do
-not disturb Mr. Watt, but keep him as free from
-anxiety as you can.” He himself took the main share
-of the burden,&mdash;pushing the engine amongst the
-Cornish miners, bringing it under the notice of London
-brewers and water companies, and finding money to
-meet the heavy liabilities of the firm.</p>
-
-<p>So much honest endeavour could not fail. And at
-last the tide seemed to turn. The engine became
-recognised as a grand working power, and there was
-almost a run upon Soho for engines. Then pirates
-sprang up in all directions, and started new schemes
-with the object of evading Watt’s patent. And now
-a new battle had to be fought against “the illiberal,
-sordid, unjust, ungenerous, and inventionless misers,
-who prey upon the vitals of the ingenious, and make
-haste to seize upon what their laborious and often
-costly application has produced.”<a name="Anchor-410" id="Anchor-410" href="#Footnote-410" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 410.">[410]</a> At length this
-struggle, too, was conclusively settled in Boulton and
-Watt’s favour, and they were left at last to enjoy the
-fruits of their labour in peace.</p>
-
-<p>Watt never could have fought such a series of battles
-alone. He would have been a thousand times crushed;
-and, but for Boulton’s unswerving courage and resolute
-determination, he could neither have brought his engine
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_485">[485]</span>
-into general use, nor derived any adequate reward for
-his great invention. Though his specification lodged
-in the Patent Office might clearly establish his extraordinary
-mechanical genius, it is most probable that he
-himself would have broken his heart over his scheme,
-and added only another to the long list of great martyr
-inventors.</p>
-
-<p>None was more ready to acknowledge the immense
-services of Boulton in introducing the steam-engine to
-general use as a working power, than Watt himself.
-In the MS. memoir of his lately deceased friend
-deposited among the Soho papers, dated Glasgow, 17th
-September, 1809, Watt says,&mdash;“Through the whole of
-this business Mr. Boulton’s active and sanguine disposition
-served to counterbalance the despondency and
-diffidence which were natural to me; and every assistance
-which Soho or Birmingham could afford was
-procured. Mr. Boulton’s amiable and friendly character,
-together with his fame as an engineer and active
-manufacturer, procured us many and very active friends
-in both Houses of Parliament.... Suffice it to say,
-that to his generous patronage, the active part he took
-in the management of the business, his judicious advice,
-and his assistance in contriving and arranging many of
-the applications of the steam-engine to various machines,
-the public are indebted for great part of the benefits
-they now derive from that machine. Without him, or
-some similar partner (could such a one have been found),
-the invention could never have been carried by me
-to the length that it has been.</p>
-
-<p>“Mr. Boulton was not only an ingenious mechanic,
-well skilled in all the arts of the Birmingham manufacturers,
-but he possessed in a high degree the faculty
-of rendering any new invention of his own or of others
-useful to the public, by organising and arranging the
-processes by which it could be carried on, as well as of
-promoting the sale by his own exertions and those of his
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_486">[486]</span>
-numerous friends and correspondents. His conception
-of the nature of any invention was quick, and he was
-not less quick in perceiving the uses to which it might
-be applied, and the profits which might accrue from
-it. When he took any scheme in hand, he was rapid
-in executing it, and on those occasions spared neither
-trouble nor expense. He was a liberal encourager
-of merit in others, and to him the country is indebted
-for various improvements which have been brought
-forward under his auspices....</p>
-
-<p>“In respect to myself, I can with great sincerity say
-that he was a most affectionate and steady friend and
-patron, with whom, during a close connexion of thirty-five
-years, I have never had any serious difference.</p>
-
-<p>“As to his improvements and erections at Soho&mdash;his
-turning a barren heath into a delightful garden, and the
-population and riches he has introduced into the parish
-of Handsworth, I must leave such subjects to those
-whose pens are better adapted to the purpose, and whose
-ideas are less benumbed with age than mine now are.”<a name="Anchor-411" id="Anchor-411" href="#Footnote-411" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 411.">[411]</a></p>
-
-<p>We have spoken of Boulton’s generosity, which was
-in keeping with his whole character. At a time when
-he was himself threatened with bankruptcy, we have
-seen him concerting a scheme with his friend Wedgwood
-to enable Dr. Priestley to pursue his chemical investigations
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_487">[487]</span>
-free from pecuniary anxiety. To Watt he
-was most liberal, voluntarily conceding to him at different
-times profits derived from certain parts of the
-steam-engine business, beyond the proportions stipulated
-in the deed of partnership. In the course of his correspondence
-we find numerous illustrations of his generosity
-to partners as well as to workmen; making up
-the losses they had sustained, and which at the time perhaps
-he could ill afford. His conduct to Widow Swellengrebel
-illustrates this fine feature in his character. She
-had lent money to Fothergill, his partner in the hardware
-business, and the money was never repaid. The
-consequence was, that the widow and her family were
-seriously impoverished, and on their return to their
-friends in Holland, Boulton, though under no obligation
-to do so, remitted her an annuity of fifty pounds a year,
-which he continued to the close of her life. “I must
-own,” he wrote, “I am impelled to act as I do from
-pity, as well as from something in my own disposition
-that I cannot resist.”<a name="Anchor-412" id="Anchor-412" href="#Footnote-412" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 412.">[412]</a></p>
-
-<p>In fine, Matthew Boulton was a noble, manly man,
-and a true leader of men. Lofty-minded, intelligent,
-energetic, and liberal, he was one of those who constitute
-the life blood of a nation, and give force and dignity
-to the national character. Working in conjunction
-with Watt, he was in no small degree instrumental
-in introducing and establishing the great new working
-power of steam which has exercised so extraordinary an
-influence upon all the operations of industry.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_488">[488]</span></p>
-
-
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-<h3>CHAPTER XXIII.<br />
-
-<small><span class="smcap">Closing Years of James Watt&mdash;His Death&mdash;Conclusion.</span></small></h3>
-
-
-<p><span class="smcap">The</span> fragile and sickly Watt outlived the most robust of
-his contemporaries. He was residing at Glenarbach,
-near Dumbarton, with relatives, when the intelligence
-reached him of the death of his partner. To his son
-James he wrote at once, expressing his deep sorrow at
-the loss of his “very worthy and beloved friend.”<a name="Anchor-413" id="Anchor-413" href="#Footnote-413" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 413.">[413]</a> To
-Mr. Boulton’s son and successor he wrote,&mdash;“However
-we may lament our own loss, we must consider, on the
-other side, the torturing pain he has so long endured,
-and console ourselves with the remembrance of his
-virtues and eminent qualifications. Few men have possessed
-his abilities, and still fewer have exerted them
-as he has done; and if to these we add his urbanity, his
-generosity, and his affection to his friends, we shall
-make up a character rarely to be equalled. Such was
-the friend we have lost, and of whose affection we have
-reason to be proud, as you have to be the son of such
-a father.”<a name="Anchor-414" id="Anchor-414" href="#Footnote-414" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 414.">[414]</a></p>
-
-<p>The deaths of his friends, one by one, reminded Watt
-of his own mortality, and frequent references to the
-subject occur in his letters about this time. He felt as
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_489">[489]</span>
-if he were in danger of being left in the world alone.
-But he did not give himself up to melancholy, as he
-had been prone to do at the earlier periods of his life.
-Shortly after his son Gregory died, he wrote to a relative,&mdash;“I
-know that all men must die, and I submit
-to the decrees of Nature, I hope with due reverence to
-the Disposer of events. Yet one stimulus to exertion is
-taken away, and, somehow or other, I have lost my
-relish for my usual occupations. Perhaps time may
-remedy that in some measure; meanwhile I do not
-neglect the means of amusement which are in my
-power.”</p>
-
-<p>Watt was at no loss for occupation to relieve the
-tedium of old age. He possessed ample resources in
-himself, and found pleasure alike in quiet meditation
-and in active work. His thirst for knowledge was still
-unslaked, and he sought to allay it by reading. His
-love of investigation was as keen as ever, and he
-gratified it by proceeding with experiments on air, on
-light, and on electricity. His inventive faculty was still
-potent, and he occasionally varied his occupation by
-labouring to produce a new machine or to improve an
-old one. At other times, when the weather allowed,
-he would take a turn at planting in his grounds and
-gardens; and occasionally vary his pleasure by a visit
-to Scotland, to London, or to his estate in Wales.
-Strange to say, his health improved with advancing
-age, and though occasionally dyspeptic, he was now
-comparatively free from the racking headaches which
-had been the torment of his earlier years. Unlike
-Boulton, who found pleasure in the active pursuit of
-business, Watt had always regarded it as a worry, and
-he was now glad to have cast it altogether behind
-him. His mind was free from harassing cares; his
-ambition in life was satisfied; he was no more distressed
-by fears of Cornish pirates; and he was content to
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_490">[490]</span>
-enjoy at last the fruits of his labour in peace. And
-thus it was that Watt’s later years may be pronounced
-to have been the happiest of his life.</p>
-
-<p>He had, indeed, lost nearly all his old friends, and
-often thought of them with a melancholy regret, not,
-however, unmingled with pleasure. But other young
-friends gathered about him, sat at his feet, and looked up
-to him with an almost reverential admiration. Among
-these we find Rennie and Telford the engineers, Campbell
-the poet, Humphry Davy, Henry Brougham,
-Francis Horner, and other rising men of the new
-generation. Lord Brougham bears testimony to Watt’s
-habitual cheerfulness, and his enjoyment of the pleasures
-of society during the later years of his life. “I
-can speak on the point,” he says, “with absolute certainty,
-for my own acquaintance with him commenced
-after my friend Gregory’s decease. A few months
-after that event, he calmly and with his wonted acuteness
-discussed with me the composition of an epitaph
-to be inscribed on his son’s tomb. In the autumn and
-winter of 1805 he was a constant attendant at our
-Friday Club, and in all our private circles, and was the
-life of them all.”<a name="Anchor-415" id="Anchor-415" href="#Footnote-415" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 415.">[415]</a></p>
-
-<p>To the close of his life Watt continued to take great
-pleasure in inventing. It had been the pursuit of his
-life, and in old age it became his hobby. “Without
-a hobby-horse,” said he, “what is life?” He proceeded
-to verify his old experiments, and to live over again
-the history of his inventions. When Mr. Kennedy of
-Manchester asked him, at one of his last visits to Heathfield,
-if he had been able, since his retirement from
-business, to discover anything new in the steam-engine,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_491">[491]</span>
-he replied, “No; I am devoting the remainder of my
-life to perfect its details, and to ascertain whether in
-any respect I have been wrong.”</p>
-
-<p>But he did not merely confine himself to verifying
-his old inventions. He also contrived new ones. One
-of the machines that occupied his leisure hours for many
-years, was his machine for copying statuary. We find
-him busy with it in 1810, and he was still working
-upon it in the year of his death, nearly ten years later.
-The principle of the machine was to make a cutting tool
-or drill travel over the work to be executed, in like
-ratio with the motion of a guide-point placed upon the
-bust to be copied. It worked, as it were, with two
-hands; the one feeling the pattern, the other cutting
-the material into the required form. The object could
-be copied either of the full size, or reduced with the
-most perfect accuracy to any less size that might be
-required.<a name="Anchor-416" id="Anchor-416" href="#Footnote-416" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 416.">[416]</a> In preparing the necessary tools, Watt had
-the able assistance of his friend Murdock, who was
-always ready with his kindly suggestions and criticisms.
-In January, 1813, Watt wrote him,&mdash;“I have done a
-little figure of a boy lying down and holding out one
-arm, very successfully; and another boy, about six inches
-high, naked, and holding out both his hands, his legs
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_492">[492]</span>
-also being separate. But I have been principally
-employed in making drawings for a complete machine,
-all in iron, which has been a very serious job, as invention
-goes on very slowly with me now. When you
-come home, I shall thank you for your criticisms and
-assistance.”<a name="Anchor-417" id="Anchor-417" href="#Footnote-417" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 417.">[417]</a></p>
-
-<p>The material in which Watt executed his copies of
-statuary were various,&mdash;marble, jet, alabaster, ivory,
-plaster of Paris, and mahogany. Some of the specimens
-we have seen at Heathfield are of exquisite
-accuracy and finish, and show that he must have
-brought his copying-machine to a remarkable degree
-of perfection before he died. There are numerous
-copies of medallions of his friends,&mdash;of Dr. Black, De
-Luc, and Dr. Priestley; but the finest of all is a reduced
-bust of himself, being an exact copy of Chantrey’s
-original plaster-cast. The head and neck are beautifully
-finished, but there the work has stopped, for the
-upper part of the chest is still in the rough. Another
-exquisite work, than which Watt never executed a
-finer, is a medallion of Locke in ivory, marked “January,
-1812.” There are numerous other busts, statuettes,
-medallions,&mdash;some finished, others half executed, and
-apparently thrown aside, as if the workman had been
-dissatisfied with his work, and waited, perhaps, until he
-had introduced some new improvement in his machine.</p>
-
-<p>Watt took out no patent for the invention, which he
-pursued, as he said, merely as “a mental and bodily
-exercise.” Neither did he publish it,&mdash;but went on
-working at it for several years before his intentions
-to construct such a machine had become known. When
-he had made considerable progress with it, he learned,
-to his surprise, that a Mr. Hawkins, an ingenious
-person in his neighbourhood, had been long occupied
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_493">[493]</span>
-in the same pursuit. The proposal was then made to
-him that the two inventors should combine their talents
-and secure the invention by taking out a joint patent.
-But Watt had already been too much worried by patents
-to venture on taking out another at his advanced age.
-He preferred prosecuting the invention at his leisure
-merely as an amusement; and the project of taking out
-a patent for it was accordingly abandoned. It may not
-be generally known that this ingenious invention of
-Watt has since been revived and applied with sundry
-modifications by our cousins across the Atlantic, in
-fashioning wood and iron in various forms; and powerful
-copying-machines are now in regular use in the
-Government works at Enfield, where they are employed
-in rapidly, accurately, and cheaply manufacturing gun-stocks!</p>
-
-<p>Watt carried on the operations connected with this
-invention for the most part in his Garret, a room immediately
-under the roof at the kitchen end of the house
-at Heathfield, and approached by a narrow staircase.
-It is a small room, low in the ceiling, and lighted by a
-low broad window, looking into the shrubbery. The
-ceiling, though low, inclines with the slope of the roof
-on three sides of the room, and, being close to the slates,
-the place must necessarily have been very hot in
-summer, and very cold in winter. A stove was placed
-close to the door, for the purpose of warming the apartment,
-as well as enabling the occupant to pursue his
-experiments, being fitted with a sand-bath and other
-conveniences. But the stove must have been insufficient
-for heating the garret in very cold weather, and
-hence we find him occasionally informing his correspondents
-that he could not proceed further with his
-machine until the weather had become milder.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_494">[494]</span></p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_515" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_515.png" width="450" height="294" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">WATT’S GARRET AT HEATHFIELD.</p>
-<p class="caption">[By Percival Skelton.]</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>His foot-lathe was fixed close to the window, fitted
-with all the appliances for turning in wood and metal
-fifty years since; while a case of drawers fitted into the
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_495">[495]</span>
-recess on the left-hand side of the room, contained a
-large assortment of screws, punches, cutters, taps, and
-dies. Here were neatly arranged and stowed away
-many of the tools with which he worked in the early
-part of his life, one of the drawers being devoted to his
-old “flute tools.” In other divisions were placed his
-compasses, dividers, scales, decimal weights, quadrant
-glasses, and a large assortment of instrument-making
-tools. A ladle for melting lead, and a soldering-iron
-were hung ready for use near the stove.</p>
-
-<p>Crucibles of metal and stone were ranged on the
-shelves along the opposite side of the room, which
-also contained a large assortment of bottles filled with
-chemicals, boxes of fossils and minerals, jars, gallipots,
-blowpipes, retorts, and the various articles used in
-chemical analysis. In one corner of the room was a
-potter’s lathe. A writing-desk was placed as close to
-the window, for the sake of the light, as the turning-lathe
-would allow; and in the corner was the letter-copying
-machine, conveniently at hand.</p>
-
-<p>In this garret Watt spent much of his time during
-the later period of his life, only retiring from it when
-it was too hot in summer, or too cold in winter to
-enable him to prosecute his work. For days together
-he would confine himself here, without even descending
-to his meals. He had accordingly provided himself,
-in addition to his various other tools, with sundry
-kitchen utensils,&mdash;amongst others, with a frying-pan
-and Dutch oven&mdash;with which he cooked his meals.
-For it must be explained that Mrs. Watt was a
-thorough martinet in household affairs, and, above all
-things, detested “dirt.” Mrs. Schimmelpenninck says
-she taught her two pug-dogs never to cross the hall
-without first wiping their feet on the mat. She hated
-the sight of her husband’s leather apron and soiled
-hands while he was engaged in his garret-work, so he
-kept himself out of her sight at such times as much
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_496">[496]</span>
-as possible. Some notion of the rigidity of her rule
-may be inferred from the fact of her having had a
-window made in the kitchen wall, through which she
-could watch the servants, and observe how they were
-getting on with their work. Her passion for cleanliness
-was carried to a pitch which often fretted those about
-her by the restraints it imposed; but her husband, like
-a wise man, gently submitted to her rule. He was fond
-of a pinch of snuff, which Mrs. Watt detested, regarding
-it only as so much “dirt;” and Mr. Muirhead says
-she would seize and lock up the offending snuff-box
-whenever she could lay hands upon it. He adds that
-at night, when she retired from the dining-room, if Mr.
-Watt did not follow at the time fixed by her, a servant
-would enter and put out the lights, even when a friend
-was present, on which he would slowly rise and meekly
-say, “We must go.” One can easily understand how,
-under such circumstances, Watt would enjoy the perfect
-liberty of his garret, where he was king, and could
-enjoy his pinch of snuff in peace, and make as much
-“dirt” with his turning-lathe, his crucibles, and his
-chemicals, as he chose, without dread of interruption.</p>
-
-<p>One of the fears which haunted Watt as old age
-advanced upon him was, that his mental faculties, in
-the exercise of which he took so much pleasure, were
-deserting him. To Dr. Darwin he said, many years
-before,&mdash;“Of all the evils of age, the loss of the few
-mental faculties one possessed in youth is most grievous.”
-To test his memory, he again began the study of
-German, which he had allowed himself to forget; and
-he speedily acquired such proficiency as enabled him to
-read the language with comparative ease. But he gave
-still stronger evidence of the integrity of his powers.
-When in his seventy-fifth year, he was consulted by
-the Glasgow Waterworks Company as to the best mode
-of conveying water from a peninsula across the Clyde
-to the Company’s engines at Dalmarnock,&mdash;a difficulty
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_497">[497]</span>
-which appeared to them almost insurmountable; for it
-was necessary to fit the pipes, through which the water
-passed, to the uneven and shifting bed of the river.
-Watt, on turning over the subject in his mind, shortly
-hit upon a plan, which showed that his inventive
-powers were unimpaired by age. Taking the tail of
-the lobster for his model, he devised a tube of iron
-similarly articulated, of which he forwarded a drawing
-to the Waterworks Company; and, acting upon his
-recommendation, they had the tube forthwith executed
-and laid down with complete success. Watt declined
-to be paid for the essential service he had thus rendered
-to the Waterworks Company; but the directors made
-handsome acknowledgment of it by presenting him with
-a piece of plate of the value of a hundred guineas,
-accompanied by the cordial expression of their thanks
-and esteem.</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_518" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_518.png" width="450" height="78" alt="" />
-<p class="caption"><ins title="Transcriber's Note: added missing caption" id="Corr-497">WATER-PIPE IN THE BED OF THE CLYDE.</ins></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Watt did not, however, confine himself to mechanical
-recreations at home. In summer-time he would proceed
-to Cheltenham, the air of which agreed with him, and
-make a short stay there; or he would visit his friends
-in London, Glasgow, or Edinburgh. While in London,
-his great delight was in looking in at the shop-windows,&mdash;the
-best of all industrial exhibitions,&mdash;for there he
-saw the progress of manufacture in all articles in
-common use amongst the people. To a country person,
-the sight of the streets and shop-windows of London
-alone, with their display of objects of art and articles
-of utility, is always worth a visit. To Watt it was
-more interesting than passing along the finest gallery
-of pictures.</p>
-
-<p>At Glasgow, where he stayed with his relatives the
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_498">[498]</span>
-Macgregors, he took pleasure in revisiting his old
-haunts, dined with the College Professors,<a name="Anchor-418" id="Anchor-418" href="#Footnote-418" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 418.">[418]</a> and noted
-with lively interest the industrial progress of the
-place. The growth of Glasgow in the course of his
-lifetime had, indeed, been extraordinary, and it was in no
-small degree the result of his own industrial labours. The
-steam-engine was everywhere at work; factories had
-sprung up in all directions; the Broomielaw was silent
-no longer; the Clyde was navigable from thence to
-the sea, and its waters were plashed by the paddles of
-a thousand steamers. The old city of the tobacco lords
-had become a great centre of manufacturing industry;
-it was rich, busy, and prosperous; and the main source
-of its prosperity was the steam-engine. A long time
-had passed since Watt had first taken in hand the
-repair of the little Newcomen engine in Glasgow
-College, and afterwards laboured in the throes of his
-invention in his shop in the back court in King Street.
-There were no skilled mechanics in Glasgow then, and the
-death of the “old white-iron man” who helped him had
-been one of his sorest vexations. Things were entirely
-changed now. Glasgow had already become famous
-for its engine-work, and its factories contained among
-the most skilled mechanics in the kingdom. Watt’s
-early notion that Scotchmen were incapable of becoming
-first-rate mechanics, like Englishmen, was confuted by
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_499">[499]</span>
-the experience of hundreds of workshops; and to
-none did the practical contradiction of his theory give
-greater pleasure than to himself. He delighted to visit
-the artisans at their work, and to see with his own eyes
-the improvements that were going forward; and when
-he heard of any new and ingenious arrangement of
-engine-power, he would hasten to call upon the mechanic
-who had contrived it, and make his acquaintance.</p>
-
-<p>One of such calls, which Watt made during a visit
-to Glasgow, in 1814, has been pleasantly related by
-Mr. Robert Hart, who, with his brother, then carried on
-a small steam-engine factory in the town. “One forenoon,”
-he says, “while we were at work, Miss Macgregor
-and a tall elderly gentleman came into the shop.
-She, without saying who he was, asked if we would
-show the gentleman our small engine. It was not
-going at the time, and was covered up. My brother
-uncovered it. The gentleman examined it very minutely,
-and put a few pointed questions, asking the reason for
-making her in that form. My brother, seeing he understood
-the subject, said that she had been so made to try
-what we thought was an improvement; and for this
-experiment we required another cistern and air-pump.
-He was beginning to show what was properly Mr.
-Watt’s engine, and what was not; when, at this observation,
-Miss Macgregor stopped him, saying,&mdash;‘Oh, he
-understands it; <em>this is Mr. Watt</em>.’ I never at any
-time saw my brother so much excited as he was at that
-moment. He called on me to join them, saying,&mdash;‘This
-is Mr. Watt!’ Up to this time I had continued to work
-at what I was doing when they came; and, although I
-had heard all that was said, I had not joined the party
-till I learned who he was. Our supposed improvement
-was to save condensing water, and was on the principle
-introduced by Sir John Leslie, to produce cold by
-evaporation in a vacuum. Mr. Watt took much interest
-in this experiment, and said he had tried the same thing
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_500">[500]</span>
-on a larger scale, but without the vacuum, as that invention
-of Professor Leslie’s was not known at the
-time. He tried it exposed to the air, and also kept
-wet; and at one of the large porter-breweries in
-London he had fitted up an apparatus of the same
-nature. The pipes forming his condenser were laid
-in the water of the Thames, but he could not keep them
-tight, from the expansion and contraction of the metal,
-as they were exposed to various temperatures.” The
-conversation then diverged to the subject of his early
-experiments with the Newcomen engine, the difficulties
-he had encountered in finding a proper material
-for steam-pipes, the best method of making steam-joints,
-and the various means of overcoming obstacles
-which occur in the prosecution of mechanical experiments,
-in the course of which he reverted to the many
-temporary expedients which he had himself adopted in
-his early days.</p>
-
-<p>Watt was so much pleased with the intelligence of
-the brothers Hart, that he invited them to call upon
-him that evening at Miss Macgregor’s, where they
-found him alone with the ladies. “In the course of
-conversation,” continues Mr. Hart, “which embraced
-all that was new at the time, the expansion and the
-slow contraction of metals were touched on. This led
-to a discussion on iron in engine-making,” in which
-Watt explained the practice which experience had led
-him to adopt as the best. The conversation then turned
-upon the early scene of his inventions, the room in the
-College, the shop in King Street, the place on Glasgow
-Green near the Herd’s house where the first idea of a
-separate condenser flashed upon his mind, and the various
-steps by which he had worked out his invention. He went
-on to speak of his experience at Kinneil and Boroughstoness,
-of the Newcomen engine he had erected and
-worked there for the purpose of gaining experience,
-and incidentally referred to many of the other interesting
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_501">[501]</span>
-events in his past career. At a late hour the
-brothers took their leave, delighted, as they well might
-be, with the affability and conversableness of “the great
-Mr. Watt.”</p>
-
-<p>But it was not mechanics alone that Watt fascinated
-by his powers of conversation and his stores of knowledge
-relating to the special business of his life: he
-was equally at home amongst philosophers, women,
-and children. When close upon his eighty-second year,
-he formed one of a distinguished party assembled
-in Edinburgh, at which Sir Walter Scott, Francis
-Jeffrey, and others were present. He delighted the
-northern literati with his kindly cheerfulness, not less
-than he astonished them by the extent and profundity
-of his information. “This potent commander of the
-elements,” says Scott,&mdash;“this abridger of time and
-space, this magician, whose cloudy machinery has produced
-a change in the world, the effects of which, extraordinary
-as they are, are perhaps only now beginning
-to be felt,&mdash;was not only the most profound man of
-science, the most successful combiner of powers, and
-combiner of numbers, as adapted to practical purposes,&mdash;was
-not only one of the most generally well-informed,
-but one of the best and kindest of human beings. There
-he stood, surrounded by the little band of Northern
-literati, men not less tenacious, generally speaking, of
-their own opinions, than the national regiments are
-supposed to be jealous of the high character they have
-won upon service. Methinks I yet see and hear what
-I shall never see or hear again. The alert, kind, benevolent
-old man had his attention alive to every one’s
-question, his information at every one’s command. His
-talents and fancy overflowed on every subject. One
-gentleman was a deep philologist, he talked with him
-on the origin of the alphabet as if he had been coeval
-with Cadmus; another, a celebrated critic, you would
-have said the old man had studied political economy
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_502">[502]</span>
-and belles-lettres all his life; of science it is unnecessary
-to speak, it was his own distinguished walk.”<a name="Anchor-419" id="Anchor-419" href="#Footnote-419" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 419.">[419]</a></p>
-
-<p>Indeed, the extent of his knowledge was the wonder
-of all who came in contact with him. “It seemed,”
-said Jeffrey, “as if every subject that was casually
-started had been that which he had been occupied in
-studying.” Yet, though no man was more ready to
-communicate knowledge, none could be less ambitious
-of displaying it. In company, when not spoken to,
-he sat as if tranquilly pursuing his own meditations,
-with his head bent forward or leaning on his hand.
-But as he could not fail to be a prominent feature in
-any society that he entered, it was seldom that he was
-left outside the circle of social talk. Men of letters,
-men of science, artists, ladies and children, thronged
-about him. Once when on a visit to his friend Rennie
-in London, he accompanied him to an evening party at
-Sir George Warrender’s. At first he sat by himself,
-quiet and abstracted, until some young ladies engaged
-him in conversation, which gradually turned upon the
-mystery of the fabrics they wore, the insignificant
-materials out of which they were formed, and the beauty
-and value given to them by the industry and ingenuity
-of man; and, other auditors being attracted by his
-descriptions, he shortly found himself the centre of a
-group of fair and admiring listeners.</p>
-
-<p>He seemed to be alike at home on all subjects, the
-most recondite and the most common, the most special
-and the most general. Mrs. Schimmelpenninck<a name="Anchor-420" id="Anchor-420" href="#Footnote-420" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 420.">[420]</a> relates
-how he took her upon his knee when a little girl, and
-explained to her the principles of the hurdy-gurdy, the
-piano, the Pan’s-pipe, and the organ; teaching her how
-to make a dulcimer and improve a Jew’s-harp. To
-a Swedish artist he communicated the information that
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_503">[503]</span>
-the most pliant and elastic painting-brush was to be
-made out of rats’ whiskers. He advised ladies how to
-cure smoky chimneys, how to warm and ventilate dwellings,
-and how to obtain fast colours, while he would
-willingly instruct a maid-servant as to the best way
-of cleaning a grate.<a name="Anchor-421" id="Anchor-421" href="#Footnote-421" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 421.">[421]</a> A lady still living, who remembers
-Watt, informs us that he used to carry a
-carpenter’s foot-rule in the side pocket of his breeches,
-and would occasionally bring it out in after-dinner conversation
-or elsewhere, to illustrate the subject under
-discussion.</p>
-
-<p>He was full of anecdotes relating to all manner of
-subjects, which he was accustomed to tell in a very
-effective way.<a name="Anchor-422" id="Anchor-422" href="#Footnote-422" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 422.">[422]</a> He spoke in a low grave tone, with a
-broad Scottish accent. The late Mr. Murdock mentioned
-to us one of his favourite stories relating to two smugglers
-pursued by excisemen. The two smugglers had reached
-the mouth of a coal-pit and got into the corve-cage with
-their apparatus, the excisemen only coming up in time
-to see them descending the shaft, where they were soon
-out of sight. On the ascending corves coming up to the
-settle-board, the excisemen asked to be sent down after
-the smugglers, and they were sent down accordingly.
-Halfway down the shaft they met the smugglers in the
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_504">[504]</span>
-other cage <em>coming up</em>! And so the relator kept them
-ascending and descending, passing and repassing each
-other,&mdash;his auditors being in convulsions of laughter,
-while he himself seemed wholly unmoved. Campbell,
-the poet, who paid Watt a visit in February, 1819,
-only six months before his death, describes him as
-so full of anecdote that he spent one of the most
-amusing days he had ever enjoyed with a man of science
-and a stranger to his own pursuits. To the last he
-was a great reader of novels; and Mrs. Watt and he
-had many a hearty cry over the imaginary woes of
-love-lorn heroes and heroines. Scott says no novel
-of the least celebrity escaped his perusal, and that this
-gifted man of science was as much addicted to productions
-of this sort as if he had been a very milliner’s
-apprentice of eighteen. A lady, still living,<a name="Anchor-423" id="Anchor-423" href="#Footnote-423" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 423.">[423]</a> informs
-us that she remembers the admiration which Watt
-expressed for the Waverley novels, then making their
-appearance in rapid succession, and used to quote his
-opinion as a great authority for her own devotion to
-such works,&mdash;forgetting that, as the old frame requires
-the arm-chair after the heat and burden of the day,
-so the taxed mind needs rest and recreation after long
-years of study, anxiety, and labour.</p>
-
-<p>Mr. Stockdale, of Carke, gives the following account
-of a visit which his sister, a cousin of Mr. Boulton’s,
-paid to Heathfield in 1818, shortly before Mr. Watt’s
-death:&mdash;“When tea was announced to Mr. Watt, he
-came from his ‘garret,’ and on being told who my sister
-was, he asked after her relations in the kindest way,
-and then sat down in his arm-chair. A cup of tea was
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_505">[505]</span>
-handed to him, and alongside of it was placed a small
-cup containing a yellow powder, of which he took a
-spoonful and put it into his tea, observing that he
-had long been plagued with a stomach complaint, for
-which he had found this powder of mastich a sovereign
-remedy. He talked more than my sister expected.
-Sometimes he fell into a reverie, appearing absorbed in
-thought, his eyes fixed on space, and his head leaning
-over his chest. After a while, he retired to his study,
-and my sister returned to Soho.” Mr. Hollins, of
-Birmingham, sculptor, supplies the following further
-reminiscence. When a youth in a local architect’s
-office, he was sent out to Heathfield one afternoon, to
-submit to Mr. Watt the plans of certain proposed alterations
-in the parish church of Handsworth. The church
-stood a few fields off, and its spire rose above the trees
-within sight of the drawing-room windows. It was his
-parish church, in which his friend Boulton had been
-buried, and where he himself was to lie. When the
-young man mentioned his errand, Mr. Watt said he was
-just about to take his afternoon’s nap. “But you can sit
-down there and read that newspaper, and when I have
-got my nap I will look at the plans.” So saying he
-composed himself to rest in his arm-chair; the youth
-scarce daring to turn the page for fear of disturbing
-him. At length, after a short sleep, he woke full up
-and said, “Now let me see them.” He looked over the
-plans, examined them in detail, and criticised them
-keenly. He thought the proposed alterations of a paltry
-character, unworthy of the wealth and importance of
-the parish; “Why,” said he, “if these plans be carried
-out, preaching at Handsworth will be like pitching the
-word of God out of a keyhole!” When Mr. Watt’s
-decided views as to the insufficiency of the design was
-reported to the committee, steps were taken greatly
-to enlarge it, and Handsworth Church was thus
-indebted to his suggestions for much of its present
-beauty.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_506">[506]</span></p>
-
-<p>He proceeded with the completion of his sculpture-copying
-machine until nearly the close of his life.
-When the weather was suitable, he would go up stairs
-to his garret, don his woollen surtout and leather apron,
-and proceed with his work. He was as fastidious as
-ever, and was constantly introducing new improvements.
-It was a hobby and a pursuit, and served him
-as well as any other. To M. Berthollet he wrote,&mdash;“Whatever
-may be its success, it has at least had the
-good effect of making me avoid many hours of ennui,
-by employing my hands when I could not employ my
-head, and given me some exercise when I could not go
-out.” It also pleased him to see the invention growing
-under his hands as of old, though it is possible that
-during his later years he added but little to the machine.
-Indeed, it seems to have been as nearly as possible
-complete by the year 1817, if we may judge by the
-numerous exquisitely-finished specimens of reduced
-sculpture&mdash;busts, medallions, and statuary&mdash;laid away
-in the drawers of the garret at Heathfield. He took
-pleasure in presenting copies to his more intimate
-friends, jocularly describing them as “the productions
-of a young artist just entering his eighty-third year.”
-Shortly after, the hand of the cunning workman was
-stopped by death. The machine remained unfinished,
-according to its author’s intentions; and it is a singular
-testimony to the skill and perseverance of a man
-who had accomplished so much, that it is almost his
-only unfinished work.</p>
-
-<p>In the autumn of 1819 he was seized by his last
-illness. It could scarcely be called a seizure, for he
-suffered little, and continued calm and tranquil, in the
-full possession of his faculties, almost to the last. He
-was conscious of his approaching end, and expressed
-from time to time his sincere gratitude to Divine
-Providence for the worldly blessings he had been permitted
-to enjoy, for his length of days, and his exemption
-from the infirmities of age. “I am very sensible,” said
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_507">[507]</span>
-he to the mourning friends who assembled round his
-deathbed, “of the attachment you show me, and I hasten
-to thank you for it, as I feel that I am now come to
-my last illness.” He parted with life quietly and peacefully,
-on the 19th of August, 1819, in the eighty-third
-year of his age. He was buried near his deceased friend
-and partner Mr. Boulton, in Handsworth Church. Over
-his remains, which lie in a side aisle, was placed a
-monument by Chantrey, perhaps his finest work,
-justifying the compliment paid to the sculptor that he
-“cut breath;” for when first uncovered before the old
-servants assembled round it at Soho, it so powerfully
-reminded them of their old master, that they “lifted up
-their voices and wept.”</p>
-
-<p>Watt has been fortunate in his monumental honours.
-The colossal statue of him in Westminster Abbey, also
-from the chisel of Chantrey, bears upon it an epitaph
-from the pen of Lord Brougham, which is beyond comparison
-the finest lapidary inscription in the English
-language; and among its other signal merits, it has one
-which appertains rather to its subject than its author,
-that, lofty as is the eulogy, every word of it is true.<a name="Anchor-424" id="Anchor-424" href="#Footnote-424" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 424.">[424]</a>
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_508">[508]</span>
-The monument was raised by public subscriptions, initiated
-at a meeting in London presided over by the
-Prime Minister, and attended by the most illustrious
-statesmen, men of science, men of letters, and men of
-art, of the time, who met for the purpose of commemorating
-in some suitable manner the genius of Watt.
-“It has ever been reckoned one of the chief honours of
-my life,” says Lord Brougham, “that I was called upon
-to pen the inscription upon the noble monument thus
-nobly reared.”</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_529" style="width: 300px;">
-<img src="images/i_529.png" width="300" height="402" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">WATT’S STATUE IN HANDSWORTH CHURCH.</p>
-</div>
-
-<p>Watt was also honoured during his lifetime. Learned
-Societies were proud to enrol him amongst their members.
-He was a Fellow of the Royal Societies of London
-and Edinburgh, a Foreign Associate of the Institute
-of France, and a Member of the Batavian Society. The
-University of Glasgow conferred on him the degree of
-Doctor of Law. Lord Liverpool offered him a baronetcy;
-but, consistent with the simplicity of his character, he
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_509">[509]</span>
-declined the honour. He was invited to serve as Sheriff
-on two occasions, for Staffordshire and for Radnorshire;
-but he strongly pleaded to be excused undertaking the
-office. He was “a timid old man,” and hoped that he
-“should not have a duty imposed upon him that he was
-totally unfit for, nor have his grey hairs weighed down
-with a load of vexatious cares. My inventions,” he
-said, “are giving employment to the best part of a
-million of people, and having added many millions to
-the national riches, I have a natural right to rest in my
-extreme age.” His pleas were in both cases regarded
-as sufficient, and he was excused the office.</p>
-
-<hr class="tb" />
-
-<p>It is altogether unnecessary to pronounce a panegyric
-on the character and achievements of James Watt. This
-has already been done by Lord Jeffrey in language
-that cannot be surpassed. Sir James Macintosh placed
-him “at the head of all inventors in all ages and
-nations;” and Wordsworth the poet, twenty years after
-his death, said, “I look upon him, considering both the
-magnitude and the universality of his genius, as perhaps
-the most extraordinary man that this country ever produced:
-he never sought display, but was content to
-work in that quietness and humility, both of spirit and
-of outward circumstances, in which alone all that is
-truly great and good was ever done.”</p>
-
-<p>Watt was himself accustomed to speak of his inventions
-with the modesty of true genius. To a nobleman
-who expressed to him his wonder at the greatness of
-his achievements, he said, “the public only look at my
-success, and not on the intermediate failures and uncouth
-constructions which have served as steps to enable me to
-climb to the top of the ladder.” Watt looked back upon
-his twenty long years of anxiety and labour before the
-engine succeeded, and heaved a sigh. “Without affecting
-any maidenly coyness,” he wrote to Dr. Darwin,
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_510">[510]</span>
-who proposed to eulogise him in his ‘Botanic Garden,’
-“you really make me appear contemptible in my own
-eyes by considering how far short my pretensions, or
-those of the invention, were of the climax of human
-intellect,&mdash;I that know myself to be inferior to the
-greatest part of enlightened men in most things. If
-I have excelled, I think now it has been by chance, and
-by the neglects of others. Preserve the dignity of a
-philosopher and historian; relate the facts, and leave
-posterity to judge. If I merit it, some of my countrymen,
-inspired by the <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">amor patriæ</i>, may say, ‘Hoc a
-Scoto factum fuit.’”</p>
-
-<p>Although the true inventor, like the true poet, is
-born, not made,&mdash;and although Watt pursued his inventions
-because he found his highest pleasure in inventing,&mdash;yet
-his greatest achievements were accomplished
-by unremitting application and industry. He was a
-keen observer and an incessant experimenter. “Observare”
-was the motto he deliberately adopted; and it
-expresses the principle and success of his life. He was
-always on the watch for facts, noting and comparing
-them. He took nothing for granted; and accepted no
-conclusions save on experimental evidence. “Nature
-can be conquered,” he said, “if we can but find out her
-weak side.” His patience was inexhaustible. He was
-never baffled by failure, from which he declared that he
-learnt more than from success. “It is a great thing,”
-he once observed to Murdock, “to find out what will
-<em>not</em> do: it leads to one finding out what <em>will</em> do.”</p>
-
-<p>“Give me facts,” he once said to Boulton, “I am sick
-of theory: give me actual facts.” Yet, indispensable
-though facts are, theory is scarcely less so in invention;
-and it was probably because Watt was a great theorist,
-that he was a great inventor. His invention of the
-separate condenser was itself the result of a theory,
-the soundness of which he proved by experiment. So
-with the composition of water, the theory of which he
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_511">[511]</span>
-at once divined from the experiments of Priestley.
-He continued theorising during the whole progress of
-his invention of the steam-engine. New facts suggested
-new arrangements and the application of entirely new
-principles, until in course of time the engine of Newcomen
-became completely transformed.</p>
-
-<p>Watt’s engine was not an invention merely&mdash;it might
-almost be called a creation. “The part which he played,”
-says M. Bataille, “in the mechanical application of the
-force of steam, can only be compared to that of Newton
-in astronomy, and of Shakspeare in poetry. And is
-not invention the poetry of science? It is only when
-we compare Watt with other mechanicians that we are
-struck by his immense superiority,&mdash;when we compare
-him, for example, with Smeaton, who was, perhaps, after
-him, the man who had advanced the farthest in industrial
-mechanism. Smeaton began, about the same time
-as Watt, his inquiries as to the best means of improving
-the steam-engine. He worked long and patiently, but
-in an entirely technical spirit. While he was working
-out his improvements, Watt had drawn forth from his
-fertile imagination all those brilliant inventions to which
-we owe the effective working steam-engine. In a word,
-Smeaton knew how to improve, but Watt knew how to
-create.”<a name="Anchor-425" id="Anchor-425" href="#Footnote-425" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 425.">[425]</a></p>
-
-<p>As for the uses of the steam-engine, they are too
-widely known to stand in need of illustration. Had
-Watt, at the outset of his career, announced to mankind
-that he would invent a power that should drain
-their mines, blow their furnaces, roll and hammer their
-metals, thrash and grind their corn, saw their timber,
-drive their looms and spindles, print their books, impel
-ships across the ocean, and perform the thousand offices
-in which steam is now regularly employed, he would
-have been regarded as an enthusiast, if not as a madman.
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_512">[512]</span>
-Yet all this the steam-engine has done and is now doing.
-It has widely extended the dominion of man over
-inanimate nature, and given him an almost unbounded
-supremacy over the materials which enter into his daily
-use. It has increased his power, his resources, and his
-enjoyments. It is the most universal and untiring of
-labourers,&mdash;the steam-power of Great Britain alone being
-estimated as equal to the manual labour of upwards
-of four hundred millions of men, or more than double
-the number of males supposed to inhabit the globe.<a name="Anchor-426" id="Anchor-426" href="#Footnote-426" class="fnanchor" title="Go to footnote 426.">[426]</a>
-It is, indeed, no exaggeration to say that the steam-engine
-of Watt is, without exception, the greatest invention
-of modern times; and that it has been
-instrumental in effecting the most remarkable revolution
-in all departments of industry that the world has
-ever seen.</p>
-
-<hr class="tb" />
-
-<p>Some months since, we visited the little garret at
-Heathfield in which Watt pursued the investigations of
-his later years. The room had been carefully locked up
-since his death, and had only once been swept out. Everything
-lay very much as he left it. The piece of iron he
-was last employed in turning lay on the lathe. The ashes
-of the last fire were in the grate, the last bit of coal was
-in the scuttle. The Dutch oven was in its place over the
-stove, and the frying-pan in which he cooked his meal
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_513">[513]</span>
-was hanging by its accustomed nail. Many objects lay
-about or in the drawers, indicating the pursuits which
-had been interrupted by death,&mdash;busts, medallions, and
-figures, waiting to be copied by the sculpture-machine,&mdash;many
-medallion moulds, a store of plaster of Paris, and
-a box of plaster casts from London, the contents of which
-do not seem to have been disturbed. Here are Watt’s
-ladles for melting lead, his foot-rule, his glue-pot, his
-hammer. Reflecting mirrors, an extemporised camera
-with the lenses mounted on pasteboard, and many
-camera-glasses laid about, indicate interrupted experiments
-in optics. There are quadrant-glasses, compasses,
-scales, weights, and sundry boxes of mathematical instruments,
-once doubtless highly prized. In one place a
-model of the governor, in another of the parallel motion,
-and in a little box, fitted with wooden cylinders mounted
-with paper and covered with figures, is what we suppose
-to be a model of his proposed calculating machine. On
-the shelves are minerals and chemicals in pots and jars,
-on which the dust of nearly half a century has settled.
