JAMES WATT, MATHEMATICAL INSTRUMENT MAKER.
When James Watt, a youth of eighteen, went to Glasgow in 1754 to learn
his trade, the place was very different from the Glasgow of to-day. Not a
steam-engine was then at work in the town; not a steam-boat disturbed the
quiet of the Clyde. There was a rough quay along the Broomielaw, then,
as the name implies, partly covered with broom. The quay was furnished
with a solitary crane, for which there was very little use, as the river
was full of sandbanks, and boats and gabberts of only six tons burden
and under could then ascend the Clyde.[57] Often for weeks together not a
single masted vessel was to be seen in the river. The principal buildings
in the town were the Cathedral and the University. The west port, now in
the centre of Glasgow, was then a real barrier between the town and the
country. The ground on which Enoch-square stands consisted chiefly of
gardens. A thick wood occupied the site of the present Custom-house and
of that part of Glasgow situated behind West Clyde-street. Blythswood
was grazing-ground. Not a house had yet been erected in Hutchinson-town,
Laurieston, Tradeston, or Bridgeton. The land between Jamaica-street on
the east, and Stobcross on the west, and south from Anderston-road to
the river, now the most densely populated parts of Glasgow, consisted
of fields and cabbage-gardens. The town had but two main streets, which
intersected each other at the Cross or Market-place, and the only paved
part of them was known as “The Plainstanes,” which extended for a few
hundred yards in front of the public offices and the Town-hall. The two
main streets contained some stately well-built houses--Flemish-looking
tenements with crow-stepped gables,--the lower stories standing on
Doric columns, under which were the principal booths or shops--small,
low-roofed, and dismal. But the bulk of the houses had only wooden fronts
and thatched roofs, and were of a very humble character. The traffic along
the unpaved streets was so small, that the carts were left standing in
them at night. The town was as yet innocent of police;[58] it contained
no Irish immigrants, and very few Highlanders. The latter then thought it
beneath them to engage in any pursuit connected with commerce; and Rob
Roy’s contempt for the wabsters of Glasgow, as described by Sir Walter
Scott in the novel, was no exaggeration. No Highland gentleman, however
poor, would dream of condemning his son to the drudgery of trade; and
even the poorest Highland cottar would shrink with loathing from the
life of a weaver or a shopkeeper. He would be a hunter, a fisher, a
cattle-lifter, or a soldier; but trade he would not touch--that he left
to the Lowlanders.[59]
[Illustration: TRONGATE, GLASGOW.]
[57] According to Smeaton’s report in 1755, there were in spring
tides only 3 feet 8 inches water at Pointhouse Ford. Measures
were taken to deepen the river, and operations with that
object were begun in 1768. Salmon abounded in the Clyde, and
was so common that servants and apprentices were accustomed to
stipulate that they should not have salmon for dinner more than
a certain number of days in the week.
[58] The “middens” in the street were sometimes complained of as
a nuisance; and in 1776, the magistrate threatened a penalty
of 5_s._ if middens of which complaint had been made were not
removed within 48 hours.
[59] The Highland gentry and people regarded the Lowlanders as
their natural enemies, fair subjects for plunder at all times as
opportunities offered. The Lowlanders, on their part, regarded
the Highlanders very much as the primitive settlers of North
America regarded the Cherokee and Chocktaw Indians. Sometimes a
band of uncouth half-clad Highlandmen would suddenly rush down
upon the Lowlands, swoop up all the cattle within their reach,
and drive them off into the mountains. Hence the Lowlanders and
the Highlanders were always in a state of feud. Long after the
’45 a Highlandman would “thank God that he had not a drop of
Lowland blood in his veins.”
The principal men of business in Glasgow at the time of which we speak
were the tobacco lords--importers of that article from the plantations in
Virginia,[60]--who were often to be seen strutting along the Plainstanes,
dressed in scarlet cloaks, cocked hats, and powdered wigs; the “boddies”
who kept the adjoining shops eying them over their half-closed doors,
and humbly watching for a nod of recognition from the mighty potentates.
