THE AGE OF STEAM, NAPOLEON AND NELSON
In the early part of the nineteenth century began what has been called
the Age of Steam; but before it ended, it was supplanted by the Age of
Electricity. When the century opened, the steam engine of Watt existed
in a practical and useful form, and the numberless experiments of
the physicists in the preceding century had laid bare the main laws
governing the force and the expansion of steam and air, and of gases
and vapors in general. The laws of the expansion of solids and liquids
were also understood in their main features, and the various inventions
mentioned in the last chapter were in operation. Seizing on the
facilities thus supplied, and noting the worldly success that certain
discoverers and inventors had achieved, the inventors of the nineteenth
century got speedily to work. The result was that the civilized world
at the end of the nineteenth century was vastly different from the
civilized world at the end of the eighteenth century.
In general terms, it may be declared that during the first half of the
nineteenth century, the principal inventions were in the utilization of
heat, especially in the form of steam engines; while during the latter
half, the principal inventions were electrical:--though some very
important electrical inventions were made before 1850. In this brief
résumé, no attempt will be made to describe or even mention all the
inventions made, or even all the important ones; for such an attempt
would be impossible to carry out. Only a few super-important ones will
be mentioned.
The first important successful application of the steam engine was
embodied in the steamboat _Charlotte Dundas_ that was produced in
Scotland in 1801. Other steamboats had appeared before, but they had
not been successful. The first was tried on the Soane River in France
in 1781. Later, Fitch and Ramsay made some unsuccessful attempts in the
United States. Then, in 1788, Patrick Miller, with the assistance of an
engineer named William Symington, had constructed a steam vessel that
attained a speed of five knots on a lake in Scotland. In the next year,
Mr. Miller and Mr. Symington had put another steamboat on the water
that developed a speed of nearly seven knots. None of these experiments
could be called successful of itself; but the experience gained by
them induced Lord Dundas to build the _Charlotte Dundas_ and name it
after his daughter. The _Charlotte Dundas_ was a practical success from
the start; for, in March, 1802, it towed two vessels of 70 tons each
a distance of 19-1/2 miles in six hours, while such a strong wind was
blowing from ahead that no other vessel on the canal tried to move to
windward.
Whether or not this constituted an actual invention the present author
will not attempt to determine, even in his own mind. It is clear,
however, that it was the direct issue of several inventions, and that
it was the first embodiment in a concrete form of the successful and
practical application of steam power to transportation on the water.
The next successful application was made by Robert Fulton, who built
the _Clermont_ in 1807. This vessel went into regular service in 1808,
plying between New York and Albany, on the Hudson River.
The first steamboat to venture on the ocean was the _Phoenix_, that
made the trip from New York to Delaware Bay by sea in 1808. It was
built by Mr. R. L. Stevens, an engineer of Hoboken. If it accomplished
nothing else, it supplied a precedent and gave encouragement to
inventors everywhere. It made "le premier pas qui coute."
Meanwhile, in June, 1802, Mr. Thomas Wedgwood had published "An Account
of a Method of Copying Paintings upon Glass, and of making Profiles
by the Agency of Light upon Nitrate of Silver," with observations by
Sir Humphry Davy. In the course of his paper, he declared that he had
secured profiles of paintings made on glass by throwing the shadows
of those paintings on paper covered with a solution of the nitrate;
the paper showing the objects delineated in tones that were dark or
light inversely as they were in the painting. He also took profiles of
natural objects by throwing their shadows on the prepared paper: the
parts of the paper covered by the shadows being white, while the parts
outside the shadows became dark.
This seems to have been an actual invention, in that it followed a
discovery made by Wedgwood that sunlight acted on nitrate of silver,
and was the embodiment of an idea, then conceived by him, to utilize
his discovery in making profile pictures. His invention was far from
perfect, however; the greatest imperfection being the fact that the
pictures could not be fixed; because, unless the paper was ever
afterward kept away from the light, its whole surface would become
dark, and the picture therefore cease to exist. In consequence, it
aroused almost no interest whatever at the time. In 1814, M. Niepce
invented a process that he called "heliography," by which he made
pictures on silvered copper covered with a thin solution of asphaltum.
In 1829, Daguerre and Niepce entered into a copartnership for
developing heliography, and instituted experiments that led Daguerre
to inventing the daguerreotype, made by a process quite new in detail,
but based on the earlier inventions of both Wedgwood and Niepce. The
daguerreotype was followed in 1850 by the present "photograph."
