The Steam-Engine is one of the most important of human discoveries, and is certainly one of those which afford the greatest portion of ease and advantage to the human species, as well in the operation of its cause, as in its ultimate effects. The most powerful of machines had its origin from the single idea of one individual of our own nation. It has been, from time to time, improved by different individuals, also natives of Britain, the precise period of which improvements can be traced, and their effects fortunately ascertained.

Although we should observe, that the first principle of this mechanical power was discovered by some of the ancient nations, many ages before that which gave the origin to the present practised invention, but from the state of information, it is conceived, to answer no purpose of utility. It may be said to have occurred in a small machine which the ancients called an Æolipila (the bull of Æolus) consisting of a hollow ball of metal, with a slender neck, or pipe, also of metal, having a small orifice entering into the ball, by means of a screw; this pipe being taken out, the ball being filled with water, and the pipe again screwed in, the ball is heated—there issues from the orifice, when sufficiently hot, a vapour, with great violence and noise; care was required that this should not be by accident stopped, if it were, the machine would infallibly burst, and perhaps, to the danger of the lives of all in its vicinity, so immense is its power.

Another way of introducing the water was first to heat the ball when empty, and then suddenly to immerse it in water. Descartes, in particular, has used this instrument to account for the natural generation of winds. Chauvin thinks it might be employed instead of bellows, to blow a fire. It would admirably serve to fumigate a room, being filled with perfume instead of common water. It is said to have been applied to clear chimneys of their soot, a practice still alleged to be common in Italy. Dr. Plott, in his “History of Staffordshire,” records this singular custom, where the Æolipila is used to blow the fire. “The lord of the mannor of Essington is bound by his tenure to drive a goose, every New Year’s day, three times round the hall of the Lord of Hilton, while Jack of Hilton, a brazen Æolipila, blows the fire.” The last circumstance we shall mention of this instrument, has relation to an antique one, discovered whilst digging the Basingstoke canal, representing a grotesque metallic figure, in which the blast proceeded from the mouth. This figure is now in the possession of the Society of Antiquaries of London. In this instrument, the uncommon elastic force of steam was recognised before the suggestion of the Marquis of Worcester, which follows:

“In 1655, or subsequent thereto, the Marquis of Worcester published the earliest account of the application of this power for the purposes of utility, and suggested it as applicable to raising water. ‘Sixty-eight. An admirable and most forcible way to drive up water by fire; not by drawing or sucking it upwards, for that would be what the philosopher calleth it, intra spherum actroctatis, which is, but at such a distance. But this way has no bounder, if the vessel be strong enough; for I have taken a whole piece of cannon, whereof the end was burst, stopping and screwing up the broken end, as also the touch-hole; and making a constant fire under it, within twenty-four hours it burst and made a great crack: so that having a way to make my vessels, so that they are strengthened by the force within them, and the one to fill after the other, I have seen the water run like a constant fountain stream, forty feet high; one vessel of cold water being consumed, another begins to force and refill with cold water, and so successively; the fire being tended and kept constant, which the self-same person may likewise abundantly perform, in the interim between the necessity of turning the cocks.’”

The marquis’s ingenuity did not, it appears, meet with that attention which it deserved, from those to whom his communication was addressed. In the article of steam it has been since very much improved, and is acted upon for the most useful of purposes; also his ideas for short-hand telegraphs, floating baths, escutcheons for locks, moulds for candles, and a mode to disengage horses from a carriage, after they have taken fright; which, with several others, proclaim the originality and ingenuity of the mind of this nobleman—an honour which very few of the British nobility aspire to.

Since his time, another design upon the same principle has been projected by Captain Thomas Savery, a commissioner of sick and wounded, who in the year 1691 obtained a patent for “a new invention for raising water, and occasioning motion to all sorts of mill-work, by the impellant force of fire.” This patent bears date the 25th of July, sixteenth of William III., A.D. 1698. The patent states that the invention will be of great use for drawing of mines, serving towns with water, and working all sorts of mills. “Mr. Savery, June 14th, 1699, entertained the Royal Society with showing a model of his engine for raising water by help of fire, which he set to work before them; the experiment succeeded according to expectation.”

