Lives of Boulton and Watt by Samuel Smiles: Chapter 17

Double-Acting Engine, Albion Mill

CHAPTER XVII. COMMERCIAL POLITICS - THE ALBION MILLS - RIOTS IN CORNWALL - PROSPERITY OF BOULTON AND WATT.

When Boulton returned to Birmingham, he was urgently called upon to take part in a movement altogether foreign to his habits. He had heretofore been too much engrossed by business to admit of his taking any active part in political affairs. Being, however, of an active temperament, and mixing with men of all classes, he could not but feel an interest in the public movements of his time. Early in 1784, we find him taking the lead in getting up a loyal address to the King on the resignation of the Portland Administration and the appointment of Mr. Pitt as Prime Minister. It appears, however, that Pitt disappointed his expectations. One of his first projects was a scheme of taxation, which he introduced for the purpose of remedying the disordered state of the finances, but which, in Boulton's opinion, would, if carried, have the effect of seriously damaging the national industry. The Minister proposed to tax coal, iron, copper, and other raw materials of manufacture, to the amount of about a million a year. Boulton immediately bestirred himself to oppose the adoption of the scheme. He held that for a manufacturing nation to tax the raw materials of wealth was a suicidal measure, calculated, if persevered in, to involve the producers of wealth in ruin. "Let taxes," he said, "be laid upon luxuries, upon vices, and if you like upon property; tax riches when got, and the expenditure of them, but not the means of getting them of all things, don't cut open the hen that lays the golden eggs."

Petitions and memorials were forthwith got up in the midland counties, and presented against the measure and Boulton being recognised as the leader of the movement in his district, was summoned by Mr. Pitt to London to an interview with him on the subject. He then took the opportunity of pressing upon the Minister the necessity of taking measures to secure reciprocity of trade with foreign nations, as being of vital importance to the trade of England. Writing to his partner Scale, he said, "Surely our Ministers must be bad politicians, to suffer the gates of nearly every commercial city in the world to be shut against us." "There is no doubt," he wrote to his friend Garbett, "but the edicts, prohibitions, and high duties laid upon our manufacturers by foreign powers will be severely felt, unless some new commercial treaties are entered into with such powers. I fear our young Minister is not sufficiently aware of the importance of the subject, and I likewise fear he will pledge himself before Parliament meets to carry other measures in the next session that will be as odious to the country as his late attempts? "

As Boulton had anticipated, the Ministry introduced several important measures, calculated to have a highly injurious effect upon English industry, and he immediately bestirred himself, in conjunction with Josiah Wedgwood, of Etruria, to organise a movement in opposition to them. Wedgwood and Boulton met at Birmingham in February, 1785, and arranged to assemble a meeting of delegates from the manufacturing districts, who were to meet and sit in London "all the time the Irish commercial affairs were pending. " A printed statement of the objects of the movement was circulated, and Boulton and Wedgwood wrote to their friends in all quarters to meet and appoint delegates to the central committee in London. Boulton was unanimously appointed the delegate for Birmingham, and he proceeded to London furnished with a bundle of petitions from his neighbourhood. The delegates proceeded to form themselves into a Chamber of Manufacturers, over the deliberations of which Wedgwood, Boulton, or John Wilkinson usually presided.

The principal object of these meetings and petitionings was to prevent, if possible, the imposition of the proposed taxes on coal, iron, and raw materials generally, as well as the proposed export duties on manufactured articles. At a time when foreign governments were seeking to exclude English manufactures from their dominions by heavy import duties, it was felt that this double burden was more than English industry could bear. The Irish Parliament were at the same time legislating in a hostile spirit towards English commerce; imposing taxes upon all manufactures imported into Ireland from England, while Irish manufactures were not only sent into England duty free, but their own parliament encouraged them by a bounty on exportation. The committee strongly expostulated against the partial and unjust spirit of this legislation, and petitioned for free interchange on equal terms. So long as such a state of things continued, the petitioners urged that "every idea of reciprocity in the interchange of manufactures between Britain and Ireland was a mere mockery of words."