The invention of electroplating was made by Brugnatelli in Italy
in 1803. The fact that electric currents could decompose certain
liquids had been known since 1800, and also the further fact that
oxygen and hydrogen, acids and alkalies, appeared at the positive and
negative poles respectively of the wires in contact with the liquid.
But Brugnatelli seems to have been the first to conceive the idea of
utilizing these facts in a device whereby he could deposit metals
at will at the negative end of a solution. In the embodiment of his
conception, pieces (say of silver) were hung on rods in connection with
the positive pole of the battery supplying the electric current, while
the articles to be plated with silver were hung on rods connected with
the negative pole. The value of this invention and its extensive use in
the electrodeposition of metals at the present day are well known.
In the following year, Sir Humphry Davy, working along the general
line of electrical decomposition of liquids, made a number of
super-brilliant investigations. Possibly the most important result was
his discovery of a new metal, to which he gave the name Potassium,
formed at the negative pole by the electrical decomposition of
moistened caustic potash. He followed this by decomposing caustic soda
and discovering another new metal, that he named Sodium.
During the course of his experiments, Davy noted that when the two
terminal wires from a large Voltaic battery were touched together and
then drawn apart, not only did a spark pass, but a continuous discharge
of great brilliancy, that did not cease until the wires were separated
by a considerable distance. The extent of this distance was found later
to be dependent on the number of cells in the battery. He noted also
that the discharge did not follow a straight line, but was bent into
an arc; and for this reason he gave it the name, "Voltaic arc." This
light is still known by the name "arc light." Its importance does not
seem to have been realized until after the dynamo-machine had been
invented, and means thereby supplied for providing a greater amount of
electric current, and at less expense than Voltaic cells were capable
of delivering.
Davy's last great invention was his miner's safety lamp, made in 1816.
There had been frequent explosions in the collieries, attended with
great loss of life, and Davy was requested to try to ascertain how they
could be prevented. After visiting the mines, he had samples of the gas
that was found in them sent to him for investigation. He went about the
work with scientific thoroughness and system, and ascertained that the
gas would not explode if it were mixed with less than six times or more
than fourteen times its volume of air; that air rendered impure by the
combustion of a candle would not explode the gas; that, if a candle
were burnt in a closed vessel, with small openings near the flame, no
explosion would take place, even if the vessel were introduced into an
explosive mixture; and that the gas from the mines would not explode
inside a tube less than 1/8 inch in diameter. These data being secured,
Davy conceived the idea of making a lamp in which a small oil light
should be fixed and surrounded with a cylinder of wire gauze. He then
embodied his conception in a concrete form, and the "Miners' Safety
Lamp" resulted.
This was an invention of the first order; original, concrete and
highly useful. After meeting the customary chorus of prejudice and
opposition, it justified its existence by a quickly established record
of effectiveness, and took its place among the useful adjuncts of the
machine of civilization.
Meanwhile, several other adjuncts had appeared. Among these was the
steel pen, a process of making malleable iron castings, the planing
machine, a fireproof safe, the knitting machine and the band wood-saw.
In 1726 Dr. Hales had announced that a gas capable of burning, and
giving light while burning, could be distilled from coal. This
announcement created great interest, and led to a long series of
scientific investigations as to the possibility of utilizing it for
house and street illumination, especially by a Mr. Murdock in the
latter decade of the century. In 1802 Mr. Murdock made a public display
of the result of his labors, by illuminating a factory with gas. In
the year 1803-1804 the Lyceum Theatre in London was so lighted, and a
year later some extensive cotton mills in Manchester. Public interest
was so roused that investigations on a larger scale ensued, which
resulted in lighting Westminster Bridge with gas in 1813, and the town
of Westminster the following year. In 1816 street lighting by gas was
common in London. The lighting of houses by gas followed later, but
very slowly.
It is a little difficult to see that there was much invention of an
original or brilliant kind involved in the gradual development of the
art of illuminating by gas; but it cannot reasonably be denied that a
considerable amount of invention must have been done in the aggregate,
for the reason that a wholly novel art was created. If it was not
invented, how was it brought into being? The best answer probably is
that the art was not the result of one brilliant invention followed by
others that improved upon it, but was rather the aggregate work of a
number of minor inventions, each one of which carried the art forward,
but by only one short step.