-The moist substances have long since dried up, the
-putty has been turned to stone, and the paste to dust.
-On one shelf we come upon a dish in which lies a
-withered bunch of grapes. On the floor, in a corner,
-near to where Watt sat and worked, is a hair-trunk&mdash;a
-touching memorial of a long past love and a long dead
-sorrow. It contains all poor Gregory’s school-books,&mdash;his
-first attempts at writing, his boy’s drawings of
-battles, his first school exercises down to his College
-themes, his delectuses, his grammars, his dictionaries,
-and his class books,&mdash;brought into this retired room,
-where the father’s eye could rest upon them. Near
-at hand is the sculpture-machine, on which he continued
-working to the last. Its wooden framing is worm-eaten
-and dropping into dust, like the hands which made it.
-But though the great workman has gone to rest, with
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_514">[514]</span>
-all his griefs and cares, and his handiwork is fast
-crumbling to decay, the spirit of his work, the thought
-which he put into his inventions, still survives, and will
-probably continue to influence the destinies of his race
-for all time to come.</p>
-
-<div class="figcenter" id="i_535" style="width: 450px;">
-<img src="images/i_535.png" width="450" height="409" alt="" />
-<p class="caption">HANDSWORTH CHURCH.</p>
-<p class="caption">THE BURIAL-PLACE OF BOULTON, WATT, AND MURDOCK.</p>
-<p class="caption">[By Percival Skelton.]</p>
-</div>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_515">[515]</span></p>
-
-
-<hr class="full" />
-
-<h2>INDEX.</h2>
-
-
-
-<ul id="index">
-  <li class="section">A.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Æolipile</span>, the Greek, <a href="#Page_6">6</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Adventurers</span>, the Cornish meetings of, <a href="#Page_258">258&ndash;60</a>, <a href="#Page_273">273&ndash;4</a>, <a href="#Page_332">332</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Albion</span> Mill scheme, <a href="#Page_353">353&ndash;7</a>;</li>
-    <li>the mill burnt by incendiaries, <a href="#Page_358">358&ndash;9</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Anderson</span>, Professor, Glasgow, <a href="#Page_113">113</a>, <a href="#Page_119">119</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Arkwright’s</span> patent trial, <a href="#Page_302">302</a>, <a href="#Page_347">347</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Austhorpe Engine</span>, Leeds, <a href="#Page_61">61</a>.</li>
-
-
-<li class="section">B.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Bacon, Roger</span>, his prophecy of steam power, <a href="#Page_4">4</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Banks</span>, Sir <span class="smcap">Joseph</span>, and <span class="smcap">Boulton</span> and <span class="smcap">Watt</span>, <a href="#Page_267">267</a>, <a href="#Page_286">286</a>, <a href="#Page_369">369</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">‘Beelzebub’ Engine</span>, Soho, <a href="#Page_241">241</a>, <a href="#Page_326">326</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Beighton, Henry</span>, improvements on Newcomen’s engine, <a href="#Page_67">67</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Bell, Andrew</span>, and Symington’s steamboat, <a href="#Page_449">449</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Bell, Henry</span>,&mdash;his ‘Comet,’ <a href="#Page_453">453</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Berthollet</span>, M., on chlorine, <a href="#Page_381">381</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Birmingham</span>, its ancient industry, <a href="#Page_161">161&ndash;3</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Copper Company formed, <a href="#Page_281">281&ndash;2</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">illegal coining, <a href="#Page_386">386&ndash;7</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">riots at, <a href="#Page_410">410&ndash;13</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Black</span>, Dr., intercourse with and friendship for Watt, <a href="#Page_110">110&ndash;14</a>, <a href="#Page_123">123</a>, <a href="#Page_132">132</a>, <a href="#Page_464">464</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">lends Watt money, <a href="#Page_150">150</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Boulton’s intercourse with, <a href="#Page_329">329</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">discovers carbonic acid gas, <a href="#Page_372">372</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his death, <a href="#Page_464">464</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his character, <a href="#Page_465">465</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Boats</span>, first constructed of iron, <a href="#Page_213">213</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Boats</span>, paddle and steam, <i>see</i> <a href="#steam_boats">Steam and Paddle boats</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Bonze</span>, Cornish engineer, <a href="#Page_233">233&ndash;4</a>, <a href="#Page_236">236</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his atmospheric engine, <a href="#Page_245">245</a>, <a href="#Page_296">296</a>, <a href="#Page_313">313</a>.</li>
-
-  <li id="boulton"><span class="smcap">Boulton, Matthew</span>, F.R.S., Birmingham,&mdash;his family, <a href="#Page_163">163</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">birth and education, joins his father in business, <a href="#Page_164">164</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his early trade correspondence, <a href="#Page_165">165</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his marriage, <a href="#Page_166">166</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his business enterprise, <a href="#Page_167">167</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">removes from Snow-hill to Soho, <a href="#Page_168">168</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his aims at excellence, <a href="#Page_170">170</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his distinguished and Royal patrons, <a href="#Page_171">171</a>, <a href="#Page_174">174</a>, <a href="#Page_176">176</a>, <a href="#Page_180">180&ndash;1</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his artistic taste, <a href="#Page_172">172</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">surpasses French art manufacturers, <a href="#Page_173">173</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">makes clocks and timepieces, <a href="#Page_174">174</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">employs first-rate artists, <a href="#Page_175">175</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">corresponds with Benjamin Franklin concerning his model fire-engine, <a href="#Page_182">182&ndash;4</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">first meeting with Watt, <a href="#Page_186">186</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">takes Roebuck’s share in Watt’s engine, <a href="#Page_197">197</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Boulton’s qualities, <a href="#Page_199">199</a>, <a href="#Page_200">200</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his friends, <a href="#Page_201">201</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his views as to engine business, <a href="#Page_202">202&ndash;3</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his grief at the death of Dr. Small, <a href="#Page_208">208</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">puts Watt’s son to school, is visited by the Empress of Russia, <a href="#Page_216">216</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">goes to London on financial affairs, <a href="#Page_217">217</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">terms of partnership, <a href="#Page_219">219</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">advice to Watt on his marriage, <a href="#Page_219">219&ndash;20</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">pressure of work, <a href="#Page_221">221</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his tubular boilers, <a href="#Page_222">222</a>, <a href="#Page_283">283</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">difficulties, financial, and with his partners, <a href="#Page_240">240</a>, <a href="#Page_247">247</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">raises extra capital, <a href="#Page_242">242</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his visits to Cornwall, raises capital, and combats the adventurers, <a href="#Page_247">247</a>, <a href="#Page_261">261</a>, <a href="#Page_270">270</a>, <a href="#Page_273">273</a>, <a href="#Page_317">317</a>, <a href="#Page_320">320</a>, <a href="#Page_331">331</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his property and financial affairs, <a href="#Page_262">262</a>, <a href="#Page_277">277&ndash;8</a>, <a href="#Page_320">320</a>, <a href="#Page_363">363&ndash;4</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">pushes the letter-copying machine in London, <a href="#Page_266">266&ndash;7</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">has erysipelas, <a href="#Page_270">270</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his courageous perseverance, patience, and business tact, <a href="#Page_241">241</a>, <a href="#Page_249">249</a>, <a href="#Page_252">252</a>, <a href="#Page_271">271</a>, <a href="#Page_273">273</a>, <a href="#Page_276">276&ndash;7</a>, <a href="#Page_294">294</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his tender regard for Watt, and encouraging treatment, <a href="#Page_272">272</a>, <a href="#Page_301">301</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">organises mining business in Cornwall, <a href="#Page_273">273&ndash;4</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">suggests a tooth-cutting machine, <a href="#Page_284">284</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his mechanical drawings, <a href="#Page_283">283</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">suggests horizontal-axled elliptical rotary engines for general uses, <a href="#Page_307">307</a>, <a href="#Page_324">324</a>, <a href="#Page_327">327</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">life in Cornwall, his scientific tastes, <a href="#Page_323">323</a>, <a href="#Page_340">340&ndash;41</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">ill health, and visit to Scotland, <a href="#Page_328">328&ndash;9</a>, <a href="#Page_365">365</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his paternal affection and domestic enjoyments, <a href="#Page_340">340&ndash;1</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">a commercial politician, <a href="#Page_342">342</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">connection with the Copper Company, <a href="#Page_349">349&ndash;50</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">hostility towards him in Cornwall, <a href="#Page_351">351&ndash;2</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his sympathy with the Quakers, <a href="#Page_352">352</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">starts the Albion Mill scheme, <a href="#Page_353">353</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his depressed spirits, <a href="#Page_366">366</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his friendships, <a href="#Page_367">367&ndash;71</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">turns coiner by steam power, his Soho mint, <a href="#Page_389">389&ndash;99</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his success in medalling, <a href="#Page_395">395</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">contract with Government for a new coinage, fits up the Royal mint and others, <a href="#Page_398">398&ndash;9</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Watt on Boulton’s merits in coining, <a href="#Page_399">399</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his affectionate nature and generosity, <a href="#Page_366">366</a>, <a href="#Page_401">401</a>, <a href="#Page_405">405</a>, <a href="#Page_487">487</a>;<span class="pagenum" id="Page_516">[516]</span></li>
-    <li class="isub">paternal care for young Watt, <a href="#Page_406">406</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">continued activity, his water-raising machine, <a href="#Page_457">457</a>, <a href="#Page_474">474</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his reception of burglars at Soho, <a href="#Page_458">458</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">correspondence with Sir W. Scott, <a href="#Page_459">459</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">failing health, <a href="#Page_462">462</a>, <a href="#Page_475">475</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">counsel of friends to give up business, <a href="#Page_475">475&ndash;6</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his death and funeral, <a href="#Page_477">477</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">monumental inscription, his qualities and character, <a href="#Page_477">477</a>, <a href="#Page_478">478</a>, <a href="#Page_486">486</a>, <a href="#Page_487">487</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his workmen’s assurance society, <a href="#Page_480">480</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his powers for organization and business qualities, <a href="#Page_481">481&ndash;4</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Watt’s estimate of Boulton, <a href="#Page_485">485</a>, <a href="#Page_486">486</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Boulton and Watt</span> commence partnership, <a href="#Page_197">197</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">prospects of engine business, <a href="#Page_207">207</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">manufacture of engines commenced, <a href="#Page_213">213&ndash;15</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">terms of partnership, <a href="#Page_218">218&ndash;23</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">orders from Scotland, <a href="#Page_219">219</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Gainsborough’s attack on the patent, <a href="#Page_222">222&ndash;3</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">difficulties with workmen and engine men, <a href="#Page_227">227&ndash;8</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Cornish business, <a href="#Page_231">231</a>, <a href="#Page_237">237</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">terms on which engines were erected, <a href="#Page_243">243&ndash;4</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">resistance of engine dues, <a href="#Page_246">246</a>, <a href="#Page_262">262</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">orders from abroad, <a href="#Page_249">249</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">their altercations with the Cornish miners, <a href="#Page_257">257&ndash;60</a>, <a href="#Page_315">315&ndash;16</a>, <a href="#Page_331">331&ndash;2</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">engines sold, <a href="#Page_262">262</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">engine patent threatened, they share in mining adventures, <a href="#Page_273">273</a>, <a href="#Page_278">278</a>, <a href="#Page_295">295&ndash;304</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">their voluminous correspondence, <a href="#Page_307">307&ndash;8</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">adverse circumstances, <a href="#Page_315">315</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">dues from pumping-engines, <a href="#Page_317">317</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Hornblowers’ opposition, <a href="#Page_320">320</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">miscellaneous engine orders, <a href="#Page_333">333</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">profits commence, <a href="#Page_363">363</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">their personal friends, <a href="#Page_367">367</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">their sons join the firm, <a href="#Page_417">417&ndash;21</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">partnership dissolved, <a href="#Page_456">456</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Boulton, M. Robinson</span>, his education and attainments, <a href="#Page_433">433&ndash;4</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">in Paris, <a href="#Page_405">405</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">returns, 1788, <a href="#Page_408">408</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his reception by the Lunar Society, <a href="#Page_408">408&ndash;9</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">settles to business, <a href="#Page_417">417</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his business ability, <a href="#Page_418">418&ndash;21</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Boulton, M. P. W.</span>, on alleged photographic discoveries of Boulton and Watt, <a href="#Page_383">383</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Branca’s</span> steam machine, <a href="#Page_7">7</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Brougham, Lord</span>, opinion of Watt, <a href="#Page_490">490</a>, <a href="#Page_503">503</a>, <a href="#Page_507">507</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Burke, Edmund</span>, opposes Watt’s patent-right, <a href="#Page_210">210</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">denounces Dr. Priestley, <a href="#Page_410">410</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">also young Watt, <a href="#Page_415">415</a>.</li>
-
-
-  <li class="section">C.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Caledonian Canal</span> surveyed by Watt, <a href="#Page_157">157</a>, <a href="#Page_197">197</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Calley, John</span>, Dartmouth, <a href="#Page_63">63</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Campbell, Thomas</span>, opinion of Gregory Watt, <a href="#Page_468">468</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Carron Iron Works</span>, <a href="#Page_138">138&ndash;9</a>, <a href="#Page_329">329</a>, <a href="#Page_443">443</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Cartsdyke</span>, Greenock, <a href="#Page_80">80&ndash;2</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Cartwright</span>, Dr., and steam navigation, <a href="#Page_450">450</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Caus, Solomon de</span>, his steam apparatus, <a href="#Page_8">8</a>, <a href="#Page_9">9</a>, <a href="#Page_20">20</a>, <a href="#Page_21">21</a>.</li>
-
-  <li>‘<span class="smcap">Century</span> of Inventions,’ Marquis of Worcester’s, <a href="#Page_10">10&ndash;16</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Charles II.</span> and mechanical inventors, <a href="#Page_15">15</a>, <a href="#Page_28">28</a>.</li>
-
-  <li>‘<span class="smcap">Charlotte Dundas</span>,’ steamboat, of Symington, <a href="#Page_447">447</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap"><ins title="Transcriber's Note: original reads 'Chasewater'" id="Corr-516">Chacewater</ins> Mine</span> and engine, <a href="#Page_231">231</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">engine finished, <a href="#Page_235">235</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">its working, <a href="#Page_242">242&ndash;3</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Chlorine</span>, bleaching by, <a href="#Page_381">381</a>.</li>
-
-  <li>‘<span class="smcap">Clermont</span>,’ the steamboat, <a href="#Page_453">453</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Clyde</span>, survey of, by Watt, <a href="#Page_155">155</a>, <a href="#Page_191">191</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Coinage</span> improved by Boulton, <a href="#Page_387">387&ndash;99</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Coining</span>, illegal, <a href="#Page_386">386</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">punishments for, <a href="#Page_387">387</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Coins</span> struck at Soho Mint, <a href="#Page_394">394</a>.</li>
-
-  <li>‘<span class="smcap">Comet</span>,’ the steamboat, <a href="#Page_453">453&ndash;4</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Cooper</span>, of Manchester, political friend of young Watt, <a href="#Page_408">408</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">they are delegates to Paris, <a href="#Page_414">414</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Copper Company</span> organized, <a href="#Page_281">281&ndash;2</a>, <a href="#Page_349">349&ndash;50</a>.</li>
-
-  <li id="cornish_engines"><span class="smcap">Cornish</span> pumping engines, <a href="#Page_46">46</a>, <a href="#Page_52">52</a>, <a href="#Page_55">55</a>, <a href="#Page_65">65</a>, <a href="#Page_75">75</a>, <a href="#Page_230">230&ndash;31</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub"><ins title="Transcriber's Note: original reads 'Chasewater'" id="Corr-516b">Chacewater</ins>, <a href="#Page_235">235</a>, <a href="#Page_239">239</a>, <a href="#Page_242">242&ndash;3</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Dalcoath, <a href="#Page_246">246</a>, <a href="#Page_270">270</a>, <a href="#Page_306">306&ndash;7</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Hallamanin, <a href="#Page_253">253</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Huel Vor, <a href="#Page_55">55</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">United Mines, <a href="#Page_237">237</a>, <a href="#Page_275">275</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Poldice, Polgooth, Tingtang, Wheal Chance, W. Crenver, W. Busy, W. Maid, W. Treasury, W. Union, W. Virgin, and others, see <i>passim</i>, <a href="#Page_235">235&ndash;327</a>, <a href="#Page_339">339</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Cornwall</span>, early mining in, <a href="#Page_45">45&ndash;48</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Savery’s engines employed, <a href="#Page_55">55</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Newcomen’s, <a href="#Page_69">69</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Watt’s engines introduced, <a href="#Page_230">230</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">life in Cornwall, <a href="#Page_235">235</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">appearance of mining districts, <a href="#Page_237">237</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">character of miners, <a href="#Page_257">257&ndash;60</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">rain in, <a href="#Page_260">260</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">postal service, roads, and weather, <a href="#Page_321">321&ndash;3</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">wasteful mining, <a href="#Page_349">349</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">riots, <a href="#Page_351">351</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Corn-mill</span> first worked by steam, <a href="#Page_325">325</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Cosgarne House</span>, Cornwall, <a href="#Page_275">275</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Cosmo</span>, Grand Duke of Tuscany, visit to Marquis of Worcester’s water engine, <a href="#Page_19">19</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Counter</span> for steam engine, <a href="#Page_245">245</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Craig, John</span>, Watt’s partner, <a href="#Page_125">125</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Crank</span> motion invention stolen, <a href="#Page_289">289</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Cromwell</span> and the <span class="smcap">Marquis of Worcester</span>, <a href="#Page_14">14</a>.</li>
-
-
-  <li class="section">D.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Dalrymple</span>, Sir <span class="smcap">John</span>, and steam navigation, <a href="#Page_440">440</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Darwin</span>, Dr. <span class="smcap">Erasmus</span>&mdash;correspondence with Boulton, <a href="#Page_184">184</a>, <a href="#Page_201">201</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">a Member of the Lunar Society, <a href="#Page_369">369</a>, <a href="#Page_465">465</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Davy</span>, Sir <span class="smcap">Humphry</span>, on gas-lighting, <a href="#Page_429">429</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">and Gregory Watt, <a href="#Page_468">468&ndash;9</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Davy on Gregory’s death, <a href="#Page_472">472</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Day, Thos.</span>, author of ‘Sandford and Merton,’ <a href="#Page_201">201</a>, <a href="#Page_263">263</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Dick</span>, Dr., Glasgow, <a href="#Page_101">101</a>, <a href="#Page_106">106</a>, <a href="#Page_113">113&ndash;14</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Digester, Papin’s</span>, <a href="#Page_32">32</a>, <a href="#Page_120">120</a>.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_517">[517]</span></li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Dircks</span>, Mr., on Marquis of Worcester’s inventions, <a href="#Page_11">11</a>, <a href="#Page_22">22</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Dundas</span>, Lord, and steamboats, <a href="#Page_448">448</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Dundonald</span>, Lord, and <span class="smcap">Boulton</span>, <a href="#Page_329">329</a>.</li>
-
-
-  <li class="section">E.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Edgeworth</span>, R. L., and <span class="smcap">Boulton</span>, <a href="#Page_201">201</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">and the locomotive, <a href="#Page_336">336</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">and the Lunar Society, <a href="#Page_369">369&ndash;70</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Engine dues</span>&mdash;contests with miners, <a href="#Page_243">243&ndash;5</a>, <a href="#Page_271">271</a>, <a href="#Page_311">311</a>, <a href="#Page_315">315</a>, <a href="#Page_317">317</a>, <a href="#Page_320">320</a>, <a href="#Page_331">331&ndash;2</a>, <a href="#Page_339">339</a>, <a href="#Page_418">418&ndash;21</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Eginton, Fr.</span>, at Soho, <a href="#Page_171">171</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">partnership with Boulton in picture business, <a href="#Page_264">264</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Ewart, Peter</span>,&mdash;his opinion of Boulton, <a href="#Page_486">486</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Expansive working</span>, <a href="#Page_146">146&ndash;7</a>, <a href="#Page_228">228&ndash;9</a>, <a href="#Page_304">304</a>, <a href="#Page_307">307</a>, <a href="#Page_310">310&ndash;11</a>.</li>
-
-
-  <li class="section">F.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Fairbairn, William</span>, opinion of Murdock, <a href="#Page_431">431&ndash;2</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Fire and Steam Engines.</span> <i>See</i> <a href="#steam_engines">Steam engines</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Fond, M. St.</span>, describes interviews with Watt and Priestley, <a href="#Page_383">383&ndash;5</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Fothergill, John</span>, a Soho partner, <a href="#Page_169">169</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">travels on the Continent for the firm, <a href="#Page_172">172</a>, <a href="#Page_204">204</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his despondency, <a href="#Page_240">240</a>, <a href="#Page_247">247</a>, <a href="#Page_263">263</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his tenacity, his death, <a href="#Page_275">275</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his embarrassments, <a href="#Page_314">314</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Franklin, Benjamin</span>,&mdash;correspondence with Boulton on steam-engine, <a href="#Page_182">182&ndash;4</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Fulton</span> inspects Symington’s steamboat, <a href="#Page_449">449</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">makes a model steamboat in Paris, <a href="#Page_450">450</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">applies to James Watt, jun., for an engine, <a href="#Page_451">451</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his ‘Nautilus’ infernal-machine, <a href="#Page_452">452</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">he fits up the ‘Clermont’ steamer, <a href="#Page_452">452</a>.</li>
-
-
-  <li class="section">G.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Gainsborough, Humphrey</span>, attacks Watt’s patent, <a href="#Page_222">222</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Garay, Blasco</span>, and paddle-boats, <a href="#Page_36">36</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Gas-lighting</span> invented by Wm. Murdock, <a href="#Page_424">424&ndash;7</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Wintzer’s wonderful project, <a href="#Page_428">428</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">George III.</span> and <span class="smcap">Boulton</span>, <a href="#Page_3">3</a>, <a href="#Page_174">174</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Watt’s interview with the King, <a href="#Page_403">403</a>, <a href="#Page_476">476</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Glasgow</span> in 1754, <a href="#Page_96">96&ndash;100</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">the tobacco lords, <a href="#Page_98">98</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">the clubs, <a href="#Page_99">99</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">drinking habits, <a href="#Page_100">100</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">the University and Professors, <a href="#Page_106">106&ndash;8</a>, <a href="#Page_113">113&ndash;15</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">the Green, <a href="#Page_127">127</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Governor</span>, The, invented by Watt, <a href="#Page_335">335</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Greenock</span> at end of last century, <a href="#Page_80">80&ndash;4</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">improvements, <a href="#Page_85">85</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">at the rebellion of 1745, <a href="#Page_93">93</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Gunpowder and Steam</span> as powers, <a href="#Page_5">5</a>.</li>
-
-
-  <li class="section">H.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Hamilton Bridge</span>&mdash;James Watt architect, <a href="#Page_156">156</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Handsworth Church</span>, near Birmingham, <a href="#Page_477">477&ndash;8</a>, <a href="#Page_505">505</a>, <a href="#Page_507">507</a>, <a href="#Page_514">514</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Harper’s Hill</span>, Birmingham, <a href="#Page_214">214</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Hart, Robert</span>,&mdash;Reminiscences of Watt, <a href="#Page_147">147</a>, <a href="#Page_229">229</a>, <a href="#Page_424">424</a>, <a href="#Page_499">499</a>, <a href="#Page_500">500</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Heathfield</span>, Birmingham, <a href="#Page_460">460</a>, <a href="#Page_493">493&ndash;5</a>, <a href="#Page_512">512&ndash;13</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Hero of Alexandria</span>, his writings on steam, <a href="#Page_5">5&ndash;7</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Hollins</span>, Mr., Birmingham,&mdash;Reminiscence of Watt, <a href="#Page_505">505</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Hooke</span>, Dr., on the Vauxhall hydraulic-machine, <a href="#Page_19">19</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">correspondence with Newcomen, <a href="#Page_62">62</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Hornblower, Jabez</span>, and his brothers, <a href="#Page_296">296&ndash;7</a>, <a href="#Page_332">332</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Hornblower, Jonathan</span>,&mdash;Watt’s first meeting with, <a href="#Page_232">232&ndash;3</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">with his sons, erects engine to supersede Watt’s, <a href="#Page_296">296&ndash;304</a>, <a href="#Page_320">320&ndash;24</a>, <a href="#Page_331">331</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Hornblower, Joseph</span>, erects Newcomen engines in Cornwall, <a href="#Page_71">71</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Hulls, Jonathan</span>, of Campden, <a href="#Page_72">72</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his steamboat, <a href="#Page_73">73</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">unsatisfactory trial, his publications, <a href="#Page_74">74</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Huntsman, Benjamin</span>, Sheffield, and Boulton, <a href="#Page_165">165</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Hutton, William</span>, Birmingham, <a href="#Page_153">153</a>, <a href="#Page_162">162</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">house destroyed by the rioters, <a href="#Page_412">412</a>.</li>
-
-
-  <li class="section">J.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Joint Stock Mining</span> in Cornwall, <a href="#Page_47">47&ndash;8</a>.</li>
-
-
-  <li class="section">K.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Kaltoff, Caspar</span>, assistant to the Marquis of Worcester, <a href="#Page_10">10</a>, <a href="#Page_13">13</a>, <a href="#Page_18">18</a>, <a href="#Page_19">19</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Keir, Jas.</span>, friend of Boulton, <a href="#Page_170">170</a>, <a href="#Page_201">201</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his partner, <a href="#Page_265">265</a>, <a href="#Page_409">409</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Kinneil House</span>, <a href="#Page_142">142</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Watt’s workshop, <a href="#Page_148">148</a>.</li>
-
-
-  <li class="section">L.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Latent heat</span>, <a href="#Page_122">122&ndash;3</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Lawson, James</span>, on Boulton’s Mints, <a href="#Page_391">391</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap"><ins title="Transcriber's Note: original reads 'Leman'" id="Corr-517">Lemon</ins>, William</span>, Penzance, <a href="#Page_69">69</a>.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_518">[518]</span></li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Letter-copying machines</span> invented by Watt,&mdash;partnership, <a href="#Page_265">265</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Locomotion by steam</span>, <a href="#Page_187">187</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">patent by Watt, <a href="#Page_333">333</a>, <a href="#Page_337">337</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Edgeworth, <a href="#Page_336">336</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Murdock’s model, <a href="#Page_336">336&ndash;7</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Symington, <a href="#Page_435">435&ndash;6</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Luc, M. de</span>, friend of Boulton and Watt, <a href="#Page_351">351</a>, <a href="#Page_369">369</a>, <a href="#Page_376">376</a>, <a href="#Page_381">381&ndash;2</a>, <a href="#Page_395">395</a>, <a href="#Page_476">476</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Lunar Society of Birmingham</span>, <a href="#Page_367">367&ndash;70</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">its discussions, <a href="#Page_375">375</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">alleged photographic discovery, <a href="#Page_382">382&ndash;3</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">demise of the Society, its influence, <a href="#Page_385">385</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">dissolution by deaths, <a href="#Page_465">465</a>.</li>
-
-
-  <li class="section">M.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Meason</span>, Mr., Wanlockhead, <a href="#Page_435">435&ndash;6</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Medals</span> struck at Soho Mint, <a href="#Page_395">395&ndash;7</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Micrometer</span>, prismatic, <a href="#Page_152">152</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Miller</span>, Mr., of Dalswinton, propels boats by paddle-wheels, <a href="#Page_437">437</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">employs Symington to make an engine for steamboat, <a href="#Page_439">439</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">its trial, <a href="#Page_442">442</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">orders a second engine, <a href="#Page_443">443</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">another trial, applies to Boulton and Watt, <a href="#Page_444">444</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">their reply, <a href="#Page_445">445</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Mines, United District</span>, Cornwall, <a href="#Page_231">231</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Mint</span>, Soho, <a href="#Page_390">390</a>, <a href="#Page_396">396</a>, <a href="#Page_400">400</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Mint</span>, Tower Hill, fitted up by Boulton, <a href="#Page_398">398&ndash;9</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Mints</span>, foreign, fitted up by Boulton, <a href="#Page_389">389</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Monkland Canal</span>,&mdash;Watt, engineer, <a href="#Page_153">153&ndash;4</a>, <a href="#Page_194">194</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Morland</span>, Sir <span class="smcap">Samuel</span>,&mdash;his fire-engine, <a href="#Page_29">29</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his poverty and blindness, his death, <a href="#Page_30">30</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Murdock, William</span>, employed by Boulton and Watt, <a href="#Page_253">253</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his character, early days, and antecedents, <a href="#Page_254">254</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his interview with Boulton, the wooden hat, and his engagement, <a href="#Page_255">255</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">sent to Cornwall, interest in his work, <a href="#Page_256">256</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">how he dealt with the bullies, fights a duel with Captain Trevithick, <a href="#Page_257">257</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">invents sun-and-planet motion, <a href="#Page_309">309</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his value and merits, <a href="#Page_311">311&ndash;12</a>, <a href="#Page_337">337&ndash;8</a>, <a href="#Page_361">361</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">presented with an acknowledgment, <a href="#Page_312">312</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his popularity in Cornwall, <a href="#Page_313">313</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">testimony of Boulton to his worth, <a href="#Page_321">321</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">makes a model locomotive, <a href="#Page_336">336&ndash;435</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">puts Albion Mill engine to rights, <a href="#Page_356">356</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">at Soho, <a href="#Page_400">400</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his loyalty and usefulness to the firm, <a href="#Page_422">422</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his inventions, <a href="#Page_423">423</a>, <a href="#Page_430">430&ndash;32</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">the D slide valve, lighting by gas, <a href="#Page_424">424&ndash;28</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his steam-gun, engine cement, <a href="#Page_431">431</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">obtains the Rumford gold medal, <a href="#Page_425"><ins  title="Transcriber's Note: original reads '525'" id="Corr-518">425</ins></a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Mr. Fairbairn’s opinion of him, <a href="#Page_431">431&ndash;3</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his death, <a href="#Page_433">433</a>.</li>
-
-
-  <li class="section">N.</li>
-
-  <li>‘<span class="smcap">Nautilus</span>,’ the infernal machine, by Fulton, <a href="#Page_452">452</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Newcomen, Thos.</span>, of Dartmouth, <a href="#Page_59">59</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his house, <a href="#Page_60">60</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his family and character, <a href="#Page_61">61</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his improvements on the fire-engine, <a href="#Page_62">62&ndash;70</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">correspondence with Dr. Hooke, <a href="#Page_62">62</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Newcomen engine described, <a href="#Page_63">63&ndash;68</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">he erects colliery engines, <a href="#Page_68">68</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">supplies pumping-engines for Cornwall, <a href="#Page_69">69</a>, <a href="#Page_71">71</a>, <a href="#Page_74">74&ndash;5</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his obscure end, <a href="#Page_72">72</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Newcomen engines</span>, increased use of for pumping, <a href="#Page_74">74&ndash;75</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">they are superseded, <a href="#Page_275">275</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Newcomen Model</span> at Glasgow University, <a href="#Page_119">119&ndash;21</a>.</li>
-
-
-  <li class="section">O.</li>
-
-  <li>“<span class="smcap">Old Bess</span>” engine, Soho, <a href="#Page_250">250</a>, <a href="#Page_326">326</a>.</li>
-
-
-  <li class="section">P.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Papin</span>, Dr. D.,&mdash;preference for gunpowder to steam, <a href="#Page_5">5</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">a French refugee, <a href="#Page_31">31</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Curator Royal Society, his digester, inventor of the safety-valve, <a href="#Page_32">32</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">proceeds to Germany, his experiments on water and steam, <a href="#Page_33">33&ndash;35</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his steam-boat, <a href="#Page_37">37</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his misfortunes and death, <a href="#Page_38">38</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Parallel motion</span> patented by Watt, <a href="#Page_333">333&ndash;4</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Patent-right</span>, attacks and defence, Watt on patent-right, <a href="#Page_280">280&ndash;1</a>, <a href="#Page_295">295</a>, <a href="#Page_303">303</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">combination against, <a href="#Page_347">347</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Watt, junr., vindicates rights, <a href="#Page_418">418</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Pickard, James</span>, steals Watt’s crank motion, <a href="#Page_289">289</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Pitt, William</span>,&mdash;<span class="smcap">Boulton</span>, and his commercial policy, <a href="#Page_342">342&ndash;6</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">coinage projects, <a href="#Page_388">388</a>, <a href="#Page_393">393</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Port Glasgow</span> piers, by Watt, <a href="#Page_156">156</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Potter, Humphrey</span>,&mdash;his invention of the “Scoggan,” <a href="#Page_66">66</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Priestley</span>, Dr., of Birmingham and the Lunar Society, <a href="#Page_369">369</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his gifts, <a href="#Page_370">370&ndash;72</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Boulton’s association with him, <a href="#Page_373">373</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">meeting of the Lunar Society, <a href="#Page_409">409</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his sympathy with its French revolutionists, <a href="#Page_410">410</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">the new meeting-house and his house at Fairhill burnt by a mob, <a href="#Page_411">411</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">grievous loss of his books, MSS., and apparatus, <a href="#Page_412">412</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his death, <a href="#Page_466">466</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Pumping-engines.</span> <i>See</i> <a href="#cornish_engines">Cornish Pumping-engines</a>.</li>
-
-
-  <li class="section">Q.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Queen Charlotte</span> and <span class="smcap">Boulton</span>, <a href="#Page_174">174&ndash;5</a>.</li>
-
-
-  <li class="section">R.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Radstoke</span>, Bristol, Hornblowers’ Engine, <a href="#Page_322">322&ndash;3</a>.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_519">[519]</span></li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Raglan Castle</span>, <a href="#Page_10">10&ndash;12</a>, <a href="#Page_26">26</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Redruth</span>, Cornwall, <a href="#Page_237">237&ndash;8</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Rennie, John</span>, engineer, Albion Mill, <a href="#Page_354">354</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Reynolds</span>, Mr., of Ketley, has Watt’s first rotary engine, <a href="#Page_327">327</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Robinson Family</span>, The, <a href="#Page_166">166</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Robison</span>, Professor,&mdash;his intercourse with Watt, <a href="#Page_113">113&ndash;14</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his voyagings, his estimate of Watt, <a href="#Page_115">115&ndash;16</a>, <a href="#Page_118">118</a>, <a href="#Page_121">121</a>, <a href="#Page_130">130&ndash;31</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">idea of a locomotive, <a href="#Page_336">336</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">incident in class on his return from Watt’s patent trial, <a href="#Page_463">463&ndash;4</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his death, <a href="#Page_472">472&ndash;3</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Roebuck</span>, Dr.,&mdash;Carron Works and coal mining adventures, <a href="#Page_138">138</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">correspondence with Watt, <a href="#Page_139">139</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">terms of partnership with Watt, <a href="#Page_141">141</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his house at Kinneil, <a href="#Page_142">142</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his embarrassments, <a href="#Page_150">150</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his patent for alkali manufacture, <a href="#Page_152">152</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his ruin, <a href="#Page_158">158</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">correspondence with Boulton, <a href="#Page_185">185</a>, <a href="#Page_189">189</a>, <a href="#Page_192">192</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">arrangement to transfer his share in Watt’s engine to Boulton, <a href="#Page_190">190</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his share transferred, <a href="#Page_195">195&ndash;7</a>, <a href="#Page_204">204</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Rotary motion</span>, <a href="#Page_286">286</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Watt employs the crank, <a href="#Page_287">287</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">the invention stolen, <a href="#Page_289">289</a>, <a href="#Page_293">293</a>, <a href="#Page_299">299&ndash;301</a>, <a href="#Page_309">309&ndash;10</a>, <a href="#Page_319">319</a>, <a href="#Page_325">325&ndash;7</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Russia</span>, Empress of, visit to Boulton, <a href="#Page_216">216</a>.</li>
-
-
-  <li class="section">S.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Savery, Captain Thomas</span>, his family, <a href="#Page_40">40</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">early life, study of mechanics, <a href="#Page_41">41</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his clocks, machine for polishing plate glass, his paddle boat, <a href="#Page_42">42</a>, <a href="#Page_43">43</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">opposed by the Navy Board, <a href="#Page_43">43</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his “Navigation Improved,” <a href="#Page_42">42</a>, <a href="#Page_44">44</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his paddle yacht on the Thames, <a href="#Page_44">44</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his fire-engine, <a href="#Page_48">48&ndash;54</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his ‘Miner’s Friend,’ <a href="#Page_50">50</a>, <a href="#Page_52">52</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his engines used in Cornwall, <a href="#Page_55">55</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">failures of engines, <a href="#Page_56">56</a>, <a href="#Page_57">57</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his later years, death, and will, <a href="#Page_58">58</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Schimmelpenninck</span>, Mrs., descriptions of meetings of Lunar Society, &amp;c., <a href="#Page_408">408&ndash;9</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">on Watt’s character, <a href="#Page_503">503</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Scott</span>, Sir W., on gas-lighting, <a href="#Page_429">429</a>, <a href="#Page_431">431</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">opinion of Boulton, <a href="#Page_459">459</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">of Watt, <a href="#Page_501">501&ndash;4</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Screw-propeller</span> suggested by Watt, <a href="#Page_192">192</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Shelburne, Lord</span>, opinion of Boulton, <a href="#Page_171">171</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Simson, Professor</span>, Glasgow, <a href="#Page_112">112&ndash;15</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Small</span>, Dr., birth and parentage, <a href="#Page_145">145</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">correspondence with Watt, <a href="#Page_146">146&ndash;7</a>, <a href="#Page_150">150&ndash;51</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">correspondence, <a href="#Page_186">186&ndash;198</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his attainments, <a href="#Page_201">201</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his death, <a href="#Page_208">208</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Smeaton, James</span>, engineer, attracted by the atmospheric engine, <a href="#Page_68">68</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">improvements on Newcomen’s engine, <a href="#Page_76">76</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">adverse opinion of Watt’s engine, <a href="#Page_202">202</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">improves York buildings engine, <a href="#Page_217">217</a>, <a href="#Page_226">226</a>, <a href="#Page_292">292</a>, <a href="#Page_511">511</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Soho</span>, Birmingham, its situation and cost of building, <a href="#Page_167">167&ndash;70</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">its varied manufactures, <a href="#Page_176">176</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">its distinguished visitors, <a href="#Page_176">176</a>, <a href="#Page_180">180&ndash;1</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">extent of capital and trade, <a href="#Page_177">177</a>, <a href="#Page_180">180</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">persons employed and machinery, <a href="#Page_179">179&ndash;80</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Watt’s first visit, <a href="#Page_185">185</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">brisk engine trade, <a href="#Page_348">348</a>, <a href="#Page_361">361</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">workmen tempted to leave, <a href="#Page_227">227</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">training of workmen, <a href="#Page_228">228</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Prussian spies, <a href="#Page_250">250</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">loss by painting business, <a href="#Page_264">264</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">letter-copying machine business, <a href="#Page_265">265&ndash;8</a>, <a href="#Page_349">349</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">steam corn-mill at, <a href="#Page_325">325</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">the mint at, <a href="#Page_390">390</a>, <a href="#Page_396">396&ndash;99</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">illuminated with gas, <a href="#Page_427">427</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Soho</span> pictures, the, <a href="#Page_264">264</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap"><ins title="Transcriber's Note: original reads 'Sorbiere'" id="Corr-519">Sorbière</ins>, M.</span>, on Marquis of Worcester’s inventions, <a href="#Page_18">18&ndash;20</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Speaking-trumpet</span> invented by Sir S. Morland, <a href="#Page_29">29</a>.</li>
-
-  <li id="steam_boats"><span class="smcap">Steam</span> and paddle boats. <i>See</i> Bell, Henry, <a href="#Page_453">453</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Fulton, <a href="#Page_449">449&ndash;52</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Garay, <a href="#Page_35">35</a>, <a href="#Page_36">36</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Hulls, <a href="#Page_72">72&ndash;74</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Miller, <a href="#Page_437">437&ndash;45</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Papin, <a href="#Page_37"><ins title="Transcriber's Note: original reads '67'" id="Corr-519b">37</ins></a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Savery, <a href="#Page_37">37</a>, <a href="#Page_42">42&ndash;44</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Symington, <a href="#Page_435">435&ndash;49</a>.</li>
-
