CHAPTER IV.

Watt's WorkshopFig. 35.—James Watt’s Workshop.(From Smiles’s “Lives of Boulton and Watt.”)

Fig. 35.—James Watt’s Workshop.(From Smiles’s “Lives of Boulton and Watt.”)

Smiles, Watt’s most conscientious and indefatigable biographer, writes:[41]

“Some months since, we visited the little garret atHeathfield in which Watt pursued the investigations of his later years. The room had been carefully locked up since his death, and had only once been swept out. Everything lay very much as he left it. The piece ofiron which he was last employed in turning, lay on the lathe. The ashes of the last fire were in the grate; the last bit of coal was in the scuttle. The Dutch oven was in its place over the stove, and the frying-pan in which he cooked his meals was hanging on its accustomed nail. Many objects lay about or in the drawers, indicating the pursuits which had been interrupted by death—busts, medallions, and figures, waiting to be copied by the copying-machine—many medallion-moulds, a store of plaster-of-Paris, and a box of plaster casts from London, the contents of which do not seem to have been disturbed. Here are Watt’s ladles for melting lead, his foot-rule, his glue-pot, his hammer. Reflecting mirrors, an extemporized camera with the lenses mounted on pasteboard, and many camera-glasses laid about, indicate interrupted experiments in optics. There are quadrant-glasses, compasses, scales, weights, and sundry boxes of mathematical instruments, once doubtless highly prized. In one place a model of the governor, in another of the parallel-motion, and in a little box, fitted with wooden cylinders mounted with paper and covered with figures, is what we suppose to be a model of his calculating-machine. On the shelves are minerals and chemicals in pots and jars, on which the dust of nearly half a century has settled. The moist substances have long since dried up; the putty has been turned to stone, and the paste to dust. On one shelf we come upon a dish in which lies a withered bunch of grapes. On the floor, in a corner, near to where Watt sat and worked, is a hair-trunk—a touching memorial of a long-past love and a long-dead sorrow. It contains all poor Gregory’s school-books, his first attempts at writing, his boy’s drawings of battles, his first school-exercises down to his college-themes, his delectuses, his grammars, his dictionaries, and his class-books—brought into this retired room, where the father’s eye could rest upon them. Near at hand is the sculpture-machine, on which he continued working to the last. Its wooden frame is worm-eaten, and droppinginto dust, like the hands that made it. But though the great workman is gone to rest, with all his griefs and cares, and his handiwork is fast crumbling to decay, the spirit of his work, the thought which he put into his inventions, still survives, and will probably continue to influence the destinies of his race for all time to come.”

The visitor to Westminster Abbey will find neither monarch, nor warrior, nor statesman, nor poet, honored with a nobler epitaph than that which is inscribed on the pedestal of Chantrey’s monument to Watt:

Not to perpetuate a Name,WHICH MUST ENDURE WHILE THE PEACEFUL ARTS FLOURISH,BUT TO SHOWTHAT MANKIND HAVE LEARNT TO HONOR THOSE WHO BEST DESERVE THEIRGRATITUDE,THE KING,HIS MINISTERS, AND MANY OF THE NOBLES AND COMMONERS OF THE REALM,RAISED THIS MONUMENT TOJAMES WATT,WHO, DIRECTING THE FORCE OF AN ORIGINAL GENIUS,EARLY EXERCISED IN PHILOSOPHIC RESEARCH,TO THE IMPROVEMENT OFTHE STEAM-ENGINE,ENLARGED THE RESOURCES OF HIS COUNTRY, INCREASED THE POWER OF MAN,AND ROSE TO AN EMINENT PLACEAMONG THE MOST ILLUSTRIOUS FOLLOWERS OF SCIENCE AND THE REALBENEFACTORS OF THE WORLD.Born at Greenock, MDCCXXXVI.Died at Heathfield, in Staffordshire, MDCCCXIX.

Watt's TombTomb of James Watt.

Tomb of James Watt.

In the chronology of the steam-engine, the contemporaries of Watt have been so completely overshadowed by the greater and more successful inventor, as to have been almost forgotten by the biographer and by the student of history. Yet, among the engineers and engine-builders, as well as among the inventors of his day, Watt found many enterprising rivals and keen competitors. Some of these men, had they not been so completely fettered by Watt’s patents, would have probably done work which would have entitled them to far higher honor than has been accorded them.