Although Watt was naturally averse to taking any public part in politics, his services were enlisted in the cause, and he drew up for circulation "An answer to the Treasury Paper on the Iron Trade of England and Ireland." The object of his statement was to show that the true way of encouraging manufactures in Ireland was, not by bounties, not by prohibitions, but by entire freedom of industry. It was asserted by the supporters of the propositions, that the natives of Ireland were ignorant, ignorant, indolent, and poor. "If they be so," said Watt, "the best method of giving them vigour is to have recourse to British manufacturers, possessed of capital, industry, and knowledge of trade." The old covenanting spirit of his race fairly breaks out in the following passage:—

"It is contemptible nonsense to argue that because Ireland has never had iron manufactories she cannot soon have them. . . . One hundred years ago the Irish had no linen manufacture; they imported linen; and now they sell to us to the amount of a million annually. How came this about? The civil wars under Charles I., and the tyranny of the Scotch Privy Council under Charles II., chased the people out of Scotland, because they were Presbyterians. Ireland received and protected them; they peopled the northern provinces; many of them were weavers; they followed their business in Ireland, and taught others. Philip II. chased the inhabitants out of Flanders, on account of religion; Queen Elizabeth received and protected them; and England learnt to manufacture woollen cloth. The persecutions of Lewis XIV. occasioned the establishment of a colony in Spitalfields. And the Parliament of Britain, under the auspices of - and -, and others, imposed oppressive duties on glass; and -'s Act gave the Irish liberty to export it to our Colonies; the glass-makers fled from the tyranny of the Excise; Ireland has now nine glass-houses. Britain has lost the export trade of that article! More examples of the migrations of manufactures could be adduced, but it seems unnecessary; for it cannot be denied that men will fly from tyranny to liberty, whether Philip's Priests, Charles's Dragoons, or our Excisemen be the instruments of the tyranny. And it must also be allowed that even the Inquisition itself is not more formidable than our Excise Laws (as far as property is concerned) to those who unhappily are subjected to them."

Towards the end of the statement he asks, "Would it not be more manly and proper at once to invite the Irish to come into a perfect union with Britain, and to pay the same duties and excises that we do? Then every distinction of country might with justice be done away with, and they would have a fair claim to all the advantages which we enjoy. "

The result of the agitation was that most of the proposals to impose new taxes on the raw materials of manufacture were withdrawn by the Ministry, and the Irish resolutions were considerably modified. But the relations of British and Irish industry were by no means settled. The Irish Parliament might refuse to affirm the resolutions adopted by the British Parliament, in which case it might be necessary again to oppose the Ministerial measures and to provide for this contingency, the delegates separated, with the resolution to maintain and extend their organisation in the manufacturing districts. Watt did not, however, like the idea of his partner becoming engrossed in political agitation, even in matters relating to commerce. He accordingly wrote to Boulton in London, "I find myself quite unequal to the various business now lying behind, and wish much you were at home, and that you would direct your attention solely to your own and to Boulton and Watt's business until affairs can be brought into reasonable compass." Later he wrote, "At Manchester they are busy making a collection for the Chamber of Manufacturers, which I fancy will be in vogue again next winter. But I hope that neither you nor I will be mad enough to be demagogues then. Let us leave that to those who can defy Ministers, and get our property secured, which may be done in the confusion."

Watt was at this time distressed by an adverse decision against the firm in one of the Scotch courts. "I have generally observed," he wrote, "that there is a tide in our affairs. We have had peace for some time, but now cross accidents have begun, and more are to be feared." His anxieties were increased by the rumour which reached his ears from several quarters of a grand combination of opulent manufacturers to make use of every beneficial patent that had been taken out, and cut them down by ‘scire facias’, as they had already cut down Arkwright's. It was said that subscriptions had been obtained by the association amounting to £50,000. Watt was requested to join a counter combination of patentees to resist the threatened proceedings. To this, however, he objected, on the ground that the association of men to support one another in lawsuits was illegal, and would preclude the members from giving evidence in support of each other's rights. Besides," said he, "the greater number of patentees are such as we could not associate with, and if we did it would do us more harm than good."