The above memoir is accompanied with a copperplate figure, with references by way of description; from whence it appears, that the engine then shown by Captain Savery was for raising water, not only by the expansive force of steam, like the Marquis of Worcester’s, but also by the condensation of steam, the water being raised by the pressure of a rarified atmosphere to a given height, by the expansive force of steam, in the same manner as the Marquis proposed. This action was performed alternately in two receivers, so that while the vacuum formed in one was drawing up water from the well, the pressure of steam in the other was forcing up water into the reservoir; but both receivers being supplied by one suction-pipe and one forcing-pipe, the engine could be made to keep a continual stream, so as to suffer very little interruption. This engine of Captain Savery’s displays much ingenuity, and is almost as perfect in its contrivance as the same engine has been made since his time. We regret, that without a figure we cannot supply a perfect description of it.

However, it appears that it was necessary to have two boilers, or vessels of copper, one large and the other smaller: those boilers have a gauge-pipe inserted into the smaller boiler, within about eight inches of its bottom, and about the centre of the side of the larger boiler; the small boiler must be quite full of water, and the larger one only about two-thirds full. The fire is then to be lighted beneath the larger boiler, to make the water boil, by which means the steam being confined, will be greatly compressed, and will, therefore, on opening a way for it to issue out (which is done by pushing the handle of a regulator from the operator), rush with great violence through a steam-pipe into a receiver, driving out all the air before it, sending it up into a force-pipe through a clack, as may be perceived from its noise; when the air is expelled, the receiver will be very much heated by the steam. When it is thoroughly emptied of atmospheric air, and grown very hot, which may be both seen and felt, then the handle of the regulator is to be drawn towards the operator, by which means the first steam-pipe will be stopped, so that no more steam can rise into the first receiver, by which means a second receiver will be filled in like manner. Whilst this is doing, some cold water must be poured on the first receiver, by which means the steam in it will be cooled, and thereby condensed into smaller room: consequently the pressure in the valve, or cock, at the bottom of the receiver—there being nothing to counterbalance the atmospheric pressure at the surface of the receiver in the inner part of the sucking-pipe, it will be pressed up into the receiver, driving up before it the valve at the bottom, which afterwards falling again, prevents the descent of the water that way. Then the first receiver being, at the same time, emptied of its air, push the handle of the regulator, and the steam which rises from the boiler will act upon the surface of the water contained in the first receiver, where the force or pressure on it still increasing its elasticity, till it exceeds the weight of a column of water in another receiving-pipe, then it will necessarily drive up through the passage into the force-pipe, and eventually discharge itself at the top of the machinery.

After the same manner, though alternately, is the first receiver filled and emptied of water, and by this means a regular stream kept continually running out of the top of a force-pipe, and so the water is raised very often from the bottom of a mine, to the place where it is meant to be discharged.

It should be added, that after the machine begins to work, and the water has risen into and filled the force-pipe, it fills also a little cistern, and by that means fills another pipe, called the condensing-pipe, which may be turned either way, over any of the receivers, when either is thoroughly heated by, the steam, to condense it within, thereby producing a vacuum, which absorbs the water out of the well into the receiver, on the principle of a syphon. Also a little above the cistern goes another pipe to convey the water from the force-pipe into the lesser boiler, for the purpose of replenishing the great boiler, when the water in it begins to be almost consumed. Whenever there is occasion for this, the cock is to be turned which communicates between the force-pipe and the lesser boiler, to close it effectually; at the same time having put a little fire beneath the small boiler, which will grow hot; its own steam, which has no vent to escape, pressing on its surface, will force the water up another pipe, through an aperture in the great boiler, and so long will it run, till the surface of the water gets so low as to be beneath the bottom of the pipe of communication—then the steam and water running together, will cause the valve (called a clack) to strike, which will intimate to the operator that it has discharged itself into the greater boiler, and carried in as much water as is then necessary; after which, by turning a cock, as much fresh water is let in as may be necessary; and then, by turning another cock, new fresh water is let out of a recipient into the less boiler as before; and thus the engine is supplied without fear of decay, or any delay in the operations; and proper attention in the workmen is only necessary to prevent disorder in a machine so expensive and complicated.

Also, to know when the great boiler wants replenishing, turn the gauge-cock; if water comes out, it does not need a supply; but if steam alone, then the want of water is certain. The like with the cock with which the lesser boiler is prepared for the same purpose, when the same state will be marked by like results. In working this engine, very little skill, and less labour is required: Attention is the chief requisite; it is only to be injured by want of due care, extreme stupidity, or wilful neglect.

The engine described above, does not differ essentially from that first designed by the inventor, Captain Savery; the chief alteration which now occurs, is only in some few slight particulars. For example, the original engine had only one boiler, and there was no ready means for supplying it with water, to remedy the waste occasioned by evaporation of steam, without stopping the action of the engine, whenever the boiler was emptied to such a degree as to risk burning the vessel. After it was replenished the machine had to remain idle till the steam was raised, thus causing an immense loss of time; which is remedied by the application of a second boiler.