-  <li id="steam_engines"><span class="smcap">Steam</span> and fire engines, improvers of, and alleged inventors, <a href="#Page_75">75&ndash;76</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub"><i>see also</i> pp. <a href="#Page_6">6</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Branca, <a href="#Page_7">7</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Caus de, and Worcester, Marquis of, <a href="#Page_9">9&ndash;26</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Morland, <a href="#Page_29">29</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Savery, <a href="#Page_49">49&ndash;54</a>, <a href="#Page_59">59</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Newcomen, <a href="#Page_63">63</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub"><i>also index entries</i>, <a href="#boulton">Boulton, Matthew</a>, and <a href="#watt">Watt, James</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">possible defects, <a href="#Page_224">224</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Watt’s single acting pumping engine, <a href="#Page_236">236</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Steam flour-mills</span>, <a href="#Page_291">291</a>, <a href="#Page_325">325&ndash;<ins title="Transcriber's Note: original reads '5'" id="Corr-519c">6</ins></a>, <a href="#Page_327">327</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Steam-gun</span> suggested by Murdock, <a href="#Page_431">431</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Steam hammer</span>, Watt’s, <a href="#Page_300">300</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Steam</span>, its employment by the ancients, its enormous power, <a href="#Page_5">5</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Stockdale</span>, Mr., of Carke, visited by Boulton and Watt, <a href="#Page_419">419</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">describes a visit to Watt, <a href="#Page_505">505</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Stratford-le-Bow Engine</span>, <a href="#Page_217">217</a>, <a href="#Page_223">223&ndash;6</a>, <a href="#Page_369">369</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Strathmore Canal</span> surveyed by Watt, <a href="#Page_155">155</a>.</li>
-
-  <li>“<span class="smcap">Sun and Planet</span>” motion, <a href="#Page_309">309</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Sycamore Hill</span>, Handsworth, Murdock’s residence, <a href="#Page_254">254</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Symington, William</span>, of Wanlockhead,&mdash;his model locomotive, <a href="#Page_435">435&ndash;6</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">matriculates at Edinburgh University, projects steamboat for canals, <a href="#Page_436">436&ndash;7</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">joins Mr. Miller in constructing a steamboat, <a href="#Page_439">439</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his first steamboat engine, <a href="#Page_441">441</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">its trial, <a href="#Page_442">442</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">makes a second engine for Mr. Miller, <a href="#Page_443">443</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">another trial, <a href="#Page_444">444</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">fits up the ‘Charlotte Dundas,’ his adversity and death, <a href="#Page_449">449</a>.</li>
-
-
-  <li class="section">T.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Telescope for measuring distances</span>, invention of Watt, <a href="#Page_151">151</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Tilt-hammer</span> worked by steam, patent by Watt, <a href="#Page_301">301</a>, <a href="#Page_325">325</a>, <a href="#Page_333">333</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Tobacco Trade</span>, Glasgow, <a href="#Page_98">98&ndash;9</a>.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_520">[520]</span></li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Trevithick</span>, Captain, Watt’s altercation with, <a href="#Page_257">257</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Murdock fights a duel with, <a href="#Page_257">257</a>, <a href="#Page_259">259</a>, <a href="#Page_296">296</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Tubular Boilers</span> made by Boulton, <a href="#Page_282">282&ndash;3</a>.</li>
-
-
-  <li class="section">U.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">United Mines</span>, Cornwall, map, <a href="#Page_231">231</a>, <a href="#Page_261">261</a>, <a href="#Page_275">275</a>.</li>
-
-
-  <li class="section">V.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Vauxhall Water Engine</span>, &amp;c., <a href="#Page_18">18</a>, <a href="#Page_25">25</a>, <a href="#Page_29">29</a>.</li>
-
-
-  <li class="section">W.</li>
-
-  <li>“<span class="smcap">Waggon and Horses</span>,” Birmingham, <a href="#Page_288">288</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Walker, Zaccheus</span>, manager at Soho, <a href="#Page_169">169</a>, <a href="#Page_400">400</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Warltire</span>, Mr., Birmingham, lecturer, <a href="#Page_377">377</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Washborough, Matthew</span>, of Bristol, <a href="#Page_289">289</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Watt’s opinion of him, <a href="#Page_291">291&ndash;293</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Water</span>, composition of,&mdash;Watt, Cavendish, Lavoisier, and Priestley, <a href="#Page_377">377&ndash;81</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Water-raising engines</span>, <a href="#Page_20">20&ndash;25</a>, <a href="#Page_29">29</a>, <a href="#Page_52">52&ndash;5</a>, <a href="#Page_63">63&ndash;9</a>.</li>
-    <li class="isub"><i>See</i> also <a href="#cornish_engines">Cornish pumping-engines</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Watt, Gregory</span>,&mdash;his personal beauty and brilliant talents, <a href="#Page_467">467&ndash;8</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his infirm health, is lodged at Penzance, friendship with Humphry Davy, <a href="#Page_468">468&ndash;9</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his travels, continued illness and death, <a href="#Page_470">470&ndash;71</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Davy’s appreciation of Gregory Watt, <a href="#Page_472">472</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Watt, James</span>,&mdash;the engineer’s father, <a href="#Page_83">83</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his varied occupations and trade, <a href="#Page_85">85&ndash;6</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">he fills important public offices, <a href="#Page_86">86</a>.</li>
-
-  <li id="watt"><span class="smcap">Watt, James</span>, engineer, F.R.S., &amp;c.,&mdash;his ancestry, <a href="#Page_80">80</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his birth, feeble constitution, home education, <a href="#Page_87">87</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his early exhibition of mechanical taste and dexterity, his precocity, <a href="#Page_88">88</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">sent to school, <a href="#Page_89">89</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">continual ailments, taken to Glasgow, gift of storytelling, <a href="#Page_90">90</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">sent to Greenock Grammar School, <a href="#Page_91">91</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">love of reading, <a href="#Page_92">92</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">recollections of the rebellion, <a href="#Page_93">93</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">rambles, scientific pursuits and studies, <a href="#Page_94">94</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his single sport, <a href="#Page_95">95</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">goes to Glasgow to learn a trade, difficulty in finding a master, <a href="#Page_100">100</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">proceeds to London, <a href="#Page_101">101</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">has again difficulty in finding a master, serves a watch-maker, cuts letters in metal, finds a master, <a href="#Page_102">102</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his rapid progress as mathematical-instrument-maker, his life in London, <a href="#Page_103">103</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">danger from pressgangs, <a href="#Page_104">104</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">returns to <ins title="Transcriber's Note: original reads 'Sotland'" id="Corr-520">Scotland</ins>, refused permission to commence business in Glasgow, <a href="#Page_105">105</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">finds asylum in the college, <a href="#Page_106">106</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his shop there, <a href="#Page_107">107</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his unprofitable business, sells maps and quadrants, <a href="#Page_109">109</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">makes musical instruments, <a href="#Page_110">110</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">builds organs, <a href="#Page_111">111</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his studies, his club, his intercourse with the professors and students, <a href="#Page_112">112</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his principal associates, <a href="#Page_113">113</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Dr. Robison and others, <a href="#Page_114">114</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Watt’s scientific attainments, <a href="#Page_115">115</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">studies chemistry, <a href="#Page_118">118</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">the Newcomen model, studies steam, <a href="#Page_119">119&ndash;121</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his inquiries and experiments, <a href="#Page_122">122&ndash;124</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">business improves, takes a partner, <a href="#Page_125">125</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">marries his cousin, <a href="#Page_126">126</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his continued brooding over the steam-engine, <a href="#Page_127">127</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">walk on Glasgow Green, a discovery, <a href="#Page_127">127&ndash;8</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">the separate condenser, experimental apparatus, <a href="#Page_129">129&ndash;31</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Robison and Watt, anecdote, <a href="#Page_131">131</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">friendship with Dr. Black, <a href="#Page_132">132</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Watt’s air-tight cover, <a href="#Page_133">133</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his model engine, <a href="#Page_134">134</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">working engine, <a href="#Page_135">135</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">mechanical and financial difficulties, <a href="#Page_136">136&ndash;37</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Watt’s connexion with Roebuck, <a href="#Page_138">138&ndash;9</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">begins business as surveyor, <a href="#Page_139">139</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">surveys canals, <a href="#Page_140">140</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">proceeds with the engine, <a href="#Page_141">141</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">visit to Roebuck at Kinneil House, <a href="#Page_142">142</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">a patent determined on, <a href="#Page_143">143</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">strives after improvements, <a href="#Page_144">144</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his perseverance, <a href="#Page_145">145</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his foresight, <a href="#Page_146">146</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">erects Newcomen engines, <a href="#Page_147">147</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">trial engine erected at Kinneil, <a href="#Page_148">148&ndash;9</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">dreary prospects, Roebuck embarrassed, <a href="#Page_150">150</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Watt’s minor inventions, <a href="#Page_151">151</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">multifarious pursuits, superintends canal works, <a href="#Page_152">152&ndash;3</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">surveys Strathmore Canal, <a href="#Page_155">155</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">designs Hamilton Bridge and other engineering works, <a href="#Page_156">156</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">death of Mrs. Watt, <a href="#Page_157">157</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Watt visits Soho, <a href="#Page_185">185</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">first meeting with Boulton, and correspondence with him and Dr. Small, <a href="#Page_186">186</a>, <a href="#Page_190">190</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Watt resumes surveying, <a href="#Page_191">191</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">more unsuccessful engine experiments, <a href="#Page_192">192</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Monkland Canal works stopped, and Watt loses employment, <a href="#Page_194">194</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">resumed overtures, Roebuck’s share transferred to Boulton, and commencement of Boulton and Watt’s partnership, Watt’s arrival in Birmingham, <a href="#Page_195">195&ndash;8</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">contrast between Boulton and Watt, <a href="#Page_199">199&ndash;200</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">the engine re-erected at Soho, <a href="#Page_202">202&ndash;4</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">works successfully, <a href="#Page_205">205</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">inquiries for engines, extension of patent, Watt’s arguments, Act obtained, <a href="#Page_206">206&ndash;12</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">invited to Russia, <a href="#Page_209">209</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">visits to London, <a href="#Page_206">206&ndash;7</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Bow engine, <a href="#Page_224">224&ndash;26</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">goes to Cornwall, his life there, describes the adventurers, <a href="#Page_231">231&ndash;34</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">unable to wrestle for engine-dues, <a href="#Page_244">244&ndash;46</a>, <a href="#Page_257">257</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">fears as to financial obligations, <a href="#Page_249">249</a>, <a href="#Page_263">263</a>, <a href="#Page_268">268</a>, <a href="#Page_273">273</a>, <a href="#Page_293">293&ndash;4</a>, <a href="#Page_314">314</a>, <a href="#Page_315">315</a>, <a href="#Page_317">317</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Watt’s <ins title="Transcriber's Note: original reads 'imperfecfections'" id="Corr-520b">imperfections</ins>, <a href="#Page_258">258</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his infirm health and intolerance of inefficient workmen, <a href="#Page_251">251</a>, <a href="#Page_269">269</a>, <a href="#Page_270">270</a>, <a href="#Page_272">272</a>, <a href="#Page_276">276&ndash;7</a>, <a href="#Page_308">308&ndash;9</a>, <a href="#Page_311">311&ndash;12</a>, <a href="#Page_316">316</a>, <a href="#Page_348">348</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">invents letter-copying machine, <a href="#Page_265">265</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">opinion on patent right, <a href="#Page_280">280&ndash;281</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">rotary motion, <a href="#Page_286">286</a>, <a href="#Page_293">293</a>, <a href="#Page_299">299&ndash;301</a>, <a href="#Page_311">311</a>, <a href="#Page_318">318</a>, <a href="#Page_325">325</a>, <a href="#Page_327">327</a>, <a href="#Page_359">359</a>;<span class="pagenum" id="Page_521">[521]</span></li>
-    <li class="isub">Washborough and Pickard’s piracy, <a href="#Page_288">288&ndash;93</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">invents contrivance for stopping engine, <a href="#Page_306">306</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">equalising beam, <a href="#Page_307">307</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">experiments on nutgalls, <a href="#Page_307">307</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">new patent, <a href="#Page_300">300</a>, <a href="#Page_309">309&ndash;310</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">visits Radstoke about Hornblowers’ engine, <a href="#Page_322">322&ndash;3</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">steam applied to the tilt-hammer, <a href="#Page_333">333</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">parallel motion, <a href="#Page_334">334</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">the governor, <a href="#Page_335">335</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">opinions of free commerce, <a href="#Page_345">345</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">financial caution, <a href="#Page_364">364&ndash;5</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">theory on the composition of water, <a href="#Page_377">377&ndash;81</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">connexion with the Lunar Society, <a href="#Page_367">367</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">experiments on bleaching by chlorine, <a href="#Page_381">381</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">takes pleasure tours, <a href="#Page_402">402</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">interview with the king, <a href="#Page_403">403</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">fears for his son’s safety, <a href="#Page_415">415&ndash;417</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">letter on steam-navigation, <a href="#Page_445">445</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his garret-workshop, <a href="#Page_460">460</a>, <a href="#Page_493">493</a>, <a href="#Page_495">495</a>, <a href="#Page_513">513&ndash;14</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">search after investments, <a href="#Page_460">460&ndash;61</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his bereavements, <a href="#Page_466">466&ndash;74</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">enjoys retirement, <a href="#Page_460">460</a>, <a href="#Page_475">475</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">studies medical chemistry, <a href="#Page_467">467</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">sorrow at the death of Boulton, <a href="#Page_488">488</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">cheerful occupation of declining years, <a href="#Page_489">489&ndash;90</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">statuary-copying machine, <a href="#Page_491">491</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">medallions of his friends, <a href="#Page_492">492</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">consulted by the Glasgow Waterworks Company, his tours and visits, <a href="#Page_497">497&ndash;8</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Sir W. Scott, Jeffrey, Mrs. Schimmelpenninck, on Watt’s character and  attainments, <a href="#Page_501">501&ndash;3</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">caustic criticism by Watt, <a href="#Page_506">506</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">last illness and death, monumental honours, <a href="#Page_507">507&ndash;8</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">honours conferred upon and offered to him, <a href="#Page_509">509</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">modest estimate of himself, traits of character, <a href="#Page_510">510&ndash;12</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">concluding reflections, <a href="#Page_513">513</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Watt</span>, Mrs. <span class="smcap">James</span>, <a href="#Page_218">218</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">letters to Boulton about life in Cornwall, <a href="#Page_235">235</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Watt’s distresses, <a href="#Page_276">276&ndash;7</a>, <a href="#Page_308">308</a>, <a href="#Page_475">475</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">is very particular in domestic affairs, <a href="#Page_496">496</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Watt, James</span>, junr.,&mdash;his education and attainments, <a href="#Page_403">403&ndash;4</a>, <a href="#Page_406">406</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Manchester life and training, his confidence in Boulton, <a href="#Page_405">405&ndash;7</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his political proclivities, <a href="#Page_408">408</a>, <a href="#Page_417">417</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">a delegate to the Jacobin Club, <a href="#Page_414">414</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">scene with Robespierre, flees Paris, is denounced by Burke in the House of Commons, <a href="#Page_415">415</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his liberty endangered, <a href="#Page_416">416</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">settles to  business, <a href="#Page_417">417</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his business ability, <a href="#Page_418">418</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Watt, Thomas</span>, the engineer’s grandfather, <a href="#Page_79">79&ndash;82</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Wedgwood, Josiah</span>, and <span class="smcap">Boulton</span>, <a href="#Page_172">172&ndash;3</a>, <a href="#Page_201">201</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">a mining adventurer, <a href="#Page_273">273</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">commercial politics, <a href="#Page_343">343</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">a member of the Lunar Society, his delicate and generous conduct towards Priestley, <a href="#Page_374">374&ndash;5</a>, <a href="#Page_465">465</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Wilkinson, John</span>, of <ins title="Transcriber's Note: original reads 'Brosely'" id="Corr-521">Broseley</ins>, constructs the first iron boats, <a href="#Page_212">212&ndash;13</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">orders first engine from Boulton and Watt, <a href="#Page_215">215</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">casts cylinders for Boulton and Watt, <a href="#Page_216">216&ndash;224</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">a mining adventurer, <a href="#Page_273">273</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">orders rotary engine, <a href="#Page_318">318</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">William III.</span> and <span class="smcap"><ins title="Transcriber's Note: original reads 'Savary'" id="Corr-521b">Savery</ins></span>, <a href="#Page_50">50</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Withering</span>, Dr., and the Lunar Society, <a href="#Page_201">201</a>, <a href="#Page_369">369</a>, <a href="#Page_383">383</a>, <a href="#Page_409">409</a>, <a href="#Page_413">413</a>, <a href="#Page_465">465</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Woodcroft</span>, B., on Hero of Alexandria, <a href="#Page_7">7</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">Marquis of Worcester’s inventions, <a href="#Page_23">23</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">steam navigation, <a href="#Page_448">448</a>, <a href="#Page_452">452</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Worcester, Edw.</span>, Marquis of,&mdash;birth and family, early life and studies, water-commanding steam-engine, ‘Century of Inventions,’ <a href="#Page_10">10&ndash;13</a>, <a href="#Page_16">16&ndash;23</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his escutcheon lock, <a href="#Page_17">17</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">a Royalist in the civil war, advances money to the king, <a href="#Page_12">12</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his exile and return, imprisonment in the Tower, College of Artisans at Vauxhall, <a href="#Page_13">13</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his poverty, <a href="#Page_14">14</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">revived hopes, <a href="#Page_15">15</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">patented inventions, <a href="#Page_16">16</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">descriptions of his engine, <a href="#Page_19">19</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">seeks access to the king, <a href="#Page_24">24</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his embarrassments, <a href="#Page_25">25</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">his death, <a href="#Page_25">25</a>.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">Worcester</span>, Marchioness of,&mdash;zeal for her deceased husband’s honour, <a href="#Page_25">25</a>, <a href="#Page_27">27</a>, <a href="#Page_28">28</a>.</li>
-
-
-  <li class="section">Y.</li>
-
-  <li><span class="smcap">York Buildings Engine</span>, <a href="#Page_206">206</a>;</li>
-    <li class="isub">improved by Smeaton, <a href="#Page_217">217</a>, <a href="#Page_227">227</a>.</li>
-</ul>
-
-
-<div class="center space-above">
-THE END.</div>
-
-<div class="center space-above"><small>LONDON: PRINTED BY W. CLOWES AND SONS, DUKE STREET, STAMFORD STREET,
-AND CHARING CROSS.</small>
-</div>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_adI">[I]</span></p>
-
-<hr class="full" />
-
-
-<div class="ad-header"><p>Lately published. By the same Author.<br />
-
-Vols. I. and II., 8vo., 42<i>s.</i>, with 5 Steel Portraits and 200 Illustrations on Wood.</p>
-
-<p><span class="big">LIVES OF THE ENGINEERS;</span><br />
-
-<big><b>WITH AN ACCOUNT OF THEIR PRINCIPAL WORKS, AND A HISTORY OF INLAND
-COMMUNICATION IN BRITAIN.</b></big></p>
-
-<p><i>FIRST SERIES.</i></p>
-</div>
-
-<p class="center"><b>Opinions of the Press, &amp;c.</b></p>
-
-<p>“There may be many here who have made themselves acquainted with a
-book that cannot be too widely brought into public notice&mdash;I mean the recent
-publication of a popular author, Mr. Smiles, entitled <cite>The Lives of the Engineers</cite>.
-There may be those here who have read the Life of Brindley, and perused the
-record of his discouragement in the tardiness of his own mind, as well as in
-the external circumstances with which he determined to do battle, and over
-which he achieved his triumph. There may be those who have read the exploits
-of the blind Metcalfe, who made roads and bridges in England at a time when
-nobody else had learnt to make them. There may be those who have dwelt with
-interest on the achievements of Smeaton, Rennie, and Telford. In that book we
-see of what materials Englishmen are made. These men, who have now become
-famous among us, had no mechanics’ institutes, no libraries, no classes, no
-examinations to cheer them on their way. In the greatest poverty, difficulties,
-and discouragements, their energies were found sufficient for their work, and
-they have written their names in a distinguished page of the history of their
-country.”&mdash;<i>The Right Hon. W. E. Gladstone at Manchester.</i></p>
-
-<p>“I have just been reading a work of great interest, which I recommend to
-your notice&mdash;I mean Smiles’s <cite>Lives of the Engineers</cite>. No more interesting books
-have been published of late years than those by Mr. Smiles&mdash;his <cite>Lives of the
-Engineers</cite>, his <cite>Life of George Stephenson</cite>, and his admirable little book on <cite>Self-Help</cite>&mdash;a
-most valuable manual.”&mdash;<i>Sir Stafford Northcote at Exeter.</i></p>
-
-<p>“We cannot but refer, in passing, to the captivating and instructive volumes
-which Mr. Smiles has devoted to the <cite>Lives of the Engineers</cite>, a record not before
-attempted of the achievements of a race of men who have conferred the highest
-honour and the most extensive benefits on their country. ‘Who are the great
-men of the present age?’ said Mr. Bright a few nights ago in the House of
-Commons,&mdash;‘Not your warriors&mdash;not your statesmen; they are your engineers,’”&mdash;<cite>Edinburgh
-Review.</cite></p>
-
-<p>“A chapter of English history which had to be written, and which, probably,
-no one could have written so well. Mr. Smiles, has obtained a mass of original
-materials. It is not too much to say that we now have an Engineers’ Pantheon,
-with a connected narrative of their successive reclamations from sea, bog, and
-fen; a history of the growth of the inland communication of Great Britain by
-means of its roads, bridges, canals, and railways; and a survey of the lighthouses,
-breakwaters, docks, and harbours constructed for the protection and accommodation
-of our commerce with the world.”&mdash;<cite>Times.</cite></p>
-
-<p>“Happy alike in the choice of his subject and in the treatment he has bestowed
-upon it, Mr. Smiles has in these two delightful volumes made another sterling
-addition to our standard literature. The history of English engineering, which
-he has here traced from the beginning, forms an essential part of the history
-of English civilization, but one which had hitherto remained unwritten. The men
-whose lives he has narrated were all men of singular genius, and indomitable
-energy and perseverance; self-taught and self-made for the most part, and
-impelled by the force of their constructive instincts to the accomplishment,
-without precedents or guides, of works of inestimable national importance.”&mdash;<cite>Daily
-News.</cite></p>
-
-<p>“In two handsome volumes, richly illustrated and luxuriously printed, Mr. Smiles
-begins what is in fact a History of the results of Engineering Science in this
-country. He puts his history into the most interesting form by developing it
-through successive stories of the Lives of the Engineers. Although his subject is
-one of the most curious and important in the whole history of civilization, and
-abounds in details that are known to delight even our boys, the ground Mr. Smiles
-traverses is to a remarkable degree his own peculiar possession.”&mdash;<cite>Examiner.</cite></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_adII">[II]</span></p>
-
-
-<hr class="tb noepub" />
-
-<div class="ad-header"><p>Lately published. By the same Author.<br />
-
-Vol. III., 8vo., 21<i>s.</i>, with 2 Portraits and 70 Illustrations.</p>
-
-<p><span class="big">LIVES OF THE ENGINEERS,</span><br />
-<big><b>ETC. ETC.</b></big></p>
-
-<p><i>SECOND SERIES.</i></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>“Mr. Smiles’s third volume of <cite>The Engineers</cite> contains the biographies of George
-Stephenson and his son Robert. The life of George Stephenson is a revised
-edition of the author’s previous excellent work on the same subject, but it is much
-more complete, from the circumstance that the history of George’s son and lifelong
-colleague is interwoven with his own. It is impossible fully to comprehend
-either without the other. Father and son understood one another better than
-any other person could have understood either of them. Their ambition was alike,
-and they perfectly coincided as to the means by which its objects were to be accomplished.
-They were equally kindly and generous, and there never was a shadow
-of reserve or estrangement between them. It is delightful to contemplate these
-two great men in their intercourse with each other, their mutual and perfect confidence,
-the laborious paths of discovery which they trod together, and the brilliant
-combinations of their genius hallowed by their strong affection.... This volume
-brings down the subject of British engineering to the establishment of the railway
-system, in which, as the author justly observes, ‘British engineers have displayed
-their highest skill and achieved their greatest triumphs.’ Mr. Smiles’s <cite>Life of
-George Stephenson</cite> is so well and so favourably known that we confine ourselves to
-the simple announcement of its appearance in the ‘Engineers’ series in a greatly
-improved form, and perfected by being blended with that of Robert Stephenson....
-This volume is a monument to truth, honour, and integrity, as the deepest and
-most solid foundations of human renown.”&mdash;<cite>Daily News.</cite></p>
-
-<p>“The Biographical History of British Engineering would be very imperfect
-without the lives of the Stephensons, and we must thank Mr. Smiles for a third
-volume containing the story of the famous father and son, George and Robert.
-The career of George Stephenson, indeed, is already familiar to us through the
-earlier publication of Mr. Smiles, and the greater part of the present volume may
-be looked upon as a new and enlarged edition of that work; but, in the life of
-Robert, Mr. Smiles enters upon new ground, and he has produced a biography
-little inferior in interest to his former narrative. As interesting it can scarcely be
-called; for the difficulties which George Stephenson had to encounter were, by his
-carefulness, removed to a great extent from the path of his son, and we are not
-absorbed in the story of a single-handed battle with innumerable obstacles. The
-career of Robert Stephenson is, moreover, so much nearer to us than that of his
-father, that it was probably impossible to write its history with that fulness of
-biographic detail which presented the very man, George, before us, and gave such
-a charm to the story of his life.”&mdash;<cite>London Review.</cite></p>
-
-<p>“It was almost necessary, that the life of George Stephenson as an engineer
-should combine itself with that of his son, so closely were the two mixed up in
-the most remarkable project of their lives. Robert Stephenson has been removed
-by death since his father’s biography was first given to the world by Mr. Smiles
-and the author has acted very judiciously in adding to his work those special details
-which are required to furnish forth a complete biography of the pair. The keen,
-bluff, intelligent features of the younger Stephenson are finely engraved among the
-illustrations of this volume from a photograph by Claudet. Much is recorded respecting
-the man that is of great interest over and above the information given us
-as to the achievements of the engineer.... This book will be a sterling addition
-to our libraries&mdash;adding to its literary and human interest the merits of excellent
-typography and fine ornament in the engravings with which it is enriched.”&mdash;<cite>John
-Bull.</cite></p>
-
-<p>“A book which has at once the conciseness necessary to render it valuable to
-the professional man, and the interesting character which makes it acceptable to
-the general reader.... The information is so interspersed with anecdotes and
-interesting notes, that the work will be read with pleasure by everybody....
-Mr. Smiles has enjoyed the active co-operation of those who were able to throw a
-light upon the subject, including Robert Stephenson himself.”&mdash;<cite>Mining Journal.</cite></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_adIII">[III]</span></p>
-
-
-<hr class="tb noepub" />
-
-<div class="ad-header"><p>Lately published. By the same Author. Post 8vo. 6<i>s.</i></p>
-
-<p><span class="big">INDUSTRIAL BIOGRAPHY:</span><br />
-
-<big><b>IRON WORKERS AND TOOL MAKERS.</b></big></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>“Mr. Smiles is not only a skilful workman, but he has chosen a new field of
-work. Hitherto the great biographies have been written of soldiers and sailors,
-statesmen, poets, artists, and philosophers. It would seem as if these only were
-the great men of the world, as if these only were the benefactors of mankind,
-whose deeds are worthy of memory. The suspicion has arisen that, after all,
-there may be other heroes than those of the pen, the sceptre, and the sword.
-There are, indeed, men in various walks of life whose footsteps are worthy of
-being traced; but surely, considering what England is, and to what we owe most
-of our material greatness, the lives of our engineers are peculiarly worthy of being
-written. ‘The true Epic of our time,’ says Mr. Carlyle, ‘is not Arms and the
-man, but Tools and the man&mdash;an infinitely wider kind of Epic.’ Our machinery
-has been the making of us; our ironworks have, in spite of the progress of other
-nations, still kept the balance in our hands. Smith-work in all its branches of
-engine-making, machine-making, tool-making, cutlery, iron ship-building, and
-iron-working generally, is our chief glory. England is the mistress of manufactures
-and the queen of the world, because it is the land of Smith; and Mr. Smiles’s
-biographies are a history of the great family of Smith.... Many of the facts
-which he places before us are wholly new, and are derived from the most likely
-sources. Thus, Maudslay’s partner, Mr. Joshua Field, and his pupil, Mr. Nasmyth,
-supplied the materials for his biography. Mr. John Penn supplied the chief
-material for the memoir of Clement. And so of the other memoirs; though they
-necessarily go over much well-trodden ground, they contain also much original
-information, expressed with great clearness, and with a practised skill which
-renders the reader secure of entertainment in every page.”&mdash;<cite>Times.</cite></p>
-
-<p>“Mr. Smiles has become the biographer of our profession. Only the other day
-the world knew little or nothing of the <cite>Lives of the Engineers</cite>, whether of this
-century or the last. There were none who, as authors, attempted to blend with
-general biographical portraiture that popular reference to constructive and
-mechanical details, without which the life of an engineer or an inventor would be
-either a chapter of naked facts or of indiscriminate eulogy. In his <cite>Life of George
-Stephenson</cite>, Mr. Smiles showed that practical appreciation of the strong points of
-engineering life which, with his skill and industry as a biographer, has given us
-a new department of literature. The great success of that book proved that there
-were many thousands who were not only willing but desirous to know something
-of our railway-makers and mechanicians. Mr. Smiles has since done much in this
-branch of biography, and in his present book he has grouped together the leading
-incidents of the professional lives of Dud Dudley, Andrew Yarranton, Abraham
-Darby, Richard Reynolds, Benjamin Huntsman, Henry Cort, Dr. Roebuck, David
-Mushet, J. B. Neilson, Joseph Bramah, Henry Maudslay, Joseph Clement, Fox
-of Derby, Matthew Murray, Richard Roberts, Joseph Whitworth, James Nasmyth,
-and William Fairbairn. A few of the subjects of these memoirs are still living,
-but this, certainly, does not render the more important part of their history&mdash;already
-accomplished as we may believe&mdash;the less interesting.”&mdash;<cite>Engineer.</cite></p>
-
-<p>“This is not a very large book, but it is astonishing how much individual, conscientious,
-and thoroughly original research, has been required for its composition,
-and how much interesting matter it contains which we possess in no other form.
-Mr. Smiles rescues no name, but many histories, from oblivion. His heroes are
-known and gratefully remembered for the benefits they have conferred on mankind,
-but our knowledge of our benefactors has hitherto been mostly confined to
-our knowledge of the benefit. It was reserved for Mr. Smiles to discover in the
-workshop heroes as true as ever hurled their battalions across a battle-field, and
-to present us with much-enduring, much-endeavouring, and brave men, where
-hitherto we had been content with disembodied, almost meaningless names. The
-present work is further distinguished, not indeed from its predecessors, but from
-much of the current literature, by the exquisitely pellucid English, the vigorous
-but unobtrusive style, in which the narratives are conveyed. The value of the
-work before us is doubled, and the time required for perusing and especially for
-consulting it halved, by the full and minute index in which its contents are tabulated.”&mdash;<cite>Edinburgh
-Daily Review.</cite></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_adIV">[IV]</span></p>
-
-<hr class="tb noepub" />
-
-
-<div class="ad-header"><p>Lately published. By the same Author. Post 8vo. 5<i>s.</i></p>
-
-<p><span class="big">“SELF-HELP,”</span><br />
-
-<big><b>OU CARACTÈRE, CONDUITE, ET PERSÉVÉRANCE,</b></big><br />
-
-<small>ILLUSTRÉS À L’AIDE DE BIOGRAPHIES.</small></p>
-
-<p><big>TRADUIT DE L’ANGLAIS PAR ALFRED TALANDIER,</big><br />
-
-<small>SUR LE TEXTE REVU ET CORRIGÉ PAR L’AUTEUR.</small></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>“Le succès de cet ouvrage, qui s’est répandu comme par enchantement dans
-les mains de la jeunesse, dans les bibliothèques des villes et des villages, dans les
-cottages des ouvriers, est un remarquable indice des tendances du génie anglo-saxon.
-Le titre à lui seul est à peu près intraduisible: <cite>Self-Help</cite> (aide-toi toi-même)....
-Une grande sagesse qu’on pourrait appeler la splendeur du bon
-sens, comme Platon définissait le beau la splendeur du vrai, tel est le caractère qui
-distingue surtout <cite>Self-Help</cite>.... La traduction de M. Talandier est à la fois
-fidèle, nerveuse et élégante; elle contribuera à propager en France les saines idées
-de M. Smiles.”&mdash;<cite>Revue des Deux Mondes.</cite></p>
-
-<p>“Les Français, nés malins, mais très-ignorants en ce qui touche leurs voisins,
-viennent de découvrir, après dix ans d’existence, un livre anglais classique,
-destiné à l’éducation des enfants. C’est une espèce de morale en action, écrite par
-un homme de haute valeur, qui a dû faire de grands efforts pour se mettre à la
-portée de jeunes intelligences.... Le <cite>Self-Help, ou caractère, conduite et persévérance</cite>,
-est un livre honnête et sérieux qu’on lit à petits coups, en le savourant;
-il est écrit pour les enfants avec une simplicité voulue; il vous dit que la pauvreté
-est sainte, que l’homme ne doit se soucier que de sa conscience; il honore l’industrie,
-enseigne le courage, relève les faibles, humilie les forts, vous dicte des
-maximes pour toutes les circonstances de la vie, et appuie tous ses conseils d’une
-anecdote qui sert d’exemple.... Voici une anecdote à écrire en lettres d’or:&mdash;Le
-vrai courage.&mdash;‘<i>Un officier français, au combat de cavalerie d’El-Bodon, en
-Espagne, s’avance, l’épée nue, sur Sir Fulton Harvey; il va le frapper, quand il
-s’aperçoit que son ennemi n’a qu’un bras; il s’arrête aussitôt, abaisse son épée devant
-Sir Fulton et, faisant avec courtoisie le salut militaire, part au galop.</i>’ Vous voyez
-que c’est un livre qui élève plus l’âme que les <i>Mémoires d’une femme de chambre</i>!”&mdash;<cite>Le
-Monde Illustré.</cite></p>
-
-<p>“Le livre de M. Smiles est une nouvelle <i>Morale en action</i>, mais elle a l’avantage
-d’être complète, méthodique, raisonnée, et surtout appropriée aux goûts et aux
-tendances modernes. L’origine de cet ouvrage mérite d’être rapportée, car c’est le
-meilleur moyen d’en faire connaître le caractère.... Si nous voulions donner
-une idée du livre, il nous suffirait de citer la table des matières où se trouvent
-réunis les noms des hommes qui, fils de leurs œuvres, ont le plus servi la science,
-le plus honoré l’humanité. Nous nous contentons donc de recommander ce volume
-à tous ceux qui aiment les beaux et bons livres, mais nous tenons toutefois à
-ajouter un dernier mot. La plupart des ouvrages de morale (cela est triste à dire,
-mais vrai), sont ennuyeux; les auteurs semblent trop compter sur le mérite de
-leur sujet, et ils ne se donnent pas la peine d’ajouter quelques ornements à la
-vérité. Il en résulte que la sévérité de la forme nuit aux sérieuses qualités du
-fond, et que plus d’un bon livre reste lettre close pour ceux qui auraient le plus
-d’intérêt à le connaître. <cite>Self-Help</cite> est écrit dans un genre tout différent: c’est la
-morale la plus pure et la plus saine présentée sous la forme la plus attrayante:
-c’est un ouvrage dont la lecture offre, plus que toute autre, plaisir et profit.”&mdash;<cite>Revue
-de l’Instruction Publique.</cite></p>
-
-<p>“‘Ne t’attends qu’à toi seul, c’est un commun proverbe,’ a dit notre immortel
-Lafontaine. Cette utile vérité vient d’être mise en lumière, ou pour mieux dire,
-développée, dans un bon livre anglais dont je veux vous parler. <cite>Self-Help,
-S’aider soi-même</cite>, c’est ne pas hésiter devant le travail du jour, c’est résister à sa
-paresse, à son égoïsme, à la pente de ses vices de toute sorte, et en un mot, se
-vaincre soi-même. Quelle victoire! Rappelez-vous ce mot d’un ancien: ‘Si tu
-parviens à te vaincre toi-même, tu vaincras le monde.’ ... Bref, le <cite>Self-Help</cite>,
-qui vient d’être traduit en français, est un plaidoyer éloquent en faveur de la confiance
-en soi-même, sans orgueil toutefois et sans mépris des autres, et de l’aristocratie
-humaine et sociale du travail dans toutes ses applications. <em>A cœur vaillant
-rien d’impossible!</em> comme s’exprime la devise de Jacques Cœur, citée aussi par M.
-Smiles. C’est pourquoi un président americain, à qui on demandait quelles
-<span class="pagenum" id="Page_adV">[V]</span>
-étaient ses armoiries, se souvenant qu’il avait été bûcheron dans sa jeunesse,
-répondit: ‘<i>Une paire de manches de chemise retroussées</i>.’ Je ne sache rien de plus
-beau que cette mâle et fortifiante devise. Vous qui voulez apprendre à quelle
-école se forment les hommes,&mdash;j’entends de ces êtres rarissimes que cherchait
-Diogène à la lueur de sa lanterne,&mdash;lisez et méditez le <cite>Self-Help</cite>.”&mdash;<cite>La Sentinelle
-du Jura.</cite></p>
-
-<p>“Je veux vous parler ici d’un bon livre. Les livres abondent; mais, dans ce
-fatras de papiers imprimés et réunis en faisceaux de toutes formes et de toutes
-dimensions, à quels signes particuliers reconnaîtrons-nous les bons livres?...
-M. Ampère definissait ainsi un grand nombre d’ouvrages parus en ce temps:&mdash;‘Ce
-sont des œuvres qui intéressent et souvent même qui attachent; mais, quand on a
-fini de lire, on éprouve une singulière impression: il semble qu’on ait besoin de
-brosser son habit et de se laver les mains.’ Les bons livres sont une nourriture
-plus ou moins délicate, mais saine et fortifiante, qui procure la santé de l’âme et de
-la conscience. On se sent meilleur, plus heureux même, à mesure qu’on en suit
-les douces pages, et, plus tard, c’est avec un esprit content qu’on s’en souvient. Il
-en coule, en effet, de l’espérance et de la foi, tout ce qu’il nous faut pour être
-satisfaits du présent, et pour affronter paisiblement l’avenir. <cite>Self-Help</cite> est un
-livre précieux à tous ces titres, et je ne saurais trop vous le recommander....
-Le livre de M. Smiles, traduit en français par M. Alfred Talandier, obtiendra
-tout le succès qu’il mérite, le succès d’une bonne et vertueuse action.... Le
-moraliste anglais qui nous occupe a donc présenté au public une suite de biographies,
-très-écourtées, mais très-substantielles, des grands hommes qui se sont
-honorés par leur travail et qui ont ensuite glorifié l’humanité par leur génie et
-leurs découvertes.... Quelle notice attachante que celle que M. Smiles a
-consacrée à ces deux hommes illustres qui se sont unis dans une œuvre commune
-et dont la gloire est inséparable aussi, Richard et Lenoir! Leur double
-nom a été donné, à Paris, au boulevard <i>Richard-Lenoir</i>! Mais tout serait à citer
-de ce curieux assemblage de salutaires leçons et de profitables anecdotes, où sont
-invoqués, tour à tour, Vauquelin, Dupuytren, Ramus, Buffon, Béranger, Watt,
-Jacquart, Papin, Robert Peel, Michel-Ange, Nicolas Poussin, Ambroise Paré,
-Shakspeare, Saint François Xavier et Saint Vincent de Paul, Franklin, Walter
-Scott, Meyerbeer, etc. Chacun d’eux apporte son témoignage et vient affirmer
-à sa façon que le travail seul est grand, que la patience honnête est seule féconde,
-que la persévérance et l’esprit de conduite sont la véritable alchimie que doivent
-pratiquer et étudier tous les chercheurs d’or.”&mdash;<cite>Le Moniteur Universel du Soir.</cite></p>
-
-<p>“Le <cite>Self-Help</cite> ou <cite>Aide-toi toi-même</cite>, comme on est obligé de dire pour traduire
-littéralement ces deux mots anglais, c’est le secret de trouver en nous-mêmes, si
-une volonté ferme et un cœur vaillant nous en rendent dignes, des ressources et
-des secours infiniment supérieurs à tous ceux qui pourraient nous venir du dehors....
-M. Samuel Smiles, s’adressant d’abord à ses compatriotes, leur citait à
-l’appui de ses théories la vie et les œuvres des hommes qui, en Angleterre, ont
-porté le plus haut la dignite humaine et poussé le plus loin la force de caractère.
-Aujourd hui que son livre passe en France, il a changé pour nous la plupart de ces
-exemples, et ce sont des noms tels que ceux de Palissy, de Papin, de Jacquart,
-d’Ambroise Paré, de Nicolas Poussin, et de Richard-Lenoir, qui lui servent à nous
-convaincre de la vérité de sa doctrine, en même temps qu’ils font plus fortement
-vibrer en nous le sentiment de l’honneur et de l’amour-propre national. L’amour-propre
-national, en France comme en Angleterre, n’a pas cessé d’agir à sa manière
-sur l’esprit et sur le courage des hommes laborieux qui, voulant honorer avant tout
-leur patrie, ont honoré l’humanité entière. Nous ne saurions recommander avec
-trop d’instances ce recueil intéressant, instructif et curieux, moral au plus haut
-degré, gros d’anecdotes et d’histoires plus émouvantes que celles des romans, où
-l’émotion est le mieux conduite et le mieux amenée, plein d’enseignements utiles
-appuyés sur des biographies on ne peut plus concluantes et laissant après sa lecture
-une impression saine et durable. Ce livre s’adresse aux travailleurs de tous ordres;
-sa place est dans le cabinet de l’homme d’étude et dans l’atelier de l’ouvrier; sa
-place est surtout dans ces bibliothèques communales, dont nous apprenons la création
-avec tant de plaisir, et qui font naître en nous tant d’espoir. <cite>Self-Help</cite> est du
-nombre des livres utiles qu’une commune doit acquérir, de façon que ceux qui n’ont
-pas les moyens d’avoir une bibliothèque puissent cependant le lire. On a dit de
-certains ouvrages littéraires qu’ils sont une <i>bonne action</i>. <cite>Self-Help</cite> a tous les
-droits à être ainsi qualifié et désigné au public.”&mdash;<cite>Le Pays, Journal de l’Empire.</cite></p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_adVI">[VI]</span></p>
-
-
-<hr class="tb noepub" />
-
-<div class="ad-header"><p>Lately published. By the same Author. Post 8vo. 6<i>s.</i> each.</p>
-
-<p><span class="big">JAMES BRINDLEY</span><br />
-
-<small>AND</small><br />
-
-<span class="big"><small>THE EARLY ENGINEERS.</small></span><br />
-
-<small>[ABRIDGED FROM ‘LIVES OF THE ENGINEERS.’]</small></p>
-
-<p><span class="big"><small>STORY</small></span><br />
-
-<small>OF</small><br />
-
-<span class="big">THE LIFE OF GEORGE STEPHENSON,</span><br />
-
-<b>CONTAINING ALSO A MEMOIR OF HIS SON, ROBERT STEPHENSON.</b><br />
-
-<small>[ABRIDGED FROM ‘LIVES OF THE ENGINEERS.’]</small></p>
-</div>
-
-<p>“We have taken the facts in this account of Brindley from a delightful popular
-edition of that part of Mr. Smiles’s ‘Lives of the Engineers’ which tells of him and
-of the earlier water engineers. Of Mr. Smiles’s ‘Lives of George and Robert
-Stephenson’ there is a popular edition as a companion volume, and therein all may
-read, worthily told, the tale of the foundation and of the chief triumphs of that
-new form of engineering which dealt with water, not by the river-full but by the
-bucket-full, and made a few buckets of water strong as a river to sweep men and
-their goods and their cattle in a mighty torrent from one corner of the country to
-another.”&mdash;<cite>All the Year Round.</cite></p>
-
-<p>“It would be impossible to have selected two more valuable works for general
-circulation in a cheap form, or to have given the working classes a better incentive,
-not to ‘rest and be thankful’ with their present position and attainments, but to
-become convinced that the path of success is always open to those who, by patience
-and perseverance, are determined to pursue it. No one knows better than
-Mr. Smiles how to promote this important object; and no one is a greater benefactor
-to his fellow men than himself, since by his talent and discrimination he
-incontestably proves how ‘Heaven helps those who help themselves.’”&mdash;<cite>Bell’s
-Weekly Messenger.</cite></p>
-
-<p><ins title="Transcriber's Note: added missing quote mark" id="Corr-VI">“The</ins> <cite>Story of the Life of George Stephenson</cite> (including a memoir of his son
-Robert Stephenson), is a cheaper and more compact form of a work which, on its
-first appearance, was received with universal approbation. Now we have it
-cheaper and handier&mdash;and better than ever. Is it not enough to say this much?
-Could we say more? <cite>James Brindley and the Early Engineers</cite> was originally published
-in ‘The Lives of the Engineers.’ Besides the biography of the man who made
-canals do the great carrying work of the country before railways were extended
-over the length and breadth of the country, the volume contains memoirs of Sir
-Cornelius Vermuyden, who drained the Fens; of Sir Hugh Myddelton, who brought
-the New River water into London; of Captain Perry, who stopped a breach
-in the Thames embankment at Dagenham: and in an appendix we have the life
-of Pierre Paul Riquet, who constructed the Grand Canal of Languedoc, and who
-has been fitly called ‘the French Brindley.’ Two volumes like these cannot fail
-to be as widely circulated as is the reputation of those whom they commemorate.
-They will go through the length and breadth, and into the nooks and corners of
-the land; and they deserve to go wherever the English language prevails, for
-they are models of their kind.”&mdash;<cite>Standard.</cite></p>
-
-<p>“The <cite>Life of James Brindley</cite> is partly a reproduction of the Life of Brindley,
-originally published in the <cite>Lives of the Engineers</cite>, and now forms a companion
-volume to the <cite>Life of Stephenson</cite>&mdash;the two men having so much in common, that
-having read the life of one, we look to the other with increased interest; what
-one achieved for railways, the other achieved for canals, each being great in his
-particular branch. There are several other lives of engineers given&mdash;such as Sir
-Hugh Myddelton, Vermuyden, and Captain Perry; and a very curious memoir of
-Pierre Riquet, the French Brindley, whose life is incorporated in the French
-edition of <cite>Self-Help</cite> published in Paris. As in the Lives of the Stephensons, the
-liberality of the publisher is evinced in making the work, though adapted for the
-general public, perfect in every respect; it teems with illustrations of the most
-curious nature, which evidently, from their character, must have been collected
-with infinite labour. No one will read the lives of Brindley and his brother
-engineers without that glow of satisfaction that rises within us from feeling that
-these men were thoroughly English in every respect, and that the works illustrating
-their lives are models also of English literature.”&mdash;<cite>News of the World.</cite></p>
-
-<hr class="full noepub" />
-
-<div class="footnotes">
-
-<h3 title="">Footnotes:</h3>
-
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-1" id="Footnote-1" href="#Anchor-1" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[1]</span></a> Article “Government,” in ‘Encyclopædia Britannica.’
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-2" id="Footnote-2" href="#Anchor-2" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[2]</span></a> The principle of the Æolipile is
-the same as that embodied in Avery
-and Ruthven’s engines for the production
-of rotary motion. “These engines,”
-says Bourne, “are more expensive
-in steam than ordinary engines,
-and travel at an inconvenient speed;
-but in other respects they are quite
-as effectual, and their construction is
-extremely simple and inexpensive.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-3" id="Footnote-3" href="#Anchor-3" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[3]</span></a> See Bennet Woodcroft’s ‘Pneumatics of Hero of Alexandria,’ from the
-original Greek. London, 1851.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-4" id="Footnote-4" href="#Anchor-4" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[4]</span></a> Les Raisons des Forces Mouvantes,
-avec diverses machines tant
-utiles que plaisantes, &amp;c., par Solomon
-de Caus, Ingénieur et Architecte du
-Roy. Frankfort, 1615.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-5" id="Footnote-5" href="#Anchor-5" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[5]</span></a> De Caus eventually returned to
-France, and was appointed engineer to
-the King. During the later years of
-his life he was employed in carrying
-out plans for the better supply of
-Paris with water. The story so often
-told of De Caus having been shut up
-in the Bicêtre turns out to be a fiction.