Towards the end of 1785 the engines which had been in hand were nearly finished, and work was getting slacker than usual at Soho. Though new orders gave Watt trouble, and occasioned him anxiety, still he would rather not be without them. "It will be well," he wrote to his partner, "if we can get some orders now for engines worth while. What we have been doing lately has been very trifling, and if we don't get orders soon, our men will be idle. As it happens at present, we have at least three engineers too few here, there being eight engines to be done in two or three months, and only three engineers." It was matter of gratification to Watt to be able to report that the engines last delivered had given great satisfaction. The mechanics were improving in skill, and their workmanship was becoming of a superior character. "Strood and Curtis’s engine", said he, "has been at work some time, and does very well. Whitbread's has also been tried, and performs exceedingly well." The success of Whitbread's engine was such that it had the honour of a visit from the King, who was greatly pleased with its performances. Not to be outdone, "Felix Calvert," wrote Watt, "has bespoken one, which is to outdo Whitbread's in magnificence."

The slackness of work at Soho was not of long continuance. Orders for rotative engines came in gradually; one from Harris, of Nottingham another from Macclesfield, to drive a silk-mill; a third from Edinburgh, for the purposes of a distillery and others from different quarters. The influx of orders had the effect at the same time of filling Soho with work, and plunging Watt into his usual labyrinth of perplexity and distress. In September we find him writing to Boulton,—

My health is so bad that I do not think I can hold out much longer, at least as a man of business, and I wish to consolidate something before I give over." . . . Again, I cannot help being dispirited, because I find my head fail me much, business an excessive burden to me, and little prospect of my speedy release from it. Were we both young and healthy, I should see no reason to despair, but very much the contrary. However, we must do the best we can, and hope for quiet in heaven when our wary bones are laid to rest."

A few months later, so many more orders had come in, that Watt described Soho as "fast for the next four months," but the additional work only had the effect of increasing his headaches. "In the anguish of my mind," he wrote, "amid the vexations occasioned by new and unsuccessful schemes, like Lovelace I ‘curse my inventions,’ and almost wish, if we could gather our money together, that somebody else should succeed in getting our trade from us. However, all may yet be well. Nature can be conquered if we can but find out her weak side."

We return to the affairs of the Cornish copper-miners, which were now in a very disheartening condition. The mines were badly and wastefully worked and the competition of many small companies of poor adventurers kept the copper trade in a state of permanent depression. In this crisis of their affairs it was determined that a Copper Company should be formed, backed by ample capital, with the view of regulating this important branch of industry, and rescuing the mines and miners from ruin. Boulton took an active part in its formation, and induced many of his intimate friends in the north to subscribe largely for shares. An arrangement was entered into by the Company with the adventurers in the principal mines, to buy of them the whole of the ore raised, at remunerative prices, for a period of eleven years. At the first meeting, held in September, 1785, for the election of Governor, Deputy-Governor, and Directors, Boulton held in his hands the power of determining the appointments, representing, as he did by proxy, shares held by his northern friends to the amount of £86,000. The meeting took place in the Town-hall at Truro, and the proceedings passed off satisfactorily; Boulton using his power with due discretion. "We met again on Friday," he wrote to Matthews, "and chose the assayers and other subordinate officers, after which we paid our subscriptions, and dined together, all in good humour and thus this important revolution in the copper trade was finally settled for eleven years. "

Matters were not yet, however, finally settled, as many arrangements had to be made for setting the Company to work, in which Boulton took the leading part; the Governor and Directors pressing him not to leave Cornwall until they were definitely settled. It happened to suit his convenience to remain until the Wheal Fortune engine was finished - one of the most formidable engines the firm had yet erected in Cornwall. In the mean time he entered into correspondence with various consumers of copper at home and abroad, with the object of finding a vend for the metal. He succeeded in obtaining a contract through Mr. Hope, of Amsterdam, for supplying the copper required for the new Dutch coinage; and he opened out new markets for the produce in other quarters. Being a large holder of mining shares, Boulton also tried to introduce new and economical methods of working the mines but with comparatively little result. To Wilkinson he wrote,— "Poldice is in a desponding way, and must give up unless better managed. North Downs is managed badly by incapable, ignorant, drunken captains, who bold their posts not by merit, but by their cousinship to some of the adventurers. . . . . I should spend a great part of next year in Cornwall, and make myself master of the minutiae. I think I could then accomplish many necessary regulations."