Yet even the greatest of the tobacco lords only lived in flats, entering
from a common stair; and the domestic accommodation was so scanty and so
primitive, that visitors were of necessity received in the bedrooms. This
circumstance seems to have had some influence in the formation of the
Clubs,[61] which then formed a curious feature of society in most Scotch
towns. They consisted of knots of men of like tastes and pursuits, who
met in the evenings at public-houses for purposes of gossip and social
drinking. There they made new and cultivated old acquaintanceships,
and exchanged news with each other. The Club combined the uses of the
newspaper and the newsroom, which now accomplish the same objects without
the drinking. But Glasgow had then no newspaper; and a London news-sheet
of a week old was looked upon as a novelty. There was no coffee-room nor
public library in the town; no theatre[62] nor place of resort open,
except the “Change-house;” so that the Club was regarded as a social
necessity. The drinking was sometimes moderate, and sometimes “hard.”
The better class confined themselves to claret and other French wines,
which were then cheap, being free from duty. Those disposed to indulge
in more frugal fare confined themselves to oat-cake and small-beer. It
was not until heavy taxes were laid on foreign wines and malt that the
hard whisky-drinking of Scotland set in. Whisky was introduced from the
Highlands shortly after the “Forty-five;” and it soon became the popular
drink. By 1780 the drinking of raw whisky in Glasgow at midday had become
general.[63]
[60] The only trade which Glasgow carried on with foreign
countries previous to the Union, was in coal, grindstones, and
fish,--Glasgow-cured herrings being in much repute abroad. After
the Union partnerships were formed; vessels were built down the
Clyde, and chartered for carrying on the trade with Virginia,
Maryland, and Carolina. The first _honest_ vessel crossed
the Atlantic from the Clyde in 1719; in 1735 the Virginia
merchants in Glasgow had fifteen vessels engaged in the trade,
and the town shortly after became the great mart for tobacco.
Of the 90,000 hogsheads imported into the United Kingdom in
1772, Glasgow alone imported 49,000, or more than one-half.
The American Revolution had the effect of completely ruining
the tobacco trade of Glasgow, after which the merchants were
compelled to turn to other fields of enterprise and industry.
The capital which they had accumulated from tobacco enabled
them to enter upon their new undertakings with spirit, and the
steam-engine which had by that time been invented by their
townsman James Watt, proved their best helper in advancing
the prosperity of modern Glasgow. The rapidity of its progress
may be inferred from the following facts. In 1735, though the
Glasgow merchants owned half the entire tonnage of Scotland, it
amounted to only 5600 tons. In that year the whole shipping of
Scotland was only one-fortieth part of that of England: it is
now about one-fifth. From 1752 to 1770 the total tonnage dues
of the harbour of Glasgow amounted to only 147_l._, or equal to
an average of about 8_l._ per annum. In 1780, the Clyde having
been deepened in the interval, they reached 1515_l._; and in
1854, they amounted to 86,580_l._ The increase has been quite
as great in later years. In point of value of exports, Glasgow
ranks fourth among the ports of the United Kingdom; and Greenock
now takes precedence of Bristol.
[61] For many curious particulars of Old Glasgow and its society,
see Dr. Strang’s ‘Glasgow and its Clubs.’
[62] a temporary wooden theatre was run up in 1752, but the
religious prejudices of the population were violently excited
by the circumstance, and the place was attacked by a mob and
seriously damaged. The few persons who went there had to be
protected from insults. In 1762, when some persons proposed
to build a theatre, not a single individual who had ground
within the burgh would grant them a site. Two years later the
theatre was erected outside the precincts, and on the night on
which it was opened it was wilfully set on fire by some persons
instigated by the preaching of a neighbouring methodist, when
it narrowly escaped destruction.
[63] When the Lowlanders want to drink a cheering cup, they go
to the public-house, called the Change-house, and call for a
chopin of twopenny, which is their yeasty beverage, made of
malt, not quite so strong as the table-beer of England.... The
Highlanders, on the contrary, despise the liquor, and regale
themselves with whisky, or malt spirit, as strong as Geneva,
which they swallow in great quantities, without any signs of
inebriation: they are used to it from the cradle, and find it
an excellent preservative against the winter cold, which must
be extreme on these mountains.--Smollett, ‘Expedition of Humphry
Clinker.’