-Though a Huguenot, he was
-not persecuted by Richelieu, but was,
-on the contrary, employed by him;
-and in 1624 he dedicated to that
-prelate his treatise entitled ‘Horologes
-Solitaires.’ Mr. Charles Read, editor
-of several interesting memoirs of early
-French Protestants, has recently
-brought to light and published in the
-‘Gazette des Tribunaux’ the proofs
-of the patronage of De Caus by
-Richelieu, and reproduced the original
-documents, which he discovered slumbering
-in the dust of the State Records
-at Paris. In 1621 De Caus is found
-proposing to Louis XIII. to adopt
-measures for cleansing Paris and the
-faubourgs of dirt and uncleanness,
-by a system of reservoirs established
-at elevated points, and by fountains at
-various places which he indicated.
-The king and his council sent the
-propositions to the chief magistrate of
-Paris, and Mr. Read transcribes the
-deliberation which took place on the
-subject at the City Council, as handed
-down in the records deposited in the
-Imperial Archives. De Caus died at
-Paris, and was buried in the church
-of La Trinité in February, 1626.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-6" id="Footnote-6" href="#Anchor-6" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[6]</span></a> Dr. Bayly, in his ‘Apothegms’
-(1682), p. 87, describes the fright
-given to some Puritan visitors on the
-occasion of their searching Raglan
-Castle for arms, the Marquis of Worcester
-being a known Papist. “Having
-carried them up and down the
-castle, his lordship at length brought
-them over a high bridge that arched
-over the moat between the castle and
-the great tower, wherein the Lord
-Herbert had lately contrived certain
-water-works, which, when the several
-engines and wheels were set agoing,
-much quantity of water through the
-hollow conveyances of the aqueducts
-was to be let down from the top of
-an high tower.” When all was ready
-for the surprise, the water was let in,
-and it made such a hideous and fearful
-noise by reason of the hollowness of
-the tower, and the neighbouring
-echoes of the castle, that the men
-stood amazed and terror-struck. At
-this point up came a man staring and
-running, who exclaimed, “Look to
-yourselves, my masters, for the lions
-are got loose.” Whereupon the Puritans
-fled down the narrow staircase in
-such haste that they lost footing and
-fell, tumbling one over the other, and
-never halted until they had got the
-castle out of sight. Mr. Dircks, in
-his able and exhaustive ‘Life, Times,
-and Scientific Labours of the Marquis
-of Worcester,’ London, 1865, says
-that this hydraulic apparatus “probably
-depended for its operation on
-the influence of heat from burning
-fuel acting on a suitably constructed
-boiler, and so arranged as to be able
-to apply the expansive force of steam
-to the driving of water through vertical
-pipes to a considerable elevation.”
-But it does not seem to us
-that the facts stated are sufficient to
-warrant this assumption.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-7" id="Footnote-7" href="#Anchor-7" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[7]</span></a> Mr. Dircks says “it was a machine
-consisting of a wheel 14 feet
-in diameter, carrying forty weights
-of forty pounds each, and is supposed
-to have rotated on an axle supported
-on two pillars or upright frames,” as
-indicated in the ‘Century of Inventions,’
-Art. 56.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-8" id="Footnote-8" href="#Anchor-8" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[8]</span></a> ‘Weld’s Royal Society,’ i. 53.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-9" id="Footnote-9" href="#Anchor-9" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[9]</span></a> ‘Industrial Biography,’ p. 57.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-10" id="Footnote-10" href="#Anchor-10" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[10]</span></a> ‘A Century of the Names and
-Scantlings of such Inventions as at
-present I can call to mind to have
-tried and perfected, which (my former
-Notes being lost) I have, at the instance
-of a powerful Friend, endeavoured
-now, in the year 1655, to
-set these down in such a way as may
-sufficiently instruct me to put any of
-them in practice.’ London, 1663.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-11" id="Footnote-11" href="#Anchor-11" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[11]</span></a> The writer of the elaborate article
-“Lock,” in the supplement to the
-‘Penny Cyclopædia’ (ii. 217), in describing
-the <i>combination lock</i>, says:
-“The Marquis of Worcester, in whose
-‘Century of Inventions’ several different
-kinds of lock, which lay claim
-to the most marvellous properties, are
-enumerated, would appear, from his
-72nd article, to have devised an improvement
-on this apparatus; as he
-refers to ‘an escutcheon to be placed
-before any of these locks,’ one of the
-properties of which he describes as
-being that ‘the owner, though a
-woman, may, with her delicate hand,
-vary the ways of coming to open the
-lock ten millions of times beyond the
-knowledge of the smith that made it,
-or of me who invented it.’ The details
-of this invention are not given; but in
-the third volume of the ‘Transactions
-of the Society of Arts,’ pp. 160&ndash;5, is
-an escutcheon of similar character,
-invented by Mr. Marshall, and rewarded
-by the Society in 1784. The
-details of this ingenious contrivance
-are fully given in the volume referred
-to.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-12" id="Footnote-12" href="#Anchor-12" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[12]</span></a> His words are these:&mdash;“One of
-the most curious things that I wished
-to see was an hydraulic machine which
-the Marquis of Worcester has invented,
-and of which he is making trial. I
-went with all speed to Fox-hall, on
-the other side of the Thames, a little
-below Lambeth, which is the Palace of
-the Archbishop of Canterbury, in sight
-of London. This machine will raise to
-the height of forty feet, by the strength
-of one man only, and in a minute of
-time, four large buckets of water
-through a pipe of eight inches. But
-what will be the most powerful help
-to the wants of the public is the work
-which is performed by another ingeniously-constructed
-machine, which
-can be seen raised on a wooden tower
-on the top of Somerset House, which
-supplies that part of the town with
-water, but with some difficulty, and a
-smaller quantity than could be desired.
-It is somewhat like our Samaritane
-water-work on the Pont Neuf; and
-on the raising-pump they have added
-an impulsion which increases the
-force; but for what we obtain by the
-power of the Seine, they employ one
-or two horses, which incessantly turn
-the machine, as the river changes its
-course twice a day, and the spring or
-wheels which are used for the ebbing
-tide would not do for the flow.”&mdash;Sorbière,
-‘Relation d’un Voyage en
-Angleterre.’
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-13" id="Footnote-13" href="#Anchor-13" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[13]</span></a> The Works of the Hon. Robert
-Boyle, v. 532.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-14" id="Footnote-14" href="#Anchor-14" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[14]</span></a> Dircks’s ‘Life and Times,’ &amp;c., 356.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-15" id="Footnote-15" href="#Anchor-15" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[15]</span></a> Mr. Woodcroft is, however, of
-opinion that the Marquis’s contrivance
-was but a boat with paddle-wheels,
-with an axis across it, which axis
-was turned by the action of the stream
-on the paddles, and thus wound up a
-rope and dragged the boat onward to
-the other end of the rope fixed by an
-anchor; certainly a more clumsy and
-less notable contrivance than that of
-a steamboat.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-16" id="Footnote-16" href="#Anchor-16" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[16]</span></a> Letter to some person unknown, quoted by Mr. Dircks from the Badminton
-MSS.&mdash;Dircks’s ‘Life, Times,’ &amp;c., 276.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-17" id="Footnote-17" href="#Anchor-17" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[17]</span></a> We are informed that Morland’s
-<i lang="la" xml:lang="la">Tuba Stentorphornica</i>, or speaking-trumpet,
-is still to be seen at Trinity
-College, Cambridge. Butler, in his
-‘Hudibras,’ alludes to the invention:&mdash;</p>
-
-<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
-<div class="i00 leading-q">“I heard a formidable voice</div>
-<div class="i00">Loud as the stentorphornic noise.”</div>
-</div></div>
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-18" id="Footnote-18" href="#Anchor-18" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[18]</span></a> His first idea seems to have been
-to employ gunpowder for the production
-of motive power, for in the
-‘Calendar of State Papers’ (Dom) we
-find the following entry:&mdash;“Decr.
-11th, 1691.&mdash;Warrant for a grant to
-Sir Samuel Morland of the sole use
-for 14 years of his invention for raising
-water out of pits, &amp;c., to a reasonable
-height, by the force of powder
-and air conjointly.”&mdash;(‘Entry Book,’
-V., p. 85.) In vol. XLVI., p. 49, we
-find this entry under the same date:&mdash;“Warrant
-for a grant to Sir S. Morland
-of the sole making of an engine invented
-by him for raising water in
-mines or pits, draining marshes, or
-supplying buildings with water.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-19" id="Footnote-19" href="#Anchor-19" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[19]</span></a> The ‘Harleian Miscellany’ (Brit.
-Mus.), No. 5771, contains the following
-brief tract in French, written by
-Morland in 1682. It is on vellum,
-and entitled ‘Les Principes de la
-Nouvelle Force de Feu:’&mdash;“L’eau
-estant evaporée par la force de feu,
-ces vapeurs demandent incontinant
-une plus grand’espace [environ deux
-mille fois] que l’eau n’occupoiet auparavant,
-et plus tost que d’etre toujours
-emprisonnés, feroient crever une
-piece de canon. Mais estant bien
-gouvernées selon les regles de la statique,
-et par science reduites a la
-mesure au poids, et à la balance, alors
-elles portent paisiblement leurs fardeaux
-[comme des bons chevaux] et
-ainsy seroient elles du grand usage au
-gendre humain, particulièrement pour
-l’elevation des eaux, selon la table
-suivante que marque les nombres des
-livres qui pourrant estre levés 1800
-fois par heure, à 6 pouces de levée, par
-de cylindres à moitie remplies d’eau,
-ausi bien que les divers diametres et
-profondeurs des dit cylindres.” Tables
-are then given, showing the power
-requisite to raise given quantities of
-water to certain heights by cylinders
-of different dimensions.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-20" id="Footnote-20" href="#Anchor-20" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[20]</span></a> M. Bergenroth says the documents
-at Simancas consist of&mdash;1. A holograph
-letter of Blasco Garay to the
-Emperor, dated Malaga, 10th Sept.,
-1540, containing his report on the trial
-trip of one of his paddle-wheel ships;
-2. The report of the Captain Antonio
-Destigarura on the same trial trip;
-3. The report of the Provcedores of
-Malaga concerning the same trip, dated
-27th July, 1540; 4. The report of
-Blasco Garay to the Emperor, dated
-6th July, 1543, concerning the trial
-trip of another of his paddle-wheel
-ships made at Barcelona in June,
-1543; 5. A letter of Blasco Garay to
-Carrs, dated 20th June, 1543. In
-none of these is there to be found any
-reference to steam-power; but only to
-the power of men employed in driving
-the paddle-wheels. This is confirmed
-by the independent examination of the
-same documents by J. Macgregor,
-Esq., of the Temple, who gives the
-result in a Letter to Bennet Woodcroft,
-Esq., inserted as a note to the ‘Abridgments
-of the Specifications relating to
-Steam Propulsion,’ pp. 105&ndash;7.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-21" id="Footnote-21" href="#Anchor-21" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[21]</span></a> Burn, ‘History of Foreign Protestant Refugees,’ 261.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-22" id="Footnote-22" href="#Anchor-22" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[22]</span></a> In a letter, dated Shilston, August
-9th, 1727, he writes:&mdash;“The late Mr.
-Thomas Savery, inventor of the engines
-for rowing, and raising water by
-fire, was, I believe, well known to
-several of the Royal Society, perhaps
-to the President; but as I am a perfect
-stranger, do acquaint you that his
-father was youngest brother to my
-grandfather. The late Servington
-Savery, M.D., of Marlborough, was
-one of my family, viz., a brother to
-my deceased father.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-23" id="Footnote-23" href="#Anchor-23" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[23]</span></a> It is now in the possession of Capt.
-Lowe, of the 26th Regiment, whose
-grand-aunt was a Miss Savery of Shilston.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-24" id="Footnote-24" href="#Anchor-24" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[24]</span></a> ‘Navigation Improved; or the Art
-of Rowing Ships of all rates in calms,
-with a more easy, swift and steady motion
-than oars can. Also, a description
-of the engine that performs it;
-and the Author’s answer to all Mr.
-Drummer’s objections that have been
-made against it. By Tho. <ins title="Transcriber's Note: Original reads 'Savory'">Savery</ins>,
-Gent. London, 1698.’
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-25" id="Footnote-25" href="#Anchor-25" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[25]</span></a> Mr. Davies Gilbert says even this
-method was comparatively modern, as
-he remembered a carpenter who used
-to boast that he had assisted in making
-the first whim ever seen westward
-of Hayle.&mdash;Davies, ‘Parochial History
-of Cornwall,’ London, 1838, ii. 83.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-26" id="Footnote-26" href="#Anchor-26" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[26]</span></a> Borlase, ‘Natural History of Cornwall,’ 175&ndash;6.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-27" id="Footnote-27" href="#Anchor-27" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[27]</span></a> The absurd story is told by Dr.
-Desaguliers (‘Experimental Philosophy,’
-ii. 465) that Savery, having
-read the Marquis’s book, “was the
-first to put in practice the raising of
-water by fire, which he proposed for
-the draining of mines;” and having
-copied the Marquis’s engine, “the
-better to conceal the matter, bought
-up all the Marquis of Worcester’s
-books that he could purchase in Paternoster-row
-and elsewhere, and burned
-’em in the presence of the gentleman,
-his friend, who told me this!” It
-need scarcely be said that it was very
-unlikely that Savery should have attempted
-thus to conceal an invention
-recorded in a printed book which had
-been in circulation for more than forty
-years.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-28" id="Footnote-28" href="#Anchor-28" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[28]</span></a> Switzer, ‘System of Hydrostaticks and Hydraulicks,’ London, 1729.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-29" id="Footnote-29" href="#Anchor-29" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[29]</span></a> The patent is dated the 25th July,
-1698, and is entitled, “A grant to
-Thomas Savery, Gentl., of the sole
-exercise of a new invenc̃on, by him
-invented, for raiseing of water, and
-occasioning moc̃on to all sort of mill
-works, by the impellant force of fire,
-which will be of great use for draining
-mines, serving towns with water, and
-for the working of all sorts of mills
-when they have not the benefit of
-water nor constant winds; to hold for
-14 years; with usual clauses.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-30" id="Footnote-30" href="#Anchor-30" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[30]</span></a> ‘Philosophical Transactions,’ No.
-252. Weld’s ‘Royal Society,’ i. 357.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-31" id="Footnote-31" href="#Anchor-31" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[31]</span></a> ‘The Miner’s Friend, or an Engine to Raise Water
-by Fire, described, and of the manner of fixing it in
-Mines, with an account of the several uses it is applicable
-unto; and an answer to the objections
-made against it. By Tho. Savery, Gent.’
-London, 1702.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-32" id="Footnote-32" href="#Anchor-32" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[32]</span></a> Two boilers, a large, <ins title="Transcriber's note: removed duplicate 'A,'"><span class="smcap lowercase">A</span>,</ins> and a
-smaller, <span class="smcap lowercase">B</span>, were fixed in a furnace, and
-connected together at the top by a
-pipe, <span class="smcap lowercase">C</span>. The larger boiler was filled
-two-thirds full, and the smaller quite
-full of water. When that in the larger
-one was raised to the boiling-point, the
-handle of the regulator, <span class="smcap lowercase">D</span>, was thrust
-back as far as it would go, by which
-the steam forced itself through the pipe
-connected with the vessel <span class="smcap lowercase">E</span>, expelling
-the air it contained through the clack
-at <span class="smcap lowercase">F</span>. The handle of the regulator being
-then drawn towards you, the communication
-between the boiler and the vessel,
-<span class="smcap lowercase">E</span>, was closed, and that between the
-boiler and the second vessel, <span class="smcap lowercase">G</span>, was
-opened, which latter was also filled with
-steam, the air being in like manner discharged
-through the clack, <span class="smcap lowercase">H</span>. Cold water was then poured from
-the water-cock, <span class="smcap lowercase">I</span>, on to the vessel <span class="smcap lowercase">E</span>, by which the steam was
-suddenly condensed, and a vacuum being thereby caused, the water
-to be raised was drawn up through the sucking-pipe, <span class="smcap lowercase">J</span>, its return
-being prevented by a clack or valve at <span class="smcap lowercase">K</span>. The handle of the regulator
-<span class="smcap lowercase">D</span> being again thrust back, the steam was again admitted,
-and pressing upon the surface of the water in <span class="smcap lowercase">E</span>, forced it out at
-the bottom of the vessel and up through the pipe <span class="smcap lowercase">L</span>, from which
-it was driven into the open air. The handle of the regulator was
-then reversed, on which the steam was again admitted to <span class="smcap lowercase">G</span>, and
-the water in like manner expelled from it, while <span class="smcap lowercase">E</span>, being again
-dashed with cold water, was refilling from below. Then the cold
-water was turned upon <span class="smcap lowercase">G</span>, and thus alternate filling and forcing
-went on, and a continuous stream of cold water kept flowing
-from the upper opening. The large boiler was replenished with
-water by shutting off the connection of the small boiler with the
-cold water pipe, <span class="smcap lowercase">M</span>, which supplied it from above, on which the
-steam contained in the latter forced the water through the connecting
-pipe, <span class="smcap lowercase">C</span>, into the large boiler, and kept it running in a continuous
-stream until the surface of the water in the smaller boiler was depressed
-below the opening of the connecting pipe, which was indicated by the noise
-of the clack, when it was refilled from the cold water pipe, <span class="smcap lowercase">M</span>, as before.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-33" id="Footnote-33" href="#Anchor-33" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[33]</span></a> Switzer, ‘Introduction to a General System of Hydrostaticks and Hydraulicks,’
-237.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-34" id="Footnote-34" href="#Anchor-34" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[34]</span></a> Dr. Wilkes in ‘Shaw’s History of Staffordshire,’ i. 85, 119.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-35" id="Footnote-35" href="#Anchor-35" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[35]</span></a> Bradley, ‘Discourses on Earth
-and Water, &amp;c.’ Westminster, 1727.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-36" id="Footnote-36" href="#Anchor-36" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[36]</span></a> We are informed by Quartermaster
-Conolly, R.E., who has given
-much attention to the early history of
-the Royal Engineers, that the book
-of Warrants and Appointments, anno
-1712, No. 172½, in the Tower Record-room,
-contains the following memorandum
-in pencil on the inside cover:&mdash;[Thomas] “Savery,
-Engineer officer,
-1702&ndash;14.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-37" id="Footnote-37" href="#Anchor-37" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[37]</span></a> A pamphlet published in 1712,
-entitled ‘An Impartial Inquiry into
-the Management of the War in
-Spain,’ contains the following reference
-to Savery:&mdash;“Sums allowed
-by Parliament for carrying on the
-war in Spain ... for the year 1710.
-To Thomas Savery, Esq., for Thomas
-Cale, surgeon, for care of disabled
-soldiers, 306<i>l.</i> 6<i>s.</i> 4<i>d.</i>”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-38" id="Footnote-38" href="#Anchor-38" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[38]</span></a> Newcomen’s house occupies the centre of the above engraving&mdash;the house
-with the peaked gable-end supported by timbers.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-39" id="Footnote-39" href="#Anchor-39" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[39]</span></a> Pamphlet on ‘Dartmouth: the
-advantages of its Harbour as a Station
-for Foreign Mail Packets, and a Short
-Notice of its Ancient and Present
-Condition.’ By A. H. Holdsworth.
-London, 1841.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-40" id="Footnote-40" href="#Anchor-40" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[40]</span></a> Switzer, ‘Introduction to a System of Hydrostatics and Hydraulics,’ p. 342.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-41" id="Footnote-41" href="#Anchor-41" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[41]</span></a> Harris, ‘Lexicon Technicum.’
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-42" id="Footnote-42" href="#Anchor-42" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[42]</span></a> It has been stated that Newcomen
-took out a patent for his invention
-in 1705; but this is a mistake,
-as no patent was ever taken out
-by Newcomen. It is supposed that
-Savery, having heard of his invention,
-gave him notice that he would regard
-his method of producing a speedy
-vacuum by condensation, as an infringement
-of his patent, and that
-Newcomen accordingly agreed to give
-him an interest in the new engine
-during the term of Savery’s patent.
-It will, however, be observed that the
-principle on which Newcomen’s engine
-worked was entirely different
-from that of Savery.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-43" id="Footnote-43" href="#Anchor-43" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[43]</span></a> <i>Scogging</i> is a north country word,
-meaning skulking one’s work, from
-which probably the boy gave the
-contrivance its name. Potter, however,
-grew up to be a highly-skilled
-workman. He went abroad about
-the year 1720, and erected an engine
-at a mine in Hungary, described by
-Leupold in his ‘Theatrum Machinarum,’
-with many encomiums upon
-Potter, who was considered the inventor.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-44" id="Footnote-44" href="#Anchor-44" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[44]</span></a> The illustration shows the several
-parts of Newcomen’s atmospheric engine.
-<i>a</i> is the boiler; <i>b</i>, the piston
-moving up and down; <i>c</i>, the cylinder;
-<i>d</i>, a pipe proceeding from the top of
-the boiler, and inserted into the bottom
-of the cylinder, having a cock, <i>e</i>, to
-interrupt the flow of steam at pleasure;
-<i>f</i>, cold-water cistern, from which the
-cold water is conveyed by the pipe <i>g</i>,
-called the injection-pipe, and thrown
-in a jet into the cylinder, <i>b</i>, on turning
-the injection-cock, <i>h</i>; the snifting-valve,
-<i>i</i>, enables the air to escape from
-the cylinder, while the siphon-pipe, <i>j</i>,
-enables the condensed steam to flow
-from the same cavity in the form of
-water; <i>k</i>, the main lever beam; <i>l</i>, the
-counterpoise or weight hung on the
-balance-beam, or on <i>m</i>, the pump-rod
-which works the pump, <i>n</i>.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-45" id="Footnote-45" href="#Anchor-45" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[45]</span></a> Mr. Lemon eventually became the
-principal merchant and tin-smelter
-of Cornwall. Mr. Davies Gilbert says:&mdash;“The
-energies of his mind were
-not limited to these undertakings,
-great though they were. He cultivated
-a taste for literature, and, which
-is extremely unusual, acquired, amidst
-business, and at a middle age, the
-power of reading the classic authors
-in their original language.... He
-was distinguished in his district as
-“the great Mr. Lemon,” but such were
-the impressions of his abilities, his
-exertions, and general merit, that a
-progress so rapid and unexampled does
-not appear to have excited envy, or
-any of those bad passions which
-usually alloy the enjoyment of prosperity.”&mdash;‘History
-of Cornwall,’ ii. 84.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-46" id="Footnote-46" href="#Anchor-46" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[46]</span></a> “It may be interesting to know
-that it required three hands to work
-Newcomen’s first engines. I have
-heard it said that when the engine
-was stopped, and again set at work,
-the words were passed “Snift Benjy!”
-“Blow the fire, Pomery!” “Work
-away, Joe!” The last let in the condensing
-water. Lifting the condensing
-clack was called “snifting,” because
-on opening the valve, the air rushing
-through it made a noise like a man
-snifting. The fire was increased
-through artificial means by another
-hand, and all being ready, the machine
-was set in motion by a third.”&mdash;Cyrus
-Redding, ‘Yesterday and To-day.’
-London, 1863. The “snifting
-clack” was a valve in the cylinder
-opening outwards, which permitted
-the escape of air or permanently
-elastic fluid, which could not be condensed
-by cold and run off through
-the eduction-pipe.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-47" id="Footnote-47" href="#Anchor-47" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[47]</span></a> In 1737 he published a Treatise
-on the subject entitled, ‘A description
-and Draught of a new-invented
-Machine for carrying Vessels or Ships
-out of or into any Harbour, Port, or
-River, against Wind or Tide, and in a
-Calm,’ by Jonathan Hulls.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-48" id="Footnote-48" href="#Anchor-48" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[48]</span></a> In describing his mode of obtaining
-rotary motion by ratchet wheels,
-a weight, and ropes, Hulls states that
-he uses two axes, one behind the
-other, each of which is essential to
-the object; and he then adds, that
-when his tow-boat is to be used in
-shallow rivers, the machine works by
-two cranks fixed to the hindermost
-axis; to which cranks are fixed two
-shafts (or poles) of proper length to
-reach the bottom of the river, and
-which move alternately forward <em>from
-the motion of the wheels by which the
-vessel is carried on</em>: so that the
-cranks, as described by Hulls, receive
-rotary motion from the axis on which
-they are placed, and do not, as has
-been erroneously stated, impart that
-motion to it.&mdash;Bennet Woodcroft,
-‘Sketch of the Origin and Progress
-of Steam Navigation.’ London, 1848.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-49" id="Footnote-49" href="#Anchor-49" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[49]</span></a> There are several versions of the
-same satire current to this day in the
-villages of Campden and Hanging
-Aston.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-50" id="Footnote-50" href="#Anchor-50" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[50]</span></a> Borlase, ‘Natural History of Cornwall,’ p. 175.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-51" id="Footnote-51" href="#Anchor-51" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[51]</span></a> Among the few household articles
-belonging to him which descended to
-his son, and afterwards to his grandson
-the engineer, were two portraits,
-one of Sir Isaac Newton, and the
-other of John Napier, the inventor of
-Logarithms.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-52" id="Footnote-52" href="#Anchor-52" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[52]</span></a> The mansion house of the Shaws
-is now principally occupied as manorial
-offices. The fine old garden
-and pleasure-grounds have been presented
-by Sir John Shaw to the
-people of Greenock as a public park
-for ever. It is now called “The
-Watt Park,” and a more beautiful
-spot (bating the smoke of the busy
-town below) is scarcely to be found
-in Britain.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-53" id="Footnote-53" href="#Anchor-53" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[53]</span></a> In 1715 the Greenock and Cartsdyke
-men kept strict watch and
-ward for eighty days against a threatened
-visit of Rob Roy and his caterans.
-The conduct of these unruly neighbours
-continued to cause apprehensions
-amongst the townspeople until
-a much later period, especially during
-fair time, then the great event of the
-year. The fair was the occasion of
-the annual gathering of the people
-from the neighbouring country to
-buy and to sell. Highlandmen came
-from the opposite shores and from
-the lochs down the Clyde, men caring
-little for Lowland law, but duly impressed
-by a display of force. Their
-boats were drawn up on the beach
-with their prows to the High Street,
-the north side of which at that time
-lay open to the sea. The Highland
-folk lived and slept on board, each
-boat having a plank or gangway
-between it and the shore. On the
-first day of the fair Sir John Shaw,
-the feudal superior, convened the
-local dignitaries, the deacons and the
-trades, and after drinking the King’s
-health and throwing the glasses
-amongst the populace, they formed
-in procession and perambulated the
-town.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-54" id="Footnote-54" href="#Anchor-54" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[54]</span></a> Some of her neighbours thought
-her stately and unbending, and that
-she affected a superior style of living.
-In the ‘Memorials of Watt,’ by the
-late George Williamson, Esq., Greenock,
-are to be found many curious
-and interesting details as to the Watt
-family; collected partly from tradition
-and partly from local records.
-Of Mrs. Watt’s “superior style of
-living,” compared with the custom of
-the period, the following anecdote is
-given:&mdash;“One of the author’s informants
-on such points, a venerable
-lady in her eightieth year, was wont
-to speak of the worthy baillie’s wife
-with much characteristic interest and
-animation. As illustrative of the
-internal economy of the family, the
-old lady related an occasion on which
-she had spent an evening, when a
-girl, at Mrs. Watt’s house, and remembered
-expressing with much
-naïveté to her mother on returning
-home, her childish surprise that
-‘Mrs. Watt had <em>two</em> lighted candles
-on the table.’ Among these and
-other reminiscences of her youth, our
-venerable informant described James
-Watt’s mother, in her expressive
-Doric, as ‘a braw, braw woman&mdash;none
-now to be seen like her.’” p.
-128&ndash;9.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-55" id="Footnote-55" href="#Anchor-55" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[55]</span></a> The truth in regard to young
-Watt’s first years in the public school
-is, that, owing doubtless to infirm
-health, to the suffering and depression
-which affected his whole powers,
-he was prevented for a considerable
-time displaying even a very ordinary
-and moderate aptitude for the
-common routine of school lessons;
-and during those years he was regarded
-by his schoolmasters as slow
-and inapt. Although to some minds
-facts of such a nature may be conceived
-to mar the romance of a great
-man’s history, yet, seeing they rest
-on authenticity which cannot be impugned,
-there appears no reasonable
-ground on which it may be thought
-that they ought to be passed over
-as if they had not existed, or were
-altogether unfounded.&mdash;Williamson’s
-‘Memorials of Watt,’ p. 130.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-56" id="Footnote-56" href="#Anchor-56" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[56]</span></a> The Shaw baronetcy was the
-reward of the feudal superior’s services
-on the occasion. The banner
-carried by the tenantry in the civil
-war was long preserved in Greenock,
-and was hung up with the other
-town flags in one of the public rooms.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-57" id="Footnote-57" href="#Anchor-57" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[57]</span></a> According to Smeaton’s report in
-1755, there were in spring tides only
-3 feet 8 inches water at Pointhouse
-Ford. Measures were taken to deepen
-the river, and operations with that
-object were begun in 1768. Salmon
-abounded in the Clyde, and was so
-common that servants and apprentices
-were accustomed to stipulate that
-they should not have salmon for
-dinner more than a certain number
-of days in the week.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-58" id="Footnote-58" href="#Anchor-58" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[58]</span></a> The “middens” in the street
-were sometimes complained of as a
-nuisance; and in 1776, the magistrate
-threatened a penalty of 5<i>s.</i> if middens
-of which complaint had been made
-were not removed within 48 hours.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-59" id="Footnote-59" href="#Anchor-59" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[59]</span></a> The Highland gentry and people
-regarded the Lowlanders as their
-natural enemies, fair subjects for
-plunder at all times as opportunities
-offered. The Lowlanders, on their
-part, regarded the Highlanders very
-much as the primitive settlers of
-North America regarded the Cherokee
-and Chocktaw Indians. Sometimes a
-band of uncouth half-clad Highlandmen
-would suddenly rush down upon
-the Lowlands, swoop up all the cattle
-within their reach, and drive them
-off into the mountains. Hence the
-Lowlanders and the Highlanders were
-always in a state of feud. Long after
-the ’45 a Highlandman would “thank
-God that he had not a drop of Lowland
-blood in his veins.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-60" id="Footnote-60" href="#Anchor-60" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[60]</span></a> The only trade which Glasgow
-carried on with foreign countries previous
-to the Union, was in coal, grindstones,
-and fish,&mdash;Glasgow-cured
-herrings being in much repute
-abroad. After the Union partnerships
-were formed; vessels were built down
-the Clyde, and chartered for carrying
-on the trade with Virginia, Maryland,
-and Carolina. The first <em>honest</em> vessel
-crossed the Atlantic from the Clyde
-in 1719; in 1735 the Virginia merchants
-in Glasgow had fifteen vessels
-engaged in the trade, and the town
-shortly after became the great mart
-for tobacco. Of the 90,000 hogsheads
-imported into the United Kingdom
-in 1772, Glasgow alone imported
-49,000, or more than one-half. The
-American Revolution had the effect
-of completely ruining the tobacco
-trade of Glasgow, after which the
-merchants were compelled to turn
-to other fields of enterprise and industry.
-The capital which they had
-accumulated from tobacco enabled
-them to enter upon their new undertakings
-with spirit, and the steam-engine
-which had by that time been
-invented by their townsman James
-Watt, proved their best helper in advancing
-the prosperity of modern
-Glasgow. The rapidity of its progress
-may be inferred from the following
-facts. In 1735, though the Glasgow
-merchants owned half the entire
-tonnage of Scotland, it amounted to
-only 5600 tons. In that year the
-whole shipping of Scotland was only
-one-fortieth part of that of England:
-it is now about one-fifth. From 1752
-to 1770 the total tonnage dues of the
-harbour of Glasgow amounted to only
-147<i>l.</i>, or equal to an average of about
-8<i>l.</i> per annum. In 1780, the Clyde
-having been deepened in the interval,
-they reached 1515<i>l.</i>; and in 1854,
-they amounted to 86,580<i>l.</i> The increase
-has been quite as great in
-later years. In point of value of exports,
-Glasgow ranks fourth among
-the ports of the United Kingdom;
-and Greenock now takes precedence
-of Bristol.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-61" id="Footnote-61" href="#Anchor-61" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[61]</span></a> For many curious particulars of
-Old Glasgow and its society, see Dr.
-Strang’s ‘Glasgow and its Clubs.’
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-62" id="Footnote-62" href="#Anchor-62" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[62]</span></a> a temporary wooden theatre was
-run up in 1752, but the religious prejudices
-of the population were violently
-excited by the circumstance,
-and the place was attacked by a mob
-and seriously damaged. The few
-persons who went there had to be
-protected from insults. In 1762,
-when some persons proposed to build
-a theatre, not a single individual who
-had ground within the burgh would
-grant them a site. Two years later
-the theatre was erected outside the
-precincts, and on the night on which
-it was opened it was wilfully set on
-fire by some persons instigated by the
-preaching of a neighbouring methodist,
-when it narrowly escaped destruction.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-63" id="Footnote-63" href="#Anchor-63" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[63]</span></a> When the Lowlanders want to
-drink a cheering cup, they go to the
-public-house, called the Change-house,
-and call for a chopin of twopenny,
-which is their yeasty beverage, made
-of malt, not quite so strong as the
-table-beer of England.... The
-Highlanders, on the contrary, despise
-the liquor, and regale themselves
-with whisky, or malt spirit, as strong
-as Geneva, which they swallow in
-great quantities, without any signs of
-inebriation: they are used to it from
-the cradle, and find it an excellent
-preservative against the winter cold,
-which must be extreme on these
-mountains.&mdash;Smollett, ‘Expedition
-of Humphry Clinker.’
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-64" id="Footnote-64" href="#Anchor-64" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[64]</span></a> Letter to his father quoted in Muirhead’s ‘Life of Watt,’ p. 39.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-65" id="Footnote-65" href="#Anchor-65" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[65]</span></a> The following “letter of Guildry”
-embodied the local regulations which
-existed for the purpose of preventing
-“loss and skaith” to the burgesses
-and craftsmen of Glasgow by the intrusion
-of “strangers”:&mdash;“The Dean
-of Guild and his Council shall have
-full power to discharge, punish, and
-unlaw all persons, unfreemen, using
-the liberty of a freeman within the
-burgh, as they shall think fit, ay and
-while the said unfreemen be put off
-the town, and restrained, or else be
-made free with the town and their
-crafts; and sic like, to pursue, upon
-the judges competent, all persons
-dwelling within this burgh, and usurping
-the liberty thereof, obtain decrets
-against them, and cause the same to
-be put to speedy execution.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-66" id="Footnote-66" href="#Anchor-66" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[66]</span></a> When we visited the room some
-years since, we found laid there the
-galvanic apparatus employed by Professor
-Thomson for perfecting the
-invention of his delicate process of
-signalling through the wires of the
-Atlantic Telegraph.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-67" id="Footnote-67" href="#Anchor-67" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[67]</span></a> The illustration does not show the
-Inner Quadrangle, situated to the left
-of the Main Court, that part of the
-building having been added since the
-view was published.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-68" id="Footnote-68" href="#Anchor-68" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[68]</span></a> The author of ‘Glasgow, Past
-and Present’ thus writes:&mdash;“Last
-week (Nov. 1851) I was crossing the
-ferry at the west end of Tradeston,
-and in the course of our passage over
-we turned round the bow of a large
-ship. The ferryman, looking up to
-her leviathan bulwarks, exclaimed,
-‘She came up here yesterday, drawing
-eighteen feet water!’ Now, upon
-this very spot seventy years ago,
-when a very little boy, I waded across
-the river, my feet never being off the
-ground, and the water not reaching
-above my arm-pits. The depth at
-that time could not have been much
-more than three feet.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-69" id="Footnote-69" href="#Anchor-69" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[69]</span></a> The ‘Glasgow Courant’ of Oct.
-22, 1759, contains the following advertisement:&mdash;</p>
-
-<div class="fn-ad"><div class="para">
-<div class="i05">“<i>Just Published</i>,</div>
-<div class="i00">“And to be Sold by James Watt, at his Shop
-in the College of Glasgow, price 2<i>s.</i> 6<i>d.</i>,</div>
-<div class="i00">“A large Sheet Map of the River Clyde,
-from Glasgow to Portincross, from an
-Actual Survey.</div></div>
-
-<div class="para">
-<div class="i05">“To which is added,</div>
-<div class="i00">“A Draught of Part of the North Channel,
-with the Frith of Clyde according to the
-best authorities.”</div></div>
-</div></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-70" id="Footnote-70" href="#Anchor-70" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[70]</span></a> General T. Perronet Thompson
-is another remarkable instance of a
-person without ear for music, who
-has mastered the principles of harmony
-and applied them in the invention
-of his “Enharmonic Organ.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-71" id="Footnote-71" href="#Anchor-71" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[71]</span></a> Watt seems to have made other
-organs besides those above mentioned.
-Not long since a barrel-organ of his
-construction was offered for sale at
-Glasgow. It was originally in the
-form of a table, about three feet square,
-having no appearance of a musical
-instrument externally. At this table,
-when Watt and his friends were
-seated, he would set the concealed
-mechanism in action, and surprise
-them with the production of the
-music. It has since been mounted
-with an organ front and sides, with
-gilt pipes. When in proper tune it
-is of considerable power and pleasing
-harmony; and continues orthodox in
-its psalm tunes, which range from
-“Martyrs” to the “Old Hundred.” A
-correspondent writes as follows:&mdash;“A
-large organ made and used by
-Watt when he had his shop in
-Glasgow, was disposed of by him,
-when he finally left this city. It
-came into the possession of the late
-Mr. Archibald M‘Lellan, coach-builder,
-Miller Street, Glasgow, and
-he had it fitted up in his elegant
-residence in that fine old street. I
-have heard it played by Mr. M‘Lellan.
-After his death it was sold, and purchased
-by Mr. James G. Adam of the
-Denny print-works. Mr. Adam died,
-and the organ was advertised for sale,
-in 1864, and purchased for 10<i>l.</i>, by
-Adam Sim, Esq., of Coulter Mains, in
-whose possession it now is. Mr. Sim
-has authentic documents to prove that
-this organ was really James Watt’s.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-72" id="Footnote-72" href="#Anchor-72" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[72]</span></a> The club he frequented was
-called the Anderston Club, of which
-Mr. (afterwards Professor) Millar,
-Dr. Robert Simson, the mathematician,
-Dr. Adam Smith, Dr. Black,
-and Dr. Cullen, were members. The
-standing dish of the club was hen-broth,
-consisting of a decoction of
-“how-towdies” (fowls), thickened
-with black beans, and seasoned with
-pepper. Dr. Strang says Professor
-Simson was in the habit of counting
-the steps from his house to the club,
-so that he could tell the distance to
-the fraction of an inch. But it is not
-stated whether he counted the steps
-on his return, and found the number
-of steps the same.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-73" id="Footnote-73" href="#Anchor-73" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[73]</span></a> John Anderson was a native of
-Greenock, and an intimate friend of
-James Watt. He was appointed professor
-of Hebrew in his twenty-seventh
-year, and succeeded Dr. Dick as professor
-of Natural Philosophy in 1757.
-Watt spent many of his evenings at
-his residence within the College, and
-had the free use of his excellent private
-library. Professor Anderson is
-entitled to the honour of being the
-first to open classes for the instruction
-of working men&mdash;“anti-toga
-classes,” as he called them&mdash;in the
-principles of Natural Philosophy;
-and at his death he bequeathed his
-property for the purpose of founding
-an institution with the same object.
-The Andersonian University was
-opened in 1796, long before the age
-of Mechanics’ Institutes.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-74" id="Footnote-74" href="#Anchor-74" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[74]</span></a> At a meeting held in Glasgow in
-1839 to erect a monument to Watt,
-Dr. Ure observed:&mdash;“As to the
-latent heat of steam,” said Mr. Watt
-to me, “it was a piece of knowledge
-essential to my inquiries, and I
-worked it out myself in the best way
-that I could. I used apothecaries’
-phials for my apparatus, and by
-means of them I got approximations
-sufficient for my purpose at the
-time.” The passage affords a striking
-illustration of the large results that
-may be arrived at by means of the
-humblest instruments. In like manner
-Cavendish, when asked by a foreigner
-to be shown over his laboratories,
-pointed to an old tea-tray on the
-table, containing a few watch-glasses,
-test papers, a balance, and a blowpipe,
-and observed, “There is all the
-laboratory I possess.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-75" id="Footnote-75" href="#Anchor-75" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[75]</span></a> Watt’s notes to Robison’s Articles on ‘Steam and Steam-engines.’
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-76" id="Footnote-76" href="#Anchor-76" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[76]</span></a> The following advertisement in
-the ‘Glasgow Journal’ of the 1st Dec.,
-1763, fixes the date of this last removal:&mdash;</p>
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“James Watt has removed his shop from
-the Saltmercat to Mr. Buchanan’s land in the
-Trongate, where he sells all sorts of Mathematical
-and Musical Instruments, with
-variety of toys, and other goods.”</p></div>
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-77" id="Footnote-77" href="#Anchor-77" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[77]</span></a> About the site of the Humane
-Society’s House.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-78" id="Footnote-78" href="#Anchor-78" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[78]</span></a> Mr. Robert Hart’s ‘Reminiscences
-of James Watt,’ in ‘Transactions of
-the Glasgow Archæological Society,
-1859.’
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-79" id="Footnote-79" href="#Anchor-79" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[79]</span></a> “The last step of all,” says Professor
-Jardine, “was more difficult&mdash;the
-forming of the separate condensing
-vessel. The great knowledge he had
-acquired of the mechanical powers
-enabled him to construct it, but I have
-often heard him say this was a work
-of great difficulty, and that he met
-with many disappointments before he
-succeeded. I have often made use of
-this beautiful analysis received from
-Mr. Watt, in another department in
-which I have been long engaged, to
-illustrate and encourage the progress of
-genius in youth, to show, that once in
-possession of a habit of attention, under
-proper direction, it may be carried from
-one easy step to another, till the mind
-becomes qualified and invigorated for
-uniting and concentrating effort&mdash;the
-highest exertion of genius.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-80" id="Footnote-80" href="#Anchor-80" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[80]</span></a> “I have now (April, 1765) almost
-a certainty of the <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">facturum</i> of the fire-engine,
-having determined the following
-particulars: The quantity of steam
-produced; the ultimatum of the lever
-engine; the quantity of steam destroyed
-by the cold of its cylinder;
-the quantity destroyed in mine; and
-if there be not some devil in the hedge,
-mine ought to raise water to 44 feet
-with the same quantity of steam that
-theirs does to 32 (supposing my
-cylinder as thick as theirs), which I
-think I can demonstrate. I can now
-make a cylinder 2 feet diameter and
-3 feet high, only a 40th of an inch
-thick, and strong enough to resist the
-atmosphere; <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">sed tace</i>. In short, I
-can think of nothing else but this
-machine.”&mdash;Watt to Dr. Lind, quoted
-in Muirhead’s ‘Life of Watt,’ 94&ndash;5.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-81" id="Footnote-81" href="#Anchor-81" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[81]</span></a> For Memoir of Roebuck, see ‘Industrial Biography,’ p. 133.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-82" id="Footnote-82" href="#Anchor-82" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[82]</span></a> When we visited the place many
-years ago, Miss Stewart’s spinnet still
-stood in the drawing-room, but there
-was not a tone left in it. Like many
-other old houses, Kinneil has the reputation
-of being haunted. The ghost
-is that of a “Lady Lilburne,” wife of
-the Parliamentary General, who is
-said to have thrown herself out of one
-of the windows during her husband’s
-absence.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-83" id="Footnote-83" href="#Anchor-83" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[83]</span></a> Dr. Small was born in 1734 at
-Carmylie, Angus, Scotland, of which
-parish his father was the minister.
-He had been for some time the professor
-of Natural Philosophy in the
-University of Williamsburg, Virginia,
-from whence he returned to England
-and settled at Birmingham.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-84" id="Footnote-84" href="#Anchor-84" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[84]</span></a> “I have,” he writes, “just now
-got a curious book, being an account of
-all the machines, furnaces, methods
-of working, profits, &amp;c., of the mines
-of the Upper Hartz. It is unluckily
-in German, which I understand little
-of, but am improving in by the help
-of a truly Chymical Swiss Dyer, who
-is come here to dye standing red on
-linen and cotton, in which he is successful.
