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.

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.

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.

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.

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._

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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._

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“SELF-HELP,”

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ILLUSTRÉS À L’AIDE DE BIOGRAPHIES.

TRADUIT DE L’ANGLAIS PAR ALFRED TALANDIER,

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“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.)

End of Project Gutenberg's Lives of Boulton and Watt, by Samuel Smiles