The description of the engine formerly mentioned is transcribed from Mr. Savery’s publication, “The Miner’s Friend,” and which had a subsidiary boiler, with water of a boiling heat, always ready to supply the large boiler; and the power of steam raised in it is employed to force the water into the larger boiler, to replace the waste occasioned by evaporation from that boiler; by this means the transposition of the feeding water is not only speedily performed, but being itself of a boiling heat, it is instantly ready to produce steam for carrying on the work. There is also one more grand improvement in the modern machine: the first engine was worked by four separate cocks, which the operator was compelled to turn separately at every change of stroke; if he turned them wrong, he was not only liable to damage the engine, but he prevented its effect, and, at the same time, lost a part of the operation: whereas, in the improved engine, the communications are made by a double sliding valve, or, as it has since been termed, regulator; that is, a brass plate, shaped like a fan, and moving on a centre within the boiler, so as to slide horizontally in contact with the under surface of the cover of the boiler, to which it is accurately fitted by grinding, and thus, at pleasure, opens or shuts the orifices, or entries, to the steam pipes of the two receivers alternately. This regulator acts with less friction than a cock of equal bore, and, by the motion of a single handle backwards, at once opens the proper steam pipe from one receiver, and closes that which belongs to the other receiver. Captain Savery, in his publication before noticed, describes the uses to which this machine may be applied, besides those before described, viz.—1, to serve water for turning all sorts of mills; 2, for supplying palaces, noblemen and gentlemen’s houses with water, and affording the means for extinguishing fires therein, by the water so raised; 3, the supplying cities and towns with water; 4, draining fens and marshes; 5, for ships; 6, for draining mines of water; and 7, for preventing damps in mines.

Dr. Desaguliers, we conceive, ungenerously attacked Captain Savery’s reputation, by alleging that this was not an original invention, and that he was indebted for the first idea to the previously mentioned plan of the Marquis of Worcester. Dr. Rees, with a generous liberality worthy his great critical discrimination, scientific skill, and general erudition, has, we think, ably defended the captain’s character, by proving his ideas to have originated with himself; we have only an opportunity to notice the most prominent features in this justification, where Dr. Rees thus expresses himself. “We know that the Marquis of Worcester gave no hint concerning the contractibility or condensation of steam, upon which all the merit of the modern engine depends. The Marquis of Worcester’s engine was actuated wholly by the elastic power of steam, which he either found out, or proved by the bursting of cannon in part filled with water; and not the least hint that steam so expanded, is capable of being so far contracted in an instant, as to leave the space it occupied in a vessel, and occasion, in a great measure, a vacuum.”

Subsequent to the Marquis of Worcester’s, and Captain Savery’s original ideas, and also, subsequent to the perfection the captain had brought his machine to, M. Amonton, a native of France, invented a machine which he called a fire-wheel; but it does not appear that it was ever brought to that perfection to be conducive to real utility, although it was certainly very ingenious.

Also, M. Papin, a native of Germany, made some pretensions to what he alleged was an invention of his own, only it happened to appear, unfortunately for his claim, that he was in London, and present at the time when Captain Savery exhibited the model of his steam-engine to the Royal Society. He made some unsuccessful experiments, by order of his patron, the Landgrave of Hesse, which sufficiently proved that, if he was the inventor, he did not understand the nature of his own machine.

Not long after Savery had invented his engine, Thomas Newcomen, an ironmonger, and John Calley, a glazier, began to direct their attention to the employment of steam as a mechanic power. Their first engine was constructed about the year 1711. This machine still acted on the principle of condensing the steam by means of cold water, and the pressure of the atmosphere on the piston. It was found of great value in pumping water from deep mines; but the mode of its construction, the great waste of fuel, the continued cooling and heating of the cylinder, and the limited capacities of the atmosphere in impelling the piston downward, all tended to circumscribe its utility.

The steam-engine was in this state, when it happily attracted the attention of Mr. Watt, to whom the merit and honour is due, of having first rendered this invention available as a mechanical agent. We cannot illustrate the improvements of this ingenious individual better than by giving a short biographical sketch of him to whom the world is so much indebted.