-He is according to the
-custom of philosophers ennuyé to a
-great degree, but seems to be more
-modest than is usual with them; and,
-what is still more unusual, is attached
-only to his dyeing, though he has a
-tolerable knowledge of chymestry. He
-promises to make me a coat that will
-not wet though boiled in water. This
-would be of great use to a hundred
-people I see just now running by, wet
-to the skin.... I verily believe the
-drops are an inch in diameter! To
-return to the book&mdash;it contains an
-account of all the unsuccessful experiments
-that have been tried in the
-Hartz, and I assure you it gives me
-some consolation to see the great
-Liebnitz, the rival of Newton, bungling
-repeatedly, applying wind mills
-to raise ore while water ran idle past
-him. There is among other machines
-the fellow of Blackie’s, only worked by
-water, and a full and true account of
-why it did not succeed, which he
-should read. Their machines in general
-display great ingenuity though
-ignorance of principles.”&mdash;Watt to
-Small, May 28, 1769. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-85" id="Footnote-85" href="#Anchor-85" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[85]</span></a> “I mentioned to you a method of
-still doubling the effect of the steam,
-and that tolerably easy, by using the
-power of steam rushing into a vacuum,
-at present lost. This would do a
-little more than double the effect, but
-it would too much enlarge the vessels
-to use it all. It is peculiarly applicable
-to wheel engines, and may
-supply the want of a condenser where
-force of steam is only used; for, open
-one of the steam valves and admit
-steam, until one-fourth of the distance
-between it and the next valve is filled
-with steam, shut the valve, and the
-steam will continue to expand and to
-press round the wheel with a diminishing
-power, ending in one-fourth of its
-first exertion. The sum of this series
-you will find greater than one-half,
-though only one-fourth steam was
-used. The power will indeed be unequal,
-but this can be remedied by a
-fly, or in several other ways.”&mdash;Watt
-to Small, 28th May, 1769. Boulton
-MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-86" id="Footnote-86" href="#Anchor-86" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[86]</span></a> He anticipated the use of high-pressure
-steam, as afterwards employed
-in the locomotive by Trevithick,
-in the following passage:&mdash;“I intend,”
-he said, “in many cases to employ
-the expansive force of steam to press
-on the piston, or whatever is used
-instead of one, in the same manner as
-the weight of the atmosphere is now
-employed in common fire-engines. In
-some cases I intend to use both the
-condenser and this force of steam, so
-that the powers of these engines will
-as much exceed those pressed only by
-the air, as the expansive power of the
-steam is greater than the weight of
-the atmosphere. In other cases,
-when plenty of cold water cannot be
-had, I intend to work the engines by
-the force of steam only, and to discharge
-it into the air by proper outlets
-after it has done its office.”&mdash;Watt to
-Small, March, 1769. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-87" id="Footnote-87" href="#Anchor-87" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[87]</span></a> Mr. Hart’s “Reminiscences of James Watt,” in ‘Transactions of the
-Glasgow Archæological Society,’ Part I. 1859.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-88" id="Footnote-88" href="#Anchor-88" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[88]</span></a> The telescope was mounted with
-two parallel horizontal hairs in the
-focus of the eyeglass, crossed by one
-perpendicular hair. The measuring
-pole was divided into feet and inches,
-so that, wrote Watt, “if the hairs
-comprehend one foot at one chain distance,
-they will comprehend ten feet
-at ten chains,” and so on. This invention
-Watt made in 1770, and used
-the telescope in his various surveys.
-Eight years later, in 1778, the Society
-of Arts awarded to a Mr. Green a premium
-for precisely the same invention.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-89" id="Footnote-89" href="#Anchor-89" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[89]</span></a> Letter to Small, 24th Nov. 1772.
-Watt, however, took no steps to bring
-this invention before the public, and
-in 1777, a similar instrument having
-been invented by Dr. Maskelyne, was
-presented by him to the Royal Society.
-Thus Watt also lost the credit of this
-invention.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-90" id="Footnote-90" href="#Anchor-90" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[90]</span></a> The Company afterwards came to
-grief. The original subscription list
-was not filled up, and the stagnation
-in trade which took place at the outbreak
-of the American war, brought
-the works to a standstill. In 1782
-the concern was sold to the Messrs.
-Stirling, who eventually became the
-sole proprietors and finished the undertaking.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-91" id="Footnote-91" href="#Anchor-91" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[91]</span></a> There was then a ford at Dumbuck,
-a few miles below Glasgow, which prevented
-boats of more than ten tons
-burden ascending to the Broomielaw.
-This was shortly after removed by
-the Clyde Trust, who have expended
-3,564,397<i>l.</i> in improvement of the
-navigation between 1770 and 1863,
-the revenue collected during the same
-time in dues having been 2,288,000<i>l.</i>
-Vessels drawing 21 feet can now ascend
-to the Broomielaw; and when the present
-improvements are completed the
-depth at high water is expected to be
-upwards of 24 feet.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-92" id="Footnote-92" href="#Anchor-92" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[92]</span></a> Watt to Small, 21st Dec. 1770.
-Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-93" id="Footnote-93" href="#Anchor-93" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[93]</span></a> The bridge was partially destroyed
-by a flood in 1806, when one
-of the central piers was thrown down.
-Two of the arches fell, and were rebuilt,
-but the others stand as originally
-constructed.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-94" id="Footnote-94" href="#Anchor-94" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[94]</span></a> The child was stillborn. Of four
-other children who were the fruit of
-this marriage, two died young. A
-son and daughter survived; the son,
-James, succeeded his father, and died
-unmarried, at Aston Hall, near Birmingham,
-in 1848. The daughter
-married Mr. Miller, of Glasgow, whose
-grandson, the present J. W. Gibson
-Watt, Esq., succeeded to the Watt
-property.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-95" id="Footnote-95" href="#Anchor-95" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[95]</span></a> There seems reason to believe that
-the capacity for skilled industry is to
-a certain extent transmissible; and
-that the special aptitude for mechanics
-which characterises the population of
-certain districts, is in a great measure
-the result of centuries of experience,
-transmitted from one generation to
-another. Mr. Morell takes the same
-view: “We have every reason to
-believe,” he says, “that the power of
-specialised instincts is transmitted,
-and when the circumstances favour it,
-goes on increasing from age to age in
-intensity, and in a particular adaptation
-to the purposes demanded. All
-confirmed habits which become a part
-of the animal nature, seem to be imparted
-by hereditary descent; and
-thus what <em>seems</em> to be an original
-instinct may, after all, be but the
-accumulated growth and experience of
-many generations.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-96" id="Footnote-96" href="#Anchor-96" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[96]</span></a> For Memoir of Huntsman, see ‘Industrial Biography,’ 102&ndash;110.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-97" id="Footnote-97" href="#Anchor-97" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[97]</span></a> While on Snow-hill, Mr. Boulton’s
-business was principally confined to
-the making of buttons, shoe-buckles,
-articles in steel, and various kinds of
-trinkets. His designation was that
-of “toymaker,” as is shown by the
-following document copied from the
-original:&mdash;“Received of Matthew
-Boulton, toymaker, Snow-hill, three
-shillings and sixpence, for which sum
-I solemnly engage, if he should be
-chosen by lot to serve in the militia
-for this parish, at the first meeting
-for that purpose, to procure a substitute
-that shall be approved of. Birmingham,
-January 11, 1762, Henry
-Brookes, Sergt.” The Birmingham
-toymaker was, however, often a man
-doing a large business, producing articles
-of utility as well as ornament.
-Mr. Osler, the Birmingham manufacturer
-of glass beads and other toys,
-when examined before a Committee
-of the House of Commons many years
-since, astonished the members by informing
-them that trifling though
-dolls’ eyes might appear to be as an
-article of manufacture, he had once
-obtained an order for 500<i>l.</i> worth of
-the article. “Eighteen years ago,”
-said he, “on my first going to London,
-a respectable-looking man in the city
-asked me if I could supply him with
-dolls’ eyes; and I was foolish enough
-to feel half offended; I thought it derogatory
-to my dignity as a manufacturer
-to make dolls’ eyes. He took
-me into a room quite as wide, and
-perhaps twice the length of this, and
-we had just room to walk between
-the stacks, from the floor to the ceiling,
-of parts of dolls. He said,
-‘These are only the legs and the
-arms; the trunks are below.’ But I
-saw enough to convince me, that he
-wanted a great many eyes.... He
-ordered various quantities, and of
-various sizes and qualities. On returning
-to the Tavistock Hotel, I
-found that the order amounted to
-upwards of 500<i>l.</i>... Calculating on
-every child in this country not using
-a doll till two years old, and throwing
-it aside at seven, and having a new
-one annually, I satisfied myself that
-the eyes alone would produce a circulation
-of a great many thousand
-pounds. I mention this merely to
-show the importance of trifles.”&mdash;Babbage,
-‘Economy of Machinery and
-Manufactures,’ 243&ndash;5.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-98" id="Footnote-98" href="#Anchor-98" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[98]</span></a> Mr. Boulton afterwards purchased
-the fee simple of the property, together
-with much of the adjoining land.
-The nature of his tenure caused him
-to take a lively interest in the question
-of common lands enclosure, and at
-a much later period (17th April, 1790)
-we find him writing to the Right Hon.
-Lord Hawkesbury as follows:&mdash;“The
-argument of robbing the poor [by
-enclosures of wastes] is fallacious.
-They have no legal title to the
-common land; and the more of it that
-is cultivated, the more work and the
-more bread there will be for them. I
-speak from experience; for I founded
-my manufactory upon one of the most
-barren commons in England, where
-there existed but a few miserable
-huts filled with idle beggarly people,
-who by the help of the common land
-and a little thieving made shift to
-live without working. The scene is
-now entirely changed. I have employed
-a thousand men, women, and
-children, in my aforesaid manufactory
-for nearly thirty years past. The
-Lord of the Manor hath exterminated
-these very poor cottages, and hundreds
-of clean comfortable cheerful houses
-are found erected in their place. Thus
-the inhabitants of the parish have
-been trebled without at all increasing
-the poor levies. I am more confirmed
-in this view when I turn my eyes to
-a neighbouring parish (Sutton Colefield),
-where there are 10,000 acres of
-common land uncultivated, and yet
-the poor rates are very high. Let
-this land be divided, enclosed, cultivated,
-and rendered saleable to active,
-industrious, and spirited men; and
-the poor will then have plenty of
-work, and the next generation of them
-will be fully reconciled to earning
-their bread instead of begging for it.”&mdash;Boulton
-MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-99" id="Footnote-99" href="#Anchor-99" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[99]</span></a> Mr. Keir, in a MS. memoir of
-Mr. Boulton now before us, says he
-was the first to introduce the silver
-plate business at Birmingham, and to
-make complete services in solid silver.
-But the business was not profitable,
-in consequence of the great value of
-the material, the loss of interest upon
-which was not compensated by the
-additional price put upon it for workmanship.
-One good consequence of
-the silver plate business, however,
-was the establishment of an assay
-office in Birmingham, the necessary
-Act for which was obtained at Mr.
-Boulton’s expense, and proved of much
-advantage to the town.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-100" id="Footnote-100" href="#Anchor-100" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[100]</span></a> “If, in the course of your future
-travelling,” he wrote Mr. Wendler
-(July, 1767), “you can pick up for
-me any metallic ores or fossil substances,
-or any other curious natural
-productions, I should be much obliged
-to you, as I am fond of all those
-things that have a tendency to improve
-my knowledge in mechanical
-arts, in which my manufactory will
-every year become more and more
-general, and therefore wish to know
-the taste, the fashions, the toys, both
-useful and ornamental, the implements,
-vessels, &amp;c., that prevail in all
-the different parts of Europe, as I
-should be glad to work for all Europe
-in all things that they may have
-occasion for&mdash;gold, silver, copper,
-plated, gilt, pinchbeck, steel, platina,
-tortoiseshell, or anything else that
-may become an article of general demand.
-I have lately begun to make
-snuff-boxes, instrument-cases, tooth-picks,
-&amp;c., in metal, gilt, and in tortoiseshell
-inlaid, likewise gilt and
-pinchbeck watch-chains. We are
-now being completely fixed at Soho,
-and when Mr. Fothergill returns
-(which will not be for six months), I
-shall then have more time to attend to
-improvements than I have at present.”&mdash;Boulton
-MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-101" id="Footnote-101" href="#Anchor-101" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[101]</span></a> Boulton to Wedgwood, January,
-1769.&mdash;Wedgwood was one of his
-most intimate friends; the two alike
-aiming at excellence in their respective
-branches of production. Their
-kindred efforts seem to have excited
-the ire of some satirist, whose effusion
-against them in the ‘Public Ledger’
-is thus referred to in the postscript of
-a letter from Wedgwood to Boulton,
-dated 19th February, 1771:&mdash;“If you
-take in the ‘Public Ledger’ you’ll see
-that Mr. Antipuffado has done me the
-honour to rank me with the most
-<em>stupendous geniuses</em> of the age, and
-has really <em>cut me up very cleanly</em>. He
-talks, too, that he should not wonder
-if some surprising genius at Birmingham
-should be tempted to make
-<em>Roman medals</em> and <em>tenpenny nails</em>,
-or <em>Corinthian knives</em> and <em>daggers</em>, and
-style himself Roman medal and Etruscan
-tenpenny nail-maker to the Empress
-of Abyssinia. But see the paper:
-I believe it is the first week in
-February, and is one of the better
-sort of this class.”&mdash;Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-102" id="Footnote-102" href="#Anchor-102" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[102]</span></a> The clocks, with several other
-articles, were sent out to Russia, and
-submitted to the Empress through
-the kindness of Earl Cathcart. His
-lordship, in communicating the result
-to Mr. Boulton, said&mdash;“I have the
-pleasure to inform you that her Imperial
-Majesty not only bought them
-all, last week, but did me the honour
-to tell me that she was extremely
-pleased with them, and thought them
-superior in every respect to the French,
-as well as cheaper, which entitled
-them in all lights to a preference.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-103" id="Footnote-103" href="#Anchor-103" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[103]</span></a> Pet names of his two children,
-Matthew Robinson and Anne Boulton.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-104" id="Footnote-104" href="#Anchor-104" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[104]</span></a> These letters are without date,
-but we infer that they were written
-in the summer of 1767.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-105" id="Footnote-105" href="#Anchor-105" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[105]</span></a> Boulton to the Duke of Richmond,
-April 8, 1770. The Duke was engaged
-at the time in preparing a set
-of machines for making the various
-experiments in Natural Philosophy
-described in S’Gravande’s book. The
-Duke was himself a good turner and
-worker in metal.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-106" id="Footnote-106" href="#Anchor-106" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[106]</span></a> The manufactory was complete so
-far as regarded the hardware manufacture.
-But additions were constantly
-being made to it; and, as
-other branches of industry were added,
-it became more than doubled in extent
-and accommodation.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-107" id="Footnote-107" href="#Anchor-107" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[107]</span></a> Boulton to John Taylor, 23rd January, 1769. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-108" id="Footnote-108" href="#Anchor-108" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[108]</span></a> When the canal came to be constructed
-at the point at which it
-passed Soho, it occasioned him great
-anxiety through the leakage of the
-canal banks and loss of water for the
-purposes of his manufactory. The
-supply, especially in dry summers,
-was already too limited; but the
-canal threatened to destroy it altogether.
-Writing to Mr. Thomas
-Gilbert, M.P., on the subject in
-February, 1769, he said, “The very
-holes which Mr. Smeaton hath dug to
-try the ground, drink up the water
-nearly as fast as you can pour it in....
-Let Smeaton or Brindley, or all
-the engineers upon earth give what
-evidence they will before Parliament,
-I am convinced by last summer’s
-experience that if the proprietors of
-the canal continue to take the two
-streams on which my mill depends, it
-is ruined. I might as well have built
-it upon the summit of the hill.” After
-the act had passed he wrote his friend
-Garbett, “I have seen the testimony
-of the two engineers, Smeaton and
-Yeoman, but I value the opinions of
-neither of them, nor of Brindley nor
-Simcox (in this case), nor of the
-whole tribe of jobbing ditchers, who
-are retained as evidence on any side
-which first applies for them.” His
-alarms, however, proved unfounded,
-as the leakage of the canal was eventually
-remedied; and in November,
-1772, we find him writing to the Earl
-of Warwick, “Our navigation goes on
-prosperously; the junction with the
-Wolverhampton Canal is complete;
-and we already sail from Birmingham
-to Bristol and to Hull.”&mdash;Boulton
-MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-109" id="Footnote-109" href="#Anchor-109" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[109]</span></a> Among Boulton’s scientific memoranda,
-we find some curious speculations,
-bearing the date of 1765, relative
-to improvements which he was
-trying to work out in gunnery. He
-proposed the truer boring of the guns,
-the use of a telescopic sight, and a
-cylindrical shot with its end of a
-parabolic form as presenting in his
-opinion the least resistance to the air.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-110" id="Footnote-110" href="#Anchor-110" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[110]</span></a> On the 22nd May, 1765, Franklin
-writes Boulton,&mdash;“Mr. Baskerville informs
-me that you have lately had a
-considerable addition to your fortune,
-on which I sincerely congratulate you.
-I beg leave to introduce my friend
-Doctor Small to your acquaintance,
-and to recommend him to your civilities.
-I would not take this freedom,
-if I were not sure it would be agreeable
-to you; and that you will thank
-me for adding to the number of those
-who from their knowledge of you
-must respect you, one who is both an
-ingenious philosopher and a most
-worthy honest man. If anything new
-in magnetism or electricity, or any
-other branch of natural knowledge,
-has occurred to your fruitful genius
-since I last had the pleasure of seeing
-you, you will by communicating it
-greatly oblige me.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-111" id="Footnote-111" href="#Anchor-111" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[111]</span></a> Franklin to Boulton, March 19,
-1766. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-112" id="Footnote-112" href="#Anchor-112" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[112]</span></a> Darwin to Boulton, March 11,
-1766. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-113" id="Footnote-113" href="#Anchor-113" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[113]</span></a> The following passage occurs in
-his letter:&mdash;“Suppose one piston up,
-and the vacuum made under it by the
-jet d’eau froid. That piston cannot
-yet descend, because the cock is not
-yet opened which admits the steam
-into its antagonist cylinder. Hence
-the two pistons are in equilibrio, being
-either of them pressed by the atmosphere.
-Then, I say, if the cock
-which admits the steam into the
-antagonist cylinder be opened gradually
-and not with a jerk, that the first
-mentioned [piston in the] cylinder
-will descend gradually and yet not
-less forcibly. Hence by the management
-of the steam cocks the motion
-may be accelerated, retarded, destroyed,
-revived, instantly and easily.
-And if this answers in practice as it
-does in theory, the machine cannot
-fail of success! Eureka!”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-114" id="Footnote-114" href="#Anchor-114" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[114]</span></a> Small wrote Watt from Birmingham,
-on the 7th January, 1768:&mdash;“Our
-friend Boulton will by this
-post send letters both to you and Dr.
-Roebuck. I know not well how to
-resolve without seeing you. I have
-not the pleasure of being enough
-acquainted with Dr. R. to judge
-whether we should all suit one another.
-His integrity and generosity
-everybody agrees are great. You
-certainly know the proposal he has
-made to Boulton, who will tell you
-his determination about it. Before I
-knew of your connexion with Dr. R.
-my idea was that you should settle
-here, and that Boulton and I should
-assist you as much as we could, which
-in any case we will most certainly do.
-I have no kind of doubt of your
-success, nor of your acquiring fortune,
-if you proceed upon a proper plan as
-to the manner of doing business;
-which, if you do, you will be sole
-possessor of the affair even after your
-patent has expired. I had not thoroughly
-considered this part of the
-matter when you left me. In a
-partnership that I liked, I should not
-hesitate to employ any sum of money
-I can command on your scheme, and
-I am certain it may be managed with
-only a moderate capital. Whether it
-would be possible to manage the wheel
-and reciprocating engines by separate
-partnerships without their interfering
-I am not certain. If it is, Boulton
-and I would engage with you in
-either, <em>provided you will live here</em>.”&mdash;Boulton
-MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-115" id="Footnote-115" href="#Anchor-115" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[115]</span></a> Watt to Small, January 28, 1769. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-116" id="Footnote-116" href="#Anchor-116" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[116]</span></a> Small to Watt, 18th April, 1769. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-117" id="Footnote-117" href="#Anchor-117" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[117]</span></a> Roebuck was at this time willing
-to admit Boulton as a partner in the
-patent, but only as respected the
-profits of engines sold in the counties
-of Warwick, Stafford, and Derby.
-This Boulton declined, saying, “It
-would not be worth my while to
-make engines for three counties only;
-but it might be worth my while to
-make for all the world.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-118" id="Footnote-118" href="#Anchor-118" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[118]</span></a> Watt to Small, 28th April, 1769.
-Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-119" id="Footnote-119" href="#Anchor-119" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[119]</span></a> Watt to Small, 20th September,
-1769. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-120" id="Footnote-120" href="#Anchor-120" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[120]</span></a> “I am really very sorry on my own
-account,” he wrote, “that your engagements
-hinder you from entering
-into our scheme, for that ought to
-be the result of your deliberation.
-Though there are few things I have
-wished more for than being connected
-with you on many accounts, yet I
-should be very loath to purchase that
-pleasure at the expense of your quiet,
-which might be the case if you involved
-yourself in more business than
-you could easily manage, or, what is
-worse, find money for. Besides, this
-is not a trade, but a project; and no
-man should risk more money on a
-project than he can afford to lose.”&mdash;Watt
-to Small, 21st October, 1769.
-Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-121" id="Footnote-121" href="#Anchor-121" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[121]</span></a> Watt to Small, 20th September,
-1769.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-122" id="Footnote-122" href="#Anchor-122" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[122]</span></a> Small informed Watt that it was
-intended to make an engine for the
-purpose of <em>drawing canal boats</em>.
-“What Mr. Boulton and I,” he wrote,
-“are very desirous of is, to move canal
-boats by this engine; so we have
-made this model of a size sufficient
-for that purpose. We propose first to
-operate without any condenser, because
-coals are here exceedingly cheap, and
-because you can, more commodiously
-than we, make experiments on condensers,
-having several already by
-you. Above 150 boats are now employed
-on these new waveless canals,
-so if we can succeed, the field is not
-narrow.” This suggestion of working
-canal boats by steam immediately
-elicited a reply from Watt on the
-subject. Invention was so habitual
-to him that a new method of employing
-power was no sooner hinted
-than his active mind at once set to
-work to solve the problem. “Have
-you ever,” he wrote Small, “considered
-<em>a spiral oar</em> for that purpose,
-or are you for two wheels?” And to
-make his meaning clear, he sketched
-out a rough but graphic outline of a
-screw propeller. Small’s reply was
-unfavourable: he replied, “I have
-tried models of spiral oars, and have
-found them all inferior to oars of either
-of the other forms; I believe because
-a cylinder of water immersed in water
-can be easily turned round its own
-axis. We propose to try gun-lock
-springs with the fixed part longer
-than the moving. If we cannot succeed,
-we will have recourse to what
-you have so obligingly and clearly
-described.” Finally Watt writes a
-fortnight later, “concerning spirals, I
-do not continue fond of them.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-123" id="Footnote-123" href="#Anchor-123" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[123]</span></a> Roebuck to Boulton, February
-12, 1770.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-124" id="Footnote-124" href="#Anchor-124" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[124]</span></a> Small to Watt, 17th September, 1770. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-125" id="Footnote-125" href="#Anchor-125" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[125]</span></a> Watt to Small, 20th October,
-1770. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-126" id="Footnote-126" href="#Anchor-126" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[126]</span></a> He then held an eighth share in the
-pottery, which brought him in about
-70<i>l.</i> a year clear.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-127" id="Footnote-127" href="#Anchor-127" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[127]</span></a> Watt to Small, 30th August,
-1772. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-128" id="Footnote-128" href="#Anchor-128" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[128]</span></a> Small to Watt, 16th November,
-1772. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-129" id="Footnote-129" href="#Anchor-129" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[129]</span></a> About this time, in order to bring
-himself and his engine into notice,
-Watt contemplated writing a treatise
-on steam and its applications. “I
-have some thoughts,” he wrote to
-Small, “of writing a book on the
-elements of the theory of steam-engines,
-in which, however, I shall
-only give the enunciation of the
-perfect engine. This book might do
-me and the scheme good. It would
-still leave the world in the dark as to
-the true construction of the engine.
-Something of this kind is necessary,
-as Smeaton is labouring hard at the
-subject, and if I can make no profit,
-at least I ought not to lose the honour
-of my experiments.”&mdash;Watt to Small,
-17th August, 1773. Boulton MSS.
-To this letter Small replied, “The
-more I consider the propriety of your
-publishing about steam, the more I
-wish you to publish. Smeaton has
-only trifled hitherto, though he may
-perhaps discover something. He told
-Boulton some time ago that the circular
-engine would not do. He said
-he had considered it, and was sure of
-this. As B. does not much respect
-his genius, this had no effect.” Watt’s
-treatise was, however, never written;
-his attention being shortly after fully
-occupied by other and more engrossing
-subjects.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-130" id="Footnote-130" href="#Anchor-130" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[130]</span></a> Boulton to Watt, 29th March,
-1773. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-131" id="Footnote-131" href="#Anchor-131" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[131]</span></a> “As I found the engine at Kinneil
-perishing, and as it is from circumstances
-highly improper that it should
-continue there longer, and as I have
-nowhere else to put it, I have this
-week taken it to pieces and packed up
-the ironwork, cylinder, and pump,
-ready to be shipped for London on its
-way to Birmingham, as the only place
-where the experiments can be completed
-with propriety. I suppose the
-whole will not weigh above four tons.
-I have left the whole of the woodwork
-until we see what we are to do.”&mdash;Watt
-to Small, 20th May, 1773.
-Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-132" id="Footnote-132" href="#Anchor-132" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[132]</span></a> In a letter to Small, Watt wrote,
-“I begin now to see daylight through
-the affairs that have detained me so
-long, and think of setting out for you
-in a fortnight at furthest. I am
-monstrously plagued with my headaches,
-and not a little with unprofitable
-business. I don’t mean my
-own whims: these I never work at
-when I can do any other thing; but I
-have got too many acquaintances; and
-there are too many beggars in this
-country, which I am afraid is going to
-the devil altogether. Provisions continue
-excessively dear, and laws are
-made to keep them so. But luckily
-the spirit of emigrating rises high,
-and the people seem disposed to show
-their oppressive masters that they can
-live without them. By the time
-some twenty or thirty thousand more
-leave the country, matters will take a
-turn not much to the profit of the
-landholders.”&mdash;Watt to Small, 29th
-April, 1774. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-133" id="Footnote-133" href="#Anchor-133" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[133]</span></a> Watt to Small, 25th July, 1773.
-Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-134" id="Footnote-134" href="#Anchor-134" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[134]</span></a> Mr. Edgeworth was first introduced
-to the notice of Mr. Boulton in
-the following letter from Dr. Darwin
-(1767):&mdash;“Dear Boulton, I have got
-with me a mechanical friend, Mr.
-Edgeworth, from Oxfordshire,&mdash;the
-greatest conjurer I ever saw. God
-send fine weather, and pray come to
-my assistance, and prevail on Dr.
-Small and Mrs. Boulton to attend you
-to-morrow morning, and we will reconvey
-you to Birmingham if the
-devil permit. E. has the principles
-of nature in his palm, and moulds
-them as he pleases,&mdash;can take away
-polarity, or give it to the needle by
-rubbing it thrice on the palm of his
-hand! And can see through two
-solid oak boards without glasses! Wonderful!
-astonishing!! diabolical!!!
-Pray tell Dr. Small he must come to
-see these miracles. Adieu, E. Darwin.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-135" id="Footnote-135" href="#Anchor-135" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[135]</span></a> Richard Lovell Edgeworth says of
-this distinguished coterie,&mdash;“By means
-of Mr. Keir I became acquainted with
-Dr. Small of Birmingham, a man
-esteemed by all who knew him, and
-by all who were admitted to his
-friendship beloved with no common
-enthusiasm. Dr. Small formed a link
-which combined Mr. Boulton, Mr.
-Watt, Dr. Darwin, Mr. Wedgwood,
-Mr. Day, and myself together&mdash;men
-of very different characters, but all
-devoted to literature and science.
-This mutual intimacy has never been
-broken but by death, nor have any of
-the number failed to distinguish themselves
-in science or literature. Some
-may think that I ought with due
-modesty to except myself. Mr. Keir
-with his knowledge of the world and
-good sense; Dr. Small, with his benevolence
-and profound sagacity; Wedgwood,
-with his increasing industry,
-experimental variety, and calm investigation;
-Boulton, with his mobility,
-quick perception, and bold adventure;
-Watt, with his strong inventive
-faculty, undeviating steadiness, and
-bold resources; Darwin, with his imagination,
-science, and poetical excellence;
-and Day, with his unwearied
-research after truth, his integrity and
-eloquence;&mdash;proved altogether such a
-society as few men have had the good
-fortune to live with; such an assemblage
-of friends, as fewer still have
-had the happiness to possess, and keep
-through life.”&mdash;Memoirs, i. 186.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-136" id="Footnote-136" href="#Anchor-136" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[136]</span></a> Dr. Roebuck proposed to confine
-Boulton’s profits to the engine business
-done only in three counties. It
-will be observed that Boulton declined
-to negotiate on such a basis.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-137" id="Footnote-137" href="#Anchor-137" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[137]</span></a> Boulton to Watt, 7th February,
-1769. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-138" id="Footnote-138" href="#Anchor-138" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[138]</span></a> In a statement prepared by Mr.
-Boulton for the consideration of the
-arbitrators between himself and
-Fothergill as to the affairs of that
-firm, the following passage occurs:&mdash;“The
-first engine that was erected at
-Soho I purchased of Mr. Watt and
-Dr. Roebuck. The cylinder was cast
-of solid grain tin, which engine, with
-the boiler, the valves, the condenser,
-and the pumps, were all sent from
-Scotland to Soho. This engine was
-erected for the use of the Soho manufactory,
-and for the purpose of making
-experiments upon by Mr. Watt, who
-occupied two years of his time at Soho
-with that object: and lived there at
-Mr. Boulton’s expense. Nevertheless
-Mr. Watt often assisted Boulton and
-Fothergill in anything in his power,
-and made one journey to London upon
-their business, when he worked at
-adjusting and marking weights manufactured
-by Boulton and Fothergill.”
-In another statement of a similar
-kind, Mr. Boulton says,&mdash;“The only
-fire-engine that was erected at Soho
-prior to Boulton and Watt obtaining
-the Act of Parliament, was entirely
-made and erected in Scotland, and was
-removed here by sea, being a part of
-my bargain with Roebuck. All that
-were afterwards erected were for persons
-that ordered them, and were at the
-expense of erecting them.”&mdash;Boulton
-MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-139" id="Footnote-139" href="#Anchor-139" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[139]</span></a> Quoted in Muirhead’s ‘Mechanical
-Inventions of James Watt,’ ii. 79.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-140" id="Footnote-140" href="#Anchor-140" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[140]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 31st January, 1775. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-141" id="Footnote-141" href="#Anchor-141" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[141]</span></a> Bonds were given for the 1000<i>l.</i>,
-but the assignees of Roebuck becoming
-impatient for the money,
-Boulton discharged them to get rid of
-their importunity, long before any
-profits had been derived from the
-manufacture of the engines.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-142" id="Footnote-142" href="#Anchor-142" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[142]</span></a> John Wilkinson, the “father of
-the iron-trade” as he styled himself,
-was a man of extraordinary energy of
-character. He was strong-headed and
-strong-tempered and of inflexible determination.
-His father, Isaac Wilkinson,
-who originally started the iron
-trade at Wrexham, was a man possessed
-of quick discernment and versatile
-talents, though he wanted that
-firmness and constancy of purpose
-which so eminently distinguished his
-son. Isaac Wilkinson used thus to
-tell his own history:&mdash;“I worked,”
-said he, “at a forge in the north.
-My masters gave me 12<i>s.</i> a week: I
-was content. They raised me to 14<i>s.</i>:
-I did not ask them for it. They went
-on to 16<i>s.</i>, 18<i>s.</i>: I never asked them
-for the advances. They gave me a
-guinea a week! Said I to myself, if I
-am worth a guinea a week to you,
-I am worth more to myself! I left
-them, and began business on my own
-account&mdash;at first in a small way. I
-prospered. I grew tired of my leathern
-bellows, and determined to make iron
-ones. Everybody laughed at me. I
-did it, and applied the steam-engine
-to blow them; and they all cried,
-‘Who could have thought it!’” His
-son John carried on the operations
-connected with the iron manufacture
-on a far more extensive scale than his
-father at Bradley, Willey, Snedshill,
-and Bersham. His castings were the
-largest until then attempted, and
-the boring machinery which he invented
-was the best of its kind. All
-the castings for Boulton and Watt’s
-large Cornish engines were manufactured
-by him, previous to the erection
-of the Soho foundry. He also bored
-cannon for the government on a large
-scale. Amongst his other merits,
-John Wilkinson is clearly entitled to
-that of having built the first iron
-vessel. It was made to bring peat-moss
-to his iron furnace at Wilson
-House, near Castle Head, in Cartmel,
-in order to smelt the hematite iron-ore
-of Furness. This was followed by
-other larger iron vessels, one of which
-was of 40 tons burden, and used to
-carry iron down the Severn. Before
-Wilkinson’s first iron boat was
-launched, people laughed at the idea
-of its <em>floating</em>,&mdash;as it was so well
-known that iron immediately sank in
-water! In a letter to Mr. Stockdale,
-of Carke, Cartmel, the original of
-which is before us, dated Broseley,
-14th July, 1787, Mr. Wilkinson says,
-“Yesterday week my iron boat was
-launched,&mdash;answers all my expectations,
-and has convinced the unbelievers,
-who were 999 in 1000. It
-will be only a nine days’ wonder, and
-afterwards a Columbus’s egg.” In
-another letter, dated Bradley Iron
-Works, 24th Oct., 1788, he writes to
-the same,&mdash;“There have been two
-iron vessels launched in my service
-since 1st September. One is a canal-boat
-for this navigation, the other a
-barge of 40 tons, for the river Severn.
-The last was floated on Monday, and
-is, I expect, now at Stourport, a-lading
-with bar-iron. My clerk at Broseley
-advises me that she swims remarkably
-light, and exceeds even my own expectations.”
-For further notice of
-John Wilkinson, see ‘Lives of the
-Engineers,’ ii. 337, 356.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-143" id="Footnote-143" href="#Anchor-143" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[143]</span></a> Boulton to Watt, 24th February,
-1776. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-144" id="Footnote-144" href="#Anchor-144" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[144]</span></a> Watt was himself occupied, during
-his temporary residence at Broseley,
-in devising improvements in the details
-of his engine. Boulton says&mdash;“I
-observe you are thinking of making
-an inverted cylinder. Pray how are
-you to counterbalance the descent of
-the piston and pump rods, which will
-be a vast weight? If by a counterweight
-you gain nothing. But if you
-can employ the power that arises from
-the descent of that vast weight to
-strain a spring that will repay its
-debts&mdash;if by it you can compress air
-in an iron cylinder which in its return
-will contribute to overcome the <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">vis
-inertiæ</i> of the column of water to be
-raised, you will thereby get rid of that
-unmechanical tax, and very much
-improve the reciprocating engine.”&mdash;Boulton
-to Watt, 24th February,
-1776. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-145" id="Footnote-145" href="#Anchor-145" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[145]</span></a> Boulton to Watt, 23rd April,
-1776. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-146" id="Footnote-146" href="#Anchor-146" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[146]</span></a> The arrangement between the
-partners is indicated by the following
-passage of Watt’s letter to Boulton:&mdash;“As
-you may have possibly mislaid
-my missive to you concerning the
-contract, I beg just to mention what
-I remember of the terms.</p>
-
-<p>“1. I to assign to you two-thirds of
-the property of the invention.</p>
-
-<p>“2. You to pay all expenses of the
-Act or others incurred before June,
-1775 (the date of the Act), and also
-the expense of future experiments,
-which money is to be sunk without
-interest by you, being the consideration
-you pay for your share.</p>
-
-<p>“3. You to advance stock in trade
-bearing interest, but having no claim
-on me for any part of that, further
-than my intromissions; the stock
-itself to be your security and property.</p>
-
-<p>“4. I to draw one-third of the profits
-so soon as any arise from the business,
-after paying the workmen’s wages
-and goods furnished, but abstract
-from the stock in trade, excepting the
-interest thereof, which is to be deducted
-before a balance is struck.</p>
-
-<p>“5. I to make drawings, give directions,
-and make surveys, the company
-paying the travelling expenses
-to either of us when upon engine business.</p>
-
-<p>“6. You to keep the books and
-balance them once a year.</p>
-
-<p>“7. A book to be kept wherein to be
-marked such transactions as are
-worthy of record, which, when signed
-by both, to have the force of the
-contract.</p>
-
-<p>“8. Neither of us to alienate our
-share without consent of the other,
-and if either of us by death or otherwise
-shall be incapacitated from acting
-for ourselves, the other of us to be the
-sole manager without contradiction or
-interference of heirs, executors, assignees,
-or others; but the books to
-be subject to their inspection, and
-the acting partner of us to be allowed
-a reasonable commission for extra
-trouble.</p>
-
-<p>“9. The contract to continue in force
-for twenty-five years, from the 1st of
-June, 1775, when the partnership
-commenced, notwithstanding the contract
-being of later date.</p>
-
-<p>“10. Our heirs, executors, and assignees,
-bound to observance.</p>
-
-<p>“11. In case of demise of both parties,
-our heirs, &amp;c., to succeed in same
-manner, and if they all please, they
-may burn the contract.</p>
-
-<p>“If anything be very disagreeable in
-these terms, you will find me disposed
-to do everything reasonable for your
-satisfaction.”&mdash;Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-147" id="Footnote-147" href="#Anchor-147" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[147]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 3rd July, 1776. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-148" id="Footnote-148" href="#Anchor-148" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[148]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 8th July, 1776. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-149" id="Footnote-149" href="#Anchor-149" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[149]</span></a> Boulton to Watt, 15th July, 1776. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-150" id="Footnote-150" href="#Anchor-150" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[150]</span></a> During his Scotch visit, Watt
-spent much of his time in arranging
-his father’s affairs, which had got into
-confusion. He was now seventy-five
-years old, and grown very infirm.
-“He is perfectly incapable,” wrote his
-son, “of giving himself the least help,
-and the seeing him in such a situation
-has much hurt my spirits.”&mdash;Watt to
-Boulton, 28th July, 1766. Boulton
-MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-151" id="Footnote-151" href="#Anchor-151" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[151]</span></a> Boulton to Watt (without date),
-1776. Boulton MSS. In this letter,
-Boulton throws out a suggestion for
-Watt’s consideration&mdash;“When,” he
-says, “we have got our two-foot pumps
-up, I think it would be right to try
-our Soho engine with a steam strong
-enough to work the pumps with the
-axis in the centre of the beam, which
-will be almost 19 lb. upon the inch.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-152" id="Footnote-152" href="#Anchor-152" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[152]</span></a> Boulton to Watt, 3rd November,
-1776. In the same letter Boulton
-informs Watt that Perrins, another
-fireman, had returned from Bedworth,
-and had not a stroke to do, the fittings
-for the second engine not having
-arrived. The first engine was working
-twenty-four hours a day, but the pit
-was so full of water that the owners
-feared they would before long be
-drowned out; and if the work was
-stopped, the loss would be far greater
-than the whole value of the engine.
-But the sales of coal, though large, were
-but “a small consideration in comparison
-with the starving to death of
-the poor ribbon-weavers of Coventry
-and a great part of Oxfordshire....
-Coals are 9<i>d.</i> and 10<i>d.</i> per cwt., and
-’tis said they will be a shilling at
-Birmingham on Monday.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-153" id="Footnote-153" href="#Anchor-153" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[153]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 3rd December, 1776. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-154" id="Footnote-154" href="#Anchor-154" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[154]</span></a> Fire-engines at work were objects
-of curiosity in those days, and had
-many visitors. The engineman at the
-York Buildings reminded those who
-went to see his engine that something
-was expected, placing over the entrance
-to the engine room the following
-distich:&mdash;</p>
-
-<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
-<div class="i00 leading-q">“Whoever wants to see the engine here,</div>
-<div class="i00">Must give the engine-man a drop of beer.”</div>
-</div></div>
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-155" id="Footnote-155" href="#Anchor-155" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[155]</span></a> “Mr. White told me this morning
-as a great secret,” wrote Boulton’s
-London agent, “that he has reason to
-believe that Carless and Webb were
-going beyond sea, for Carless had told
-him he had 1000<i>l.</i> offered for six
-years, and he overheard Webb say
-that he was ready at an hour’s warning.”
-Carless and Webb were immediately
-ordered back to Soho, and the
-firm obtained warrants for the apprehension
-of the men as well as of the
-person who had bribed them, if they
-attempted to abscond “even though,”
-said Watt to Boulton, “Carless be a
-drunken and comparatively useless
-fellow.” Later he wrote, “I think
-there is no risk of Webb’s leaving us
-soon, and he offers to re-engage. Carless
-has been working very diligently this
-week, and is well on with his nozzle
-patterns. I mentioned to William
-the story of Sir John Fielding’s warrant,
-to show him that we are determined
-to act with spirit in case of
-interlopers.”&mdash;Watt to Boulton, May 3,
-1777.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-156" id="Footnote-156" href="#Anchor-156" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[156]</span></a> Robert Hart’s ‘Reminiscences of James Watt,’ cited above.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-157" id="Footnote-157" href="#Anchor-157" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[157]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 4th August, 1777.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-158" id="Footnote-158" href="#Anchor-158" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[158]</span></a> A mine so-called. Many of the
-Cornish mines have very odd names.
-“Cook’s Kitchen,” near Camborne, is
-one of the oldest and richest. Another
-is called “Cupboard.” There are also
-Wheal Fannys and Wheal Abrahams;
-and Wheal Fortunes and Wheal
-Virgins in great numbers.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-159" id="Footnote-159" href="#Anchor-159" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[159]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 14th August,
-1777.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-160" id="Footnote-160" href="#Anchor-160" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[160]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 25th August,
-1777. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-161" id="Footnote-161" href="#Anchor-161" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[161]</span></a> “I have seen five of Bonze’s
-engines,” wrote Watt, “but was far
-from seeing the wonders promised.
-They were 60, 63, and 70 inch cylinders.
-At Dalcoath and Wheal Chance
-they are said to use each about 130
-bushels of coals in the 24 hours, and
-to make about 6 or 7 strokes per
-minute, the strokes being under 6 feet
-each. They are burdened to 6, 6½,
-and 7 lbs. per inch. One of the 60
-inches threw out about two cubic feet
-of hot water per stroke, heated from
-60° to 165°. The 63 inches, with a 5
-feet stroke, threw out 1½ cubic foot,
-heated from 60° to 159°,” and so on
-with the others.&mdash;Watt to Boulton,
-25th August, 1777. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-162" id="Footnote-162" href="#Anchor-162" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[162]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 13th September, 1777.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-163" id="Footnote-163" href="#Anchor-163" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[163]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 2nd July, 1778.
-Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-164" id="Footnote-164" href="#Anchor-164" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[164]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 8th July, 1778,
-Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-165" id="Footnote-165" href="#Anchor-165" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[165]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 8th July, 1778. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-166" id="Footnote-166" href="#Anchor-166" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[166]</span></a> While in Cornwall in the previous
-year, Watt wrote long letters to his
-partner as to certain experimental
-alterations of “Beelzebub.” This was
-the original engine brought from
-Kinneil, which continued to be the
-subject of constant changes. “I send
-a drawing,” he wrote on the 4th
-August, 1777, “of the best scheme I
-can at present devise for equalising
-the power of Beelzebub, and obliging
-him to save part of his youthful
-strength to help him forward in his
-old age.... As the head of one of
-the levers will rise higher than the
-roof, a hole must be cut for it, which
-may after trial be covered over. If
-the new beam answer to be centred
-upon the end wall and to go out at a
-window, it will make the execution
-easy.... I long (he concluded) to
-have some particulars of Beelzebub’s
-doings, and to learn whether he has
-got on his jockey coat yet [<i>i. e.</i> an
-outer cylinder], for till that be done,
-you can form no idea of his perfection.”