When young Watt arrived in Glasgow he carried with him but a small
quantity of baggage; the articles in his trunk including amongst other
things a quadrant,--probably a specimen of his own handiwork,--a leather
apron, about a score of carpenters’ and other tools, and “a pair of
bibels.” On making inquiry for a proper master, under whom to learn the
business of mathematical instrument making, it was found that there was
no such person in Glasgow. There was, however, a mechanic in the town, who
dignified himself with the name of “optician,” under whom Watt was placed
for a time. He was a sort of Jack-of-all-trades, who sold and mended
spectacles, repaired fiddles, tuned spinets, made and repaired the simpler
instruments used in mechanical drawing, and eked out a slender living by
making and selling fishing-rods and fishing-tackle. Watt was as handy at
dressing trout and salmon flies as at most other things, and his master,
no doubt, found him useful enough; but there was nothing to be learnt in
return for his services. Though his master was an ingenious workman, in a
small way, and could turn his ready hand to anything, it soon became clear
to Watt’s relations, the Muirheads, with whom he lived during his stay,
that the instructions of such an artist were little likely to advance him
in mathematical instrument making. Among the gentlemen to whom Watt was
introduced by his relatives was Dr. Dick, Professor of Natural Philosophy
in Glasgow College, who strongly recommended him to proceed to London,
and there place himself under the instruction of some competent master.
Watt consulted his father on the subject, who readily gave his sanction
to the proposal; and, with a letter of introduction from Dr. Dick in his
pocket, he set out for the great city accordingly.
No stage-coach then ran between Glasgow and London; so it was determined
that young Watt should proceed on horseback, then the most convenient
and speedy mode of travelling. His chest was sent by sea. Old Mr. Watt’s
memorandum-book at Heathfield contains the following entry, under date
the 6th June, 1755:--
“To send James Watt’s chist to the care of Mr. William Oman,
Ventener in Leith, to be shypt for London to ye care of Captain
William Watson, at the Hermitage, London.
“P^d. 3_s._ 6_d._ for wagon carage to Edenbrough of chist.
P^d. to son James 2_l._ 2_s._
P^d. Plaster and Pomet, 1_s._ 4_d._
P^d. 4 doz. pencels, 1_s._ 6_d._”
The “plaster and pomet” may possibly have been provided in view of the
long journey on horseback and its contingencies. It was arranged that the
youth should travel in the company of a relative, Mr. Marr, a sea-captain,
who was on his way to join his ship, then lying in the Thames. They set
out on the 7th of June, travelling by way of Coldstream and Newcastle,
where they joined the great north road, then comparatively practicable to
the south of Durham. They reached London safely on the 19th, having been
about a fortnight on the road.
Mr. Marr immediately proceeded to make inquiries for a mathematical
instrument maker with whom to place his young friend. But it was found
that a serious obstacle presented itself in the rules of the trade, which
prescribed that those employed must either be apprentices serving under
a seven years’ apprenticeship, or, if journeymen, that they should have
served for that term. Watt, however, had no intention of binding himself
to serve for so long a period, and he had no pretensions to rank as a
journeyman. His object was to learn the business in the shortest possible
time, and then return to Glasgow and set up for himself. The two went
about from shop to shop, but only met with rebuffs. “I have not yet got
a master,” Watt wrote to his father about a fortnight after his arrival;
“we have tried several, but they all made some objection or other. I find
that, if any of them agree with me at all, it will not be for less than
a year; and even for that time they will be expecting some money.”
Mr. Marr continued to exert himself on behalf of the youth. Anxious to
be employed in any way rather than not at all, Watt offered his services
gratuitously to a watchmaker named Neale, with whom Mr. Marr did business,
and he was allowed to occupy himself in his shop for a time, cutting
letters and figures in metal. At length a situation of a more permanent
character was obtained for him; and he entered the shop of Mr. John
Morgan, a respectable mathematical instrument maker in Cornhill, on the
terms of receiving a year’s instruction in return for a fee of twenty
guineas and the proceeds of his labour during that time. He soon proved
himself a ready learner and skilful workman. That division of labour,
the result of an extensive trade, which causes the best London carriages
to be superior to any of provincial construction, was even then applied
to mathematical instruments. “Very few here,” wrote Watt, “know any more
than how to make a rule, others a pair of dividers, and such like.” His
first employment was in making brass scales, rules, parallels, and the
brass-work of quadrants; and by the end of a month he was able to finish
a Hadley’s quadrant in better style than any apprentice in the shop. From
rule and quadrant making he proceeded to azimuth compasses, brass sectors,
theodolites, and the more delicate kinds of instruments. At the end of the
year he wrote home to his father that he had made “a brass sector with a
French joint, which is reckoned as nice a piece of framing-work as is in
the trade;” and he expressed the hope that he would soon be able to work
for himself, and earn his bread by his own industry.