Other minor inventions produced the locomotive and the railroad. The
first steam engines were stationary; but portable engines, now called
locomotives, gradually came into being. They were engines mounted
on platforms resting on wheels that, in turn, rested on the ground;
the revolutions of the engines turning the wheels, and causing the
advancement of the whole. In 1807 a wagon-way was laid down on which
cars were run to and from a colliery, and this wagon-way passed close
in front of a house in which lived a poor family named Stephenson,
a member of which was a boy whose Christian name was George. In the
following year, the wooden parts were taken up and replaced by a
single line of iron rails with sidings. In 1811 a portable engine
was constructed for running on these rails, and this was followed by
another in the following year. George Stephenson made a locomotive for
running on rails in 1814, and followed it by another in 1816, both for
hauling coal.
It was now so obvious that locomotives could haul other things than
coal, that a railroad was laid down between Manchester and Liverpool,
and a prize of £500 was offered for the best engine. On October 6,
1829, the competition was held, though only three engines appeared. The
prize was won by Stephenson's locomotive, the _Rocket_, which attained
a speed of 29 miles per hour.
With the locomotive, as with illuminating gas, it is impossible to
see any one original or brilliant invention. We do see, however, the
result of the superposition on one brilliant invention (that of Hero's
steam engine) of a number of minor inventions, and much constructive
ingenuity and initiative.
An invention of a higher order had signalized the latter part of the
eighteenth century, in the form of a printing press in which the speed
of printing was greatly increased by the use of revolving cylinders;
one holding the type on its outer surface, and the other covered
with leather, the paper passing between, and receiving the printed
impression by the pressure exerted between the two cylinders. In order
that the type should fit on the curved surface of the cylinder, they
were made narrower toward the bottom. The machine was invented by an
Englishman named Nicholson. It was never put into practical use; but
a machine embodying the revolving cylinder for receiving the force of
the impression communicated to the paper, was invented and put into
successful use later by a German named König. The type, however, was
not put on a cylinder in this machine, but on a flat plate that passed
back and forth under the revolving impression cylinder. Two of König's
presses were bought for the _London Times_; and on November 28, 1814,
one made 1,100 impressions per hour, a marvelous advance over speeds
previously attained. From the standpoint of pure invention, it was
not so admirable as Nicholson's; but being a later product, and being
based on Nicholson's principle, it was naturally an improvement in
construction and mode of operation.
In 1814 Sir David Brewster, while experimenting on the polarization of
light, made an invention of the most original and concrete type, which
required a high grade of scientific knowledge for its conception and
development, but which was not intended for any utilitarian purpose,
and yet was of too serious a character to be called a scientific toy.
This was his famous kaleidoscope; an instrument described accurately
by its name, for it enabled one to see beautiful things. It was very
simple in construction and principle, and seems to have fallen short
of greatness in only one element, that of usefulness. By a careful
adjustment of two prisms at a definite angle to each other, Sir David
showed that geometrical images of the utmost beauty and variety could
be made of objects placed between the mirrors, especially if those
objects were small objects, and if they were of different colors,
like bits of colored glass. Knowledge of this escaping, thousands
of kaleidoscopes were soon put on the market, and sold in all the
principal cities, before Sir David had had time to get a patent.
Though the instruments were unscientifically made, they gave beautiful
pictures nevertheless; but the result was that the kaleidoscope was not
appreciated at its full value. The inventor improved the instrument
greatly, and developed it into one of the most beauty-producing
appliances known, and one of the most extraordinary and unique. The
most remarkable fact connected with it is that no real usefulness for
it has ever yet been found. The present author ventures to predict that
a clear field of usefulness will some day be found by some fortunate
inventor.