William Murdochwas one of the men to whom Watt, no less than the world, was greatly indebted. For many years he was the assistant, friend, and coadjutor of Watt; and it is to his ingenuity that we are to give credit for not onlymany independent inventions, but also for the suggestions and improvements which were often indispensable to the formation and perfection of some of Watt’s own inventions.

Murdoch was employed by Boulton & Watt in 1776, and was made superintendent of construction in the engine department, and given general charge of the erection of engines. He was sent into Cornwall, and spent in that district much of the time during which he served the firm, erecting pumping-engines, the construction of which for so many years constituted a large part of the business of the Soho establishment. He was looked upon by both Boulton and Watt as a sincere friend, as well as a loyal adherent, and from 1810 to 1830 was given a partner’s share of the income of the firm, and a salary of £1,000. He retired from business at the last of the two dates named, and, dying in 1839, was buried near the two partners in Handsworth Church.

Murdoch's Oscillating EngineFig. 36.—Murdoch’s Oscillating Engine, 1785.

Fig. 36.—Murdoch’s Oscillating Engine, 1785.

Murdoch made a model, in 1784, of the locomotive patented by Watt in that year. He devised the arrangement of “sun-and-planet wheels,” adopted for a time in all of Watt’s “rotative” engines, and invented the oscillating steam-engine (Fig. 36) in 1785, using the “D-slide valves,”G, moved by the gear,E, which was driven by an eccentric on the shaft, without regard to the oscillation of the cylinder,A. He was the inventor of a rotary engine and of many minor machines for special purposes, and of many machine-tools used at Soho in building engines and machines. He seems, like Watt, to have had special fondness for the worm-gear, and introduced it wherever it could properly take the place of ordinary gearing. Some of the machines designed by Watt and Murdoch, who always worked well together, were found still in use and in good working condition by the author when visiting the works at Soho in 1873. The old mint in which, from 1797 to 1805, Boulton had coined 4,000 tons of copper, had then been pulled down, and a new mint had been erected in 1860.Many old machines still remained about the establishment as souvenirs of the three great mechanics.

Outside of Soho, Murdoch also found ample employment for his inventive talent. In 1792, while at Redruth, his residence before finally returning to Soho, he was led to speculate upon the possibility of utilizing the illuminating qualities of coal-gas, and, convinced of its practicability, he laid the subject before the Royal Society in 1808, and was awarded the Rumford gold medal. He had, ten years earlier, lighted a part of the Soho works with coal-gas, and in 1803 Watt authorized him to extend his pipes throughout all the buildings. Several manufacturers promptly introduced the new light, and its use extended very rapidly.

Still another of Murdoch’s favorite schemes was the transmission of power by the use of compressed air. He drove the pattern-shop engine at Soho by means of air from the blowing-engine in the foundery, and erected a pneumatic lift to elevate castings from the foundery-floor to the canal-bank.He made a steam-gun, introduced the heating of buildings by the circulation of hot water, and invented the method of transmitting packages through tubes by the impulse of compressed air, as now practised by the “pneumatic dispatch” companies. He died at the age of eighty-five years.

Hornblower's Compound EngineFig. 37.—Hornblower’s Compound Engine, 1781.

Fig. 37.—Hornblower’s Compound Engine, 1781.

Among the most active and formidable of Watt’s business rivals wasJonathan Hornblower, the patentee of the “compound” or double-cylinder engine. A sketch of this engine, as patented by Hornblower in 1781, is here given (Fig. 37). It was first described by the inventor in the “Encyclopædia Britannica.” It consists, as is seen by reference to the engraving, of two steam-cylinders,AandB—Abeing the low andBthe high pressure cylinder—the steam leaving the latter being exhausted into the former, and, after doing its work there, passing into the condenser, as already described. The piston-rods,CandD, are both connected to the same part of the beam by chains, as in the other early engines. These rods pass through stuffing-boxes in the cylinder-heads, which are fitted up like those seen on the Watt engine. Steam is led to the engine through the pipe,G Y, and cocks,a,b,c, andd, are adjustable, as required, to lead steam into and from the cylinders, and are moved by the plug-rod,W, which actuates handles not shown.Kis the exhaust-pipe leading to the condenser.Vis the engine feed-pump rod, andXthe great rod carrying the pump-buckets at the bottom of the shaft.