Though actively bestirring himself for the good of the mining interest, Boulton had but small thanks for his pains. The prominence of his position had this disadvantage, that if the price of the ore went down, or profits declined, or the yield fell off, or the mines were closed, or anything went wrong, the miners were but too ready to identify him in some way with the evil; and the services which he had rendered to the mining interest were in a moment forgotten. On one occasion the discontent of the miners broke out into open revolt, and Boulton was even threatened with personal violence. The United Mines having proved unprofitable in the working, notice was given by the manager of an intended reduction of wages, this being the only condition on which the mines could be carried on. If this could not be arranged, the works must be dosed, as the adventurers declined to go on at a loss. On the announcement of the intended lowering of wages being made, there was great excitement and discontent among the workpeople. Several hundreds of them hastily assembled at Redruth, and took the road for Truro, to pull down the offices of the Copper Mining Company, and burn the house of the manager. They were especially furious with Boulton, vowing vengeance on him, and declaring that they would pull down every pumping-engine he had set up in Cornwall. When the rioters reached Truro, they found a body of men, hastily armed with muskets taken from the arsenal, stationed in front of the Copper Mining Company's premises, supported by six pieces of cannon. At sight of this formidable demonstration the miners drew back, and, muttering threats that they would repeat their visit, returned to Redruth as they had come. Two companies of soldiers and two of local militia were brought into the town immediately after; and the intended assault was not made. When Watt was informed of the violence with which his partner had been threatened, he wrote,— "In my opinion nothing can be more ungrateful than the behaviour of those people who endeavour to make you the object of the resentment of the mob, at a time when (setting aside former services) you are doing all that lies in your power to serve them If you still find the same spirit continue, for God's sake leave them immediately. The law can reach the adventurers, if it cannot the miners."

This was, however, but the wild and unreasoning clamour of misguided and ignorant men. Boulton was personally much esteemed by all who were able to appreciate his character, and to understand the position of himself and his partner with reference to the engine patent. The larger mining owners invited him to their houses, and regarded him as their friend. The more intelligent of the managers were his strenuous supporters. First and foremost among these was Mr. Phillips, manager of the Chacewater mines, of whom he always spoke with the highest respect, as a man of the most scrupulous integrity and honour. Mr. Phillips was a member of the Society of Friends, and his wife Catherine was one of the most celebrated preachers of the body. Boulton and Watt occasionally resided with them before the house at Cosgarne was taken, and conceived for both the warmest friendship. If Watt was attracted by the Cornish Anabaptists, Boulton was equally so by the Cornish Quakers. We find him, in one of his letters to Mrs. Boulton, describing to her a great meeting of Friends at Truro which he had attended, "when," he said, "I heard our friend Catherine Phillips preach with great energy and good sense for an hour and a half, although so weak in body that she was obliged to lie abed for several days before." Boulton afterwards dined with the whole body of Friends at the principal inn, being the only person present who was not of the Society; and he confessed to have spent in their company a very pleasant evening.

We return to the progress of the engine business at Soho. The most important work in band about this time was the double-acting engine intended for the Albion Mill, in Southwark. This was the first rotative with a parallel motion erected in London; and as the more extended use of the engine would in a great measure depend upon its success, the firm naturally looked forward with very great interest to its performances. The Albion Mill scheme was started by Bolton as early as 1783. Orders for rotatives were then coming in very slowly, and it occurred to him that if be had but the opportunity of exhibiting the powers of the new engine in its best form, and in connexion with the best machinery, the results would be so satisfactory and conclusive as to induce manufacturers generally to follow the example. On applying to the London capitalists, Boulton found them averse to the under- taking and at length Boulton and Watt became persuaded that if the concern was to be launched at all, they must themselves find the principal part of the capital. A sufficient number of shareholders was got together to make a start, and application was made for a charter of incorporation in 1784 but it was so strongly opposed by the millers and mealmen, on the ground that the application of steam-power to flour-grinding would throw wind and water mills out of work, take away employment from the labouring classes, and reduce the price of bread, that the charter was refused and the Albion Mill Company was accordingly constituted on the ordinary principles of partnership.