James Watt was born at Greenock, an extensive seaport in the west of Scotland, on the 19th of January, 1736. His father was a merchant, and also one of the magistrates of that town. He received the rudiments of his education in his native place; but his health being then extremely delicate, as it continued to be to the end of his life, his attendance at school was not always very regular. He amply made up, however, for what he lost in this way, by the diligence with which he pursued his studies at home, where, without any assistance, he succeeded, at a very early age, in making considerable proficiency in various branches of knowledge. Even at this time it is said his favourite study was mechanical science, to a love of which he was probably in some degree led by the example of his grandfather and his uncle, both of whom had been teachers of mathematics, and had left a considerable reputation for learning and ability in that department. Young Watt, however, was not indebted to any instruction of theirs for his own acquirements in science, the former having died two years before, and the latter one year after he was born. At the age of eighteen he was sent to London, to be apprenticed to a maker of mathematical instruments; but in little more than a year the state of his health forced him to return to Scotland; and he never received any further instruction in his profession. A year or two after this, however, a visit which he paid to some relations in Glasgow, suggested to him the plan of attempting to establish himself in that city, in the line for which he had been educated. In 1757, he accordingly removed thither, and was immediately appointed mathematical instrument maker to the College. In this situation he remained for some years, during which, notwithstanding almost constant ill health, he continued both to prosecute his profession, and to labour in the general cultivation of his mind, with extraordinary ardour and perseverance. Here also he enjoyed the intimacy and friendship of several distinguished persons, who were then members of the University, especially of the celebrated Dr. Black, the discoverer of the principle of latent heat, and Dr. Robison, so well known by his treatises on mechanical science, who was then a student, and about the same age as himself. Honourable, however as his present appointment was, and important as were many of the advantages to which it introduced him, he probably did not find it a very lucrative one; and therefore, in 1763, when about to marry, he removed from his apartments in the University, to a house in the city, and entered upon the profession of a general engineer.

For this his genius and scientific attainments most admirably qualified him. Accordingly he soon acquired a high reputation, and was extensively employed in making surveys and estimates for canals, harbours, bridges, and other public works. His advice and assistance were sought for in almost all the important improvements of this description, which were now undertaken or proposed in his native country. But another pursuit, in which he had been for some time privately engaged, was destined ere long to withdraw him from this line of exertion, and to occupy his whole mind with an object still more worthy of its extraordinary powers.

While yet residing in the College, his attention had been directed to the employment of steam as a mechanical agent, by some speculations of his friend Mr. Robison, with regard to the practicability of applying it to the movement of wheel-carriages; and he had also himself made some experiments with Papin’s digester, with the view of ascertaining its expansive force. He had not prosecuted the inquiry, however, so far as to have arrived at any determinate result, when the winter of 1763–4, a small model of Newcomen’s engine was sent him by the Professor of Natural Philosophy, to be repaired, and fitted for exhibition in the class. The examination of this model set Watt upon thinking anew, and with more interest than ever, on the powers of steam. Struck with the radical imperfections of the atmospheric engine, he began to turn in his mind the possibility of employing steam in mechanics, in some new manner which should enable it to work with much more powerful effect. This idea having got possession of him, he engaged in an extensive course of experiments, for the purpose of ascertaining as many facts as possible with regard to the properties of steam; and the pains he took in this investigation were rewarded with several valuable discoveries. The rapidity with which water evaporates he found, for instance, depended simply upon the quantity of heat which was made to enter it; and this again, on the extent of the surface exposed to the fire. He also ascertained the quantity of coals necessary for the evaporation of any given quantity of water, the heat at which water boils, under various pressures, and many other particulars of a similar kind, which had never before been accurately determined.

Thus prepared by a complete knowledge of the properties of the agent with which he had to work, he next took into consideration, with a view to their amendment, what he deemed the two great defects of Newcomen’s engine. The first of these was the necessity arising from the method employed to concentrate the steam, of cooling the cylinder, before every stroke of the piston, by the water injected into it. On this account, a much more powerful application of heat than would otherwise have been requisite was demanded for the purpose of again heating that vessel when it was to be refilled with steam. In fact, Watt ascertained that there was thus occasioned, in the feeding of the machine, a waste of not less than three-fourths of the whole fuel employed. If the cylinder, instead of being thus cooled for every stroke of the piston, could be permanently hot, a fourth part of the heat which had hitherto been applied would be found sufficient to produce steam enough to fill it. How then was this desideratum to be obtained? Savery, the first who really constructed a working engine, and whose arrangements, as we have already remarked, all showed a very superior ingenuity, employed the method of throwing cold water over the outside of the vessel containing the steam—a perfectly manageable process, but at the same time a very wasteful one; inasmuch as every time it was repeated, it cooled not only the steam, but the vessel also, which, therefore, had again to be heated, by a large expenditure of fuel, before the steam could be produced. Newcomen’s method of injecting the water into the cylinder was a considerable improvement on this; but it was still objectionable on the same ground, though not to the same degree; it still cooled not only the steam, on which it was desired to produce that effect, but also the cylinder itself, which, as the vessel in which more steam was to be immediately manufactured, it was so important to keep hot. It was also a very serious objection to this last mentioned plan, that the injected water, itself, from the heat of the place into which it was thrown, was very apt to be partly converted into steam; and the more cold water was used, the more considerable did this creation of new steam become. In fact, in the last of Newcomen’s engines, the rarefaction of the vacuum was so greatly improved from this cause, that the resistance experienced by the piston in its descent was found to amount to about a fourth part of the whole atmospheric pressure by which it was carried down, or, in other words, the working power of the machine was thereby diminished one-fourth.