Up to this time he had necessarily been maintained by his father, on whom
he drew from time to time. Mr. Watt’s memorandum-books show that on the
27th of June he remitted him 10_l._; on the 24th of August following he
enters: “Sent George Anderson by post 8_l._ to buy a bill of 7_l._ or
8_l._ to send Wheytbread and Gifferd, and ballance of my son’s bill, 2_l._
2_s._ 3_d._, for which ame to remite him more;” and on the 11th September
following, the balance was forwarded through the same channel. On the 24th
October, 4_l._ 10_s._ was in like manner sent to George Anderson “on son
James’s second bill;” and on the 31st December, 10_l._ was remitted, “to
be put to the credit of son James’s last bill.” To relieve his father as
much as possible for the cost of his maintenance in London, Watt lived in
a very frugal style, avoiding all unnecessary expenses. His living cost
him only eight shillings a week; and he could not reduce it below that,
he wrote to his father, “without pinching his belly.” He also sought for
some remunerative work on his own account; and when he could obtain it he
sat up at night to execute it.
During Watt’s stay in London he was in a great measure prevented from
stirring abroad by the hot press for sailors which was then going on. As
many as forty pressgangs were at work, seizing all able-bodied men they
could lay hands on. In one night they took not fewer than a thousand
men. Nor were the kidnappers idle. These were the agents of the East
India Company, who had crimping-houses in different parts of the city
for receiving the men whom they had seized upon for service in the
Indian army. Even when the demand for soldiers abated, the kidnappers
continued their trade, and sold their unhappy victims to the planters in
Pennsylvania and other North American colonies. Sometimes severe fights
took place between the pressgangs and the kidnappers for possession of
those who had been seized, the law and police being apparently powerless
to protect them. “They now press anybody they can get,” Watt wrote in the
spring of 1756, “landsmen as well as seamen, except it be in the liberties
of the city, where they are obliged to carry them before the Lord Mayor
first; and unless one be either a prentice or a creditable tradesman,
there is scarce any getting off again. And if I was carried before my
Lord Mayor, I durst not avow that I wrought in the city, it being against
their laws for any unfreeman to work even as a journeyman within the
liberties.”[64] What a curious glimpse does this give us into the practice
of man-hunting in London in the eighteenth century!
[64] Letter to his father quoted in Muirhead’s ‘Life of Watt,’ p.
39.
Watt’s enforced confinement, together with his sedentary habits and
unremitting labour, soon told upon his weak frame. When he hurried to
his lodgings at night, his body was wearied, and his nerves exhausted, so
that his hands shook like those of an old man; yet he persevered with the
extra work which he imposed upon himself, in order to earn a little honest
money to help to pay for his living. His seat in Mr. Morgan’s shop being
placed close to the door, which was often opened and shut in the course of
the day, he caught a severe cold in the course of the winter; and he was
afflicted by a racking cough and severe rheumatic pains, from the effects
of which he long continued to suffer. Distressed by a gnawing pain in his
back, and greatly depressed in spirits, he at length, with his father’s
sanction, determined to return to Greenock, to seek for renewal of health
in his native air. His father made him a further remittance to enable
him to purchase some of the tools required for his trade, together with
materials for making others, and a copy of Bion’s work on the construction
and use of Mathematical Instruments. Having secured these, he set out on
his return journey for Scotland, and reached Greenock in safety in the
autumn of 1756. There his health soon became sufficiently restored to
enable him to return to work; and with the concurrence and help of his
father, he shortly after proceeded to Glasgow, in his twentieth year, to
begin business on his own account.
In endeavouring to establish himself in his trade, Watt encountered
the same obstacle which in London had almost prevented his learning it.
Although there were no mathematical instrument makers in Glasgow, and it
must have been a public advantage to have so skilled a mechanic settled in
the place, Watt was opposed by the corporation of hammermen on the ground
that he was neither the son of a burgess nor had served an apprenticeship
within the borough.[65] Failing in his endeavours to open a place of
business, he next tried to prevail on the corporation to allow him to
make use of a small workshop wherein to make experiments; but this also
was peremptorily refused. The hammermen were doubtless acting in a very
narrow spirit, in thus excluding the young mechanic from the privileges
of citizenship; but such was the custom of the times,--those who were
within the favoured circles usually putting their shoulders together to
exclude those who were without. Watt had, however, already been employed
by Dr. Dick, Professor of Natural Philosophy, to repair some mathematical
instruments which had been bequeathed to the University by a gentleman in
the West Indies; and the professors, having an absolute authority within
the area occupied by the college buildings, determined to give him an
asylum there, and thus free him from the incubus of the guilds.