Meanwhile, the ill-clad captain of artillery who had invented the plan
by which the British were pushed out of Toulon with so much neatness
and despatch, had nearly turned the civilized world upside down. No man
save Alexander ever accomplished so much of that kind of work in so
short a time. His work consisted of a number of acts performed by him,
each of which was like his act at Toulon, in that it began with the
conception of a brilliant idea, proceeded with the embodiment of the
idea in a concrete plan, and ended with the carrying into operation of
that plan. Napoleon was great in each of these lines of work. He had
a brilliant and yet correct imagination, that enabled him to conceive
ideas of extraordinary brilliancy, and also to select from them the
ideas that were the most susceptible of being made into concrete plans
of the kind that could be carried out successfully. He possessed great
constructiveness, that enabled him to construct mentally a plan in
which all the means available for his use were seized upon and put to
their special tasks. He possessed finally great ardor, industry and
courage, that enabled him to start his plan to going very quickly, and
keep it going very rapidly, until it had performed its task. It would
be idle to discuss at which of these three stages of the work he was
the greatest, or to try to decide which stage of the three was the most
important; because the three were links in a continual chain, and the
chain depended on each equally for its strength:--as any chain does on
its links.
It may be interesting, however, to realize that mere imagination is
possibly the most elementary activity of the mind; mere imagination
is evidenced by savages, for instance, and by children, more than by
highly educated men. Constructiveness, on the other hand, is little
to be found in savages or children, and is a product of education,
and a result of the training of the reasoning faculties. Courage and
impulsive energy again are elemental faculties, and are observable
more in savages than in the civilized. It seems to be the effect of
civilization, therefore, to develop the reasoning faculties, at the
expense of both imagination and courage. In fact, it is clearly the
effect of civilization to develop a cold and calculating materialism.
Men are rare therefore, and have been rare in every age, who combine
the three qualities of imagination, constructiveness and courage.
Napoleon combined all three in harmonious proportions; and he possessed
each one in its most perfect form.
His performance at Toulon was so spectacular that it attracted
attention at once, and caused his promotion to the command of the
artillery in Italy. Here he was able to suggest projects that received
approval and brought successes. One plan conceived and developed by
him, however, was disapproved. It consisted essentially of dividing the
Piedmontese and Austrians, crushing the Piedmontese, and then driving
the Austrians out of Italy into Austria and following them thither.
Later, this plan was approved, and he himself was put in command in
Italy. It was this plan, executed by the Bonaparte of those days, that
began the career of the Napoleon of history. So original and brilliant
had been the conception, so mathematically correct and practically
feasible had been the plan which Bonaparte developed from it, and so
furiously energetic were his operations in carrying out the plan, that
the sluggish Piedmontese were defeated before they quite realized that
war had been begun. A like catastrophe happened to the equally mentally
and physically sluggish Austrians; then another catastrophe, and then
another, and then still others; and in such rapid and bewildering
succession, that in a year and a month after his arrival in Italy he
had driven the Austrians out completely, formed the Cisalpine and
Ligurian republics in the north of Italy, and signed the armistice of
Leoben with the Austrians, within fifty miles of Vienna.
Napoleon's next invention was a project for ruining England by
attacking her East Indian possessions by a campaign beginning with an
invasion of Egypt. Everything proceeded in substantial accordance with
the plan developed, until August 1, 1798. In the evening of that day
the whole project was destroyed by Horatio Nelson.
It was destroyed in a battle near the mouth of the river Nile, that was
decided in fifteen minutes, though it was not wholly concluded until it
had been raging for nearly four hours. In fifteen minutes, the French
fleet on which depended Bonaparte's communications with Europe, had
been so severely damaged that the failure of Bonaparte's project was
decided.
Nelson was a man like Bonaparte in certain qualities; in the qualities
that are essential to great leadership, imagination, constructiveness
and executiveness. The first clear evidence of these qualities he had
displayed startlingly at the battle of Cape St. Vincent on February 14,
1797;--when, swiftly realizing that two separated parts of the hostile
Spanish fleet were about to join, he suddenly conceived the idea of
preventing the junction by committing an act that--unless it brought
success--would probably cost him his commission and perhaps his life.
Now, the mere conception of an idea so revolting to professional ethics
would not occur to an unimaginative man: and still less would it be
retained. But it did occur to Nelson; and Nelson retained it and looked
it squarely in the face. To embody his idea in a practicable plan was a
simple matter to his active and trained intelligence, while to execute
the plan was an act so natural as to be almost automatic. Much to the
amazement of the Commander of the fleet and all the officers and men in
both the fleets, the little division commanded by Commodore Nelson was
seen actually to leave the line of battle! Nelson had taken his life,
his fortune and his sacred honor in his hand, and staked all on an
endeavor to get between the two separated parts of the Spanish fleet.