After reflecting for some time upon all this, it at last occurred to Watt to consider whether it might not be possible, instead of continuing to condense the steam in the cylinder, to contrive that method of drawing it off, to undergo that operation in some other vessel. This fortunate idea having presented itself to his mind, it was not long before his ingenuity suggested to him the means of realising it. In the course of one or two days, according to his own account, he had all the necessary apparatus arranged in his mind. The plan which he devised was, indeed, an extremely simple one, and on that account the more beautiful. He proposed to establish a communication by an open pipe, between the cylinder and another vessel, the consequence of which evidently would be, that when the steam was admitted into the former, it would flow into the other to fill it also. If, then, the portion in this latter vessel only should be subjected to a condensing process, by being brought into contact with cold water, or any other convenient means, what would follow? Why, a vacuum would be produced here—into that, as a vent, more steam would immediately rush from the cylinder—that likewise would be condensed—and so the process would go on till all the steam had left the cylinder, and a perfect vacuum had been effected in that vessel, without so much as a drop of cold water having touched or entered it. The separate vessel alone, or the condenser, as Watt called it, would be cooled by the water used to condense the steam—and that, instead of being an evil, manifestly tended to promote and quicken the condensation. When Watt reduced his views to the test of experiment, he found the result to answer his most sanguine expectations. The cylinder, although emptied of its steam for every stroke of the piston as before, was now constantly kept at the same temperature with the steam (or 212 deg. Fahrenheit); and the consequence was, that one-fourth of the fuel formerly required, sufficed to feed the engine. But besides this most important saving in the expense of maintaining the engine, its power was greatly increased by the most perfect vacuum produced in the new construction, in which the condensing water, being no longer admitted within the cylinder, could not, as before, create new steam there while displacing the old.

Such, then, was the remedy by which the genius of this great inventor effectually cured the first and most serious defect of the old apparatus. In carrying his ideas into execution, he encountered, as was to be expected, many difficulties, arising principally from the impossibility of realising theoretical perfection of structure with such materials as human art is obliged to work with; but his ingenuity and perseverance overcame every obstacle. One of the things which cost him the greatest trouble was, how to fit the piston so exactly to the cylinder, as, without affecting the freedom of its motion, to prevent the passage of the air between the two. In the old engine this end had been obtained by covering the piston with a small quantity of water, the dripping down of which into the space below, where it merely mixed with the stream introduced to effect the condensation, was of little or no consequence. But in the new construction, the superiority of which consisted in keeping this receptacle for the steam always both hot and dry, such an effusion of moisture, although in very small quantities, would have occasioned material inconvenience. The air alone, besides, which in the old engine followed the piston in its descent, acted with considerable effect in cooling the lower part of the cylinder. His attempts to overcome this difficulty, while they succeeded in that object, conducted Watt also to another improvement, which effected the complete removal of what we have called the second radical imperfection of Newcomen’s engine, namely, its non-employment for a moving power, of the expansive force of steam. The effectual way it occurred to him of preventing any air from escaping into the part of the cylinder below the piston, would be to dispense with the use of that element above the piston, and to substitute there likewise the same contrivance as below, of alternate steam and a vacuum. This was, of course, to be accomplished by merely opening communications from the upper part of the cylinder to the boiler on the one hand, and the condenser on the other, and forming it at the same time into an air-tight chamber, by means of a cover, with only a hole in it to admit the rod or shank of the piston, which might, besides, without impeding its freedom of action, be padded with hemp, the more completely to exclude the air. It was so contrived accordingly, by a proper arrangement of the cocks and the machinery connected with them; that, while there was a vacuum in one end of the cylinder, there should be an admission of steam into the other; and the steam so admitted now served, not only by its susceptibility of sudden condensation to create the vacuum, but also, by its expansive force, to impel the piston.