[65] The following “letter of Guildry” embodied the local
regulations which existed for the purpose of preventing “loss
and skaith” to the burgesses and craftsmen of Glasgow by the
intrusion of “strangers”:--“The Dean of Guild and his Council
shall have full power to discharge, punish, and unlaw all
persons, unfreemen, using the liberty of a freeman within the
burgh, as they shall think fit, ay and while the said unfreemen
be put off the town, and restrained, or else be made free with
the town and their crafts; and sic like, to pursue, upon the
judges competent, all persons dwelling within this burgh, and
usurping the liberty thereof, obtain decrets against them, and
cause the same to be put to speedy execution.”
[Illustration: INNER QUADRANGLE, GLASGOW COLLEGE.]
In the heart of old Glasgow city, not far from the cathedral of St.
Mungo, which Knox with difficulty preserved from the fury of the Scotch
iconoclasts, stands the venerable University, a curiously black and
sombre building, more than 400 years old. Inside the entrance, on the
right-hand side, is a stone staircase, guarded by fabulous beasts in
stone. The buildings consist of several quadrangles; but there is not much
regularity in their design, each part seeming to stand towards the other
parts, in a state of independent crookedness and irregularity. There are
turrets in the corners of the quadrangles,--turrets with peaked tops,
like witches’ caps. In the inner quadrangle, entered from the left-hand
side of the outer court, a workshop was found for our mechanician, in
which he was securely established by the midsummer of 1757. The apartment
appropriated to Watt by the professors is still to be seen in nearly the
same rude state in which he left it. It is situated on the first floor of
the range of building forming the north-west side of the inner quadrangle,
immediately under the gallery of the Natural Philosophy class, with which
it communicates. It is lighted by three windows, two of which open into
the quadrangle, and the third, at the back, into the Professors’ court.
There is a small closet in the corner of the room, where some students
have cut their names in the plaster,--date “1713.” The access to the room
used to be from the court by a spiral stone staircase; but that entrance
is now closed. The apartment is only about twenty feet square; but it
served Watt, as it has since served others, for high thinking and noble
working.[66]
[66] When we visited the room some years since, we found laid
there the galvanic apparatus employed by Professor Thomson for
perfecting the invention of his delicate process of signalling
through the wires of the Atlantic Telegraph.
In addition to his workshop under the Natural Philosophy class, a shop
for the sale of his instruments was also appropriated to Watt by the
Professors. It formed the ground-floor of the house situated next to the
Principal’s Gate, being part of the University Buildings, and was entered
directly from the pavement of the High Street. It has been described to
us, on the authority of Professor Fleming, as an old house, with a sort of
arcade in front, supported on pillars. In making some alterations in the
building the pillars were too much weakened, and the house, excepting the
basement, had to be taken down. The shop occupied by Watt is the little
tenement shown on the right hand of the following engraving; but the lower
story of the building has since been altered and repaired, and is now
totally different from what it was in Watt’s time.
[Illustration: ISOMETRIC VIEW OF GLASGOW COLLEGE, 1693, FROM SLEYER’S
‘THEATRUM SCOTIÆ.’[67]]
[67] The illustration does not show the Inner Quadrangle, situated
to the left of the Main Court, that part of the building having
been added since the view was published.
Though his wants were few, and he lived on humble fare, Watt found it
very difficult to earn a subsistence by his trade. His father sent him
remittances from time to time; but the old man had suffered serious losses
in his own business, and had become much less able to help his son with
money. After a year’s trial, Watt wrote to his father, that “unless it be
the Hadley’s instruments there is little to be got by it, as at most other
jobs I am obliged to do the most of them myself; and, as it is impossible
for one person to be expert at everything, they often cost me more time
than they should do.” Of the quadrants, he could make three in a week,
with the help of a lad; but the profit upon the three was not more than
40_s._ The customers for these were very few in number, as seagoing ships
with their captains could not yet reach Glasgow.[68]
[68] The author of ‘Glasgow, Past and Present’ thus writes:--“Last
week (Nov. 1851) I was crossing the ferry at the west end of
Tradeston, and in the course of our passage over we turned
round the bow of a large ship. The ferryman, looking up to her
leviathan bulwarks, exclaimed, ‘She came up here yesterday,
drawing eighteen feet water!’ Now, upon this very spot seventy
years ago, when a very little boy, I waded across the river,
my feet never being off the ground, and the water not reaching
above my arm-pits. The depth at that time could not have been
much more than three feet.”