-The engine continued to be the subject
-of repeated alterations, and was renewed,
-as Watt observed, like the
-Highlandman’s gun, in stock, lock, and
-barrel. After the occurrence of the
-above fire, we learn from Watt’s
-MS. Memoir of Boulton, that “Beelzebub”
-was replaced by a larger engine,
-the first on the expansive principle,
-afterwards known by the name of
-“Old Bess.” This engine continued
-in its place long after the career of
-Boulton and Watt had come to an
-end; and in the year 1857, the present
-writer saw “Old Bess” working as
-steadily as ever, though eighty years
-had passed over her head. The old
-engine has since found an honourable
-asylum in the Museum of Patents at
-South Kensington.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-167" id="Footnote-167" href="#Anchor-167" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[167]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 8th August, 1778. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-168" id="Footnote-168" href="#Anchor-168" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[168]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 29th August,
-1778. Later, Watt wrote from Redruth,
-“Captain Paul desires me to
-attend at Wheal Virgin meeting on
-Thursday, where several Tingtang
-people will be; but I shall only
-write, as I know they will be just in
-the worst of humours about Wheal
-Virgin affairs, and they are very disagreeable
-at the best. Every article
-must be settled and sealed with
-Cornish adventures before we begin,
-otherwise never.... Do not let Chelsea
-begin until signed and sealed. I hope
-you will not take amiss my writing so
-positively on this subject of agreements;
-but really my faith in mankind
-will carry me no further, and if
-I can’t get money, I’m resolved to
-save my bacon and to live in hunger
-and ease. As it is, we don’t get such
-a share of reputation as our works
-deserve, for every man who cheats us
-defames us in order to justify himself.”&mdash;Watt
-to Boulton, 6th September,
-1778. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-169" id="Footnote-169" href="#Anchor-169" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[169]</span></a> “With all the faults of the Cornish
-people, I think we have a better
-chance for tolerable honesty here than
-elsewhere, as, their meetings being
-public, they will not choose to expose
-themselves any further than strict
-dealing may justify; and besides, there
-are generally too many to cabal.”&mdash;Watt
-to Boulton, 29th August, 1778.
-Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-170" id="Footnote-170" href="#Anchor-170" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[170]</span></a> During his absence Mr. Keir took
-charge of the works at Soho. It had
-been intended to introduce him as a
-partner, and he left the glass-making
-concern at Stourbridge, into which he
-had entered, for the purpose; but when
-he came to look into the books of
-the Soho firm, he was so appalled by
-their liabilities that he eventually declined
-the connexion.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-171" id="Footnote-171" href="#Anchor-171" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[171]</span></a> Matthews wrote him on the 8th
-October, 1778, that he had met a Mr.
-Boldero at the Goldsmiths’ Hall, who
-had much influence in Cornwall, and
-that he expressed the opinion that, if
-the engines could do what Boulton
-and Watt promised, they might soon
-get from 40,000<i>l.</i> to 80,000<i>l.</i> for them
-in Cornwall. Matthews accordingly
-recommended Boulton to apply to
-Elliot and Praed, the Cornish bankers,
-for an advance on security of the
-engine contracts.&mdash;It would appear
-from a letter written to Boulton a few
-days later, by Mr. Barton, Matthews’s
-partner, that Boulton was, amidst his
-many speculations, engaged in a privateering
-adventure during the war of
-the American Revolution:&mdash;“It may
-give you some pleasure,” wrote Barton,
-“to hear we are likely to receive some
-produce from our adventure to New
-York. One of the vessels our little
-brig took last year was fitted out at
-New York, and in a cruise of 13 weeks
-has taken 13 prizes, 12 of which are
-carried safe in, and we have advice of
-200 hogsheads of tobacco being shipped
-as part of the prizes, which, if now
-here, would fetch us 10,000<i>l.</i> But
-while the embargo on shipping at
-New York continues, they cannot stir
-out of port. However, <em>I think we
-shall see them before you raise that
-sum from your engine concern, and
-yet I hope that is not very far off</em>.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-172" id="Footnote-172" href="#Anchor-172" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[172]</span></a> Watt to Black, 12th December,
-1778.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-173" id="Footnote-173" href="#Anchor-173" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[173]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 15th Jan., 1779.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-174" id="Footnote-174" href="#Anchor-174" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[174]</span></a> M. Perrier, of Paris, ordered an
-engine early in 1779, and the materials
-were despatched to Nantes by the
-end of May in the same year. The
-engine was erected by M. Jary at a
-colliery near Nantes, but the fitting
-was so bad&mdash;the steam-case having
-been forgotten&mdash;that it went only four
-strokes per minute. As Boulton and
-Watt sought a patent for France, it
-was necessary in the first place that
-Commissioners should certify that the
-new engine was superior to the common
-engine. This they could not do, and
-the patent was not secured. Watt
-feared that there was “a plot” against
-him; as Perrier immediately proceeded
-with a manufacture of steam-engines
-after the alleged invention of M.
-Betancourt, though this “invention”
-turned out to be a close copy of the
-engine M. Betancourt himself had imported
-from Soho.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-175" id="Footnote-175" href="#Anchor-175" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[175]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 27th January, 1779. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-176" id="Footnote-176" href="#Anchor-176" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[176]</span></a> The following is Watt’s letter,
-written in a very unusual style:&mdash;</p>
-
-<div class="letter">
-
-<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
-    <div class="i02">“Birmingham, June 30th, 1779.</div>
-  <div class="i01">“Hallelujah! Hallelujee!</div>
-<div class="i00">We have concluded with Hawkesbury,</div>
-<div class="i00">217<i>l.</i> per annum from Lady-day last;</div>
-<div class="i00">275<i>l.</i> 5<i>s.</i> for time past; 157<i>l.</i> on account.</div>
-<div class="i00">We make them a present of 100 guineas&mdash;</div>
-<div class="i00">Peace and good-fellowship on earth&mdash;</div>
-<div class="i00">Perrins and Evans to be dismissed&mdash;</div>
-<div class="i00">3 more engines wanted in Cornwall&mdash;</div>
-<div class="i00">Dudley repentant and amendant&mdash;</div>
-
-<p class="sig-less">Yours rejoicing,</p>
-
-<p class="sig"><span class="smcap">James Watt</span>.”</p></div></div>
-</div></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-177" id="Footnote-177" href="#Anchor-177" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[177]</span></a> Watt wrote Boulton, 2nd July,
-1778,&mdash;“On the subject of Mr. Hall
-I should not have been so earnest
-had I not been urged on by the prospect
-of impending ruin, which may
-be much accelerated by a wicked or
-careless servant in his place.” Later,
-on the 6th August, Watt wrote, “I
-look upon Hall as a very great blunderer,
-and very inattentive to everything
-that has hitherto been committed
-to his care; but I think that our present
-necessities will oblige us to employ
-him.”&mdash;Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-178" id="Footnote-178" href="#Anchor-178" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[178]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 11th August,
-1779.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-179" id="Footnote-179" href="#Anchor-179" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[179]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 4th October,
-1779.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-180" id="Footnote-180" href="#Anchor-180" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[180]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 28th October,
-1779.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-181" id="Footnote-181" href="#Anchor-181" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[181]</span></a> Watt told Sir Walter Scott that
-though hundreds probably of his
-northern countrymen had sought employment
-at his establishment, he
-never could get one of them to become a
-first-rate mechanic. “Many of them,”
-said he, “were too good for that, and
-rose to be valuable clerks and bookkeepers;
-but those incapable of this
-sort of advancement had always the
-same insuperable aversion to toiling so
-long at any one point of mechanism
-as to gain the highest wages among
-the workmen.”&mdash;Note to Lockhart’s
-‘Life of Scott.’ The fact, we suppose
-was, that the Scotch mechanics were
-only as yet in course of training,&mdash;the
-English having had a long start of
-them. Though Watt’s statement that
-Scotchmen were incapable of being
-first-class mechanics may have been
-true in his day, it is so no longer, as
-the workshops of the Clyde can prove;
-some of the most highly finished
-steam-engines of modern times having
-been turned out of Glasgow workshops.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-182" id="Footnote-182" href="#Anchor-182" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[182]</span></a> The above anecdotes, of Murdock’s
-introduction to Soho, and the fight
-with the captains, were communicated
-by his son, the late Mr. Murdock of
-Sycamore Hill near Birmingham. He
-also informed us that Murdock fought
-a duel with Captain Trevithick (father
-of the Trevithick of Locomotive celebrity),
-in consequence of a quarrel
-between him and Watt, in which Murdock
-conceived his master to have
-been unfairly and harshly treated.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-183" id="Footnote-183" href="#Anchor-183" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[183]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, from Chacewater, 16th October, 1779. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-184" id="Footnote-184" href="#Anchor-184" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[184]</span></a> It appears from a statement prepared
-by Zaccheus Walker, the accountant
-of Boulton and Fothergill,
-that on an invested capital of about
-20,000<i>l.</i>, the excess of losses over
-profits during the eighteen years
-ending 1780, had been upwards of
-11,000<i>l.</i>; and that but for the capital
-and credit of Matthew Boulton, that
-concern must have broken down.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-185" id="Footnote-185" href="#Anchor-185" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[185]</span></a> Thomas Day, the eccentric but
-kindly author of ‘Sandford and
-Merton,’ lent Boulton 3000<i>l.</i> at 4 per
-cent. When Boulton came to pay a
-higher rate of interest on other loans,
-he wrote Day proposing to pay him
-the same rate; but Day refused to
-accept the advance, as he could not
-make more of his money elsewhere.
-Day, however, offered him some good
-advice. “Give me leave,” said he,
-“with the real interest of a sincere
-friend, to express my wishes that now
-at last when a fortune is within your
-power, you will contract that wide
-sphere of business in which your ingenuity
-has so long kept you engaged,
-and which has prevented you hitherto,
-if I may believe the words of one of
-your sincerest friends, the late Dr.
-Small, from acquiring that independence
-which you ought to have had long
-ago. I should think that now, like a
-good Christian, thoroughly convinced
-of the inutility of other works, you
-ought to attach yourself to the one
-thing needful, and determine to be
-saved ‘even as by fire.’ You are now,
-dear Sir, not of an age to sport any
-longer with fortune. Forgive the
-freedom of these sentiments, and
-believe me, with the greatest sincerity
-and regard, Yours, &amp;c.,</p>
-
-<p class="sig">“<span class="smcap">Thomas Day</span>.”</p>
-</div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-186" id="Footnote-186" href="#Anchor-186" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[186]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 20th January,
-1779.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-187" id="Footnote-187" href="#Anchor-187" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[187]</span></a> Some of the specimens in water
-colour are to be seen at the Museum
-of Patents, South Kensington. When
-the paper is moistened with the finger,
-the colour easily rubs off. The whole
-subject of these pictures has recently
-been thoroughly sifted by M. P. W.
-Boulton, Esq., in his ‘Remarks on
-some Evidence recently communicated
-to the Photographic Society’ (Bradbury
-and Evans, 1864), apropos of the
-Papers of Mr. W. P. Smith on the
-same subject, in which it was surmised
-that they were the result of some
-photographic process. Mr. Boulton
-clearly shows, from the original correspondence,
-that the process was mechanical
-colour-printing. He also
-adds,&mdash;“From the brief statements
-which I remember to have heard from
-my father concerning the polygraphic
-process, my impression of it was that
-it copied colour mechanically, not
-merely chiaro-scuro. And I agree
-with the opinion which has been expressed
-to other persons, that in the
-coloured specimens in the Museum,
-there are indications that the colour
-was laid on <em>mechanically</em>,&mdash;not by
-hand or brush.” As the process of
-“dead-colouring” the pictures is occasionally
-referred to, it is probable that
-the pictures passed through more
-stages than one, as in the case of
-modern colour-printing. In one of
-Eginton’s letters, three plates were
-spoken of as necessary for taking impressions
-of one of the pictures.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-188" id="Footnote-188" href="#Anchor-188" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[188]</span></a> Watt to Dr. Black, 24th July, 1778.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-189" id="Footnote-189" href="#Anchor-189" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[189]</span></a> Boulton to Watt, 14th May, 1780. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-190" id="Footnote-190" href="#Anchor-190" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[190]</span></a> On the 18th May, 1780, Watt
-wrote Boulton, then in London, as
-follows:&mdash;“I am sorry, my dear Sir,
-to prove in any shape refractory to
-what you desire, but my quiet, my
-peace of mind, perhaps my very existence,
-depend on what I have told you.
-I am unhappy in not having any
-person I can advise with on this
-subject; and my own knowledge of it
-is insufficient. Therefore, if I appear
-too rigid, do not blame me, but my
-ignorance and timidity.” And again,
-on the 19th, on returning the draft
-mortgage, he wrote:&mdash;“If my executing
-this deed cannot be dispensed
-with, I will do it, but will not execute
-any personal bond for the money. I
-would rather assign you all Cornwall
-on proper conditions than execute
-this.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-191" id="Footnote-191" href="#Anchor-191" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[191]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 11th April, 1780.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-192" id="Footnote-192" href="#Anchor-192" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[192]</span></a> Boulton, at Plengwarry, to Watt,
-at Birmingham, 14th September, 1780.
-This day was Boulton’s birthday, and
-alluding to the circumstance he wrote,&mdash;“As
-sure as there are 1728 inches
-in a cubic foot, so sure was I born in
-that year; and as sure as there are
-52 weeks in the year and 52 cards in
-the pack, so surely am I 52 years old
-this very day. May you and Mrs.
-Watt live very long and be very
-happy.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-193" id="Footnote-193" href="#Anchor-193" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[193]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 10th October,
-1780. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-194" id="Footnote-194" href="#Anchor-194" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[194]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 20th April, 1780.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-195" id="Footnote-195" href="#Anchor-195" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[195]</span></a> Boulton to Watt, 25th and 30th September, 1780. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-196" id="Footnote-196" href="#Anchor-196" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[196]</span></a> His partner Fothergill would not,
-however, consent to let Boulton go,
-and the Soho business was continued
-until the death of Fothergill (bankrupt)
-in 1782, after which it was continued for some time longer under the
-firm of Boulton and Scale.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-197" id="Footnote-197" href="#Anchor-197" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[197]</span></a> Mrs. Watt to Mr. Boulton, then in London, 15th April, 1781. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-198" id="Footnote-198" href="#Anchor-198" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[198]</span></a> In another letter Watt described
-himself as “worried by the Wheal
-Chanceians.... In short,” says he,
-“I am at this moment so provoked at
-the undeserved rancour with which
-we are persecuted in Cornwall, that,
-were it not on account of the deplorable
-state of debt I find myself in,
-I would live on bread and cheese, and
-suffer the water to run out at their
-adits, before I would relax the slightest
-iota of what I thought my right in
-their favour.”&mdash;Watt to Boulton, 17th
-October, 1780. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-199" id="Footnote-199" href="#Anchor-199" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[199]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 31st October,
-1780. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-200" id="Footnote-200" href="#Anchor-200" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[200]</span></a> “Though your long stay, when
-you were last here,” wrote Henderson,
-the resident agent, “must have been
-attended with great inconveniences,
-yet you are now very much wanted
-in Wheal Virgin affairs. Different
-interests have produced a sort of
-anarchy.... Were Mr. Watt here
-now, I don’t think his health would
-allow him to stand the battles with
-the different people. I have not written
-to him freely on this subject, as I am
-afraid it would hurt him.... Your
-authority here as an adventurer has
-much greater weight than anything I
-can propose.”&mdash;Henderson to Boulton,
-4th February, 1781. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-201" id="Footnote-201" href="#Anchor-201" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[201]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 17th October, 1780.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-202" id="Footnote-202" href="#Anchor-202" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[202]</span></a> In June, 1780, we find Boulton
-describing to Colonel Watson the
-progress of the Soho business, as
-follows:&mdash;“Since I had the honour of
-seeing you in England we have erected
-upwards of 40 of our new steam-engines,
-and have (from so much experience)
-obviated every difficulty, and
-made it a most practicable and perfect
-machine. The steam wheel we have
-not meddled with since you were at
-Soho, as we have been fully employed
-upon large beam-engines;
-besides, we have applied the beam
-engine to rotative motions so successfully
-that the wheel engine seems
-almost unnecessary.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-203" id="Footnote-203" href="#Anchor-203" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[203]</span></a> Watt had made use of the crank
-at a very early period. Thus we find
-him writing to Dr. Small on the 20th
-September, 1769,&mdash;“As to the condenser,
-I laid aside the spiral wheels
-because of the noise and thumping,
-and substituted a crank: in other
-respects it performed well enough.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-204" id="Footnote-204" href="#Anchor-204" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[204]</span></a> The invention was patented by
-James Pickard, a Birmingham button-maker,
-on the 23rd August, 1780
-(No. 1263). Matthew Washborough
-of Bristol arranged with Pickard for
-employing it in the engine invented
-by him for securing circular motion.
-Washborough’s own patent has no reference
-to the crank, though he is usually
-named as the inventor of it.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-205" id="Footnote-205" href="#Anchor-205" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[205]</span></a> At a later date we find him writing
-to his partner thus:&mdash;“I cannot agree
-with Mr. Palmer’s notion about the
-crank engine, as, though a crank is not
-new, yet that application of it is new
-and never was practised except by us.
-It is by no means our interest to
-demolish the crank patent, because
-then all our own machines of that
-kind will be of no use, and I am convinced
-that the crank can be made
-their superior.”&mdash;Watt to Boulton,
-15th October, 1781.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-206" id="Footnote-206" href="#Anchor-206" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[206]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 19th November,
-1780.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-207" id="Footnote-207" href="#Anchor-207" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[207]</span></a> Boulton and Watt were by this
-time employing their engine for a like
-purpose, as appears from a letter of
-Boulton to S. Wyatt, dated 28th
-February, 1781, in which he says,&mdash;“We
-are now applying our engines to
-all kinds of mills, such as corn mills,
-rolling iron and copper, winding coals
-out of the pit, and every other purpose
-to which the wind or water mill is
-applicable. In such applications, one
-hundred weight of coals will produce
-as much mechanical power as is equal
-to the work of ten men for ten hours,
-and these mills may be made very
-much more powerful than any water-mills
-in England.” To Mr. Henderson
-he wrote at the same date:&mdash;“I make
-no scruple to say but that I could
-readily build a more powerful and in
-every respect better copper-rolling mill
-by steam than any water-mill now in
-England. As soon as the Cornish
-engines are at work, I intend to turn
-millwright and make our steam-mills
-universally known.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-208" id="Footnote-208" href="#Anchor-208" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[208]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 21st April, 1781.
-On the following day (the 22nd
-April) Watt wrote another long letter
-to Boulton on the same subject.
-His mind could not be at rest,
-and he thus unburdened himself
-of his indignation:&mdash;“If you find
-yourself so circumstanced, as you
-say you are, that you <em>dare</em> not refuse
-[to erect the proposed engine for the
-Navy Board], then let them pay M.
-Washborough and have done with him,
-and let the engine be erected under
-our direction or Mr. Smeaton’s. With
-the latter I will go hand in hand; nay
-I will do more&mdash;I will submit to him
-in all mechanical matters; but I will
-by no means submit to go on with
-thieves and puppies, whose knowledge
-and integrity I contemn. Though I
-am not so saucy as many of my countrymen,
-I have enough of innate pride
-to prevent me from doing a mean
-action because a servile prudence may
-dictate it. If a king were to think
-Matt Washborough a better engineer
-than me, I should scorn to undeceive
-him. I should leave that to Matthew.
-The connexion would be stronger as
-the evidence would be undeniable. So
-much for heroics!... I will never
-meanly sue a thief to give me my
-own again, unless I have nothing left
-behind. As it now stands, I have
-enough left to make their patent
-tremble, and shall leave no mechanical
-stone unturned to aggrieve them. I
-will do more. I will publish my
-inventions, by which means they will
-be entirely precluded, because they
-must be fools indeed that will pay
-<em>them</em> for what they can have for
-nothing. I am very ill with a headache,
-therefore can write no more than
-passion dictates.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-209" id="Footnote-209" href="#Anchor-209" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[209]</span></a> Washborough was much mortified
-by the decision of the Navy Board,
-and alleged that he had been badly
-used by them. The anxieties occasioned
-by his failure, and the pecuniary
-losses he had sustained, preyed
-heavily upon his mind, and he was
-seized by a fever which carried him
-off in October, 1781, when only in
-his 28th year. He was unquestionably
-a young man of much ingenuity
-and merit, and had he lived
-would have achieved high eminence
-and distinction as an engineer.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-210" id="Footnote-210" href="#Anchor-210" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[210]</span></a> Boulton to Watt, 21st June,
-1781.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-211" id="Footnote-211" href="#Anchor-211" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[211]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 21st June,
-1781.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-212" id="Footnote-212" href="#Anchor-212" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[212]</span></a> While Boulton spoke good humouredly
-to his partner in Cornwall
-with the object of cheering him up,
-he privately unbosomed himself to his
-friend Matthews in London. When
-requesting him to call at once on the
-bankers and get the account reduced
-to an advance of 12,000<i>l.</i>, and thus
-obtain Mr. Watt’s release, he complained
-of the distress which the communications
-of the latter had caused
-him. He thought his conduct ungenerous,
-taking all the circumstances
-into account, and considering that the
-firm were within a year of being
-tolerably easy in money matters.
-“When I reflect,” he wrote, “on his
-situation in 1772 and my own at that
-time, and compare them with his and
-mine now, I think I owe him little....
-I some time ago gave him a security
-of all my two-thirds, after paying off
-L. V. and W. [the bankers], from
-which you may judge how little
-reason he has to complain. He talks
-of his duty to his wife and children;
-by the same rule I ought not to
-neglect mine. His wife’s fortune
-joined to his own did not amount to
-sixpence: my wife brought me in
-money and land 28,000<i>l.</i> I advanced
-him all he wanted without a security,
-but in return he is not content with
-an ample security for advancing
-nothing at all but what he derived
-from his connexion with me.”&mdash;Boulton
-to Matthews, 28th June,
-1781. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-213" id="Footnote-213" href="#Anchor-213" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[213]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 24th June, 1781.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-214" id="Footnote-214" href="#Anchor-214" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[214]</span></a> Watt befriended Jabez like the
-other members of his family, as appears
-from the following passage in a
-letter to Boulton (6th September,
-1778):&mdash;“Capt. Paul has turned
-Jabez adrift, having for some time
-taken umbrage at him because he
-would do his work well and therefore
-expensively. Jabez has a bad wife, is
-poor and unhappy. He is very clever,
-a good engineer, and industrious,
-though he seems not to have the
-faculty of conciliating people’s affections.
-I fear he will go to Holland, and
-as he can hurt us [there being no patent
-for the engine secured there] I must
-try to get him bread here.” Later,
-Boulton wrote Watt from Redruth
-(18th November, 1780),&mdash;“Old Hornblower
-has disobliged Mr. Daniel. I
-have my fears they will not employ
-him; but when our own business is
-sealed to-morrow, I will make a push
-in his favour. That family hath not
-been successful in conciliating the
-affections of the people in this neighbourhood.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-215" id="Footnote-215" href="#Anchor-215" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[215]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 16th July,
-1781.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-216" id="Footnote-216" href="#Anchor-216" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[216]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 19th July, 1781. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-217" id="Footnote-217" href="#Anchor-217" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[217]</span></a> Boulton to Watt, 28th June,
-1781. On the 3rd July following he
-writes,&mdash;“The great rotative engine
-is finished, and I expected the union
-between it and the little engine would
-have been performed this evening, but
-it can’t be till to-morrow. Robert set
-the elliptic out so true that it had no
-shake and required no alteration. It
-goes so much better than the little
-model made by Joseph that I am now
-ashamed to send the little one. The
-great model makes a delightful horizontal
-foot-lathe. I gave it a few
-strokes with my foot, and it made 30
-revolutions after I withdrew it, and
-that in a quiet and peaceable manner,
-which shows how steady and frictionless
-it is.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-218" id="Footnote-218" href="#Anchor-218" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[218]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 5th July, 1781.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-219" id="Footnote-219" href="#Anchor-219" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[219]</span></a> “Yesterday I went to Penryn and
-swore that I had invented ‘certain
-new methods of applying the vibrating
-or reciprocating motion of steam or
-fire engines to produce a continued rotation
-or circular motion round an
-axis or centre, and thereby to give
-motion to the wheels of mills or other
-machines,’ which affidavit and petition
-I transmit to Mr. Hadley by this post
-with directions to get it passed with
-all due expedition.”&mdash;Watt to Boulton,
-26th July, 1781.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-220" id="Footnote-220" href="#Anchor-220" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[220]</span></a> Watt suggested caution as to
-making use of the cranks. “In relation
-to Wilkinson’s forges, I wish you
-would execute them without the
-double crank. We shall soon have a
-bad enough lawsuit on our hands
-without it.”&mdash;Watt to Boulton, 19th
-July, 1781.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-221" id="Footnote-221" href="#Anchor-221" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[221]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 28th July,
-1781. A few days later Boulton
-wrote Watt that Dr. Priestley had proceeded
-with the experiments, and that
-he had come to the conclusion that
-“there is nothing to be feared from
-any of the tribe of gases, which cannot
-be produced nearly so cheap as steam;
-and as to steam <em>you</em> know its limits
-better than any man.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-222" id="Footnote-222" href="#Anchor-222" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[222]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 30th July,
-1781. Later he wrote,&mdash;“I am tired
-of making improvements which by
-some quirk or wresting of the law
-may be taken from us, as I think
-has been done in the case of Arkwright,
-who has been condemned
-merely because he did not specify
-quite clearly. This was injustice,
-because it is plain that he has given
-this trade a being&mdash;has brought his
-invention into use and made it of
-great public utility. Wherefore he
-deserved all the money he has got.
-In my opinion his patent should not
-have been invalidated without it had
-clearly appeared that he did not invent
-the things in question. I fear we
-shall be served with the same sauce
-<em>for the good of the public</em>! and in
-that case I shall certainly do what he
-threatens. This you may be assured
-of, that we are as much envied here
-as he is at Manchester, and all the
-bells in Cornwall would be rung at
-our overthrow.”&mdash;Watt to Boulton,
-13th August, 1781.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-223" id="Footnote-223" href="#Anchor-223" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[223]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 13th November,
-1781.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-224" id="Footnote-224" href="#Anchor-224" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[224]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 19th November,
-<ins title="Transcriber's Note: original reads '1791'">1781</ins>.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-225" id="Footnote-225" href="#Anchor-225" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[225]</span></a> Watt to Samuel Ewer, jun., 9th
-July, 1781. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-226" id="Footnote-226" href="#Anchor-226" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[226]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 30th August, 1781.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-227" id="Footnote-227" href="#Anchor-227" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[227]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 30th August,
-1781. In a subsequent letter he explained
-the invention as follows:&mdash;“The
-method I propose to stop an
-engine when the pump rods break
-is by means of an air bellows or
-forcing pump of a good large diameter
-fixed in the shaft and having a solid
-piston in it which is wrought constantly
-by the engine and quite easily
-while it goes at its ordinary speed,
-because there is a large valve open
-in its bottom or rather top, which
-suffers the air to pass and repass easily;
-but whenever the engine attempts to
-move quick, that valve shuts and all
-exit from the air is cut off, and it
-becomes a feather-bed to save the
-blow of the engine. This is exemplified
-by turning the valve-hole of a
-common bellows upwards and stopping
-the nozzle, then working the bellows
-first slowly and then quickly. I
-think this contrivance will be of great
-use and may prevent damage, especially
-those bangs which occur in
-setting on an engine.”&mdash;Watt to
-Boulton, 27th September, 1781.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-228" id="Footnote-228" href="#Anchor-228" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[228]</span></a> Boulton to Watt, 10th September,
-1781. Boulton immediately proceeded
-with the erection of the new
-engine as secretly as possible. “The
-principles of the expansion engine,”
-said he to Watt, “you had invented
-before Dr. Small died, as Mr. Keir
-can testify as well as others. However,
-it is highly proper to execute every
-kind of beam that can be devised for
-the purpose of equalising the power.
-I have removed the little portions into
-the wooden house next the smith’s
-shop, and have blinded the window
-and barred the door. There is a convenient
-well that can be filled from
-the back brook, and the engine may
-be applied to the raising of water,
-which is the best sort of load to calculate
-from.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-229" id="Footnote-229" href="#Anchor-229" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[229]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 20th September, 1781.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-230" id="Footnote-230" href="#Anchor-230" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[230]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 18th October, 1781.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-231" id="Footnote-231" href="#Anchor-231" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[231]</span></a> Watt, in a letter to Boulton, dated the 3rd July, 1782, speaks of it
-as an old plan of his own “revived
-and executed by William Murdock;”
-but we were informed by the late
-Mr. Josiah Parkes, that at an interview
-which he had with Mr. Watt at
-Heathfield, at which Murdock was
-present, Murdock spoke of the Sun
-and Planet motion as his invention,
-which Watt did not contradict.
-Boulton also attributed the invention
-to Murdock, as appears from his letter
-to Henderson, dated 22nd January,
-1782; in which he says,&mdash;“Mr. Watt’s
-packet is not ready. I am to wait till
-his drawings [of the rotatory motion] are
-completed, which he is executing
-himself. There was some informality
-in those sent from Soho. Besides, he
-has another rotative scheme to add,
-which I could have told him of long
-ago, when first invented by William
-Murdock, but I did not think it a
-matter of much consequence.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-232" id="Footnote-232" href="#Anchor-232" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[232]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 26th Jan., 1782.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-233" id="Footnote-233" href="#Anchor-233" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[233]</span></a> “I have some time ago thought,”
-wrote Watt, “of a new expansive
-engine&mdash;a reciprocating engine with a
-heavy circular fly moved by a pinion
-from the end of the beam, so as to
-make three turns per down-stroke and
-as many contrariwise per return; so
-that in the first half of the stroke it
-may acquire a momentum which will
-carry it through the last half; and if
-a weight equal to half the load be put
-upon the inner end of the beam, and
-the engine be made to lift it during
-the return, by making a vacuum
-above the piston and using a rack
-instead of a chain, a cylinder of the
-present size may work to the same
-depth by half the steam; and I believe
-the engine will work very sweetly.”&mdash;Watt
-to Boulton, 16th January, 1782.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-234" id="Footnote-234" href="#Anchor-234" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[234]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 20th September, 1781.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-235" id="Footnote-235" href="#Anchor-235" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[235]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 20th December,
-1781.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-236" id="Footnote-236" href="#Anchor-236" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[236]</span></a> Boulton to Watt, 26th March,
-1782. The following was Boulton’s
-method of dealing with a refractory and
-drunken workman:&mdash;“I told you in
-my former letters how Jim Taylor
-had gone on,&mdash;that I had talked to him
-in a friendly way but all to no purpose.
-He came last Monday evening to the
-smith’s shop, drank more ale, was
-sent for, and he became abusive to
-the men, saying we had nobody could
-work well but himself, and that we
-could not do without him. The next
-morning I went into the shop predetermined
-to part with him. I
-stopped the noise of bellows and
-hammers, and appealed to the jury of
-the shop for the justice of my determination,
-and made the best use I
-could of the example. I sent Taylor
-off with deserved contempt, and to
-convince him that we really could do
-without him. However we are very
-much behind hand in nozzles.”&mdash;Boulton
-to Watt, 19th April,
-1782.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-237" id="Footnote-237" href="#Anchor-237" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[237]</span></a> “To-day was account day at
-Wheal Virgin, when there was nothing
-remarkable, only that Mr. Phillips
-insisted upon William Murdock
-being wholly at Wheal Virgin, which
-I told him could not possibly be complied
-with, unless I went to Crenver
-in his place, as I had nobody else
-to send thither; nevertheless, that
-William should be here as much as
-possible. This did not satisfy him,
-and I know not what to do, as Crenver
-will be ready to work in three weeks
-and must not be delayed.... I
-think my personal attendance should
-satisfy Wheal Virgin adventurers, but
-as they seem to have more confidence
-in William, I will for peace’s sake
-yield to their will, being satisfied that
-William will do the business well.”&mdash;Watt
-to Boulton, 15th November,
-1781.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-238" id="Footnote-238" href="#Anchor-238" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[238]</span></a> One of the pleasantest events
-that occurred to Watt in the course
-of his stay in Cornwall, was the visit
-of Wedgwood, who had come to
-inspect some of the mines in which,
-on Boulton’s recommendation, he had
-taken an interest, and at the same
-time to search for clays for use in his
-earthenware and porcelain manufacture
-at Etruria. “Mr. Wedgwood,”
-he wrote Boulton, “has been in this
-country some days hunting clays and
-soap rocks, cobalts, &amp;c. I have had
-two visits of him at the expense of a
-day and a half. Nevertheless I don’t
-grudge that, as I am glad to see a
-Christian. He has just left me.”&mdash;Watt
-to Boulton, 18th October, 1781.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-239" id="Footnote-239" href="#Anchor-239" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[239]</span></a> Fothergill died insolvent in 1782.
-Notwithstanding what he had suffered
-by the connexion, Boulton acted with
-great generosity towards Fothergill’s
-family, providing for his widow and
-orphan children. “Whatever the
-conduct of any part of that family
-towards me may have been,” said he,
-“their present distresses turn every
-passion into tender pity. I waited
-upon Mrs. Fothergill this morning,
-and administered all the consolation
-that words could give, but I must do
-more, or their distresses will be great
-indeed. I never wished for life and
-health so fervently as at present; for I
-consider it my duty to act as a father
-to that family to the best of my
-power, and the addition of a widow
-and seven children is no small one.”
-Boulton was as good as his promises;
-and he not only helped the Fothergill
-family through their difficulties, but
-he undertook to pay an annual sum
-(though under no obligation to do so)
-to a Mrs. Swellingrebel&mdash;a widowed
-lady from whom Fothergill had obtained
-money which he lost; and
-who, but for Boulton’s generous help,
-must have been left destitute.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-240" id="Footnote-240" href="#Anchor-240" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[240]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 16th March, 1782.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-241" id="Footnote-241" href="#Anchor-241" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[241]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 18th March, 1782.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-242" id="Footnote-242" href="#Anchor-242" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[242]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 27th March, 1782.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-243" id="Footnote-243" href="#Anchor-243" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[243]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 30th March, 1782.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-244" id="Footnote-244" href="#Anchor-244" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[244]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 19th September, 1782.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-245" id="Footnote-245" href="#Anchor-245" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[245]</span></a> Boulton to Watt, 28th September, 1782.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-246" id="Footnote-246" href="#Anchor-246" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[246]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 3rd October, 1782.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-247" id="Footnote-247" href="#Anchor-247" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[247]</span></a> “On my road to this place
-(Cosgarne) I stayed two days at
-Bristol in order to learn the particulars
-of Hornblower’s new engine erected in
-that neighbourhood, and I had the
-satisfaction to find that it is worse
-than a common engine, although made
-upon our principles; but from the
-various evasions introduced it is as
-bad as need be. Nevertheless I
-think we should stop it in order to
-stop the effects of the numerous lies
-they propagate in this county, and
-other mischiefs.”&mdash;Boulton to Watt,
-30th September, 1782.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-248" id="Footnote-248" href="#Anchor-248" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[248]</span></a> “I don’t know a man in Cornwall
-amongst the adventurers,” he wrote,
-“but what would think it patriotism
-to free the mines from the tribute
-they pay to us, and thereby divide
-our rights amongst their own dear
-selves. Nevertheless, let us keep our
-tempers, and keep the firm hold we
-have got; let us do justice, show
-mercy and walk humbly, and all, I
-hope, will be right at last.”&mdash;Boulton
-to Watt, 2nd November,
-1782.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-249" id="Footnote-249" href="#Anchor-249" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[249]</span></a> Boulton to Watt, 30th September, 1782.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-250" id="Footnote-250" href="#Anchor-250" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[250]</span></a> Boulton to Watson of Bristol, 7th November, 1782.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-251" id="Footnote-251" href="#Anchor-251" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[251]</span></a> Boulton to Wyatt, 16th December, 1782.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-252" id="Footnote-252" href="#Anchor-252" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[252]</span></a> Boulton to Watt, 7th December,
-1782.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-253" id="Footnote-253" href="#Anchor-253" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[253]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 28th November,
-1782.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-254" id="Footnote-254" href="#Anchor-254" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[254]</span></a> The above illustration represents
-the first engine employed at Soho,
-with the alterations subsequently introduced,
-for the purpose of producing
-rotary motion. The old Kinneil
-engine, “Beelzebub,” as Watt called
-her, was entirely removed, and replaced
-by this engine, as explained by
-Watt in his MS. Memoir of Boulton
-now before us, wherein he states,&mdash;“The
-first engine of 18 inches cylinder,
-which was employed in returning
-the water to Soho mill, was replaced
-about 1778 or 1779 by a larger engine,
-the first on the expansive principle,
-which still remains there.” The
-engine became known at Soho as
-“Old Bess,” and she continued in
-regular work until within the last
-eight years. The illustration shows
-the state in which the engine now
-stands in South Kensington Museum.</p>
-
-<p>A. steam cylinder; B. steam pipe; C.
-throttle valve; D. steam valve; E. eduction
-valve; F. eduction pipe; G. valve
-gearing; H. condenser; I. air pump; K.
-air pump rod; L. foot valve; M. hand
-gear tappet rod; N. parallel motion;
-O. balance weight; P. rocking beam;
-Q. connecting rod; R. feed pump rod;
-S. sun wheel; T. planet wheel; U. fly
-wheel; W. governor; X. feedwater
-cistern.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-255" id="Footnote-255" href="#Anchor-255" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[255]</span></a> “We have had a visit to-day
-from a Mr. Cort of Gosport, who says
-he has a forge there, and has found
-out some grand secret in the making
-of iron, by which he can make double
-the quantity at the same expense and
-in the same time as usual. He says
-he wants some kind of engine, but
-could not tell what; wants some of us
-to call on him, and says he had some
-correspondence with you on the subject.
-He seems a simple goodnatured
-man, but not very knowing. He
-says he has most of the smith-work
-for the king’s yard, and has a forge,
-a rolling and slitting mill. I think
-him a brother projector.”&mdash;Watt to
-Boulton, 14th December, 1782.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-256" id="Footnote-256" href="#Anchor-256" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[256]</span></a> 4th December, 1782.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-257" id="Footnote-257" href="#Anchor-257" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[257]</span></a> Letter to Thomas Knox, M.P.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-258" id="Footnote-258" href="#Anchor-258" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[258]</span></a> With an almost excess of politeness,
-Boulton wrote long letters to
-unknown correspondents to set them
-right about mechanical errors into
-which they seemed to him to have
-fallen. Thus a Mr. Knipe of Chelsea,
-supposing he had discovered
-a perpetual motion machine, wrote
-inviting Boulton to join him as a
-partner. Though the man was without
-means and evidently foolish, Boulton
-wrote him several long letters in the
-kindest spirit, pointing out that his
-scheme was contrary to reason and science.
-“It is impossible,” said he, “for
-inanimate mechanism to <em>produce</em> the
-least degree of power or to augment
-the sum total of the <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">primum mobile</i>.
-Mechanism may communicate or concentrate
-or economise power, but cannot
-create or augment it.” Knipe replied
-at great length, vindicating his invention.
-His enthusiasm pleased Boulton,
-who, in the generosity of his nature,
-sent him a draft for ten guineas on his
-London bankers to enable the poor
-inventor to secure his invention if
-there was really anything in it. But
-nothing more was heard of Knipe’s
-Perpetual Motion Machine.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-259" id="Footnote-259" href="#Anchor-259" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[259]</span></a> No wonder the miners were so
-urgent for reductions in working expenses,
-as we find from a communication
-from Watt to Boulton, of facts to
-be laid before Parliament against the
-proposed tax on coal, that Chacewater
-had sunk 50,000<i>l.</i> in setting the mine
-to work; Wheal Virgin 28,000<i>l.</i> in
-ten months, and still unprosperous;
-Poldice a very large sum, and merely
-paying expenses; Wheal Chance
-35,000<i>l.</i>, and only moderately prosperous;
-Pool 14,000<i>l.</i>, without much
-prospect of recovery; Roskere languishing,
-and not paying expenses;
-United Mines, which had been at
-death’s door, still in a tottering
-state; Wheal Union stopped, after
-losing about 8000<i>l.</i>; Dalcoath 500<i>l.</i>
-spent on timber per month, and a new
-kibble-rope, of above a ton weight,
-worn out in a fortnight. [To draw a
-kibble of ore then, weighing about
-3 cwt., took fully fifteen minutes,
-owing to the great depth of that mine,
-and two-thirds of the stuff drawn was
-stones.] To which Watt added, “if we
-had not furnished the miners with
-more effectual means of draining the
-water, almost all the deep mines
-would have been abandoned before
-now.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-260" id="Footnote-260" href="#Anchor-260" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[260]</span></a> The engine was of 40-horse power.
-It was erected at the “Black Works,”
-Etruria, where it continues working
-with the sun and planet motion,&mdash;one
-of the very few engines of the old
-construction still remaining in existence.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-261" id="Footnote-261" href="#Anchor-261" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[261]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 22nd June,
-1784.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-262" id="Footnote-262" href="#Anchor-262" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[262]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 30th June, 1784. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-263" id="Footnote-263" href="#Anchor-263" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[263]</span></a> The parallel motion was first put
-in practice in the engine erected for
-Mr. Whitbread; Watt informing
-Boulton (27th October, 1785) that
-“the parallel motion of Whitbread’s
-answers admirably.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-264" id="Footnote-264" href="#Anchor-264" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[264]</span></a> ‘Lives of Engineers,’ iii. 77.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-265" id="Footnote-265" href="#Anchor-265" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[265]</span></a> In a letter dated 28th August,
-1784, Watt communicated his views
-to his partner on the subject of locomotive
-engines at great length. In
-the course of the letter he says,&mdash;</p>
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“My original ideas on this subject were
-prior to my invention of the improved
-engines, or before the crank or any other
-rotative motions were thought of. My
-plan then was to have two inverted cylinders
-with toothed racks instead of piston
-rods, which were to be applied to the
-ratchet wheels on the axletree, and to act
-alternately; and I am partly of opinion that
-this method might be applied with advantage
-yet, because it needs no fly, and has
-other conveniences.</p>
-
-<p>“From what I have said, and from much
-more which a little reflection will suggest
-to you, you will see that without several
-circumstances turn out more favourable than
-has been stated, the machine will be clumsy
-and defective, and that it will cost much
-time to bring it to any tolerable degree of
-perfection; and that for me to attempt to
-interrupt the career of my business to bestow
-any attention to it, would be imprudent.
-I even grudge the time I have taken to write
-these comments on it.”</p>
-</div></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-266" id="Footnote-266" href="#Anchor-266" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[266]</span></a> Boulton to Watt, 8th November,
-1784. Though Murdock was thus
-occupied, he did not abandon his idea
-of making a working locomotive. Two
-years later we find Watt thus writing
-Boulton:&mdash;</p>
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“I am extremely sorry that W. Murdock
-still busies himself with the steam carriages.
-In one of my specifications I have secured it,
-as well as words could do, according to my
-idea of it, and if to that you add Symington’s
-and Sadler’s patents, it can scarcely be
-patentable, even if free of the general specification
-in the Act of Parliament; for even
-granting that what I have done cannot secure
-it, yet it can act as a prior invention against
-anybody else; and if it cannot be secured by
-patent, to what purpose should anybody
-labour at it? I have still the same opinions
-concerning it that I had, but to prevent as
-much as possible more fruitless argument
-about it, I have one of some size under hand,
-and am resolved to try if God will work a
-miracle in favour of these carriages. I shall
-in some future letter send you the words of
-my specification on that subject. In the
-mean time I wish William could be brought
-to do as we do, to mind the business in
-hand, and let such as Symington and Sadler
-throw away their time and money in hunting
-shadows.”&mdash;Watt to Boulton, 12th Sept.,
-1786. In a subsequent letter, Watt expresses
-himself as much gratified to learn
-“that William applies to his business.”</p>
-</div></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-267" id="Footnote-267" href="#Anchor-267" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[267]</span></a> Boulton to Wilson, 16th December, 1784. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-268" id="Footnote-268" href="#Anchor-268" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[268]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 31st March, 1785.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-269" id="Footnote-269" href="#Anchor-269" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[269]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 21st July,
-1785. Writing to Boulton on a later
-occasion on the subject of these
-threatened attacks on all patents, he
-said, “A pursuance of such decisions
-as have been given lately in several
-cases must at length drive men of
-invention to take shelter in countries
-where their ingenuity will be protected;
-and the other states of Europe
-know their interest too well to neglect
-any opportunity of curbing the insolence
-and humbling the pride of
-Britain. If the minister should not
-think it right to amend and confirm
-the patent laws, the next best thing
-would be to make a law totally taking
-away the king’s power of granting
-them. I mean, this would be the
-<em>honest</em> part.”&mdash;Watt to Boulton, 19th
-March, 1786. Boulton himself had
-equally strong views on the subject of
-patents, believing that they tended to
-encourage industrious and ingenious
-men to labour for the common good.