These were the great improvements which Watt introduced in what may be called the principle of the steam-engine, or, in other words, in the manner of using and applying the steam. They constitute, therefore, the grounds of his claim to be regarded as the true author of the conquest that has been obtained by man over this powerful element. But original and comprehensive as were the views out of which these fundamental inventions arose, the exquisite and inexhaustible ingenuity which the engine, as finally perfected by him, displays in every part of its subordinate mechanism, is calculated to strike us perhaps with scarcely less admiration. It forms undoubtedly the best exemplification that has ever been afforded of the number and diversity of services which a piece of machinery may be made to render to itself, by means solely of the various application of its first moving power, when that has once been called into action. Of these contrivances, however, we can only notice one or two, by way of specimen. Perhaps the most singular is that called the governor. This consists of an upright spindle, which is kept constantly turning, by being connected with a certain part of the machinery, and from which two balls are suspended, in opposite directions, by rods, attached by joints, somewhat in the manner of the legs of a pair of tongs. As long as the motion of the engine is uniform, that of the spindle is so likewise, and the balls continue steadily revolving at the same distance from each other. But as soon as any alteration in the action of the piston takes place, the balls, if it has become more rapid, fly further apart under the influence of the increased centrifugal force which actuates them; or approach nearer to each other in the opposite circumstances. This alone would have served to indicate the state of matters to the eye; but Watt was not to be so satisfied. He connected the rods with a valve in the tube by which the steam is admitted to the cylinder from the boiler, in such a way, that as they retreat from each other, they gradually narrow the opening which is so guarded, or enlarge it as they tend to collapse; thus diminishing the supply of steam when the engine is going too fast, and when it is not going fast enough, enabling it to regain its proper speed by allowing it an increase of aliment.

Again the constant supply of a sufficiency of water to the boiler is secured by an equally simple provision, namely, by a float resting on the surface of the water which, as soon as it is carried down by the consumption of the water to a certain point opens a valve and admits more. And so on through all the different parts of the apparatus, the various wonders of which cannot be better summed up than in the forcible and graphic language of a recent writer:—“In the present perfect state of the engine it appears a thing almost endowed with intelligence. It regulates, with perfect accuracy and uniformity, the number of its strokes in a given time, counting, or recording them moreover, to tell how much work it has done, as a clock records the beats of its pendulum; it regulates the quantity of steam admitted to work; the briskness of the fire; the supply of water to the boiler; the supply of coals to the fire; it opens and shuts its valves with absolute precision as to time and manner; it oils its joints; it takes out any air which may accidentally enter into parts which should be vacuous; and when any thing goes wrong, which it cannot of itself rectify, it warns its attendants by ringing a bell; yet, with all these talents and qualities, and even when exerting the power of six hundred horses, it is obedient to the hand of a child; its aliment is coal, wood, charcoal, or other combustible—it consumes none when idle—it never tires, and wants no sleep; it is not subject to malady when originally well made, and only refuses to work when worn out with age; it is equally active in all climates, and will do work of any kind; it is a water-pumper, a miner, a sailor, a cotton-spinner, a weaver, a blacksmith, a miller, &c., &c.; and a small engine, in the character of a steam pony, may be seen dragging after it on a rail-road a hundred tons of merchandise, or a regiment of soldiers, with greater speed than that of the fleetest coaches. It is the king of machines, and a permanent realisation of the Genii of Eastern fable, whose supernatural powers were occasionally at the command of man.”

In addition to those difficulties which his unrivalled mechanical ingenuity enabled him to surmount, Watt, notwithstanding the merit of his inventions, had to contend for some time with others of a different nature, in his attempts to reduce them to practice. He had no pecuniary resources of his own, and was at first without any friend willing to run the risk of the outlay necessary for an experiment on a sufficiently large scale. At last he applied to Dr. Roebuck, an ingenious and spirited speculator, who had just established the Carron iron-works, not far from Glasgow, and held also at the same time a lease of the extensive coal-works at Kinneal, the property of the Duke of Hamilton. Dr. Roebuck agreed to advance the requisite funds, on having two-thirds of the profits made over to him; and upon this Mr. Watt took out his first patent in the beginning of the year 1769. An engine with a cylinder of eighteen inches diameter was soon after erected at Kinneal; and although, as a first experiment, it was necessarily, in some respects, of defective construction, its working completely demonstrated the value of Watt’s improvements. But Dr. Roebuck, whose undertakings were very numerous and various, in no long time after forming this connexion, found himself involved in such pecuniary difficulties, as to put it out of his power to make any further advances in prosecution of its object. On this Watt applied himself for some years almost entirely to the ordinary work of his profession as a civil engineer; but at last, about the year 1774, when all hopes of any farther assistance from Dr. Roebuck were at an end, he resolved to close with a proposal which had been made to him through his friend, Dr. Small, of Birmingham, that he should remove to that town, and enter into partnership with the eminent hardware manufacturer, Mr. Boulton, whose extensive establishments at Soho had already become famous over Europe, and procured for England an unrivalled reputation for the arts there carried on. Accordingly an arrangement having been made with Dr. Roebuck, by which his share of the patent was transferred to Mr. Boulton, the firm of Boulton and Watt commenced the business of making steam-engines, in the year 1775.