Failing sufficient customers for his instruments, Watt sent those which
he had made to Port Glasgow and Greenock, where his father helped him to
dispose of them. He also bethought him of taking a journey to Liverpool
and London, for the purpose of obtaining orders for instruments;
though, for some reason or other--most probably because he was averse to
“pushing,” and detested the chaffering of trade--his contemplated journey
was not undertaken. He therefore continued to execute only such orders as
came to him, so that his business remained very small. He began to fear
that he must give up the trade that would not keep him, and he wrote to
his father: “If this business does not succeed, I must fall into some
other.” To eke out his income, he took to map and chart selling, and,
amongst other things, offered for sale the Map of the River Clyde,[69]
originally surveyed by his uncle John.
[69] The ‘Glasgow Courant’ of Oct. 22, 1759, contains the
following advertisement:--
“_Just Published_,
“And to be Sold by James Watt, at his Shop in the College
of Glasgow, price 2_s._ 6_d._,
“A large Sheet Map of the River Clyde, from Glasgow to
Portincross, from an Actual Survey.
“To which is added,
“A Draught of Part of the North Channel, with the Frith
of Clyde according to the best authorities.”
It is well for the world at large that Watt’s maps and quadrants remained
on his hands unsold. The most untoward circumstances in life have often
the happiest results. It is not Fortune that is blind, but man. Had his
instrument-making business prospered, Watt might have become known as a
first-class maker of quadrants, but not as the inventor of the condensing
steam-engine. It was because his own special business failed that he was
driven to betake himself to other pursuits, and eventually to prosecute
the invention on which his fame mainly rests. At first he employed part
of his leisure in making chemical and other experiments; but as these
yielded him no returns in the shape of money, he was under the necessity
of making some sort of article that was in demand, and for which he could
find customers. Although he had no ear for music, and scarcely knew one
note from another, he followed the example of the old spectacle-maker,
his first master, in making fiddles, flutes, and guitars, which met with
a readier sale than his quadrants. These articles were what artists call
“pot-boilers,” and kept him in funds until a maintenance could be earned
by higher-class work. We are informed, through a lady at Glasgow, that her
father bought a flute from Watt, who said to him, in selling it: “Woe be
to ye, Tam, if you’re no guid luck; for this is the first I’ve sold!”
His friend Dr. Black, probably to furnish him with some profitable
employment, asked Watt to make a barrel-organ for him, which he at once
proceeded to construct. Watt was not the man to refuse work of any kind
requiring the exercise of constructive skill. He first carefully studied
the principles of harmony,--making science, in a measure, the substitute
for want of ear,[70] and took for his guide the profound but obscure
work on ‘Harmonics,’ published by Dr. R. Smith of Cambridge. He next
made a model of the instrument; after which he constructed the organ,
which, when finished, was considered a great success. About the same time
the office-bearers of a Mason’s Lodge in Glasgow sent to ask him if he
would undertake to build for them a finger-organ. As he had successfully
repaired an instrument of the same kind, besides making the barrel-organ,
he readily accepted the order. Watt was always, as he said, dissatisfied
with other people’s work, as well as his own; and this habit of his mind
made him study to improve upon whatever came before him. Thus, in the
process of building this organ, he devised a number of novel expedients,
such as a sustained monochord, indicators and regulators of the strength
of the blast, means of tuning the instrument according to any system of
temperament, with sundry contrivances for improving the efficiency of the
stops. The qualities of the organ when finished are said to have elicited
the surprise and admiration of musicians.[71]
[70] General T. Perronet Thompson is another remarkable instance
of a person without ear for music, who has mastered the
principles of harmony and applied them in the invention of his
“Enharmonic Organ.”
[71] Watt seems to have made other organs besides those above
mentioned. Not long since a barrel-organ of his construction
was offered for sale at Glasgow. It was originally in the form
of a table, about three feet square, having no appearance of
a musical instrument externally. At this table, when Watt and
his friends were seated, he would set the concealed mechanism
in action, and surprise them with the production of the music.
It has since been mounted with an organ front and sides, with
gilt pipes. When in proper tune it is of considerable power and
pleasing harmony; and continues orthodox in its psalm tunes,
which range from “Martyrs” to the “Old Hundred.” A correspondent
writes as follows:--“A large organ made and used by Watt when
he had his shop in Glasgow, was disposed of by him, when he
finally left this city. It came into the possession of the late
Mr. Archibald M‘Lellan, coach-builder, Miller Street, Glasgow,
and he had it fitted up in his elegant residence in that fine
old street. I have heard it played by Mr. M‘Lellan. After his
death it was sold, and purchased by Mr. James G. Adam of the
Denny print-works. Mr. Adam died, and the organ was advertised
for sale, in 1864, and purchased for 10_l._, by Adam Sim, Esq.,
of Coulter Mains, in whose possession it now is. Mr. Sim has
authentic documents to prove that this organ was really James
Watt’s.”