By the end of the year the Albion Mill engines, carefully designed by Watt, were put in hand at Soho; the building was in course of erection, after the designs of Mr. Wyatt, the architect; while John Rennie, the young Scotch engineer, was engaged to design and fit up the flour-grinding and dressing machinery. "I am glad," wrote Boulton to Watt, "you have agreed with Rennie. Mills are a great field. Think of the crank of Wolf, Trumpeter, Wasp, and all the ghosts we are haunted by." The whole of the following year was occupied in the erection of the building's and machinery and it was not until the spring of 1786 that the mill was ready to start. Being the first enterprise of the kind, on an unprecedented scale, and comprising many novel combinations of machinery, there were many "bitches" before it could be got to work satisfactorily. After the first trial, at which Boulton was present, he wrote his partner expressing his dissatisfaction with the working of the double-acting engine, expressing the opinion that it would have been better if they had held by the single-acting one. Watt was urged to run up to town himself and set matters to rights; but he was up to the ears in work at Soho, and could not leave for a day.

"I can by no means leave home at present," he wrote, "otherwise we shall suffer much greater losses than can come from the Albion Mill. The work for Cornwall which must be planned and put in train is immense, and there will more come from that quarter. Besides, I am pulled to pieces by demands for forwardness from every side. I have lost ten days by William Murdock, Wilson, Wilkinson, and headaches, and I have neither health nor spirits to make the necessary exertions. If I went to London I should be in torment all the while with the thoughts of what was lying behind here."

After pointing out what course should be taken to discover and remedy the faults of the engine, he proceeded:—

"Above all, patience must be exercised and things coolly examined and put to rights, and care be taken not to blame innocent parts. Everything must, as much as possible, be tried separately. Remind those who begin to growl, that in new, complicated, and difficult things, human foresight falls short — that time and money must be given to perfect things and find out their defects, otherwise they cannot be remedied."

Not being able to persuade Watt to come to his help, Boulton sent to Cornwall for Murdock, always ready to lend a hand on an emergency, and in the course of a few weeks he was in town at work upon the engines. The result is best told in Wyatt's letter to Boulton, who had by this time returned to Birmingham:—

"Mr. Murdock has just set the engine to work. All the rods are altered. I think he has done more good than all the doctors we have had before; and his manner of doing it has been very satisfactory — so different from what we have been used to. He has been through all the flues himself, and really takes uncommon pains. Pray write to him; thank him for his attention. He will not have left town before he gets your letter, and press him to stay as long as he can be essentially serviceable."

There was, however, so great a demand for Murdock's presence in Cornwall, that he could not be spared for another day, and he hurried back again to his multifarious duties at the mines.

The cost of erecting the mill proved to be considerably in excess of the original estimate, and Watt early feared that it would turn out a losing concern. He had no doubt about the engines or the machinery being able to do all that had been promised but he feared that the absence of business capacity on the part of the managers would be fatal to its commercial success. He was especially annoyed at finding the mill made a public show of, and that it was constantly crowded with curious and frivolous people, whose presence seriously interfered with the operations of the workmen. It reached his ears that the managers of the mill even intended to hold a masquerade in it, with the professed object of starting the concern with eclat! Watt denounced this as sheer humbug. "What have Dukes, Lords, and Ladies," said he, "to do with masquerading in a flour-mill? You must take steps to curb the vanity of -, else it will ruin him. As for ourselves, considering that we are much envied at any rate, everything which contributes to render us conspicuous ought to be avoided. Let us content ourselves with doing." It was also found that the mill was becoming a nest for schemers and speculators occupied in devising all manner of new projects. Boulton bestirred himself to put matters in a more business-like train. Steps were taken to close the mill against the crowd of idle visitors and Boulton shortly after reported that "the manufacturing of Bubbles and new schemes is removed from the Mill to a private Lodging."