-Referring to the decision against Argand’s
-lamp patent, he wrote De Luc
-in 1787,&mdash;“It was hard, unjust, and
-impolitic, as it hath (to my knowledge)
-discouraged a very ingenious French
-chemist from coming over and establishing
-in this country an invention
-of the highest importance to one of our
-greatest manufactures. Moreover, it
-tends to destroy the greatest of all
-stimulants to invention, viz. the idea
-of enjoying the fruits of one’s own
-labour. Some late decisions against
-the validity of certain patents have
-raised the spirits of the illiberal, sordid,
-unjust, ungenerous, and inventionless
-misers, who prey upon the vitals of
-the ingenious, and make haste to seize
-upon what their laborious and often
-costly application has produced. The
-decisions to which I refer have encouraged
-a combination in Cornwall to
-erect engines on Boulton and Watt’s
-principles, contrary to the Law of
-Patents and the express provisions of
-an Act of Parliament; and this they
-are setting about in order to drive us
-into a court of law, flattering themselves
-that it is the present disposition
-of the judges to set their faces against
-all patents. Should such a disposition
-(so contrary to Lord Mansfield’s decisions)
-continue to prevail, it will produce
-far greater evils to the manufacturing
-industry of the kingdom than
-the gentlemen of the law can have any
-idea of.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-270" id="Footnote-270" href="#Anchor-270" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[270]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 27th August, 1785.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-271" id="Footnote-271" href="#Anchor-271" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[271]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 24th September, 1785.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-272" id="Footnote-272" href="#Anchor-272" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[272]</span></a> Boulton to Wilkinson, 21st November, 1785.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-273" id="Footnote-273" href="#Anchor-273" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[273]</span></a> Writing to M. De Luc, the Queen’s
-Librarian, of what he and his partner
-had done for Cornwall, Boulton said,&mdash;“The
-copper and tin mines of
-Cornwall are now sunk to so great a
-depth that had not Mr. Watt and
-myself nearly expended our fortunes
-and hazarded our ruin by neglecting
-our regular business, and by a long
-series of expensive experiments in
-bringing our engine to its present
-degree of perfection, those mines must
-inevitably have stopped working, and
-Cornwall at this time would not have
-existed as a mining county. The very
-article of extra coals for common
-engines would have amounted to more
-than the entire profits of their working.”&mdash;Boulton
-to De Luc, 31st March,
-1787.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-274" id="Footnote-274" href="#Anchor-274" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[274]</span></a> Two days after this event, when
-about to set out for Polgooth, a messenger
-arrived at Boulton’s lodgings,
-bringing him the sad news of Mr.
-Phillips’s sudden death. He describes
-the scene at the funeral, at which
-Catherine Phillips, though strongly
-urged by him to stay away, insisted
-on being present. “She was attended
-by a widow lady who had lost a good
-husband last year, and though she had
-not been accustomed to speak in the
-congregation of the righteous, yet on
-this occasion she stood with her hand
-upon her husband’s coffin and spoke
-above an hour, delivering one of the
-most pathetic discourses I ever heard.”
-A large concourse of people attended
-the interment, which took place in a
-garden near Redruth. Boulton, in
-writing to Mrs. Boulton, said, “I wish
-I had time to give you the history and
-character of my departed friend, as
-you know but little of his excellences.
-I cannot say but that I feel a gloomy
-pleasure in dwelling upon the life and
-death of a good man: it incites to
-piety and elevates the mind above
-terrestrial things. Now, let me ask
-you to hold a silent meeting in your
-heart for half an hour and then return
-to your work.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-275" id="Footnote-275" href="#Anchor-275" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[275]</span></a> The Albion Mill engine was set
-to work in 1786. The first rotative
-with a parallel motion in Scotland,
-was erected for Mr. Stein, of Kennet
-Pans near Alloa, in the following
-year.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-276" id="Footnote-276" href="#Anchor-276" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[276]</span></a> In a letter to Mr. Matthews (30th
-April, 1784) Boulton wrote,&mdash;“It
-seems the millers are determined to
-be masters of us and the public.
-Putting a stop to fire-engine mills
-because they come into competition
-with water-mills, is as absurd as
-stopping navigable canals would be
-because they interfere with farmers
-and waggoners. The argument also
-applies to wind and tide mills or any
-other means whereby corn can be
-ground. So all machines should be
-stopped whereby men’s labour is
-saved, because it might be argued
-that men were thereby deprived of a
-livelihood. Carry out the argument,
-and we must annihilate water-mills
-themselves, and thus go back again to
-the grinding of corn by hand labour!”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-277" id="Footnote-277" href="#Anchor-277" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[277]</span></a> Watt, however, continued to
-adhere to his own views as to the
-superiority of the plan adopted:&mdash;“I
-am sorry to find,” he observed in his
-reply to Boulton, “so many things are
-amiss at Albion Mill, and that you
-have lost your good opinion of double
-engines, while my opinion of them is
-mended. The smoothness of their
-going depends on the steam regulators
-being opened a little before the vacuum
-regulators, and not opened too suddenly,
-as indeed the others ought not
-to be. Otherwise the shock comes so
-violently in the opposite direction that
-no pins or brasses will stand it.
-Malcolm has no notion how to make
-gear work quietly, nor do I think he
-properly understands it. You must
-therefore attend to it yourself, and not
-leave it until it is more perfect.”&mdash;Watt
-to Boulton, 3rd March, 1786.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-278" id="Footnote-278" href="#Anchor-278" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[278]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 10th March, 1786.&mdash;Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-279" id="Footnote-279" href="#Anchor-279" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[279]</span></a> “The Albion Mill,” wrote Watt
-to Boulton, “requires your close attention
-and exertions. I look upon it
-as a weight about our necks that will
-sink us to the bottom, unless people
-of real activity and knowledge of
-business are found to manage it. I
-would willingly forfeit a considerable
-sum to be clear of the concern. If
-anybody will take my share I will
-cheerfully give him 500<i>l.</i> and reckon
-myself well quit. My reasons are
-that none of the parties concerned
-are men of business, that no attention
-has been hitherto paid to it by anybody
-except Mr. W. and ourselves,
-and that if we go on as expensively
-in carrying on the business as in the
-erection, it is impossible but that we
-should be immense losers, and thus
-probably our least loss will be to
-stop where we are. As to our reputation
-as engineers, I have no doubt
-but the mill will perform its business,
-but whether with the quantity of
-coals and labour is what I cannot say.”&mdash;Watt
-to Boulton, 19th March,
-1786.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-280" id="Footnote-280" href="#Anchor-280" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[280]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 17th April,
-1786.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-281" id="Footnote-281" href="#Anchor-281" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[281]</span></a> Watt wrote Boulton from London,
-1st October, 1789,&mdash;“I called on Wyatt
-(the architect) last night. He says
-the mill sold above 4000<i>l.</i> worth of
-flour last week and is doing well.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-282" id="Footnote-282" href="#Anchor-282" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[282]</span></a> For further particulars as to the Albion Mill, see Life of Rennie in
-‘Lives of the Engineers,’ ii. 137.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-283" id="Footnote-283" href="#Anchor-283" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[283]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 23rd September,
-1786.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-284" id="Footnote-284" href="#Anchor-284" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[284]</span></a> He spoke of Goodwyn’s Brewery
-engine, finished in 1784, as the best
-that Soho had up to that time turned
-out&mdash;it “performed wonderful well&mdash;not
-the smallest leak and scarce any
-noise.... The working gear and
-joints are the best I ever saw.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-285" id="Footnote-285" href="#Anchor-285" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[285]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 24th February,
-1786.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-286" id="Footnote-286" href="#Anchor-286" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[286]</span></a> Boulton to Morris, 2nd November,
-1786.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-287" id="Footnote-287" href="#Anchor-287" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[287]</span></a> “Your mind, my friend, is too
-active, too powerful for your body,
-and harasses it beyond its bearing.
-If this was the case with any other
-machine under your direction, except
-that in whose regulation your friends
-take so much interest, you would
-soon find out a remedy. For the
-present permit me to advise a more
-ample use of <em>the oil of delegation</em>
-through your whole machinery, and I
-am persuaded you will soon find some
-salutary effects from this application.
-Seriously, I shall conclude in saying
-to you what Dr. Fothergill desired
-me to say to Brindley&mdash;‘Spare your
-machine a little, or like others under
-your direction, it will wear out the
-sooner by hard and constant usage.’”&mdash;Josiah
-Wedgwood to Watt, December
-10, 1782.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-288" id="Footnote-288" href="#Anchor-288" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[288]</span></a> Watt to his brother-in-law, Gilbert Hamilton, Glasgow, June 18, 1786.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-289" id="Footnote-289" href="#Anchor-289" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[289]</span></a> “Mr. Watt hath lately remitted
-<em>all</em> his money to Scotland, and I have
-lately purchased a considerable quantity
-of copper at the request of Mr.
-Williams.... Besides which I have
-more than 45 tons of copper by
-me, 20 of which was bought of the
-Cornish Metal Company, and 20 of the
-Duke’s at 70<i>l.</i>, and not an ounce of
-either yet used. In short, I shall be
-in a very few weeks in great want of
-money, and it is now impossible to
-borrow in London or this neighbourhood
-as all confidence is fled.”&mdash;Boulton
-to Wilson, 4th May, 1788.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-290" id="Footnote-290" href="#Anchor-290" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[290]</span></a> Boulton to Matthews, 22nd December,
-1788.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-291" id="Footnote-291" href="#Anchor-291" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[291]</span></a> Boulton acted with his usual open-handed
-generosity in his partnership
-arrangements with Watt. Although
-the original bargain between them
-provided that Boulton was to take
-two-thirds, and Watt one-third profits,
-Boulton providing the requisite capital
-and being at the risk and expense of
-all experiments, he subsequently, at
-Watt’s request, agreed to the profits
-being equally divided between them.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-292" id="Footnote-292" href="#Anchor-292" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[292]</span></a> As early as August, 1768, we
-find Dr. Small in one of his letters
-describing Edgeworth to Watt as “a
-gentleman of fortune, young, mechanical,
-and indefatigable, who has taken
-a resolution to move land and water
-carriages by steam, and has made
-considerable progress in the short
-space of time that he has devoted to
-the study.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-293" id="Footnote-293" href="#Anchor-293" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[293]</span></a> Dr. Darwin to Boulton, April 5,
-1778. When the Doctor removed to
-Derby in 1782, he wrote,&mdash;“I am
-here cut off from the milk of science,
-which flows in such redundant streams
-from your learned Lunatics, and which,
-I can assure you, is a very great regret
-to me.” In another letter he said,&mdash;“I
-hope philosophy and fire-engines
-continue to go on well. You heard
-we sent your Society an air-balloon,
-which was calculated to have fallen in
-your garden at Soho; but the wicked
-wind carried it to Sir Edward Littleton’s.
-Pray give my compliments to
-your learned Society.” In another
-letter he wrote,&mdash;“I hope Behemoth
-has strength in his loins. Belial and
-Ashtaroth are two other devils of consequence,
-and good names for engines of
-Fire.” When he heard of the Albion
-Mill being burnt down, the Doctor
-wrote,&mdash;“The conflagration of the
-Albion Mill grieved me sincerely, both
-as it was a grand and successful effort
-of human art, and also because I fear
-you were a considerable sufferer by it.
-I well remember poor old Mr. Seward
-comparing the Immortality of the
-Soul (in a devout sermon) to a fire-engine.
-He might now have made it
-a type of the mortality of this world,
-and the conflagration of all things.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-294" id="Footnote-294" href="#Anchor-294" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[294]</span></a> In a letter from Priestley to
-Boulton, dated London, 6th November,
-1775, he wrote,&mdash;“I shall not quarrel
-with you on account of our different
-sentiments in politics. When I tell
-you what is fact, that the Americans
-have constructed a cannon on a new
-principle, by which they can hit a
-mark at a distance of a mile, you will
-say their ingenuity has come in aid of
-their cowardice! I would tell you
-the principle of it, but that I am
-afraid it would set your superior
-ingenuity to improve upon it for the
-use of their enemies.” From Boulton’s
-memoranda-books we find that the
-subject of improved artillery had
-occupied his attention some ten years
-before.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-295" id="Footnote-295" href="#Anchor-295" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[295]</span></a> Mrs. Schimmelpenninck, who had
-no sympathy for Dr. Priestley’s religious
-views, nevertheless bears
-eloquent testimony to the beauty of
-his character. She speaks of him as
-“a man of admirable simplicity,
-gentleness, and kindness of heart,
-united with great acuteness of intellect.
-I can never forget,” she says,
-“the impression produced on me by
-the serene expression of his countenance.
-He, indeed, seemed ever
-present with God by recollection, and
-with man by cheerfulness.... A
-sharp and acute intellectual perception,
-often a pointed, perhaps a playful
-expression, was combined in him with
-a most loving heart.... Dr. Priestley
-always spent part of every day in
-devotional exercises and contemplation;
-and unless the railroad has
-spoilt it, there yet remains at Dawlish
-a deep and beautiful cavern, since
-known by the name of “Dr. Priestley’s
-cavern,” where he was wont to pass
-an hour every day in solitary retirement.”&mdash;‘Life
-of Mary Ann Schimmelpenninck.’
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-296" id="Footnote-296" href="#Anchor-296" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[296]</span></a> Boulton to Watt, 3rd July, 1781.
-Dr. Black denominated carbonic acid
-gas “fixed air” because of his having
-first discovered it in chalk, marble,
-&amp;c., wherein it was <em>fixed</em> until the
-furnace or other means extracted it
-from its fixture.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-297" id="Footnote-297" href="#Anchor-297" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[297]</span></a> Boulton to Henderson, 6th September,
-1781.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-298" id="Footnote-298" href="#Anchor-298" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[298]</span></a> Wedgwood to Boulton, Etruria, 10th March, 1781.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-299" id="Footnote-299" href="#Anchor-299" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[299]</span></a> Boulton to Wedgwood, 30th March, 1781.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-300" id="Footnote-300" href="#Anchor-300" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[300]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 26th October,
-1782.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-301" id="Footnote-301" href="#Anchor-301" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[301]</span></a> A common word in the north,&mdash;meaning
-literally <em>putting sense into</em> one.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-302" id="Footnote-302" href="#Anchor-302" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[302]</span></a> He discovered, in the course of
-his inquiries at different periods, no
-fewer than nine new gases,&mdash;oxygen,
-nitrogen (a discovery also claimed by
-Cavendish and Rutherford), nitric
-oxide, nitrous oxide, sulphurous acid,
-muriatic acid (chlorine), volatile ammonia,
-fluo-silicic acid, and carbonic
-oxide,&mdash;“a tribute to science,” as is
-truly observed by Dr. Henry, “greatly
-exceeding in richness and extent that
-of any contemporary.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-303" id="Footnote-303" href="#Anchor-303" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[303]</span></a> We find among the Boulton MSS.,
-a letter from Priestley, dated Calne,
-28th September, 1776, introducing
-Warltire to Boulton as follows:&mdash;“As
-I know you will take pleasure in
-everything in which the advancement
-of science is concerned, I take the
-liberty to recommend to you Mr.
-Warltire, who has been some time in
-this part of the country, and who is
-going to read lectures on the subject
-of Air at Birmingham. I think him
-an excellent philosopher, as well as a
-modest and agreeable man. He is
-perfectly acquainted with his subject,
-and has prepared a set of experiments
-which have given the greatest satisfaction
-wherever he has been. He
-has been so obliging as to spend some
-time with me, and has given me much
-assistance in my late experiments, of
-which he can give you some account.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-304" id="Footnote-304" href="#Anchor-304" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[304]</span></a> Wilson’s ‘Life of Cavendish,’ p.
-60. In this work, the claims of
-Cavendish are strongly advocated.
-The case in favour of Watt is alike
-strongly and ably stated by Mr.
-Muirhead in his ‘Correspondence of
-the late James Watt on his Discovery
-of the Theory of the Composition of
-Water.’
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-305" id="Footnote-305" href="#Anchor-305" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[305]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 10th December,
-1782.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-306" id="Footnote-306" href="#Anchor-306" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[306]</span></a> De Luc, Watt’s “ami zélé,” as he
-described himself, confirms the fact
-of Cavendish having, in 1782, communicated
-to Priestley the nature of
-his experiments as well as his theory
-of the composition of water, in the
-following passage:&mdash;“Vers la fin de
-l’année 1782, j’allai à Birmingham,
-où le Dr. Priestley s’étoit établi depuis
-quelques années. Il me communiqua
-alors que M. Cavendish, d’après une
-rémarque de M. Warltire, qui avoit
-toujours trouvé de l’eau dans les vases
-où il avoit brúlé un mélange de <em>l’air
-inflammable</em> et <em>d’air atmosphérique</em>,
-s’étoit appliqué à découvrir la source
-de cette eau, et qu’il avoit trouvé
-qu’un mélange <em>d’air inflammable</em> et
-<em>d’air déphlogistique</em> en proportion convenable,
-étant allumé par l’étincelle
-électrique, se convertissoit <em>tout entier
-en eau</em>.&mdash;Je fus frappé au plus haut
-degré de cette découverte.”&mdash;‘Idées
-sur la Météorologie,’ tome 2, 1787,
-pp. 206&ndash;7.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-307" id="Footnote-307" href="#Anchor-307" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[307]</span></a> Watt to Black, 21st April, 1783.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-308" id="Footnote-308" href="#Anchor-308" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[308]</span></a> That Watt felt keenly on the
-subject, is obvious from his letter to
-Mr. Fry of Bristol (15th May, 1784),
-wherein he says,&mdash;“I have had the
-honour, like other great men, to have
-had my ideas pirated. Soon after I
-wrote my first paper on the subject,
-Dr. Blagden explained my theory to
-M. Lavoisier at Paris; and soon after
-that, M. Lavoisier invented it himself,
-and read a paper on the subject to the
-Royal Academy of Sciences. Since
-that, Mr. Cavendish has read a paper
-to the Royal Society on the same idea,
-without making the least mention of
-me. The one is a French financier; and
-the other a member of the illustrious
-house of Cavendish, worth above
-100,000<i>l.</i>, and does not spend 1000<i>l.</i> a
-year. Rich men may do mean actions.
-May you and I always persevere in
-our integrity, and despise such doings.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-309" id="Footnote-309" href="#Anchor-309" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[309]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 20th September,
-1785.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-310" id="Footnote-310" href="#Anchor-310" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[310]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 30th December,
-1787. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-311" id="Footnote-311" href="#Anchor-311" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[311]</span></a> Mr. W. P. Smith, of the Patent
-Museum, raised this question at a
-meeting of the Photographic Society
-held on the 3rd November, 1863.
-Certain photographic pictures on metal
-plates were found in Mr. Boulton’s
-library at Soho, which, it was supposed,
-had not been opened for about
-fifty years: and it was accordingly
-inferred that these photographs had
-been the work of Mr. Boulton, or some
-member of the Lunar Society, about
-the year 1791. One of them was supposed
-to be a view of Soho House
-“before the alterations, which were
-made previous to 1791.” But the
-evidence is very defective, as has been
-clearly shown by M. P. W. Boulton,
-Esq., the grandson of Mr. Boulton,
-in his ‘Remarks concerning certain
-Photographs supposed to be of early
-Date’ (Bradbury and Evans, 1864).
-Instead of having been closed for fifty
-years, the room in which the pictures
-were found, was in constant use, and
-the books were freely accessible. It
-is also very doubtful whether the
-house represented in one of the pictures
-is old Soho House; the strong
-probability being that it is not, but a
-house still standing at Winson Green.
-The explanation given by Mr. M. P. W.
-Boulton seems to be the true one&mdash;that
-the room in question having been
-used by a Miss Wilkinson, an experimenter
-in photography after its invention
-by Niepce, these photographs
-were merely the results of her first
-amateur experiments in the art. The
-late Mr. Murdock, son of William
-Murdock of Soho, who lived in the
-immediate neighbourhood, was also a
-very good photographist, and was
-accustomed to meet Miss Wilkinson
-to make experiments in the new art.</p>
-
-<p>There can be no doubt that the
-Wedgwoods of Etruria, more particularly
-Josiah’s son Thomas, as well as
-Humphry Davy, were early engaged
-in experimenting on the action of light
-upon nitrate of silver, but they wholly
-failed in fixing the pictures. A letter,
-dated “January, 1799,” is quoted in
-the ‘Photographic Journal’ for Jan. 15,
-1864, as from James Watt to Josiah
-Wedgwood (which must be an error,
-as Josiah died in 1795), in which the
-following words occur:&mdash;“I thank
-you for your instructions respecting
-the silver pictures, about which, when
-at home, I will make some experiments.”
-If such experiments were
-really made, we have been unable to
-find any record of them.
-</p></div>
-
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-312" id="Footnote-312" href="#Anchor-312" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[312]</span></a> ‘Voyage en Angleterre, en Ecosse, et aux Iles Hébrides.’ Par B. Faujas-Saint-Fond.
-2 vols. Paris, 1797.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-313" id="Footnote-313" href="#Anchor-313" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[313]</span></a> Horner’s ‘Memoirs and Correspondence,’ ii. 2.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-314" id="Footnote-314" href="#Anchor-314" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[314]</span></a> The word “Brummagem” doubtless originated in the numerous issues
-of counterfeit money from the Birmingham mints.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-315" id="Footnote-315" href="#Anchor-315" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[315]</span></a> The punishment for this crime was
-sometimes of a very brutal character.
-In March, 1789, <em>a woman</em>, convicted of
-coining in London, was first strangled
-by the stool being taken from under
-her, and then fixed to a stake and
-<em>burnt</em> before the debtor’s door at Newgate!
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-316" id="Footnote-316" href="#Anchor-316" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[316]</span></a> “I lately received a letter from a
-Jew about making for him a large
-quantity of base money, but I should
-be sorry ever to become so base as to
-execute such orders. On the contrary
-I have taken some measures to put a
-stop to the execution of them by
-others, and if Mr. Butcher hath any
-plan of that sort he would do well to
-guard against me; as I certainly shall
-endeavour all in my power to prevent
-the counterfeiting of British or other
-money&mdash;that being the principle on
-which I am acting.”&mdash;Boulton to
-Matthews, December, 1787.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-317" id="Footnote-317" href="#Anchor-317" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[317]</span></a> Boulton to Woodman, 13th November,
-1789.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-318" id="Footnote-318" href="#Anchor-318" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[318]</span></a> Watt says Droz “did not know
-so much on the subject as Boulton
-himself did,” and being found incompetent,
-a pretender, and disposed to be
-quarrelsome and litigious, he was
-shortly after dismissed with liberal
-payment.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-319" id="Footnote-319" href="#Anchor-319" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[319]</span></a> In a letter written by James Lawson
-to Matthew Robinson Boulton
-shortly after his father’s death, he observed,&mdash;“God
-only knows the anxiety
-and unremitting perseverance of your
-father to accomplish the end; and we
-all aided and assisted to the best of
-our powers, without ever considering
-by whose contrivance anything was
-brought to bear. Indeed the bringing
-of everything to bear was by your
-father’s perseverance, and by his hints
-and personal attendance; for often he
-attended and persevered in the experiments
-till we were all tired.”&mdash;Lawson
-to M. R. Boulton, January 10, 1810.
-Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-320" id="Footnote-320" href="#Anchor-320" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[320]</span></a> We find numerous letters from
-Boulton to Joseph Harrison relative
-to the execution of the presses, and
-the manner in which the various
-details of the work were to be carried
-out. On the 16th of January, 1788,
-he wrote,&mdash;“Push forward with the
-utmost expedition six of the cutting-out
-presses and one of the coining
-presses. I have engaged to have six
-of each kind at work by this day
-four months.... I shall be obliged
-to work after the rate of 1500 tons a
-year. I fear I must have eight presses
-[eight were eventually erected] in
-which case I must lengthen the building
-next the Gate road. Pray push
-forward, and be silent.” Various
-details as to the working of the
-presses and the execution of the coin
-were given in succeeding letters.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-321" id="Footnote-321" href="#Anchor-321" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[321]</span></a> To Lord Hawkesbury he wrote
-(14th April, 1789),&mdash;“In the course
-of my journeys I observe that I receive
-upon an average two-thirds counterfeit
-halfpence for change at toll-gates, &amp;c.;
-and I believe the evil is daily increasing,
-as the spurious money is
-carried into circulation by the lowest
-class of manufacturers, who pay with
-it the principal part of the wages of the
-poor people they employ. They purchase
-from the subterraneous coiners 36
-shillings’-worth of copper (in nominal
-value) for 20 shillings, so that the profit
-derived from the cheating is very large.
-The trade is carried on to so great an
-extent that at a public meeting at
-Stockport in Cheshire, in January last,
-the magistrates and inhabitants came
-to a resolution to take no other halfpence
-in future than those of the
-Anglesey Company [also an illegal
-coinage, though of full weight and
-value of copper], and this resolution
-they have published in their newspapers.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-322" id="Footnote-322" href="#Anchor-322" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[322]</span></a> Boulton to the Lords of the Privy
-Council for Trade, 16th December,
-1787.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-323" id="Footnote-323" href="#Anchor-323" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[323]</span></a> In 1787, and again in 1789, we
-find the merchants, traders, and
-others in Southwark urgently memorialising
-the Lords of the Treasury on
-the subject. The Memorial addressed
-to them in the latter year was signed
-by 800 of the principal inhabitants
-of the Borough, and presented to
-Mr. Pitt by a deputation, headed by
-Mr. Barclay, of Thrale’s Brewery. It
-set forth that the counterfeits of copper
-coin had become a very serious
-burden and loss, more especially to
-poor manufacturers, labourers, and
-others, many of whom were compelled
-to take counterfeit copper coin in
-payment of their commodities and
-wages; and concluded by stating that,
-having seen specimens of a new copper
-coinage made by Mr. Boulton of
-Birmingham (under order of the Lords
-of the Privy Council) the Memorialists
-take leave to represent, that such a
-coinage, from its greater weight and
-superior execution, would in their
-opinion afford to themselves and the
-public at large a certain remedy for
-the present grievance, and they therefore
-strongly recommended its adoption.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-324" id="Footnote-324" href="#Anchor-324" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[324]</span></a> The coins were: in 1790, a five-sous
-piece, “Pacte Fédératif;” in
-1792, a four sous “Hercule;” and a
-two sous “Liberté.” Boulton’s reputation
-as a coiner abroad, brought
-upon him while at Paris, a host of
-foreign schemers, one of whom pretended
-that he had discovered an
-infallible method of converting copper
-into gold! The schemer and his wife
-followed Boulton to Soho, accompanied
-by a letter of introduction from his
-friend Baumgarten. After taking
-measure of the schemer, Boulton
-replied to Baumgarten as follows:&mdash;</p>
-
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“<span class="smcap">Dear Sir</span>,&mdash;Who the devil have you sent
-me? Is he the angel or the demon Gabriel?
-Is he a seraphim or a swindler? His propositions
-appear in such a questionable form,
-that I know not whether to pronounce him
-F. or R. or S., which are favourite letters
-amongst English philosophers.</p>
-
-<p>“Doth he mean to make gold by Alchemy,
-or after the family receipt by which his
-mother and brother extracted two hundred
-guineas from my simplicity when at Paris?</p>
-
-<p>“I am content with the copper coinage, and
-shall leave the golden one to you and Gabriel.
-The science of alchemy soars so much above
-common sense that I never could obtain so
-much as a peep into its lower regions. This
-said Gabriel and his angel have, however,
-condescended to adopt common sense so far
-as to take up their lodgings in my cottage!</p>
-
-<p>“The worst of all is, I am at this juncture
-extremely busy and can’t bear interruption;
-but all that is a trifle when compared with
-the magnitude of his project, viz. converting
-1500<i>l.</i> into 60,000<i>l.</i>! But he says a small
-experiment may be made in three days and
-three nights in my laboratory. I must,
-however, own that I had rather be in Jonah’s
-situation during that time.</p>
-
-<p>“I wish not to offend this angelic couple,
-but I should prefer that you had them back
-again, with all the favours and profits intended
-for me. However, I cannot help
-wishing you a better thing; for in spite of
-your last favour I sincerely desire for you
-and all that are dear to you, many many
-happy and prosperous years,</p>
-
-<p class="sig-less">“Ever your faithful and affectionate friend,</p>
-
-<p class="sig">“<span class="smcap">M. Boulton</span>.”</p>
-</div></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-325" id="Footnote-325" href="#Anchor-325" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[325]</span></a> The following were the principal
-provincial halfpenny tokens executed at
-Soho:&mdash;1789, Cronebane and Dundee;
-1791, Anglesey, Cornwall, Glasgow,
-Hornchurch, Southampton; 1793,
-Leeds, London, Penryn, John Wilkinson’s;
-1794, Inverness, Lancaster;
-1795, Bishops Stortford; 1800, Enniscorthy.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-326" id="Footnote-326" href="#Anchor-326" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[326]</span></a> The following medals were also
-struck by Mr. Boulton at Soho:&mdash;Prince
-and Princess of Wales on their
-marriage; Marquis Cornwallis on the
-peace with Tippoo; Earl Howe on his
-victory of the First of June; Hudson’s
-Bay Company; Slave Trade abolished;
-Chareville Forest; General Suwarrow
-on his successes in Italy; the Empress
-Catherine of Russia; in commemoration
-of British Victories; Union with
-Ireland; on the peace of 1802; Battle
-of Trafalgar; Manchester and Salford
-Volunteers; Frogmore Medal; Prince
-Regent of Portugal; and the Emperor
-Alexander of Russia. The execution
-of the Trafalgar Medal furnishes a
-remarkable illustration of Boulton’s
-princely munificence. It was struck
-on the occasion of Lord Nelson’s last
-victory, and presented by him, with
-the sanction of government, to every
-officer and man engaged in the action.
-He gave an additional value to the
-present by confining the medal to this
-purpose only.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-327" id="Footnote-327" href="#Anchor-327" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[327]</span></a> Boulton to Wilson, 26th February, 1792. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-328" id="Footnote-328" href="#Anchor-328" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[328]</span></a> There was a great deal of graphic
-vigour in Watt’s correspondence about
-engines. Thus, in the case of an
-engine supplied to F. Scott and Co.
-to drive a hammer, it appears that
-instead of applying it to the hammer
-only, they applied it also to blow the
-bellows. The consequence was, that
-it worked both badly. They had also
-increased the weight of the hammer.
-Watt wrote,&mdash;“It was easy to foresee
-all this; and the only adequate remedy
-is to have another engine to blow the
-bellows. It is impossible that a regular
-blast can be had while the
-engine works the hammer and bellows,
-<em>without a regulating belly as big as a
-church</em>.... They have been for
-<em>having a pocket bible in large print</em>.
-If they mean to carry on their work
-regular, they must have a blowing
-engine; otherwise they will lose the
-price of one in a few months.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-329" id="Footnote-329" href="#Anchor-329" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[329]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 27th June, 1790.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-330" id="Footnote-330" href="#Anchor-330" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[330]</span></a> Boulton to his son, 19th December,
-1787.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-331" id="Footnote-331" href="#Anchor-331" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[331]</span></a> Boulton to Matthews, 25th
-August, 1788. In a letter dated the
-preceding day, he wrote&mdash;“I have
-been exceedingly harassed last week,
-have many letters before me unanswered.
-I cannot sleep at nights,
-and the room I write in is so hot by
-the fire-engine chimney as to relax
-me, and my head is distracted by the
-noise of the engine, by the making
-and riveting of boilers, and by a
-constant knocking at my door by
-somebody or other; but I believe and
-suspect that the separation of my son
-from me contributes more to the
-oppression of my spirits than anything
-else.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-332" id="Footnote-332" href="#Anchor-332" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[332]</span></a> “I have sent my son to Mr.
-Wilkinson’s ironworks at Bersham, in
-Wales, where he is to study practical
-book-keeping, geometry, and algebra,
-at his leisure hours; and three hours
-in the day he works in a carpenter’s
-shop. I intend he should stay there
-a year; what I shall do with him
-next I know not, but I intend to fit
-him for some employment not so precarious
-as my own.”&mdash;Watt to Mrs.
-Campbell, 30th May, 1784.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-333" id="Footnote-333" href="#Anchor-333" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[333]</span></a> Watt, jun., to Boulton, 4th
-December, 1789.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-334" id="Footnote-334" href="#Anchor-334" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[334]</span></a> Mr. Boulton having been absent
-at Bath, some time elapsed before
-young Watt’s letter reached him.
-Receiving no reply, the youth became
-apprehensive that his letter had fallen
-into his father’s hands, and wrote a
-second letter expressing his fears.
-Thus Boulton replied to both letters
-at the same time, informing his correspondent
-for his satisfaction that they
-had reached him “unopened.” He
-proceeded&mdash;</p>
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“I now send agreeably to your request,
-my draft for 50<i>l.</i>&mdash;payable to myself, that
-I might thereby conceal your name from all
-persons; and you may tranquillise yourself in
-respect to your father, as I promise you he
-shall not know aught of the transaction.</p>
-
-<p>“Although I would not willingly give you
-pain, yet I must honestly tell you that I am
-not very sorry you experienced some pain
-and anxiety by my delay; that you may not
-only feel how uncomfortable it is to be in
-debt, but that you may experience ere long
-how pleasant and how cheerful is independence,
-which no man can possess who is in
-that condition.</p>
-
-<p>“It is possible your father’s ideas may be
-too limited in regard to the <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">quantum</i> necessary
-for your expenses; but I think it equally
-probable that yours may be too diffuse, and
-therefore can’t help wishing it in my power
-to expand the one and contract the other.</p>
-
-<p>“I know and speak from experience, that
-the principal articles of expenditure in the
-generality of young men who live in large
-towns are such as produce the least additions
-to their happiness or reputation; for which
-as well as for some others I know of, I cannot
-help urging you to <em>cut your coat according
-to your cloth</em>, as the sure means of preserving
-the good opinion of your father, and as the
-most likely to induce him to open his hand
-more liberally to you.</p>
-
-<p>“It’s a subject I can’t speak to him upon
-without raising his suspicions, but you may
-state to him such arguments as may seem
-meet to yourself in favour of a further
-allowance, and if he speaks to me upon the
-subject, I will do the best I can for you.</p>
-
-<p>“I wish you to keep in view that all our
-great Cornish profits have died away till
-now they are very small,&mdash;that your father is
-building an expensive house,&mdash;and that he is
-married. For these and other reasons, I wish
-you to alter the scale of your expenses, as the
-surest means of securing your credit and your
-happiness, which I am desirous of promoting
-or I should not have expressed myself so
-freely and so unreservedly....</p>
-
-<p class="sig-less2">“I remain, dear Watt,</p>
-
-<p class="sig-less">“Your faithful and affectionate friend,</p>
-
-<p class="sig">“<span class="smcap">Matthew Boulton</span>.”</p>
-
-<p>&mdash;Boulton to Watt, junr., 26th December,
-1789. Boulton MSS.</p>
-</div></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-335" id="Footnote-335" href="#Anchor-335" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[335]</span></a> Watt, junr. to Boulton, 26th
-March, 1789.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-336" id="Footnote-336" href="#Anchor-336" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[336]</span></a> ‘Life of Mary Ann Schimmelpenninck,’ 3rd ed., 1859, pp. 125&ndash;6.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-337" id="Footnote-337" href="#Anchor-337" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[337]</span></a> Ibid., p. 181.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-338" id="Footnote-338" href="#Anchor-338" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[338]</span></a> “The address of the Société des
-Amis de la Constitution de Bourdeaux”
-to the Revolutionary Society in
-London, dated the 21st May, 1791,
-contains the following passage:&mdash;“Le
-jour consacré à porter le deuil de M.
-Price [the Rev. Dr. Price recently
-dead,&mdash;an ardent admirer of the
-French Revolution in its early stages],
-nous avons entendu la lecture du
-Discours de M. l’Evêque d’Autun sur
-la Liberté des Cultes: on nous a fait
-ensuite le rapport des ouvrages de
-MM. Priestley et Payne qui ont
-vengé M. Price des ouvrages de M.
-Burke; et c’est ainsi que nous avons
-fait son oraison funèbre. Peut-être,
-Messieurs, apprendrez vous avec
-quelque intérêt, que nous avons inscrit
-dans la liste de nos Membres les
-noms de MM. Payne et Priestley;
-c’est l’hommage de notre estime, et
-l’estime d’hommes libres a toujours
-son prix.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-339" id="Footnote-339" href="#Anchor-339" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[339]</span></a> The representation given above of
-Dr. Priestley’s house is taken from a
-rare book, entitled ‘Views of the Ruins
-of the principal Houses destroyed during
-the Riots at Birmingham, 1791.’
-London, 1792.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-340" id="Footnote-340" href="#Anchor-340" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[340]</span></a> “At midnight,” says Hutton, “I
-could see from my house the flames
-of Bordesley Hall rise with dreadful
-aspect. I learned that after I quitted
-Birmingham the mob attacked my
-house there three times. My son
-bought them off repeatedly; but in
-the fourth, which began about nine
-at night, they laboured till eight the
-next morning, when they had so
-completely ravaged my dwelling that
-I write this narrative in a house
-without furniture, without roof, door,
-chimneypiece, window, or window-frame.”&mdash;‘The
-Life of William Hutton,’
-written by himself. London, 1816.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-341" id="Footnote-341" href="#Anchor-341" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[341]</span></a> “Though our principles, which are
-well known, as friends to the established
-government and enemies of
-republican principles, should have
-been our protection from a mob whose
-watchword was Church and King,
-yet our safety was principally owing
-to most of the Dissenters living south
-of the town; for after the first moments
-they did not seem over nice in
-their discrimination of religion and
-principles. I, among others, was
-pointed out as a Presbyterian, though
-I never was in a meeting-house in
-Birmingham, and Mr. Boulton is well
-known as a Churchman. We had
-everything most portable packed up,
-fearing the worst. However, all is
-well with us.”&mdash;Watt to De Luc,
-19th July, 1791.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-342" id="Footnote-342" href="#Anchor-342" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[342]</span></a> The ‘Discours’ delivered by the
-MM. Cooper and Watt (1792) may be
-seen at the British Museum.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-343" id="Footnote-343" href="#Anchor-343" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[343]</span></a> ‘Life of Southey,’ vi. 209.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-344" id="Footnote-344" href="#Anchor-344" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[344]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 16th May,
-1794. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-345" id="Footnote-345" href="#Anchor-345" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[345]</span></a> The Habeas Corpus Act was suspended
-on the 23rd May, 1794.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-346" id="Footnote-346" href="#Anchor-346" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[346]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 19th May,
-1794. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-347" id="Footnote-347" href="#Anchor-347" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[347]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 23rd May,
-1794. Young Watt continued to
-sympathise with his political friends;
-as we find him, some months later,
-writing Matthew R. Boulton from
-London as follows:&mdash;“The citizens
-here are all in very high spirits since
-the late trials; and I had the honour of
-dining with two of the <em>acquitted felons</em>
-on Sunday last.” Watt, junr., having
-remained for some time in London on
-business connected with the prosecution
-of Bull and others for infringement
-of his father’s patent, Boulton, junr.,
-kept up an active correspondence with
-him on the affairs of the firm. In
-one letter (19th February, 1795), after
-discussing various matters of detail
-relating to the letter-copying machine
-and engine business, Boulton entreats
-his friend to send him down a supply
-of hair-powder. “I have to intrust
-to your care,” he says, “the execution
-of an important commission on the
-part of the ladies and myself. The
-report of a scarcity of hair-powder has
-caused great consternation amongst
-the beaux and belles here, and we beg
-of you to preserve for us 1 cwt. of
-that necessary article.” To which
-Watt, jun. replied,&mdash;“Your new
-order is in train, so that I hope
-(whatever the poor may suffer by
-the destruction of so scarce an article
-of nourishment) your aristocratical
-vanity will be gratified, with only the
-additional sacrifice of one guinea per
-annum to your immaculate friend Mr.
-Pitt, for the purpose of carrying on
-this ‘just and necessary war!’
-Under the existing circumstances, I
-am doubtful whether I shall not
-sacrifice my aristocratical appendage
-[queues being then the appendages of
-gentlemen], as it goes much against
-my inclination to throw away my
-money at this moment of personal
-poverty, or to contribute any sum,
-however small, to the support of
-measures which I reprobate <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">in toto</i>.
-On the other hand, however, I do say
-that, of all the taxes which have ever
-been imposed within my memory,
-this is the most politic and the least
-likely to be burdensome to the poor.”&mdash;Boulton
-MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-348" id="Footnote-348" href="#Anchor-348" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[348]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 20th March,
-1796.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-349" id="Footnote-349" href="#Anchor-349" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[349]</span></a> “We have <span class="smcap lowercase">WON THE CAUSE</span> hollow,”
-Watt wrote from London. “All
-the Judges have given their opinions
-carefully in our favour, and have passed
-judgment. Some of them made better
-arguments in our favour than our own
-counsel, for Rous’s speech was too
-long and too divergent. I most sincerely
-give you joy.”&mdash;Watt to
-Boulton, 25th January, 1799.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-350" id="Footnote-350" href="#Anchor-350" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[350]</span></a> The model was carefully preserved and exhibited with pride by his son,
-in whose house at Handsworth we saw it in 1857.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-351" id="Footnote-351" href="#Anchor-351" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[351]</span></a> Watt said to Robert Hart, “When
-Mr. Murdock introduced the slide valve,
-I was very much against it, as I did
-not think it so good as the poppet
-valve, but I gave in from its simplicity.”&mdash;Hart,
-‘Reminiscences,’ &amp;c.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-352" id="Footnote-352" href="#Anchor-352" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[352]</span></a> These several inventions were
-embodied by him in a patent taken
-out in 1799.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-353" id="Footnote-353" href="#Anchor-353" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[353]</span></a> Burning springs, though by no
-means common in Europe, were not
-unknown. They were kept burning
-by natural and spontaneous supplies
-of carburetted hydrogen gas issuing
-from fissures in the earth overlying
-beds of asphalte or coal. The inflammable
-character of fire-damp and the
-explosions which it occasioned in coal
-mines were also familiar to most
-persons living in the coal-mining districts.
-In 1658 Mr. Thomas Shirley
-first communicated to the Royal Society
-the result of some experiments
-which he had made on the inflammable
-gas issuing from a well near Wigan in
-Lancashire. Some time before 1691
-the Rev. Dr. Clayton, Dean of Kildare,
-made some experiments on what he
-called the spirit of coal: he distilled
-some coal in a retort, and, confining
-the gas produced thereby in a bladder,
-he amused his friends by burning it
-as it issued from a pin-hole. In 1721
-Dr. Stephen Hales found it was practicable
-to produce elastic inflammable
-air from coal and other substances,
-and that nearly one-third of Newcastle
-coal was drawn off in vapour, gas, &amp;c.,
-by the action of heat. In 1733 Sir
-James Lowther communicated to the
-Royal Society a paper on the subject of
-the fire-damp issuing from the shaft
-of a coal mine near Whitehaven,
-which had been accidentally set fire
-to and continued to burn for two
-years. Dr. Watson, Bishop of Landaff,
-and Dr. Priestley of Birmingham,
-examined the properties of coal-gas,
-and made experiments on its inflammable
-qualities, but pursued the
-subject no further. Lord Dundonald
-also had been accustomed, for the
-amusement of his friends, to set fire
-to the gas disengaged by the burning
-of coal in the process of coke-making.
-The same phenomena must have been
-observed on a large scale wherever
-coke was made. Each chamber in
-which coal was distilled was in point
-of fact a gas retort. Oil and gas were
-the products of the distillation; but
-strange to say, although the oil was
-collected and used, no heed was taken
-of the gas. Nor was it until Mr.
-Murdock’s attention was called to the
-subject that lighting by gas was
-proved to be practicable.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-354" id="Footnote-354" href="#Anchor-354" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[354]</span></a> ‘Philosophical Transactions,’ 1808,
-pp. 124&ndash;132.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-355" id="Footnote-355" href="#Anchor-355" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[355]</span></a> Many years later (in 1818), when
-Murdock was at Manchester for the
-purpose of starting one of Boulton and
-Watt’s engines, he was invited, with
-Mr. William Fairbairn, to dine at
-Medlock Bank, then at some distance
-from the lighted part of the town.
-“It was a dark winter’s night,” writes
-Mr. Fairbairn, our informant, “and
-how to reach the house over such bad
-roads was a question not easily solved.
