66 66 so good as to accompany me to see the great works of Mr. "Boulton, at a place which he has called Soho, about two "miles from Birmingham, which the very ingenious proprie"tor showed me himself to the best advantage. I wished "Johnson had been with us; for it was a scene which I "should have been glad to contemplate by his light. The " vastness and the contrivance of some of the machinery would " have matched his mighty mind.' I shall never forget Mr. "Boulton's expression to me, 'I sell here, Sir, what all the "world desires to have,-POWER.' He had about seven hundred people at work. I contemplated him as an iron chieftain, and he seemed to be a father to his tribe. One ❝ of them came to him, complaining grievously of his land"lord for having distrained his goods. Your landlord is in "the right, Smith,' said Boulton. But I'll tell you what: "find you a friend who will lay down one half of your rent, "and I'll lay down the other half; and you shall have your "goods again."' 66 The new engines beginning now to be disseminated over many parts of England, and giving entire satisfaction to all who availed themselves of the invention, began to attract notice on the other side of the Channel. Within a couple of years after the passing of the Act of Parliament of 1775, negotiations were set on foot by MM. Perrier for using Mr. Watt's steam-engines to supply Paris with water; and, in 1778, the King of France, by a decree, granted to Messrs. Boulton and Watt an exclusive privilege to make and sell their engines in that country. This decree, according to the French patent law at that time, could not have the force of a patent till an engine had actually been subjected to the judgment of certain Commissioners appointed by the decree, and had been reported by them to be superior to the common engines. The trial engine, it was agreed, should be erected *The attraction which detained Johnson from accompanying his friend on this occasion, was the society of his first love, (the sister of their host, Mr. Hector), then Mrs. Careless, a clergyman's widow; "a genteel wo 66 man, very agreeable and well bred," though then advanced in years; with whom Boswell on his return found the great lexicographer at tea. at the colliery of a M. Jary, near Nantes in Brittany; M. Jary, who was a very ingenious man, himself undertaking nearly the whole care of the erection. Early in 1779, Perrier visited Soho, "bargained on very "moderate terms" for engines, and drawings for one were sent to Jary by Mr. Watt, to be executed, it would appear, in France. Finding, in May, 1780, that the MM. Perrier were to erect three fire-engines, "whereof one according to our plan, and the two others with 'changements qu'il avoit "imaginé,' if we mean to keep this our kingdom of France "in proper subjection," wrote Mr. Watt, "it will be necessary "that one of ourselves go over there soon." 66 66 How far MM. Perrier showed off to advantage the engine of English design and French construction, appears from the report of M. De Luc, "who was present at Paris when Perrier "called the Royal Academy to view the engine set out, when, "lo! it went two long strokes per minute; which he said was "owing to the want of the steam-case, which in haste he had "omitted. This being afterwards added, the engine wrought "at the rate of four strokes per minute, and he (De Luc) never saw it go any faster." "This was rather a contrast to the rate at which the Soho engines moved in their own country; and perhaps M. Perrier prevailed on the two others, "with variations which he had imagined," to mind their business with more alacrity. But when Mr. Watt and Mr. Boulton visited Paris, "We have also vindicated," writes Mr. Watt, "the honour we were robbed of by M. Perrier's as"suming the merit of my invention; he said our coming was "un coup de soufflet diabolique pour lui. He has succeeded, 66 however, in having erected a most magnificent and commo"dious manufactory for steam-engines, where he executes all "the parts most exceedingly well. He is a man of abilities, " and would be very estimable if he were a little more just, (or more honest)." And, in 1790, he again writes,‡ I have a letter from Mr. Levêque of July 4th. He has seen Per 66 Mr. Watt to Mr. Boulton, 29 October, 1782. + To Dr. Roebuck, 3 February, 1787. To Mr. Boulton, 23 July, 1790. "rier's engine, which he does not like; says Mr. De Betan"court instructed him how to make double engines, and has "sent a model of them to Spain, as he does of everything he "sees; and has written a memoir upon the effects of steam, "which will be published in Prony's 'Hydraulogie.' We "must be more and more careful in respect to foreigners.' M. De Prony, (who usually spells the name of Watt either Wats or Wast), has an article in his 'Nouvelle Architecture 'Hydraulique,' -"How M. le Chevalier De Betancourt "divined the principle of a fire-engine afterwards constructed "by Messrs. Wats and Bolton:"-on perusing which, it turns out that the engine alluded to was the double-engine; that the method M. De Betancourt took to "divine the principle," was to visit and inspect the engine itself at work at Soho; to observe the piston impelled both upwards and downwards by an equal force of steam; and then, having made a model, to get MM. Perrier to make an engine on the same construction as that which he had thus