When the mill was at length set to work, it performed to the entire satisfaction of its projectors. The engine, on one occasion, ground as much as 3,000 bushels of wheat in twenty-four hours. The usual rate of work per week of six days was 16,000 bushels of wheat, cleaned, ground, and dressed into fine flour (some of it being ground two or three times over); or sufficient, according to Boulton's estimate, for the weekly consumption of 150,000 people. The important uses of the double rotative engine were thus exhibited in the most striking manner; and the fame of the Albion Mill extended far and wide. It so far answered the main purpose which Boulton and Watt had in view in originally embarking in the enterprise but it must be added that the success was accomplished at a very serious sacrifice. The mill never succeeded commercially. It was too costly in its construction and its management, and though it did an immense business it was at a loss. The concern was, doubtless, capable of great improvement, and, had time been allowed, it would probably have come round. When its prospects seemed to be brightening, it was set on fire in several places by incendiaries on the night of the 3rd of March, 1791. The villains had made their arrangements with deliberation and skill. They fastened the main cock of the water-cistern, and chose the hour of low tide for firing the building, so that water could not be got to play upon the flames, and the mill was burnt to the ground in a few hours. A reward was offered for the apprehension of the criminals, but they were never discovered. The loss sustained by the Company was about £10,000. Boulton and Watt were the principal sufferers; the former holding £6,000, and the latter £3,000 interest in the undertaking.

Meanwhile orders for rotative engines were coining in apace at Soho, engines for paper-mills and cotton-mills, for flour-mills and iron-mills, and for sugar-mills in America and the West Indies. At the same time pumping-engines were in hand for France, Spain, and Italy. The steam-engine was becoming an established power, and its advantages were every day more clearly recognised. It was alike docile, regular, economical, and effective, at all times and seasons, by night as by day, in summer and in winter. While the wind-mills were stopped by calms and the water-mills by frosts, the steam-mill worked on with untiring power. "There, is not a single water-mill now at work in Staffordshire," wrote Boulton to Wyatt in December "they are all frozen up, and were it not for Wilkinson's steam-mill, the poor nailers must have perished but his mill goes on rolling and slitting ten tons of iron a day, which is carried away as fast as it can be bundled up and thus the employment and subsistence of these poor people are secured."

As the demand for rotative engines set in, Watt became more hopeful as to the prospects of this branch of manufacture. He even began to fear lest the firm should be unable to execute the orders, so fast did they follow each other. "I have no doubt," he wrote to Boulton, "that we shall soon so methodize the rotative engines as to get on with them at a great pace. Indeed, that is already in some degree the case. But we must have more men, and these we can only have by the slow process of breeding them." A fortnight later he wrote, "Orders for rotative engines are coming in daily; but, if we part with any more men here, we must stop taking them in." Want of skilled workmen continued to be one of Watt's greatest difficulties. When the amount of work to be executed was comparatively small, and sufficient time was given to execute it, he was able to turn out very satisfactory workmanship; but when the orders came pouring in, new hands were necessarily taken on, who proved a constant source of anxiety and trouble. Even the "old hands," when sent to a distance to fit up engines, being left, in a great measure, to themselves, were apt to become careless and ill-conditioned. With some, self-conceit was the stumbling-block, with others temper, but with the greater number, drink. "I am very sorry to hear," wrote Watt to Boulton, "that Malcolm Logan's disease increases. I think you should talk to him roundly upon it, and endeavour to procure him to make a solemn resolution or oath against drinking for some given term." Another foreman sent to erect an engine in Craven was afflicted with a distemper of a different sort. He was found to have put the engine very badly together, and, instead of attending to his work, had gone a-hunting in a pig-tail wig! "If the half of this be true," wrote Watt, "as I fear it is, he will not do to be sent to New River Head [where an engine was about to be erected], and I have at present nobody else here . . . . I suppose I shall be obliged to send Joseph over, for we must not have a bad engine if it can be helped. . . . . We seem to be getting into our old troubles again.