The leisure time which Watt did not occupy with miscellaneous work of
this sort, he spent in reading. He did not want for books, as the College
library was near at hand; and the professors as well as students were
willing to lend him from their stores. He was not afraid of solid, heavy,
dry books, provided he could learn something from them. All were alike
welcome; and one of his greatest pleasures was in devouring a novel,
when it fell in his way. He is even said to have occupied himself in
writing tales and verses when he had nothing else to do. As none of his
attempts have been preserved, we cannot offer an opinion upon them; but
it is doubtful whether Watt’s poetry and fiction would display the same
originality and power of invention as his steam-engine. The only youthful
exercises of his which have been preserved are anything but poetical. One
of them, at Heathfield, is a ‘Treatise on Practical Megethometry;’ and
another is a ‘Compendium of Definitions,’ in Latin, by Gerard de Vries,
both written in a neat round hand.
Like most of the Glasgow citizens of that time, Watt occasionally visited
his club, where he cultivated the society of men of greater culture and
experience than himself.[72] As he afterwards observed to a friend, “Our
conversations then, besides the usual subjects with young men, turned
principally on literary topics, religion, morality, belles-lettres,
&c.; and to those conversations my mind owed its first bias towards
such subjects, in which they were all much my superiors, I never having
attended a college, and being then but a mechanic.”
[72] The club he frequented was called the Anderston Club, of
which Mr. (afterwards Professor) Millar, Dr. Robert Simson, the
mathematician, Dr. Adam Smith, Dr. Black, and Dr. Cullen, were
members. The standing dish of the club was hen-broth, consisting
of a decoction of “how-towdies” (fowls), thickened with black
beans, and seasoned with pepper. Dr. Strang says Professor
Simson was in the habit of counting the steps from his house to
the club, so that he could tell the distance to the fraction of
an inch. But it is not stated whether he counted the steps on
his return, and found the number of steps the same.
There was another circumstance connected with his situation at this time
which must have been peculiarly agreeable to a young man of his character,
aspirations, and thirst for knowledge. His shop, being conveniently
situated within the College, was a favourite resort of the professors and
the students. They were attracted by the ingenious instruments and models
which the shop contained, and the pleasure always felt in witnessing the
proceedings of a skilful mechanic at his work, but more particularly by
the easy, unaffected, and original conversation of Watt himself. Though
a comparative youth, the professors were usually glad to consult him on
points of mechanical knowledge and practice; and the acuteness of his
observation, the accuracy of his knowledge, and the readiness with which
he communicated what he knew, soon rendered him a general favourite.
Among his most frequent visitors were Dr. Joseph Black, the distinguished
professor of chemistry, who there contracted a friendship with Watt which
lasted, uninterrupted, for a period of forty years, until the Doctor’s
death; Professor Simson, one of the most eminent men of his day, whom Lord
Brougham has described as the restorer of the science of geometry; Dr.
Dick, the Professor of Natural Philosophy; and Professor Anderson.[73]
Dr. Moor and Dr. Adam Smith were also frequent callers. But of all Watt’s
associates, none is more closely connected with his name and history than
John Robison, then a student at Glasgow College, and afterwards Professor
of Natural Philosophy at Edinburgh.
[73] John Anderson was a native of Greenock, and an intimate
friend of James Watt. He was appointed professor of Hebrew in
his twenty-seventh year, and succeeded Dr. Dick as professor of
Natural Philosophy in 1757. Watt spent many of his evenings at
his residence within the College, and had the free use of his
excellent private library. Professor Anderson is entitled to the
honour of being the first to open classes for the instruction
of working men--“anti-toga classes,” as he called them--in the
principles of Natural Philosophy; and at his death he bequeathed
his property for the purpose of founding an institution with
the same object. The Andersonian University was opened in 1796,
long before the age of Mechanics’ Institutes.
Robison was nearer Watt’s age than the rest, and stood in the intimate
relation to him of bosom friend, as well as fellow inquirer in science.