The cockscandabeing open andbanddshut, the steam passes from the boiler into the upper part of the steam-cylinder,B; and the communication between the lower part ofBand the top ofAis also open. Before starting, steam being shut off from the engine, the great weight of the pump-rod,X, causes that end of the beam to preponderate, the pistons standing, as shown, at the top of their respective steam-cylinders.

The engine being freed from all air by opening all thevalves and permitting the steam to drive it through the engine and out of the condenser through the “snifting-valve,”O, the valvesbanddare closed, and the cock in the exhaust-pipe opened.

The steam beneath the piston of the large cylinder is immediately condensed, and the pressure on the upper side of that piston causes it to descend, carrying that end of the beam with it, and raising the opposite end with the pump-rods and their attachments. At the same time, the steam from the lower end of the small high-pressure cylinder being let into the upper end of the larger cylinder, the completion of the stroke finds a cylinder full of steam transferred from the one to the other with corresponding increase of volume and decrease of pressure. While expanding and diminishing in pressure as it passes from the smaller into the largercylinder, this charge of steam gradually resists less and less the pressure of the steam from the boiler on the upper side of the piston of the small cylinder,B, and the net result is the movement of the engine by pressures exerted on the upper sides of both pistons and against pressures of less intensity on the under sides of both. The pressures in the lower part of the small cylinder, in the upper part of the large cylinder, and in the communicating passage, are evidently all equal at any given time.

When the pistons have reached the bottoms of their respective cylinders, the valves at the top of the small cylinder,B, and at the bottom of the large cylinder,A, are closed, and the valvescanddare opened. Steam from the boiler now enters beneath the piston of the small cylinder; the steam in the larger cylinder is exhausted into the condenser, and the steam already in the small cylinder passes over into the large cylinder, following up the piston as it rises.

Thus, at each stroke a small cylinder full of steam is taken from the boiler, and the same weight, occupying the volume of the larger cylinder, is exhausted into the condenser from the latter cylinder.

Referring to the method of operation of this engine, Prof. Robison demonstrated that the effect produced was the same as in Watt’s single-cylinder engine—a fact which is comprehended in the law enunciated many years later by Rankine, that, “so far as the theoretical action of the steam on the piston is concerned, it is immaterial whether the expansion takes place in one cylinder, or in two or more cylinders.” It was found, in practice, that the Hornblower engine was no more economical than the Watt engine; and that erected at the Tin Croft Mine, Cornwall, in 1792, did even less work with the same fuel than the Watt engines.

Hornblower was prosecuted by Boulton & Watt for infringement. The suit was decided against him, and hewas imprisoned in default of payment of the royalty, and fine demanded. He died a disappointed and impoverished man. The plan thus unsuccessfully introduced by Hornblower was subsequently modified and adopted by others among the contemporaries of Watt; and, with higher steam and the use of the Watt condenser, the “compound” gradually became a standard type of steam-engine.

Arthur Woolf, in 1804, re-introduced the Hornblower or Falck engine, with its two steam-cylinders, using steam of higher tension. His first engine was built for a brewery in London, and a considerable number were subsequently made. Woolf expanded his steam from six to nine times, and the pumping-engines built from his plans were said to have raised about 40,000,000 pounds one foot high per bushel of coals, when the Watt engine was raising but little more than 30,000,000. In one case, a duty of 57,000,000 was claimed.

Bull's Pumping EngineFig. 38.—Bull’s Pumping-Engine, 1798.Large scale image(434 kB).

Fig. 38.—Bull’s Pumping-Engine, 1798.

Large scale image(434 kB).

The most successful of those competitors of Watt who endeavored to devise a peculiar form of pumping-engine, which should have the efficiency of that of Boulton & Watt, and the necessary advantage in first cost, wereWilliam BullandRichard Trevithick.[42]The accompanyingillustrationshows the design, which was then known as the “Bull Cornish Engine.”