William Murdock continued, as before, an admirable exception. He was as indefatigable as ever, always ready with an expedient to remedy a defect, and willing to work at all hours. A great clamour had been raised in Cornwall during his stay in London while setting the Albion Mill to rights, as there was no other person there capable of supplying his place, and fulfilling his numerous and responsible duties. Boulton deplored that more men such as Murdock were not to be had; - "He is now flying from mine to mine," be wrote, "and hath so many calls upon him that he is inclined to grow peevish and if we take him from North Downs, Chacewater, and Towan (all of which engines he has the care of), they will run into disorder and ruin they have not a man at North Downs that is better than a stoker."

Towards the end of 1786 the press of orders increased at Soho. A rotative engine of forty-horse power was ordered by the Plate Glass Company to grind glass. A powerful pumping-engine was in hand for the Oxford Canal Company. Two engines, one of twenty and the other of ten horse power, were ordered for Scotch distilleries, and another order was shortly expected from the same quarter. The engine supplied for the Hull paper-mill having been found to answer admirably, more orders for engines for the same purpose were promised. At the same time pumping-engines were in hand for the great French waterworks at Marli. "In short," said Watt, "I foresee I shall be driven almost mad in finding men for the engines ordered here and corning in." Watt was necessarily kept very full of work by these orders, and we gather from his letters that he was equally full of headaches. He continued to give his personal attention to the preparation of the drawing's of the engines, even to the minutest detail. On an engine being ordered by Mr. Morris, of Bristol, for the purpose of driving a tilt-hammer, Boulton wrote to him,— "Mr. Watt can never be prevailed upon to begin any piece of machinery until the plan of the whole is settled, as it often happens that a change in one thing puts many others wrong. However, he has now settled the whole of yours, but waits answers to certain questions before the drawings for the founder can he issued."

At an early period his friend Wedgwood had strongly urged upon Watt that he should work less with his own head and hands, and more through the heads and hands of others. Watt's brain was too active for his body, and needed rest but rest he would not take, and persisted in executing all the plans of the new engines himself. Thus in his fragile, nervous, dyspeptic state, every increase of business was to him increase of brainwork and increase of pain until it seemed as if not only his health, but the very foundations of his reason must give way. At the very time when Soho was beginning to bask in the sunshine of prosperity, and the financial troubles of the firm seemed coming to an end, Watt wrote the following profoundly melancholy letter to a friend:-

"I have been effete and listless, neither daring to face business, nor capable of it, my head and memory failing me much; my stable of hobby-horses pulled down, and the horses given to the dogs for carrion. . . . I have had serious thoughts of laying down the burden I find myself unable to carry, and perhaps, if other sentiments had not been stronger, should have thought of throwing off the mortal coil; but, if matters do not grow worse, I may perhaps stagger on. Solomon said that in the increase of knowledge there is increase of sorrow if he had substituted business for knowledge, it would have been perfectly true."

As might be expected, from the large number of engines sold by the firm to this time, and the increasing amounts yearly payable as dues, their income from the business was becoming considerable, and promised, before many years had passed, to be very large. Down to the year 1785, however, the outlay upon new foundries, workshops, and machinery had been so great, and the large increase of business had so completely absorbed the capital of the firm, that Watt continued to be paid his household expenses, at the rate of so much a year, out of the hardware business, and no division of profits upon the engines sold and at work had as yet been made, because none had accrued. After the lapse of two more years, matters had completely changed; and after long waiting, and indescribable distress of mind and body, Watt's invention at length began to be productive to him. During the early part of his career, though his income had been small, his wants were few, and easily satisfied. Though Boulton had liberally provided for these from the time of his settling at Birmingham, Watt continued to feel oppressed by the thought of the debt to the bankers for which he and his partner were jointly liable. In his own little business he had been accustomed to deal with such small sums, that the idea of being responsible for the repayment of thousands of pounds appalled and unnerved him; and he had no peace of mind until the debt was discharged. Now at last he was free, and in the happy position of having a balance at his bankers. On the 7th of December, 1787, Boulton wrote to Matthews, the London agent, "As Mr. Watt is now at Mr. Macgregor's, in Glasgow, I wish you would write him a line to say that you have transferred £4,000 to his own account, that you have paid for him another £1,000 to the Albion Mill, and that about Christmas you suppose you shall transfer £2,007 more to him, to balance."