He was handsome and prepossessing in appearance, frank and lively, full of
fancy and humour, and a general favourite in the College. He was a capital
talker, an accomplished linguist, and a good musician; yet, with all his
versatility, he was a profound thinker and a diligent student, especially
in mathematical and mechanical science, as he afterwards proved in his
elaborate ‘System of Mechanical Philosophy,’ edited by Sir David Brewster,
and his many able contributions to the ‘Encyclopædia Britannica,’ of which
he was the designer and editor.
Robison’s introduction to Watt has been described by himself. After
feasting his eyes on the beautifully-finished instruments in his shop,
Robison entered into conversation with him. Expecting to find only a
workman, he was surprised to discover a philosopher. “I had the vanity,”
says Robison, “to think myself a pretty good proficient in my favourite
study (mathematical and mechanical philosophy), and was rather mortified
at finding Mr. Watt so much my superior. But his own high relish for
these things made him pleased with the chat of any person who had the
same tastes with himself; and his innate complaisance made him indulge
my curiosity, and even encourage my endeavours to form a more intimate
acquaintance with him. I lounged much about him, and, I doubt not, was
frequently teasing him. Thus our acquaintance began.”
In Watt’s workshop also, Robison first met Dr. Black, and there initiated
a friendship which ended only with death. “My first acquaintance with
him,” Robison afterwards wrote Watt, “began in your rooms when you were
rubbing up Macfarlane’s instruments. He used to come in, and, standing
with his back to us, amuse himself with Bird’s quadrant, whistling softly
to himself, in a manner that thrilled me to the heart.”
In 1757 Robison applied for the office of assistant to Dr. Dick, Professor
of Natural Philosophy, in the place of the son of that gentleman, who
had just died; but though he had already taken the degree of Master of
Arts, he was thought too young to hold so important an office, being
only about nineteen years old. His friends wished him to study for the
church; but, preferring some occupation in which his mechanical tastes
might be indulged, he turned his eyes to London. Furnished with letters
from Professor Dick and Dr. Simson, he obtained an introduction to
Admiral Knowles, who engaged him to take charge of his son’s instruction
while at sea. In that capacity he sailed from Spithead in 1759, with the
fleet which assisted the land forces in the taking of Quebec; he and his
pupil being rated as midshipmen in the Admiral’s ship. Robison was on
duty in the boat which carried Wolfe to the point where the army scaled
the heights of Montcalm the night before the battle; and as the sun was
setting in the west, the General, doubtless from an association of ideas
suggested by the dangers of the coming struggle, recited, in an under
tone, Gray’s ‘Elegy on a Country Churchyard;’ and when he had finished,
said, “Now, gentlemen, I would rather have been the author of that poem
than take Quebec.”
When Robison returned from his voyagings in 1763, a travelled man,--having
had the advantage, during his absence, of acting as confidential assistant
of Admiral Knowles in his marine surveys and observations,--he reckoned
himself more than on a par with Watt; but he soon found that, during the
period of his absence from Glasgow, his friend had been even busier than
himself. When they entered into conversation, he found Watt continually
striking into new paths where he was obliged to be his follower. The
extent of the mathematical instrument maker’s investigations was no less
remarkable than the depth to which he had pursued them. Not only had he
mastered the principles of engineering, civil and military, but diverged
into studies in antiquity, natural history, languages, criticism, and
art. Every pursuit became science in his hands, and he made use of his
subsidiary knowledge for the purpose of helping him towards his favourite
objects.
Before long, Watt became to be regarded as one of the ablest men about
college. “When to the superiority of knowledge in his own line,” said
Robison, “which every man confessed, there was joined the naïve simplicity
and candour of his character, it is no wonder that the attachment of
his acquaintances was so strong. I have seen something of the world,” he
continued, “and I am obliged to say that I never saw such another instance
of general and cordial attachment to a person whom all acknowledged to be
their superior. But this superiority was concealed under the most amiable
candour, and liberal allowance of merit to every man. Mr. Watt was the
first to ascribe to the ingenuity of a friend things which were very often
nothing but his own surmises followed out and embodied by another. I am
well entitled to say this, and have often experienced it in my own case.”
There are few traits in biography more charming than this generous
recognition of merit mutually attributed by the one friend to the other.
Arago, in quoting the words of Robison, has well observed that it is
difficult to determine whether the honour of having thus recorded them be
not as great as that of having inspired them.
[Illustration: THE BROOMIELAW IN 1760.]
[Illustration: PROFESSOR ROBISON, Æt. 60.
[By T. D. Scott, after Raeburn.]]