The British Commander quickly realized what his daring subordinate
had in mind, and speedily came to his relief. A brilliant, though
not materially decisive, victory was won. The already distinguished
Commander-in-Chief was then made Earl St. Vincent, and the hitherto
obscure Horatio Nelson brought into the forefront of naval heroes, with
the rank of rear-admiral, a gold medal and a knighthood.
Now, Nelson had not appeared at the mouth of the Nile because of any
accident, or any chain of fortuitous circumstances; he did not fight
the epochal battle there because of any accidental occurrences or
conditions, and he did not gain the victory because of any similar
causes. Nelson appeared at the mouth of the Nile in accordance with a
plan that he had conceived as soon as he heard of Bonaparte's departure
from Toulon on a destination carefully kept secret, but which Nelson
divined as Egypt. He so divined it, by imagining himself in Bonaparte's
place, and imagining for what purpose he, Nelson, would have left
Toulon under the conditions prevailing then in France. He engaged the
French fleet when he did, and he fought the French fleet in the way he
did, in accordance with a plan that he had conceived long before. No
men were ever more cautious, more solicitous about the future, more
painstaking, more prudent, more insistent against taking undue risks,
than those reputedly reckless devil-may-cares, Napoleon Bonaparte and
Horatio Nelson.
Napoleon realized at once that his brilliant scheme had been shattered;
but he could not now even take his army home, because the British fleet
was in the way. Finally, he succeeded in making the trip himself, with
only a few of his staff. Events ran rapidly then; and on the sixth of
May, 1800, we see Napoleon leaving Paris to undertake a campaign in
northern Italy, in accordance with a plan embodied to carry out an idea
conceived in his fertile mind, of taking his army through the great St.
Bernard pass, dragging his cannon with him through the snow. This plan
(like most of his plans) was so brilliantly conceived, so skillfully
planned, and so energetically executed, that when Napoleon suddenly
appeared with his army in the North of Italy, the Austrian general was
bewildered with amazement. The natural result developed quickly, and
the Austrians retired beyond the Mincio River.
By this time affairs in Europe were vastly complicated, because of the
fact that the maritime enemies of France (which meant virtually all
the other maritime countries of Europe) became exasperated at one of
their number, Great Britain, in consequence of what they considered
her unreasonable insistence on certain doctrines concerning maritime
affairs. A League of Armed Neutrality against her was finally formed,
that soon assumed menacing proportions. This league was completely
broken by the same Horatio Nelson in a naval battle off Copenhagen on
April 2, 1801. This battle was the direct result of a plan conceived
by Nelson, that was so original and so daring that for a long time
he could not secure the consent of his Commander-in-Chief to its
execution. The battle resulted in a victory that was brilliant in
the highest degree; but it was brilliant only because the original
idea was brilliant, and because it was developed into a plan that was
constructively correct and skillfully carried out.
Meanwhile, a brief campaign had been going on between the French and
the Austrians in Austria. It was carried on with great brilliancy of
conception and skill of execution by Moreau, and ended with the battle
of Hohenlinden and the disastrous defeat of the Austrians. The treaty
of Lunéville followed in February, 1801, and left Great Britain as
France's only antagonist.
The victory of Copenhagen having broken the strength of the Confederacy
of Neutrals, and Napoleon seeing the folly of attempting further to
ruin British commerce then, the Treaty of Amiens between Great Britain
and France followed in March, 1802.
As part of this treaty, Great Britain agreed to give up Malta. For
various reasons that do not concern this discussion, Great Britain did
not do so, and war followed in May, 1803.
Before that time, Napoleon had realized that his principal enemy was
England. He now conceived the project of sending an invading army
across the English Channel, knowing that if he could accomplish that,
he could march to London, and dictate his own terms of peace. But how
could he get across the channel, in the face of the British fleet?
From the numberless pictures conjured up in his brilliant imagination,
Napoleon selected the one which showed a French fleet threatening
British possessions in the West Indies, a British fleet rushing to
the West Indies to save them, the French fleet returning and joining
with another French fleet waiting for it, then the combined fleets
securing the mastery of the English Channel from the depleted British
fleet remaining, then a French flotilla of transports with an invading
army forthwith starting across the channel, then a landing against an
opposition easily overcome, then a march to London, then a capture of
London: and finally, he, Napoleon, riding in triumph through London
streets and sleeping in the palace at London--as he had slept in other
palaces on the Continent.