visited, inspected, and observed at work. A truly original, and doubtless an accurate, method, "of divining the principle." M. De Prony's book is curious under another point of view. It contains a table of its own errata, in which there are enumerated no fewer than two hundred and seventy-eight; consisting of four great classes, viz., errata of the text, errata of the notes, errata of the tables, and errata of the "éclaircisse"ments." But in all that catalogue, such errors as Wats and Wast for Watt, and Darmouth for Dartmouth, Durhan for Durham, &c., &c., are not noticed. Therefore, to what the grand total of errata in the whole work might amount, we cannot even guess; and if to such as we have named were to be added the errata of the corrections of the errata,-(or errata squared),—and errata raised, as it were, to the third, or some even higher power, probably the work of Prony, like the machine of Marly as described by Belidor, might be found to be without a rival in the world. But it is satisfactory to be able to add, that, on a personal * No. 1345, Tome i., published in 1790. 66 acquaintance with M. De Prony, Mr. Watt found that he was a very estimable man; and that in any mistakes he had made as to the steam-engine, he had proceeded on erroneous information, and was anxious to correct them. "I acquit "him," writes Mr. W., in 1808, "of all blame or envious "intention; he was merely the chronicler of what was related "to him; and with such relators as Perrier and Betancourt "at his ear, what better could be expected? He knew nothing of me or my works but what they pleased to re"late. He is himself a most ingenious, modest, and candid "man, and regrets much his having published what he has "done; and he offered to insert in his next publication what"ever I pleased to communicate on the subject." In 1816 Mr. W. signed M. De Prony's certificate for the Royal Society; and, in returning it to Mr. Rennie, observed that he was glad to have had an opportunity of giving this testimony of his esteem for him.† 66 For many years after 1775, Mr. Watt resided chiefly in or near Birmingham, at one time "in a very moderate house in "the suburbs, at Harper's Hill;" within easy reach of the great manufacturing establishment to which his attention was now energetically devoted. But he was sometimes compelled to be absent, for long periods, in the mining districts of Cornwall,-a poor exchange, in his opinion, for the intellectual pleasures and hospitable sociality of the neighbourhood of Soho. His employments, during those intervals of forced absence, were, to a great extent, neither easy nor agreeable. He had, in the first place, to push his great invention into notice and use; in doing which, he had to contend not only with such obstacles as Nature presented, in the dark abysses of desperately flooded mines, but also with the deeply-rooted prejudices of a rude and obstinate class of men, generally as incredulous of the powers of the new machine, as they were ignorant of the causes of the imperfections of the old ones. How little, too, the real merits of machinery were appreciated Mr. Watt to Mr. James Watt, jun., 10th November, 1808. + To Mr. Rennie, 5th December, 1816. by those among whom he had to labour, appears from an amusing description he has given* of one of the first engines which he erected in Cornwall. "At present," he says, "the 66 66 66 velocity, violence, magnitude, and horrible noise of the ❝ engine give universal satisfaction to all beholders, believers or not. I have once or twice trimmed the engine to end "its stroke gently, and make less noise; but Mr. 66 66 cannot sleep unless it seem quite furious, so I have left it to the "engine-man. And, by the bye, the noise serves to convey "great ideas of the power to the ignorant, who seem to be no more taken with modest merit in an engine than in a "man." Naturally disinclined to solicitation, and averse to the coarse tumult of commercial business when conducted with inferior and illiberal minds, he was expected to obtain orders and extend connections; as well as to take charge, (as he did with much greater readiness), of the erection of the new engines, and of making experiments on all sorts of old ones. In public discussions at the meetings of mining adventurers, his arguments, founded on reason and science, too often met with jarring opposition,-sometimes even with ignorant contempt;-in private he had "constant bad head"aches," and his "usual tendency towards desponding views." As business increased, so did his troubles: "excessive difficulty in finding intelligent managing clerks ;"-" continual anxiety," (and frequent failure), "to get the various parts "of the metal-work executed exactly according to his own drawings," which, it is needless to say, were made with laborious accuracy and clearness; so that, "almost distracted "with multiplicity of orders," he sometimes fancied, he said, that he "must be cut in pieces, and a portion sent to every "tribe in Israel!" Then, as soon as the real value of the new engines began to be at all understood,-as soon as that water which was reckoned the "heaviest in the whole county, and which the miners had declared would never be "forked," not only was "forked," but showed, by the manner in which that process was accomplished, that the 66 In a letter to Mr. Boulton from Truro, without date. |