But while Watt's argosies were coming into port richly laden, Boulton's were still at sea. Though the latter had risked, and often lost, capital in his various undertakings, he continued as venturesome, as enterprising as ever. When any project was started calculated to bring the steam-engine into notice, he was immediately ready with his subscription. Thus he embarked £6,000 in the Albion Mill, a luckless adventure in itself, though productive in other respects. But he sadly missed the money, and as late as 1789, feelingly said to Matthews, "Oh that I had my Albion Mill capital lack again!" When any mining adventure was started in Cornwall for which a new engine was wanted, Boulton would write, "If you want a stop-gap, put me down as an adventurer;" and too often the adventure proved a failure. Then, to encourage the Cornish Copper Mining Company, he bought large quantities of copper, and had it sent down to Birmingham, where it lay long on his hands without a purchaser. At the same time we find him expending £5,000 in building and rebuilding two mills and a warehouse at Soho, and an equal amount in "preparing for the coinage." These large investments had the effect of crippling his resources for years to come and when the commercial convulsion of 1788 occurred, he felt himself in a state of the most distressing embarrassment. The circumstances of the partners being thus in a measure reversed, Boulton fell back upon Watt for temporary help; but, more cautious than his partner, Watt had already invested his profits elsewhere, and could not help him. He had got together his store of gains with too much difficulty to part with them easily; and he was unwilling to let them float away in what he regarded as an unknown sea of speculation.

To add to his distresses, Boulton's health began to fail him. To have seen the two men, no one would have thought that Boulton would have been the first to break down but so it was. Though Watt's sufferings from headaches, and afterwards from asthma, seem to have been almost continuous, he struggled on, and even grew in strength and spirits. His fragile frame bent before disease, as the reed bends to the storm, and rose erect again but it was different with Boulton. He had toiled too unsparingly, and was now feeling the effects. The strain upon him had throughout been greater than upon Watt, whose headache had acted as a sort of safety-valve by disabling him from pursuing further study until it had gone off. Boulton, on the other hand, was kept in a state of constant anxiety by business that could not possibly be postponed. He had to provide the means for carrying on his many businesses, to sustain his partner against despondency, and to keep the whole organisation of the firm in working order. While engaged in bearing his gigantic burden, disease came upon him. In 1784 we find him writing to his wine-merchant, with a cheque in payment of his account,— "We have had a visit from a new acquaintance — the gout." The visitor returned, and four years later we find him complaining of violent pain from gravel and stone, to which he continued a martyr to the close of his life. "I am very unwell indeed," he wrote to Matthews in London; "I can get no sleep and yet I have been obliged to wear a cheerful face, and attend all this week on M. l'Abbe de Capone and his friend Brunelle." He felt as if life was drawing to an end with him: he asked his friend for a continuance of his sympathy, and promised to exert himself, "otherwise," said he, "I will lay me down and die." He was distressed, above all things, at the prospect of leaving his family unprovided for, notwithstanding all the labours, anxieties, and risks he had undergone. "When I reflect," he said "that I have given up my extra advantage of one-third on all the engines we are now making and are likely to make, when I think of my children, now upon the verge of that time of life when they are naturally entitled to expect a portion of their patrimony, — when I feel the consciousness of being unable to restore to them the property which their mother intrusted to me, — when I see all whom I am connected with growing rich, whilst I and groaning under a load of debt and annuities that would sink me into the grave if my anxieties for my children did not sustain me, — I say, when I consider all these things, it behoves me to struggle through the small remaining fragment of my life (being now in my 60th year), and do my children all the justice in my power by wiping away as many of my incumbrances as possible."

It was seldom that Boulton wrote in so desponding a strain as this; but it was his "darkest hour," and happily it proved the one "nearest the dawn." Yet, we shortly after find him applying his energies, apparently unabated, in an entirely new direction — that of coining money — which, next, to the introduction of the steam-engine, was the greatest enterprise of his life.

See Also

• Lives of Boulton and Watt by Samuel Smiles
• Lives of Boulton and Watt by Samuel Smiles: Chapter 16
• Lives of Boulton and Watt by Samuel Smiles: Chapter 18