It was a beautiful vision;--a beautiful series of moving pictures
presented to his imagination. To embody all these pictures in realities
became the pre-occupation of his waking and his sleeping hours. By
dint of herculean exertions, he finally collected near Boulogne about
200,000 troops and 1,500 transports. At the proper time, Villeneuve,
with a powerful fleet, was sent to the West Indies to threaten the
British possessions there.
But the same man who had spoiled his India project by the battle of
the Nile, and who had spoiled his project of ruining British commerce
by the battle of Copenhagen, spoiled his present project: the same
man, Horatio Nelson. Nelson had some imagination himself; and he
imagined (correctly as usual) that Villeneuve had sailed for the West
Indies--and away he went in pursuit. Arriving there, and finding that
Villeneuve had been in the West Indies but had left, Nelson left also.
He imagined that Villeneuve had sailed for Europe; and so Nelson sailed
for Europe also, sending a fast frigate to inform the Admiralty of all
that he had learned, and of all that he inferred. The frigate made such
speed, and the First Lord of the Admiralty, Admiral Lord Barham, acted
with such sailor-like energy and skill, that a large British fleet
intercepted Villeneuve on his return, brought him to action near the
coast of Spain, and handled him so roughly that he went for repairs to
Cadiz. He arrived there on August 20.
The news of this, reaching Napoleon, wiped all the beautiful pictures
out of his mind. But he had other pictures in the background. These
he put promptly into the foreground, and started off with incredible
swiftness toward Austria. On October 19, he brought the Austrians to
battle near Ulm, and achieved one of the most decisive victories of his
career. The victory was mainly due to the clearness and correctness
of Napoleon's conceived idea, and the amazing speed and certainty of
his movements in carrying it into execution. The Austrian General Mack
was so wholly taken by surprise that he found his army was completely
surrounded before he had had time to take any preventive measures.
Napoleon had correctly judged the import of Villeneuve's interception
by the British fleet, and realized that it would be mere folly
afterward to attempt to cross the channel then. Still, the situation
was not wholly bad for him, and the victory at Ulm made it beautiful.
For, though England was still greater on the sea than France, France
was also great, and was still a powerful weapon which he could wield
against England, with all the power of genius. But, two days after
the victory of Ulm, came the disaster near Cape Trafalgar, when Nelson
defeated the combined French and Spanish fleets, and thereby secured
for England a superiority at sea, vastly more pronounced than it had
been before. This victory, by making Napoleon helpless at sea against
Great Britain, ruined all Napoleon's chances of dominion, except upon
the Continent.
Napoleon made two brilliant campaigns after this, that brought him to
the summit of his career. Had he been content to stop there, had he
not tried to climb still higher, his descendants might now sit on the
throne of France. But the intoxicating fumes of success seem to have
clouded that brilliant mind, and to have prevented those clear and
correct pictures from forming there that had formed before. The result
was that he embarked on a new project for ruining England that began
with an invasion of Portugal and Spain, which brought on a war with
Austria. It is true that, by a brilliant campaign, Napoleon worsted
Austria and made an advantageous treaty with her, and then married
the daughter of the emperor: but the continuance of the policy that
underlay the war with Austria, brought on later a war with Russia that
sent Napoleon to Elba, an exile.
We see the key to Napoleon's successes in the quality of his mind at
the time of those successes, and we see the key to his failures in a
lowering of the quality of that mind. Military writers tell us that his
mind was not of the same quality when he planned his Russian campaign
as it had been when he planned his early campaigns. Now the reasoning
faculties do not grow dull when one approaches middle age; but the
imaginative faculties do--(in most people). It is an old saying that
"one cannot teach an old dog new tricks." Clearly, this cannot be
because of any failing of memory, though memory fails with age; because
the memory is not involved, save slightly. It must be therefore
because of failing impressionability and receptivity. We all speak
of the "receptive years," meaning the years of childhood and then of
youth; and it is a common saying that young people are more receptive
than old people. Of what are they receptive? Clearly, of mental
impressions. Parents and teachers are warned not to forget that the
minds of young people are very impressionable, and to be careful that
their minds receive good impressions only, so far as they can compass
it. Napoleon, when he made his Russian campaign, was only 43 years old
in years; but he had lived a life that was far from normal or hygienic
physically, and extremely abnormal and unhygienic mentally.