Mr. Watt now obtained from parliament an extension of his patent for twenty-five years, in consideration of the acknowledged national importance of his inventions. The first thing which he and his partner did was to erect an engine at Soho, which they invited all persons interested in such machines to inspect. They then proposed to erect similar machines wherever required, on the very liberal principle of receiving, as payment for each, only one-third of the saving in fuel which it should effect, as compared with one of the old construction.

But the draining of mines was only one of the many applications of the steam-power now at his command, which Watt contemplated, and in course of time accomplished. During the whole twenty-five years, indeed, over which his renewed patent extended, the perfecting of his invention was his chief occupation, and notwithstanding a delicate state of health, and the depressing affliction of severe headaches, to which he was extremely subject, he continued throughout this period to persevere with unwearied diligence in adding new improvements to the mechanism of the engine, and devising the means of applying it to new purposes of usefulness. He devoted, in particular, the exertions of many years, to the contriving of the best methods of making the action of the piston communicate a rotary motion in various circumstances, and between the years 1781 and 1785, he took out four different patents for inventions having this in his view.

It is gratifying to reflect, that even while he was yet alive, Watt received from the most illustrious contemporaries, the honours due to his genius. In 1785, he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society; the degree of Doctor of Laws was conferred upon him by the University of Glasgow, in 1806; and in 1808, he was elected a member of the French Institute. He died on the 25th of August, 1819, in the 84th year of his age.

The beneficial results arising from the ingenuity of Watt have been surprising. The steam-engine has already gone far to revolutionise the whole domain of human industry; and almost every year is adding to its power and its conquests. In our manufactures, our arts, our commerce, our social accommodations, it is constantly achieving what, little more than half a century ago, would have been accounted miraculous and impossible. “The trunk of an elephant,” it has been finely and truly said, “that can pick up a pin, or rend an oak, is as nothing to it. It can engrave a seal, and crush masses of obdurate metal like wax before it—draw out, without breaking, a thread as fine as gossamer, and lift a ship of war, like a bauble, in the air. It can embroider muslins, and forge anchors; cut steel into ribbands, and impel loaded vessels against the fury of the winds and waves.”

Another application of it is perhaps destined to be productive of still greater changes on the condition of society, than have resulted from many of its previous achievements,—we refer to railroads. The first great experiment was the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, which was opened, we believe, in 1831, and practically demonstrated, with what hitherto almost undreamt of rapidity travelling by land may be carried on through the aid of steam. Carriages, under the impetus communicated by this the most potent, and at the same time the most perfectly controllable of all our mechanical agencies, can be drawn forward at the flying speed of thirty and thirty-five miles an hour. When so much has been already done, it would be rash to conclude that even this is to be our ultimate limit of attainment. In navigation, the resistance of the water, which increases rapidly as the force opposed to it increases, very soon set bounds to the rate at which even the power of steam can impel a vessel forward. But on land, the thin medium of the air presents no such insurmountable obstacles to a force making its way through it; and a rapidity of movement may perhaps be eventually attained here, which is to us even as yet inconceivable. But even when the rate of land travelling already shown to be quite practicable shall have become universal, in what a new state of society shall we find ourselves! A nation will then, indeed, become a community; and all the benefits of the highest civilization will be diffused equally over the land, like the light of heaven. This invention, in short, when fully consummated, will confer upon man as much new power and enjoyment as if he were actually endowed with wings.