-Mr. Murdock, however, fruitful in
-resources, went to the Gas Works,
-(then established in Manchester),
-where he filled a bladder which he
-had with him, and placing it under
-his arm like a bagpipe, he discharged
-through the stem of an old tobacco-pipe
-a stream of gas which enabled us
-to walk in safety to Medlock Bank.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-356" id="Footnote-356" href="#Anchor-356" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[356]</span></a> Watt here alluded to the new
-machinery and plant erected at Soho
-under Murdock’s directions, at a cost
-of about 5000<i>l.</i> for the purpose of
-manufacturing gas apparatus.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-357" id="Footnote-357" href="#Anchor-357" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[357]</span></a> The invention of lighting by gas
-has by some writers been erroneously
-attributed to Winsor. It will be
-observed, from the statement in the
-text, that coal-gas had been in regular
-use long before the appearance of his
-scheme, which was one of the most
-crude and inflated ever brought before
-the public. “The Patriotic Imperial
-and National Light and Heat Company,”
-proposed amongst other things
-to aid and assist Government with
-funds in times of emergency, to
-increase the Sinking-fund for reducing
-the National Debt, to reward meritorious
-discoverers, &amp;c. &amp;c. Some idea
-of the character of the project may be
-formed from Mr. [Lord] Brougham’s
-speech in opening the case against the
-Bill:&mdash;“‘The neat annual profits,’ says
-Mr. Winsor, ‘agreeable to the <em>official
-experiments</em>’ (that is, the experiments
-of Mr. Accum....) ‘amount to
-229,353,627<i>l.</i>’ ... now Mr. Winsor
-says, that he will allow there may be
-an error here, for the sake of arguing
-with those who still have their
-doubts; and he will admit that the sum
-should be taken at only one half, or
-114,845,294<i>l.</i>; and then giving up,
-to meet all possible objections, nine-tenths
-of that sum, still there will
-remain, to be paid to the subscribers
-of this Company, a yearly profit of
-570<i>l.</i> for every 5<i>l.</i> of deposit! So that
-upon paying 5<i>l.</i> every subscriber is to
-receive 570<i>l.</i> a year for ever, and this
-to the last farthing; it may increase
-but less it can never be; the clear
-profit is always to be above 10,000<i>l.</i>
-per cent. upon the capital! This is
-pretty well, sir, one would think.
-There is here estimate and statement
-enough to captivate the public; but
-this is not all; for Mr. Winsor has
-taken out a patent (of which, indeed,
-he has, according to his custom, enrolled
-no specification, but, on the contrary,
-has enrolled a surrender) for the invention
-of several things, and, among
-others, one for rendering this gas respirable.
-It is not enough that this
-gas (which everybody knows to be
-not respirable, but as poisonous to the
-lungs as fixed air) should be capable
-of giving light; but he thinks it also
-necessary to prove that it may easily
-be rendered respirable; in short, that
-there is no way in which it may not
-be used, and nothing which may not
-be made of it.... In another pamphlet....
-Mr. Winsor endeavours to
-prove that this gas is the vital principle;
-that in which life itself consists.
-If I had taken the trouble to go through
-his publications, which I certainly
-have not done, it is hard to say what
-I might not have discovered; but
-I should think the difficulty would
-rather be, to find one quality which
-the gas is not stated to possess.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-358" id="Footnote-358" href="#Anchor-358" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[358]</span></a> The first application of the “Gas-light
-and Coke Company” to Parliament
-in 1809 for an Act proved
-unsuccessful, but the “London and
-Westminster Chartered Gas-light
-and Coke Company” succeeded in
-the following year. The Company,
-however, did not succeed commercially,
-and was on the point of dissolution,
-when Mr. Clegg, a pupil of
-Murdock, bred at Soho, undertook
-the management and introduced new
-and improved apparatus. Mr. Clegg
-first lighted with gas Mr. Ackerman’s
-shop in the Strand in 1810, and it
-was regarded as a great novelty. One
-lady of rank was so much delighted
-with the brilliancy of the gas-lamp
-fixed on the shop counter, that she
-asked to be allowed to carry it home
-in her carriage, and offered any sum
-for a similar one. Mr. Winsor by his
-persistent advocacy of gas-lighting,
-did much to bring it into further
-notice; but it was Mr. Clegg’s practical
-ability that mainly led to its
-general adoption. When Westminster
-Bridge was first lit up with gas in
-1812, the lamplighters were so disgusted
-with it that they struck work,
-and Mr. Clegg himself had to act as
-lamplighter.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-359" id="Footnote-359" href="#Anchor-359" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[359]</span></a> “It consisted,” says Mr. Buckle,
-“of a piston working in a cylinder
-10 feet diameter in water, with a lift
-of 12 feet, and raised by forcing in air
-from a small blowing cylinder 12
-inches diameter, 18 inches stroke,
-which was worked by the gearing in
-the boring-mill.” Paper read by the
-late William Buckle at the Institution
-of Mechanical Engineers at Birmingham,
-23rd October, 1850.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-360" id="Footnote-360" href="#Anchor-360" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[360]</span></a> Lockhart’s ‘Life of Scott,’ one
-vol. edition, p. 500.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-361" id="Footnote-361" href="#Anchor-361" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[361]</span></a> Mr. Buckle, in the memoir above
-cited, says,&mdash;“So completely was he
-absorbed at all times with the subject
-he had in hand, that he was quite
-regardless of everything else. When
-in London explaining to the brewers
-the nature of his substitute for
-<ins title="Transcriber's Note: original reads 'isinglas'">isinglass</ins>, he occupied handsome apartments.
-He, however, little respected
-the splendour of his drawing-room,
-and, fancying himself in his laboratory
-at Soho, he proceeded with his experiments
-quite careless and unconscious
-of the mischief he was doing. One
-morning his landlady calling in to
-receive his orders, was horrified to
-see her magnificent paper-hangings
-covered with wet fish-skins hung up
-to dry; and he was caught in the act
-of pinning up a cod’s skin to undergo
-the same process. Whether the lady
-fainted or not is not on record, but
-the immediate ejectment of the
-gentleman and his fish was the consequence.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-362" id="Footnote-362" href="#Anchor-362" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[362]</span></a> The young partners regarded him
-with a degree of affection and veneration,
-which often shows itself in
-their correspondence. Towards the
-later years of his life Mr. Murdock’s
-faculties gradually decayed, and he
-wholly retired from the business of
-Soho, dying at his house at Sycamore
-Hill, Handsworth, on the 15th Nov.,
-1839, in his 85th year.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-363" id="Footnote-363" href="#Anchor-363" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[363]</span></a> The first piece of iron-toothed
-gearing ever cast is placed on the lawn
-in front of Murdock’s villa. The teeth
-are of somewhat unequal form, and
-the casting is rough&mdash;perhaps it has
-been exposed to rough usage. It bears
-the following inscription:&mdash;“This
-Pinton was cast at Carron Ironworks
-for John Murdock, of Bellow Mill,
-Ayrshire, A.D. 1760, being the first
-tooth-gearing ever used in millwork
-in Great Britain.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-364" id="Footnote-364" href="#Anchor-364" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[364]</span></a> The Symingtons, father and son,
-began at an early period to design
-improvements on Watt’s pumping-engine,
-and took out a patent for a
-fire-engine on a new principle as early
-as the year 1785. Watt heard of its
-progress from time to time; but he had
-no great opinion of the Symingtons,
-and treated their alleged invention
-with indifference. On the 28th September,
-1787, he wrote Boulton,&mdash;“Isaac
-Perrins [a fitter] is returned
-from Scotland. He says Symington
-has invented a new engine, which is
-to work under 12½ lbs. on the inch
-and has got a patent for it, which
-Mr. M[eason] has paid for. By his
-account it seems to be on the same
-principle as the Trumpeters. As soon
-as they can rely fully on the new
-engine, the old one is to be pulled
-down, and Symington is to put up
-one of his in the house, and, on that
-answering, ours is to be stopped!”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-365" id="Footnote-365" href="#Anchor-365" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[365]</span></a> This interesting letter, so important
-as regards the early history
-of the invention of the steamboat,
-appeared for the first time in the
-supplementary volume to the ‘Official
-Description and Illustrated Catalogue
-of the Great Exhibition of 1851,’ to
-which it was contributed by Mr. W. C.
-Aitkin of Birmingham.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-366" id="Footnote-366" href="#Anchor-366" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[366]</span></a> ‘The Elevation, Section, Plans,
-and Views, of a Triple Vessel, and of
-Wheels, with Explanations of the
-Figures in the Engraving, and a short
-Account of the Properties and Advantages
-of the Invention.’ By Patrick
-Miller, Esq., of Dalswinton, Edinburgh,
-1787.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-367" id="Footnote-367" href="#Anchor-367" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[367]</span></a> Mr. Miller’s statement to the Royal
-Society, 20th December, 1787.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-368" id="Footnote-368" href="#Anchor-368" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[368]</span></a> Boulton to Sir John Dalrymple,
-26th March, 1788. The “one purpose”
-alluded to by Boulton is supposed
-to have been the Torpedo, then a favourite
-scheme with French inventors
-for blowing up English ships.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-369" id="Footnote-369" href="#Anchor-369" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[369]</span></a> Taylor to Miller, 20th August, 1788. ‘Supplementary Vol. to Official
-Description and Illustrated Catalogue of the Exhibition of 1851,’ p. 1473.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-370" id="Footnote-370" href="#Anchor-370" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[370]</span></a> Taylor to Miller, 20th August,
-1788. ‘Supplementary Vol. to Official
-Description and Illustrated Catalogue
-of the Exhibition of 1851,’ p. 1473.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-371" id="Footnote-371" href="#Anchor-371" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[371]</span></a> The following contemporary account
-of the trial appeared in the
-‘Scots Magazine’ for November,
-1788:&mdash;“On October 14th, a boat
-was put in motion by a steam-engine
-upon Mr. Miller of Dalswinton’s piece
-of water at that place. That gentleman’s
-improvements in naval affairs
-are well known to the public. For
-some time past his attention has been
-turned to the application of the steam-engine
-to the purposes of navigation.
-He has now accomplished, and evidently
-shown to the world, the practicability
-of this, by executing it upon
-a small scale. A vessel, 25 feet long
-and 7 broad, was, on the above date,
-driven with two wheels by a small
-engine. It answered Mr. Miller’s
-expectations fully, and afforded great
-pleasure to the spectators. The
-success of this experiment is no small
-accession to the public. Its utility in
-canals, and all inland navigation,
-points it out to be of the greatest
-advantage, not only to this island, but
-to many other nations of the world.
-The engine used is Mr. Symington’s
-new patent engine.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-372" id="Footnote-372" href="#Anchor-372" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[372]</span></a> From a memorandum found
-amongst Mr. Boulton’s papers, we
-learn that the following were the
-details of Symington’s engine:&mdash;“Engine
-hath two cylinders of 18 inches
-diameter each and 2 feet stroke. The
-rods of each piston are connected to a
-circular barrel of cast iron by means
-of chains, so that whilst one piston
-moves down the other ascends, and so
-gives the barrel a reciprocating motion.
-Upon the axis of the barrel is an arm
-or lever which works the plug and
-working gear. Each of the cylinders
-hath 2 pistons, one at top and the other
-at bottom; the 2 bottom pistons have
-their rods moving in stuffing-boxes
-and are connected together by a beam.
-The steam is admitted into the cylinder
-at its side, between the 2 pistons, and
-moves the one up and the other down;
-but the motion of the upper is greater
-than the under. When the upper
-piston is got to the top and the under
-one to the bottom, the steam valve is
-shut and the exhaustion one opened;
-by which the steam is admitted into
-the bottom of the cylinder, and is in its
-way met by a jet of cold water, which
-condenses it, and then it is squeezed
-out by the under piston, which in fact
-makes the bottom of the cylinder an
-air-pump. Whilst this condensation
-is going forward in the one cylinder,
-the steam is operating in the other,
-and <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">vice versâ</i>.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-373" id="Footnote-373" href="#Anchor-373" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[373]</span></a> “I am now satisfied,” he said,
-“that Mr. Symington’s steam-engine
-is the most improper of all steam-engines
-for giving motion to a vessel,
-and that he does not know how to
-calculate frictions or mechanical
-powers. By means of a new well-constructed
-valve-wheel, and the
-pinion being doubled in diameter, I
-doubt not that the velocity of the
-vessel’s motion will be increased; but,
-do as you will, a great deal of power
-of the engine must be lost in friction.
-I remember well that when the small
-engine was wrought in the boat at
-Dalswinton, I had formed the same
-idea, and that I told you so; but not
-having studied the subject, I gave up
-my own common sense. This is now
-past remedy. As the engine cannot
-be of use to me now, I hope, with the
-aid of Mr. Tibbets and Mr. Stainton,
-you will get it sold before you leave
-Carron.”&mdash;Miller to Taylor, 7th December,
-1789.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-374" id="Footnote-374" href="#Anchor-374" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[374]</span></a> J. Watt to R. Cullen, 24th April,
-1790, ‘Supplementary Volume to
-Official Descriptive and Illustrated
-Catalogue of the Exhibition of 1851,’
-p. 1475.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-375" id="Footnote-375" href="#Anchor-375" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[375]</span></a> One day in March, 1802, on the
-occasion of a strong west wind blowing,
-when the canal-boats could with difficulty
-be moved to windward, the
-steamer took in tow two laden sloops,
-the ‘Active’ and ‘Euphemia,’ of
-seventy tons each, from Lock 20 to
-Port Dundas, Glasgow, a distance of
-19½ miles, in six hours.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-376" id="Footnote-376" href="#Anchor-376" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[376]</span></a> ‘A sketch of the Origin and Progress of Steam Navigation.’ By Bennet
-Woodcroft. London, 1848.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-377" id="Footnote-377" href="#Anchor-377" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[377]</span></a> Symington continued to struggle
-for many years under the burden of
-debt which he had incurred by his
-experiments; and though a sum of
-100<i>l.</i> was granted him from the Privy
-Purse in 1824, and 50<i>l.</i> a year or two
-afterwards, he remained in a state of
-poverty during the rest of his life. He
-died on the 22nd March, 1831, and
-was buried in the churchyard of St.
-Botolph, Aldgate, London.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-378" id="Footnote-378" href="#Anchor-378" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[378]</span></a> The following deposition was made
-on oath by Robert Weir of Kincardine,
-before Robert Dundas J. P. for the
-county of Perth, at Blair Castle, on
-the 23rd October, 1824:&mdash;“That, in
-the year 1801, he remembers of Mr.
-Symington erecting a boat, and fitting
-a steam-engine into it, and dragging
-two vessels along the Forth and Clyde
-Canal by means of the said steamboat.
-That the deponent was employed
-as engine-fireman on board of
-the said boat. Deposes that the following
-persons, now living, were also
-on board, viz., Alexander Hart and
-John Allen, ship-builders, Grangemouth,
-and John Esplin and William
-Gow, shipmasters there. That some
-time after the first experiment, while
-the boat was lying upon the canal at
-Lock 16, it was visited by a stranger,
-who requested to see the boat worked.
-That the said William Symington
-desired the deponent to light the
-furnace, which was done, and the
-stranger was carried about four miles
-along the canal, and brought back.
-That this stranger made inquiries
-both as to the mode of constructing
-and of working the boat, and took
-notes of the information given him by
-the said William Symington. That
-the deponent heard the stranger say
-his name was Fulton, and that he was
-a native of the United States of
-America. That the deponent remembers
-Mr. Symington remarking
-that the progress of the boat was
-much impeded by the narrowness of
-the canal, to which Mr. Fulton
-answered that the objection would not
-apply to the large rivers of North
-America, where he thought the boat
-might be used to great advantage.”&mdash;From
-copies of affidavits in the
-‘Biography of William Symington.’
-By J. and W. R. Rankin, Engineers,
-Falkirk, 1862.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-379" id="Footnote-379" href="#Anchor-379" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[379]</span></a> In one of his letters, Bell says&mdash;“Fulton
-came at different times to
-the country and stopped with me for
-some time.”&mdash;‘Life of Henry Bell,’
-p. 74.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-380" id="Footnote-380" href="#Anchor-380" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[380]</span></a> Cited in Muirhead’s ‘Life of James Watt,’ 2nd ed. p. 426.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-381" id="Footnote-381" href="#Anchor-381" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[381]</span></a> Boulton to Lord Hawkesbury, 22nd August, 1803. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-382" id="Footnote-382" href="#Anchor-382" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[382]</span></a> It is stated in the ‘Life of Henry
-Bell,’ that he applied to Mr. Watt in
-the year 1801, for his advice as to a
-suitable engine for a steamboat; but
-Watt gave him no encouragement to
-proceed with his design. “How many
-noblemen, gentlemen, and engineers,”
-he wrote to Bell, “have puzzled their
-brains, and spent their thousands of
-pounds, and none of these, nor yourself,
-have been able to bring the power of
-steam in navigation to a successful
-issue.”&mdash;‘Life of Bell.’ By E. Morris,
-Glasgow, 1844, p. 30.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-383" id="Footnote-383" href="#Anchor-383" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[383]</span></a> The starting of the ‘Comet’ naturally
-excited great interest along the
-Clyde. In the evenings, thousands of
-spectators lined the banks as far as
-Govan to see her pass up from Greenock.
-The masters of the old sailing
-craft, however, regarded the ‘Comet’
-with apprehension and dismay. The
-old Highland gabert men were especially
-hostile, denouncing the new
-vessel as being impelled by the
-“teevil’s wun” (devil’s wind). The
-story is told of the steamer one day
-coming up with a fly boat tacking
-against the tide, when the crew began
-to jeer the skipper of the fly, calling
-upon him to come along with his lazy
-craft. “Get oot o’ my sight,” he
-cried, in reply, “I’m just gaun as it
-pleases the breath o’ the Almichty, and
-I’ll ne’er fash my thumb how fast ye
-gang wi’ your blasted deevil’s reek.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-384" id="Footnote-384" href="#Anchor-384" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[384]</span></a> Boulton to Dumergue, 25th December,
-1800.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-385" id="Footnote-385" href="#Anchor-385" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[385]</span></a> Lockhart’s ‘Life of Scott.’ 8vo.
-ed. p. 457. One of Scott’s visits to
-Soho was made in company with his
-wife in the spring of 1803. Boulton
-was so pleased with the visit, that he
-urged Scott, or at least his wife, to
-repeat it, which produced the following
-letter, dated London, 13th May,
-1803:&mdash;</p>
-
-<div class="letter">
-<p>“My dear Sir,&mdash;He was a wise man who
-said ‘Trust not thy wife with a man of
-fair tongue.’ Now as I have very little
-wisdom of my own, I am content to gather
-all I can get at second hand, and therefore,
-upon the faith of the sage whom I have
-quoted, I should be guilty of great imprudence
-were I to permit Charlotte to wait upon
-you on her return, or even to answer your
-kind letter to Mr. Dumergue. That task I
-therefore take upon myself, and you must
-receive my thanks along with hers, for your
-very kind and flattering invitation to Soho.
-But independent of my just suspicion of a
-beau who writes such flattering love-letters
-to my wife, our time here (owing to the
-sitting of our Courts of Justice, which I must
-necessarily attend), lays us under an indispensable
-necessity of returning to Scotland
-as speedily as possible, and by the nearest
-road. We can therefore only express our
-joint and most sincere regret that we cannot
-upon this occasion have the honour and satisfaction
-of visiting Soho and its hospitable
-inhabitants. Mrs. Nicolson, Mr. and Miss
-Dumergue join Charlotte and me in the most
-sincere good wishes to Miss Boulton, to you,
-and to all your friends; and I suspect so
-foolish a letter will make you believe you
-have escaped a very idle visitor in,</p>
-
-<p class="sig-less2">“Dear Sir,</p>
-
-<p class="sig-less">“Your very faithful servant,</p>
-
-<p class="sig">“<span class="smcap">Walter Scott</span>.”</p>
-</div></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-386" id="Footnote-386" href="#Anchor-386" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[386]</span></a> Watt to M. Robinson Boulton, 9th
-September, 1799.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-387" id="Footnote-387" href="#Anchor-387" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[387]</span></a> Watt to M. Robinson Boulton,
-26th September, 1799.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-388" id="Footnote-388" href="#Anchor-388" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[388]</span></a> Boulton to Watt, 10th October,
-1802. One of Boulton’s objects in
-making his contemplated journey to
-Paris, was to undertake the erection
-of coining machinery for the French
-Government, who were about to recoin
-the whole of their gold, silver, and
-copper money. With their imperfect
-machinery, he calculated that it would
-take them nearly twenty years to
-accomplish this; whereas with his
-new machinery he could undertake to
-turn out a thousand million of pieces
-in three years. He communicated to
-Watt, that he had been making experiments
-as to the maximum speed of
-his coining machines, worked by the
-steam-engine, and found that he could
-regularly strike fifty-three of his
-copper pieces or fifty-six English
-crown-pieces per minute, while he
-could with one press in collars also
-regularly strike India copper pieces of
-half the diameter at the rate of 106 to
-112 per minute, or from 6360 to 6720
-pieces per hour; but when pieces of
-half an inch diameter were wanted he
-had recourse to his new small press,
-with which he could strike from 150
-to 200 pieces per minute! “My
-presses,” said he, “are far more exact
-and more durable, and my means of
-working them are now infinitely beyond
-anything they (the French
-coiners) have ever thought of, and my
-mint is now in far better order than
-ever.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-389" id="Footnote-389" href="#Anchor-389" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[389]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 23rd November, 1802.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-390" id="Footnote-390" href="#Anchor-390" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[390]</span></a> Robison to Watt, 3rd February, 1797.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-391" id="Footnote-391" href="#Anchor-391" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[391]</span></a> Cited in Muirhead’s ‘Origin and
-Progress of the Mechanical Inventions
-of James Watt,’ ii. 264
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-392" id="Footnote-392" href="#Anchor-392" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[392]</span></a> Lord Cockburn’s ‘Memorials,’ 51.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-393" id="Footnote-393" href="#Anchor-393" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[393]</span></a> It is a remarkable fact that Dr.
-Priestley was regarded with as much
-suspicion in America as he had been
-in England. The American government
-looked upon him as a spy in the
-interest of France; and he had great
-difficulty in forming a Unitarian congregation.
-The horror of the French
-Revolution, which had extended to
-America, was the cause of the hostile
-feeling displayed towards him. “The
-change that has taken place,” he said,
-in a letter dated 6th September, 1798,
-“is indeed hardly credible, as I have
-done nothing to provoke resentment;
-but, being a citizen of France, and a
-friend to the Revolution, is sufficient.
-I asked one of the more moderate of
-the party whether he thought, if Dr.
-Price, the great friend of their own
-Revolution, were alive, he would now
-be allowed to come into this country.
-He said, he believed he would not!”&mdash;In
-1801 Dr. Priestley, by deed of
-trust, appointed Matthew Boulton,
-Samuel Galton, and Wm. Vaughan,
-Esqrs., trustees for Mrs. Finch (his
-daughter) and her children, in respect
-of 1200<i>l.</i> invested for their benefit in
-public securities.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-394" id="Footnote-394" href="#Anchor-394" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[394]</span></a> Beattie’s ‘Life of Campbell,’ i. 112.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-395" id="Footnote-395" href="#Anchor-395" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[395]</span></a> Letter to M. R. Morehead, 7th May, 1796.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-396" id="Footnote-396" href="#Anchor-396" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[396]</span></a> Paris’s ‘Life of Davy,’ i. 48&ndash;9.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-397" id="Footnote-397" href="#Anchor-397" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[397]</span></a> ‘Philosophical Transactions,’ xcix. 279.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-398" id="Footnote-398" href="#Anchor-398" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[398]</span></a> J. Watt, jun., to M. R. Boulton, 8th June, 1804.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-399" id="Footnote-399" href="#Anchor-399" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[399]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, Sidmouth, 14th October, 1804.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-400" id="Footnote-400" href="#Anchor-400" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[400]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, Exeter, 22nd October, 1804.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-401" id="Footnote-401" href="#Anchor-401" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[401]</span></a> Paris’s ‘Life of Davy,’ i. 198&ndash;200.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-402" id="Footnote-402" href="#Anchor-402" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[402]</span></a> Cited in Muirhead’s ‘Mechanical
-Inventions of James Watt,&mdash;Correspondence,’
-ii. 269.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-403" id="Footnote-403" href="#Anchor-403" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[403]</span></a> One of these, thrown out in a
-letter to Watt, may be mentioned&mdash;a
-speculation since revived by the
-late Dr. S. Brown of Edinburgh,&mdash;the
-transmutation of bodies. “These are
-wonderful steps,” said he, “which are
-every day making in chemical analysis.
-The analysis of the alkalis and
-alkaline earths by Guyton, by Henry,
-and others, will presently lead, I think,
-to the doctrine of <em>a reciprocal convertibility
-of all things into all</em>. It
-brings to mind a minister lecturing on
-the first chapter of one of the Gospels,
-when, after reading, ‘Adam begat
-Abel, and Abel begat,’ &amp;c.,&mdash;to save
-himself the trouble of so many cramp
-names, he said, ‘and so they all begat
-one another to the 15th verse.’ I
-expect to see alchemy revive, and be
-as universally studied as ever.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-404" id="Footnote-404" href="#Anchor-404" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[404]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 13th May, 1804.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-405" id="Footnote-405" href="#Anchor-405" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[405]</span></a> Watt to Boulton, 14th October, 1804.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-406" id="Footnote-406" href="#Anchor-406" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[406]</span></a> De Luc to Boulton, Windsor
-Castle, 25th January, 1807. It had
-been arranged that George III., the
-Queen, and the Princesses, should pay
-a visit to Soho in 1805, though the
-King had by that time become quite
-blind. When told of Boulton’s illness,
-and that he was confined to bed, his
-Majesty replied, “Then I will visit
-Mr. Boulton in his sick-chamber”
-(MS. Memoir by Mr. Keir). The
-royal visit was eventually put off, the
-Council advising that the King should
-go direct to Weymouth and nowhere
-else.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-407" id="Footnote-407" href="#Anchor-407" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[407]</span></a> The following is the inscription on the mural monument erected to his
-memory in the side aisle of Handsworth Church, in the composition of which
-James Watt assisted:&mdash;</p>
-
-<div class="center">
-Sacred to the Memory of<br />
-<span class="smcap">Matthew Boulton, F.R.S.</span><br />
-By the skilful exertion of a mind turned to Philosophy and Mechanics,<br />
-The application of a taste correct and refined,<br />
-And an ardent spirit of enterprize, he improved, embellished, and extended<br />
-The Arts and Manufactures of his country,<br />
-Leaving his Establishment of Soho a noble monument of his<br />
-Genius, industry, and success.<br />
-The character his talents had raised, his virtues adorned and exalted.<br />
-Active to discern merit, and prompt to relieve distress,<br />
-His encouragement was liberal, his benevolence unwearied.<br />
-Honoured and admired at home and abroad,<br />
-He closed a life eminently useful, the 17th of August, 1809, Aged 81,<br />
-Esteemed, loved, and lamented.
-</div></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-408" id="Footnote-408" href="#Anchor-408" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[408]</span></a> The monument to Boulton is on the left hand of the altar in the above
-illustration; that of Murdock is opposite to it, on the right.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-409" id="Footnote-409" href="#Anchor-409" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[409]</span></a> Isaac Perrins was one of the most
-noted among the fighters of Soho.
-Mr. Scale, a partner in the hardware
-business, wrote to Mr. Boulton, then
-at Cosgarne (15th October, 1782),&mdash;“Perrins
-has had a battle with the
-famous Jemmy Sargent for a hundred
-guineas, in which Perrins came off
-conqueror without a fall or hurt: in
-13 rounds he knocked down his antagonist
-13 times. They had it out
-at Colemore on our Wake Monday.
-The Sohoites all returned with blue
-cockades.” Mrs. Watt, in a gossipy
-letter to Mr. Boulton of the same date,
-says “1500<i>l.</i> was betted against
-Perrins at Birmingham, and lost.”
-Perrins’s success led him to turn “professional
-bruiser” for a time, and he
-left his place in the smith’s shop. But
-either not succeeding in his new business,
-or finding the work harder than
-that of the smithy, he came back to
-Soho, and, being a good workman, he
-was taken on again and remained in
-Boulton’s employment till the close of
-his life, leaving sons to succeed him
-in the same department.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-410" id="Footnote-410" href="#Anchor-410" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[410]</span></a> Boulton to De Luc, 20th October, 1787.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-411" id="Footnote-411" href="#Anchor-411" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[411]</span></a> The MS. memoir is dated Glasgow
-the 17th September, 1809, at which
-period Watt was in his 73rd year. It
-had evidently been written at the
-request of M. Robinson Boulton, Esq.,
-shortly after his father’s death. We
-find various testimony to the same
-effect as the above in the Soho papers.
-Thus Mr. Peter Ewart, C.E., speaks
-of Mr. Boulton’s remarkable quickness
-in selecting objects to which
-machinery might be applied with advantage,
-and of his great promptitude
-and determination in carrying his plans
-into effect. He also describes the contagiousness
-of his example, which
-strengthened the weak and inspired
-the timid. “He possessed,” says Mr.
-Ewart, “above all other men I have
-ever known, the faculty of inspiring
-others with a portion of that ardent
-zeal with which he himself pursued
-every important object he had in
-view; and it was impossible to be
-near him without becoming warmly
-interested in the success of his enterprises.
-The urbanity of his manners,
-and his great kindness to young people
-in particular, never failed to leave the
-most agreeable impression on the
-minds of all around him; and most
-truly may it be said that he reigned
-in the hearts of those that were in
-his employment.”&mdash;Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-412" id="Footnote-412" href="#Anchor-412" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[412]</span></a> Boulton to M. Vanlinder, Rotterdam, 24th April, 1788.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-413" id="Footnote-413" href="#Anchor-413" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[413]</span></a> “Though I was in some measure
-prepared,” he wrote, “yet I had hoped
-that he might have recovered from
-this fit, as he has done from other
-severe ones. Such wishes, however,
-were selfish; for in respect to himself,
-none of his friends could rationally
-have desired the prolongation of a life
-which has long been passed in torture,
-without hope of relief. May he
-therefore rest in peace; and when our
-end approaches, may we have as little
-to reproach us and as much to console
-us as he had.”&mdash;Mr. Watt to his son,
-22nd August, 1809. Boulton MSS.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-414" id="Footnote-414" href="#Anchor-414" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[414]</span></a> Watt to M. Robinson Boulton,
-23rd August, 1809.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-415" id="Footnote-415" href="#Anchor-415" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[415]</span></a> Lord Brougham’s ‘Lives of Philosophers
-of the Time of George III.’
-The Friday Club of Edinburgh was so
-called because of the evening of the
-week on which it met and supped. It
-numbered amongst its members Professor
-Playfair, Walter Scott, Henry
-Brougham, Francis Jeffrey, Leonard
-Horner, Lord Corehouse, Sir W. Drummond,
-and others known to fame.
-Watt was a regular attender of the
-Club during his Edinburgh visits.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-416" id="Footnote-416" href="#Anchor-416" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[416]</span></a> In March, 1811, he wrote Dr. P.
-Wilson as follows:&mdash;“For want of
-other news I must now say a little
-upon my late invention, with which
-Dr. Herschel seemed much pleased.
-It continues to succeed, and I have
-realised some more of my ideas on the
-subject. I have executed several
-small busts in alabaster, not being
-strong enough to work in marble. I
-had a difficulty in getting the several
-segments which form the surface of
-the bust to meet, but have now accomplished
-it. It requires a very accurate
-construction of the machine, and a
-very accurate adjustment of the tools,
-so that their axes may be always
-equally distant from each other, as
-the axes of the pattern and that of the
-stone to be cut are. I have also made
-some improvements in the tools for
-cutting marble and other hard stones.
-The things you saw were done by the
-tool and the guide-point, moving in
-parallel lines, straight or circular, and
-very near one another; (an illustration
-of Euclid’s position, that the
-motion of a point generates a line, and
-the motion of a line generates a surface).
-I have now contrived, though
-not executed, that the two points, the
-guide and the cutting point, may
-move in any line, whether straight or
-crooked, square or diagonal, so that
-an inscription might be cut in stone
-from a drawing on paper.”&mdash;Cited in
-Muirhead’s ‘Mechanical Inventions of
-James Watt,’ ii. 329&ndash;30.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-417" id="Footnote-417" href="#Anchor-417" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[417]</span></a> Cited in Muirhead’s ‘Mechanical
-Inventions,’ &amp;c., ii. 340&ndash;1. These
-drawings must be in existence, and
-of great interest, as showing the vigour
-of Watt’s inventive faculty at this
-late period of his life.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-418" id="Footnote-418" href="#Anchor-418" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[418]</span></a> In 1808 Mr. Watt made over
-300<i>l.</i> to the College by Deed of Gift,
-for the purpose of founding a prize for
-students in Natural Science, as some
-acknowledgment of “the many favours”
-which the College had conferred
-upon him.&mdash;In 1816 he gave
-to the Town of Greenock 100<i>l.</i> for the
-purpose of purchasing books for the
-Mathematical School. “My intention
-in this donation,” he observed in his
-letter to Mr. Anderson of Greenock,
-“is to form the beginning of a scientific
-library, for the instruction of the youth
-of Greenock; and I hope it will
-prompt others to add to it, and to
-render my townsmen as eminent for
-their knowledge as they are for their
-spirit of enterprise.” Watt’s idea has
-since been carried out by his townsmen,
-and the Watt Library is now
-one of the most valuable institutions
-of Greenock. It ought to be added,
-that the erection of the building was
-mainly due to the munificence of Mr.
-Watt’s son, the late James Watt, Esq.,
-of Aston Hall, near Birmingham. A
-marble statue of Watt, by Chantrey,
-is placed in the Library, with an inscription
-from the pen of Lord Jeffrey.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-419" id="Footnote-419" href="#Anchor-419" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[419]</span></a> Answer by the author of ‘Waverley’
-to the Epistle Dedicatory of ‘The
-Monastery.’
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-420" id="Footnote-420" href="#Anchor-420" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[420]</span></a> ‘Autobiography of Mrs. Schimmelpenninck,’
-3rd ed. 35.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-421" id="Footnote-421" href="#Anchor-421" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[421]</span></a> The following anecdote is told by
-Mrs. Schimmelpenninck:&mdash;“During
-the peace of Amiens, Mr. Watt visited
-Paris. It so happened that while
-going through one of the palaces, I
-believe the Tuileries, a French housemaid
-appeared much perplexed concerning
-some bright English stoves
-which had just been received, and
-which she did not know how to clean.
-An English gentleman was standing
-by, to whom she appealed for information.
-This was Charles James Fox.
-He could give no help; “But,” said
-he, “here is a fellow-countryman of
-mine who will tell you all about it.”
-This was Mr. Watt, to whom he was
-at the moment talking; and who proceeded
-to give the housemaid full
-instructions as to the best mode of
-cleaning her grate. This anecdote I
-have often heard Mrs. Watt tell with
-great diversion.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-422" id="Footnote-422" href="#Anchor-422" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[422]</span></a> Lord Brougham says, “His voice
-was deep and low, and if somewhat
-monotonous, it yet seemed in harmony
-with the weight and the beauty of his
-discourse, through which, however,
-there also ran a current of a lighter
-kind; for he was mirthful, temperately
-jocular, nor could anything to
-more advantage set off the living
-anecdotes of men and things, with
-which the grave texture of his talk
-was interwoven, than his sly and quiet
-humour, both of mind and look, in
-recounting them.”&mdash;‘Lives of Philosophers
-of the Time of George III.’
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-423" id="Footnote-423" href="#Anchor-423" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[423]</span></a> “I remember, as a young girl,”
-she says, “the pleasant dinners and
-people I have seen at Soho. I remember
-being present one day when
-Bertrand de Moleville, the exiled
-minister of Louis XVI., left the
-dinner-table to make an omelette,
-which was, of course, pronounced ‘excellent.’
-That man then gave me a
-lifelong lesson,&mdash;of the power of enjoyment
-and of giving pleasure by
-his cheerful bright manner and conversation,
-under such sad circumstances
-as exile and poverty. I looked at
-him with great admiration, and I
-have his face distinct before me
-now, though I saw him only that
-once.”
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-424" id="Footnote-424" href="#Anchor-424" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[424]</span></a> The following is the inscription:&mdash;</p>
-
-<div class="center">
-<span class="smcap">not to perpetuate a name<br />
-which must endure while the peaceful arts flourish,<br />
-but to show<br />
-that mankind have learned to honour those<br />
-who best deserve their gratitude,<br />
-the King,<br />
-his ministers, and many of the nobles<br />
-and commoners of the realm,<br />
-raised this monument to<br />
-JAMES WATT,<br />
-who directing the force of an original genius<br />
-early exercised in philosophic research<br />
-to the improvement of<br />
-the Steam-engine,<br />
-enlarged the resources of his country,<br />
-increased the power of man,<br />
-and rose to an eminent place<br />
-among the most illustrious followers of science,<br />
-and the real benefactors of the world.<br />
-Born at Greenock, 1736.<br />
-Died at Heathfield, in Staffordshire, 1819.</span>
-</div></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-425" id="Footnote-425" href="#Anchor-425" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[425]</span></a> E. M. Bataille, ‘Traité des Machines à Vapeur.’ Paris, 1847&ndash;9.
-</p></div>
-
-<div class="footnote">
-<p><a name="Footnote-426" id="Footnote-426" href="#Anchor-426" title="Return to text.">
-<span class="label">[426]</span></a> What the steam-engine has done
-for the West is well known. What
-is yet expected from it in the East
-may be gathered from the few pregnant
-words lately uttered by Hassan
-Ali Khan, Persian Ambassador at the
-Court of France, at the recent celebration
-in Paris of a national festival instituted
-nineteen centuries before the
-birth of Christ. Having recalled the
-minds of his hearers to the early fire
-worship of his country, which sprang
-from the primeval idolatry, he proceeded
-to say that it was still to Fire
-that he fondly looked for the regeneration
-of Persia. Fire had changed
-the face of Europe. In the steam-engine,
-the railroad, the electric spark,
-the screw or paddle ship, far more
-than in gunpowder or rifled cannon,
-fire was the great benefactor that
-would bless one day the land of his
-forefathers, who had instinctively
-worshipped that element in secret
-anticipation of what was to come.
-</p></div>
-
-</div>
-
-<hr class="chap noepub" />
-
-<div class="tnote-end" id="tn-end">
-
-<p class="center"><b>Transcriber’s Notes:</b></p>
-
-<p>Minor inconsistencies in punctuation have been standardised.
-All other original errors and inconsistencies have been
-retained, except as follows (the first line is the original text,
-the second the passage as currently stands):</p>
-
-<ul class="corrections">
-<li><a href="#Corr-33">Page 33</a>:<br />
-Leipsic, in <span class="correction">1790</span>. “I felt<br />
-Leipsic, in <span class="correction">1690</span>. “I felt
-</li>
-
-<li><a href="#Corr-38">Page 38</a>:<br />
-this calamity <span class="correction">befel</span> Papin’s machine<br />
-this calamity <span class="correction">befell</span> Papin’s machine
-</li>
-
-<li><a href="#Corr-111">Page 111</a>:<br />
-he had <span class="correction">sucessfully</span> repaired an<br />
-he had <span class="correction">successfully</span> repaired an
-</li>
-
-<li><a href="#Corr-120">Page 120</a>:<br />
-<i>[caption missing]</i><br />
-<span class="correction">PAPIN’S DIGESTER.</span>
-</li>
-
-<li><a href="#Corr-128">Page 128</a>:<br />
-it had been <span class="correction">by</span> chance and<br />
-it had been <span class="correction">“by</span> chance and
-</li>
-
-<li><a href="#Corr-176">Page 176</a>:<br />
-exceeding good <span class="correction">acromatic</span><br />
-exceeding good <span class="correction">achromatic</span>
-</li>
-
-<li><a href="#Corr-315">Page 315</a>:<br />
-up your <span class="correction">fortitute</span> and try to<br />
-up your <span class="correction">fortitude</span> and try to
-</li>
-
-<li><a href="#Corr-404">Page 404</a>:<br />
-Every <span class="correction">pains</span> was taken to<br />
-Every <span class="correction">pain</span> was taken to
-</li>
-
-<li><a href="#Corr-438">Page 438</a>:<br />
-Symington was, <span class="correction">‘Why</span> don’t you<br />
-Symington was, <span class="correction">“Why</span> don’t you
-</li>
-
-<li><a href="#Corr-447">Page 447</a>:<br />
-chains and <span class="correction">ratched</span>-wheels, as in<br />
-chains and <span class="correction">ratchet</span>-wheels, as in
-</li>
-
-<li><a href="#Corr-447b">Page 447</a>:<br />
-proportionately <span class="correction">elate</span> at the<br />
-proportionately <span class="correction">elated</span> at the
-</li>
-
-<li><a href="#Corr-497">Page 497</a>:<br />
-<i>[caption missing]</i><br />
-<span class="correction">WATER-PIPE IN THE BED OF THE CLYDE.</span></li>
-
-<li><a href="#Corr-516">Page 516</a>:<br />
-<span class="correction">Chasewater</span> Mine and engine, 231;<br />
-<span class="correction">Chacewater</span> Mine and engine, 231;
-</li>
-
-<li><a href="#Corr-516b">Page 516</a>:<br />
-<span class="correction">Chasewater</span>, 235, 239, 242–3;<br />
-<span class="correction">Chacewater</span>, 235, 239, 242–3;
-</li>
-
-<li><a href="#Corr-517">Page 517</a>:<br />
-<span class="correction">Leman</span>, William, Penzance, 69.<br />
-<span class="correction">Lemon</span>, William, Penzance, 69.
-</li>
-
-<li><a href="#Corr-518">Page 518</a>:<br />
-Rumford gold medal, <span class="correction">525</span>;<br />
-Rumford gold medal, <span class="correction">425</span>;
-</li>
-
-<li><a href="#Corr-519">Page 519</a>:<br />
-<span class="correction">Sorbiere</span>, M., on Marquis of<br />
-<span class="correction">Sorbière</span>, M., on Marquis of
-</li>
-
-<li><a href="#Corr-519b">Page 519</a>:<br />
-Papin, <span class="correction">67</span>;<br />
-Papin, <span class="correction">37</span>;
-</li>
-
-<li><a href="#Corr-519c">Page 519</a>:<br />
-Steam flour-mills, 291, 325–<span class="correction">5</span>, 327.<br />
-Steam flour-mills, 291, 325–<span class="correction">6</span>, 327.
-</li>
-
-<li><a href="#Corr-520">Page 520</a>:<br />
-returns to <span class="correction">Sotland</span>, refused permission<br />
-returns to <span class="correction">Scotland</span>, refused permission
-</li>
-
-<li><a href="#Corr-520b">Page 520</a>:<br />
-Watt’s <span class="correction">imperfecfections</span>, 258;<br />
-Watt’s <span class="correction">imperfections</span>, 258;
-</li>
-
-<li><a href="#Corr-521">Page 521</a>:<br />
-Wilkinson, John, of <span class="correction">Brosely</span>, constructs<br />
-Wilkinson, John, of <span class="correction">Broseley</span>, constructs
-</li>
-
-<li><a href="#Corr-521b">Page 521</a>:<br />
-William III. and <span class="correction">Savary</span>, 50.<br />
-William III. and <span class="correction">Savery</span>, 50.
-</li>
-
-<li><a href="#Corr-VI">Page VI</a>:<br />
-<span class="correction">The</span> <i>Story of the</i><br />
-<span class="correction">“The</span> <i>Story of the</i>
-</li>
-
-<li><a href="#Footnote-24">Footnote 24</a>:<br />
-By Tho. <span class="correction">Savory</span>, Gent. London,<br />
-By Tho. <span class="correction">Savery</span>, Gent. London,
-</li>
-
-<li><a href="#Footnote-32">Footnote 32</a>:<br />
-a large, <span class="correction">A, A,</span> and a<br />
-a large, <span class="correction">A,</span> and a
-</li>
-
-<li><a href="#Footnote-224">Footnote 224</a>:<br />
-19th November, <span class="correction">1791.</span><br />
-19th November, <span class="correction">1781.</span>
-</li>
-
-<li><a href="#Footnote-361">Footnote 361</a>:<br />
-substitute for <span class="correction">isinglas</span>, he occupied<br />
-substitute for <span class="correction">isinglass</span>, he occupied
-</li>
-</ul>
-</div>
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-<pre>
-
-
-
-
-
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