The intention of the last sentence is to point out that mental health
cannot be long preserved amid surroundings mentally unhealthful, any
more than physical health can be long preserved amid surroundings
physically unhealthful; and that the highest qualities of our nature
are the most difficult to maintain and therefore are the first to
fail, under unhealthful surroundings. The spiritual faculties fail
first, then the moral, then the mental and lastly the physical. Now the
imagination, while a mental quality, rather than a moral one, partakes
in a measure of the spiritual, and is one of the highest of the mental
attributes. For this reason imagination is one of the first to be
impaired.
The especial picture of the imagination that becomes faulty under
certain conditions, is the picture of one's self. Under conditions such
as Napoleon had lived under for several years, the picture of himself
in his mind had become unduly magnified in relation to the pictures of
other men. Now is there any one thing more dangerous to a man than to
carry in his mind an incorrect picture of himself?
In Napoleon's case, it led him to the unforgivable military crime;
that of underestimating the enemy. His imagination, by presenting a
magnified image of himself, presented relatively dwarfed images of his
antagonists. The very faculty (imagination) which started Napoleon on
his great successes, started him now on his great reverses. The actual
beginning of these was in his carelessly planned campaign in Russia.
His invention seems to have failed him both in planning the campaign
and in meeting situations afterwards; because his imagination failed to
picture each situation to him exactly as it was.
But the Russian campaign did not wholly ruin him. Even after that,
even after Elba, situations were sometimes presented to him, such
that (although Trafalgar had prevented him from achieving European
domination), yet, if he had been able to see them as clearly as he
had seen situations in his unspoiled days, he might, at least have
saved himself from ruin. But his imagination had become impaired and
therefore his powers of invention also.
Napoleon as general, and Nelson as admiral were what we may term
"opportunistic inventors," who made inventions for meeting transient
situations with success, as distinguished from inventors like Newton
and Watt, who made permanent contributions to the welfare of mankind.
Napoleon as statesman, however, made contributions of a permanent
character.
A supremely valuable contribution of this kind was the stethoscope,
which was invented about 1819 by Dr. Laennec in Paris, and by means of
which the science and art of diagnosis were given an amazing impetus
almost instantly. Possibly one cannot find in the whole history of
modern invention any instrument so small and so inexpensive that has
been so widely and definitely useful. A painful interest hangs to it in
the fact that by means of his own invention, Laennec discovered that
he himself was dying of tuberculosis of the lungs.
In July, 1820, a discovery of a vastly different character was made by
Oersted in Copenhagen; the discovery that if a current of electricity
be passed over or under a magnetic needle, the needle will be deflected
in a direction and to a degree depending on the strength and direction
of the current and the position of the conducting wire relatively to
the needle. Now Laennec invented a simple and little instrument that
began virtually perfect, and that exists today substantially as it
started. Oersted did something equally important, that ultimately
initiated intricate inventions of many kinds, and yet he did not
really invent anything whatever. The importance of his discovery was
recognized at once; so quickly, in fact, and by so many experimenters
and inventors, that Oersted soon found himself in the extraordinary
position of being left behind, in an art to which himself had almost
unknowingly given birth! That some relation existed between magnetism
and electricity had long been evident to physicists; but what that
relation was they did not know until Oersted told them. They seized on
his information with avidity, with results that the whole world knows
now.
The first man heard from was Ampère, who communicated the results of
his experiments in the new art to the Institute of France as early as
September 18th. Almost immediately afterward, Arago discovered that,
if a conducting wire were wrapped around iron wires, those iron wires
became magnets and remained magnets as long as the electric current
continued to pass. Thereupon, Arago made and announced his epoch-making
invention, the electro-magnet. The influence of this invention on the
subsequent history of the machine of civilization, it is hardly needful
to point out.
The experiments of Oersted gave rise at once to much speculation as
to the nature of the action between electric currents and magnets,
and also to considerable experimental and mathematical research.