The commerce of the kingdom has also greatly benefited by the introduction of this valuable auxiliary, as will be seen from the following extract from the “Working Man’s Companion:”—

“The establishment of steam-boats between England and Ireland has greatly contributed to the prosperity of both countries. How have steam boats done this? They have greatly increased the trade of both countries. On the examination of Mr. Williams, before a Committee of the House of Commons, he stated that ‘before steam-boats were established, there was little trade in the smaller articles of farming production, such as poultry and eggs. The first trading steam-boat from Liverpool to Dublin, was set up in 1824; there are now (1832) forty such boats between England and Ireland. The sailing vessels were from one week to two or three weeks on the passage; the voyage from Liverpool to Dublin is now performed in fourteen hours. Reckoning ten mile, for an hour, Dublin and Liverpool are one hundred and forty miles apart; with the old vessels taking twelve days as the average time of the voyage, they were separated as completely as they would be by a distance of two thousand eight hundred and eighty miles. What is the consequence? Traders may now have, from any of the manufacturing towns in England, within two or three days, even the smallest quantity of any description of goods;’ and thus ‘one of the effects has been to give a productive employment of the capital of persons in secondary lines of business, that formerly could not have been brought into action.’” Mr. Williams adds, ‘I am a daily witness to the intercourse by means of the small traders themselves between England and Ireland. Those persons find their way into the interior of England, and purchase manufactured goods themselves. They are, of course, enabled to sell them upon much better terms in Ireland; and I anticipate that this will shortly lead to the creation of shops and other establishments in the interior of Ireland for the sale of a great variety of articles which are not now to be had there.’

“And how do the small dealers in English manufactured goods find purchasers in the rude districts of Ireland for our cloths and our hardware? Because the little farmers have sent us their butter and eggs and poultry, and have either taken our manufactures in exchange, or have taken back our money to purchase our manufactures, which is the same thing. Many millions of eggs, collected amongst the very poorest classes, by the industry of the women and children, are annually sent from Dublin to Liverpool. Mr. Williams has known fifty tons, or eight hundred and eighty thousand eggs, shipped in one day, as well as ten tons of poultry; and he says this is quite a new creation of property. It is a creation of property that has a direct tendency to act upon the condition of the poorest classes in Ireland; for the produce is laid out in providing clothes for the females and children of the families who engage in rearing poultry and collecting eggs. Thus the English manufacturer is bettered, for he has a new market for his manufactures, which he exchanges for cheap provisions; and the dealer in eggs and poultry has a new impulse to this branch of industry, because it enables him to give clothes to his wife and children. This exchange of benefits—this advancement in the condition of both parties—this creation of produce and of profitable labour—this increase of the number of labourers—could not have taken place without machinery. That machinery is the carriage which conveys the produce to the river, and the steam-boat which makes a port in another country much nearer for practical purposes, than the market town of a thinly peopled district. A new machinery is added; the steam-carriage running on the railroad, as one of the witnesses truly says, ‘is like carrying Liverpool forty miles into the interior, and thus extending the circle to which the supply will be applicable.’ The last invention perfects all the inventions which have preceded it. The village and the city are brought close together in effort, and yet retain all the advantages of their local situation; the port and the manufactory are divided only by two hours distance in time, while their distance in space affords room for all the various occupations which contribute to the perfection of either. The whole territory of Great Britain and Ireland is more compact, more closely united, more accessible than was a single county two centuries ago.”

The communication between England and Ireland has greatly increased since the above remarks were written, in 1832. There are now upwards of four hundred steam-boats sailing between Ireland and Great Britain, and of late years the largest export from that unfortunate country consists of her starving population, who, true enough, find their way into the interior of England, but not with the intention of purchasing manufactured goods, but of being employed in the manufacturing of them. We believe that our mechanical readers, at least, will agree with us, when we say that the benefit has not been reciprocal. England, for her share, has been burthened with a pauper population, and her sons deprived of their employment, by the immense immigration that has of late years taken place. Poor rates are multiplied to an extent hitherto unheard of, and our streets swarming with beggars—and those of the most importunate class. So much was this the case, that in 1847 and 1848, Liverpool was inundated with paupers from the sister country to such a degree, that her authorities were compelled to petition government to put an end to the nuisance, and to grant them assistance to prevent the death of so many thousands of their fellow-men from dying for want; the poor-rates were so increased that the ratepayers with justice complained. And we question much if ever the English manufactures have been so much benefited by the commerce as the foregoing quotation would lead us to believe. That we have been supplied with enormous quantities of provisions we cannot deny; but that the payment of these was taken back in our cloths and our hardware is very questionable. That the money was taken back there can be little doubt, not for the purpose, however, of buying clothes for the wives and children of those families whose industry had supplied us with eggs and poultry, but for supplying the insatiate wants of their profligate landlords, who were squandering the subsistence of the needy peasantry in another land. If any class of men have obtained benefit by means of this increased and speedy communication between the two countries, it assuredly is the absentee Irish landlord.