As had been the case for many thousand years in other endeavors,
speculation accomplished little, but experimental research accomplished
much. By this time mathematics had been highly developed, not only
as an abstract science but also as an aid to physical and chemical
research. The man who attacked the problem in the most scientific
manner was Ampère, who in consequence solved it in the following year,
after a series of mathematically conducted experiments of the utmost
originality and inductiveness. As a result in 1820, he showed that
all the actions and reactions of magnets could be performed by coils
of wire through which electric currents were passing, even if there
was no iron within the coils:--but that they were more powerful, if
iron were within. From this and kindred facts, which he developed by
experiment--(especially the fact that electric currents act and react
on each other as magnets do), he established a new science to which he
gave the name electro-dynamics. In recognition of his contributions to
electricity, the name given many years later to the unit of electric
current was ampère.
In the following years, while pursuing a series of investigations into
the new science, Faraday invented the first electro-magnetic machines.
In the first machine, a magnet floating in mercury was made to revolve
continuously around a central conducting wire through which an electric
current was passing; in the second a conductor was made to revolve
continuously around a fixed magnet; in a third machine, a magnet so
mounted on a longitudinal axis that an electric current could be made
to pass from one pole half way to the other pole, and then out, would
revolve continuously as long as the electric current was made to pass.
Faraday invented the first machines that converted the energy of the
electric current into mechanical motion; though Oersted was the first
who merely effected the conversion. It can hardly be said that Oersted
invented a machine; but Faraday certainly did.
The first utilization of Oersted's discovery in a concrete and
practically usable device was the galvanometer, invented by Schweigger
in 1820. It was a brilliant invention, and solved perfectly the
important problem of measuring accurately the strength of an electric
current. The apparatus consisted merely of a means of multiplying the
effect of the deflecting current by winding the conductor into a coil,
the magnetic needle being within the coil. The galvanometer (named
after Galvani) was an invention of the utmost value, and it is in use
to this day, though in many modified forms. When one realizes how
obvious a utilization of Oersted's discovery the galvanometer was, and
that Schweigger did not invent it until two years later, he wonders
why Oersted himself did not invent it. But the history of invention is
full of such cases and of cases still more amazing. Why did the world
wait several thousand years before Wise invented the metal pen? Why are
we not now inventing a great many more things than we are? Nature is
holding out suggestions for inventions to us by the million, but we do
not see them.
In the year before Schweigger's invention, in 1821, the important
discovery had been made by Seebeck in Berlin, that if two different
metals are joined at their ends, and one junction be raised to a
higher temperature than the other, a current of electricity will be
generated, the strength of which will vary with the metals employed
and the difference in temperature of the junctions. The discovery was
soon utilized in Nobili's invention of the thermopile in which the
current was increased by employing several layers of dissimilar metals
(say antimony and bismuth) in series with each other. The main use of
the thermopile has been in scientific investigations, especially in the
science of heat.
One of the results of the increased use of mathematics, especially
arithmetic, was the invention of Babbage's calculating machine in 1822.
The usefulness of this invention was so apparent that it was not long
in coming into use, or long in causing the invention of improvements on
it of many kinds. The calculating machine was a distinct contribution
to civilization.
Another contribution, but of quite a different kind, was made
by Faraday in the following year (1823) when, after a series of
experiments, he announced that he had succeeded in liquefying many
of the gases then known by the combined action of cold and pressure.
The possibility of doing this had long been suspected by physicists
reasoning from known phenomena; but the actual accomplishment of
the liquefaction of gas was none the less a feat of a high order of
brilliancy and usefulness. In experiments subsequently made, Dewar
received the gases in a vessel of his invention which had double walls,
the space between which he had exhausted of air, and thus made a
vacuum--which is a non-conductor of heat. The "thermos bottle" of today
was invented by the great chemist Dewar, and is not therefore a new
invention.
Meanwhile, the steam engine had been undergoing rapid development,
though the use of locomotives for drawing passenger trains does not
seem to have come into regular use until the Liverpool and Manchester
Railroad was opened in 1830. In 1828, the Delaware and Hudson Canal
Company constructed a short railroad, and sent an agent to England to
buy the necessary locomotives and rails. In the four years following
twelve railroad companies were incorporated. The Baltimore and
Susquehanna began actual operations in 1831.
The inventions of Hero, Branca, Worcester, Savery, Papin and Leupold,
brought to practicality by Watt, had now come to full fruition, and
entered upon that career of world-wide usefulness that has advanced
civilization so tremendously and still continues to advance it.
But the most decisive triumph of the steam engine had come more than
a decade before, when in 1819 the American steamship _Savannah_
crossed the Atlantic ocean in 26 days, going from the United States to
Liverpool.