The steam-cylinder,a, is carried on wooden beams,b, extending across the engine-house directly over the pump-well. The piston-rod,c, is secured to the pump-rods,d d, the cylinder being inverted, and the pumps,e, in the shaft,f, are thus operated without the intervention of the beam invariably seen in Watt’s engines. A connecting-rod,g, attached to the pump-rod and to the end of a balance-beam,h, operates the latter, and is counterbalanced by a weight,i. The rod,j, serves both as a plug-rod and as an air-pump connecting-rod. A snifting-valve,k, openswhen the engine is blown through, and relieves the condenser and air-pump,l, of all air. The rod,m, operates a solid air-pump piston, the valves of the pump being placed on either side at the base, instead of in the pump-bucket, asin Watt’s engines. The condensing-water cistern was a wooden tank,n. A jet “pipe-condenser,”o, was used instead of a jet condenser of the form adopted by other makers, and was supplied with water through the cock,p. The plug-rod,q, as it rises and falls with the pump-rods and balance-beam, operates the “gear-handles,”r r, and opens and closes the valves,s s, at the required points in the stroke. The attendant works these valves by hand, in starting, from the floor,t. The operation of the engine is similar to that of a Watt engine. It is still in use, with a few modifications and improvements, and is a very economical and durable machine. It has not been as generally adopted, however, as it would probably have been had not the legal proscription of Watt’s patents so seriously interfered with its introduction. Its simplicity and lightness are decided advantages, and its designers are entitled to great credit for their boldness and ingenuity, as displayed in their application of the minor devices which distinguish the engine. The design is probably to be credited to Bull originally; but Trevithick built some of these engines, and is supposed to have greatly improved them while working with Edward Bull, the son of the inventor, William Bull. One of these engines was erected by them at the Herland Mine, Cornwall, in 1798, which had a steam-cylinder 60 inches in diameter, and was built on the plan just described.

Another of the contemporaries of James Watt was a clergyman,Edward Cartwright, the distinguished inventor of the power-loom, and of the first machine ever used in combing wool, who revived Watt’s plan of surface-condensation in a somewhat modified form. Watt had made a “pipe-condenser,” similar in plan to those now often used, but had simply immersed it in a tank of water, instead of in a constantly-flowing stream. Cartwright proposed to use two concentric cylinders or spheres, between which the steam entered when exhausted from the cylinder of the engine,and was condensed by contact with the metal surfaces. Cold water within the smaller and surrounding the exterior vessel kept the metal cold, and absorbed the heat discharged by the condensing vapor.

Cartwright's EngineFig. 39.—Cartwright’s Engine, 1798.

Fig. 39.—Cartwright’s Engine, 1798.

Cartwright’s engine is best described in thePhilosophical Magazineof June, 1798, from which the accompanyingsketchis copied.

The object of the inventor is stated to have been to remedy the defects of the Watt engine—imperfect vacuum, friction, and complication.

In the figure, the steam-cylinder takes steam through the pipe,B. The piston,R, has a rod extending downward to the smaller pump-piston,G, and upward to the cross-head, which, in turn, drives the cranks above, by means of connecting-rods. The shafts thus turned are connectedby a pair of gears,M L, of which one drives a pinion on the shaft of the fly-wheel.Dis the exhaust-pipe leading to the condenser,F; and the pump,G, removes the air and water of condensation, forcing it into the hot-well,H, whence it is returned to the boiler through the pipe,I. A float inHadjusts an air-valve, so as to keep a supply of air in the chamber, to serve as a cushion and to make an air-chamber of the reservoir, and permits the excess to escape. The large tank contains the water supplied for condensing the steam.

The piston,R, is made of metal, and is packed with two sets of cut metal rings, forced out against the sides of the cylinder by steel springs, the rings being cut at three points in the circumference, and kept in place by the springs. The arrangement of the two cranks, with their shafts and gears, is intended to supersede Watt’s plan for securing a perfectly rectilinear movement of the head of the piston-rod, without friction.

In the accounts given of this engine, great stress is laid upon the supposed important advantage here offered, by the introduction of the surface-condenser, of permitting the employment of a working-fluid other than steam—as, for example, alcohol, which is too valuable to be lost. It was proposed to use the engine in connection with a still, and thus to effect great economy by making the fuel do double duty. The only part of the plan which proved both novel and valuable was the metallic packing and piston, which has not yet been superseded. The engine itself never came into use.

At this point, the history of the steam-engine becomes the story of its applications in several different directions, the most important of which are the raising of water—which had hitherto been its only application—the locomotive-engine, the driving of mill-machinery, and steam-navigation.

Here we take leave of James Watt and of his contemporaries,of the former of whom a French author[43]says: “The part which he played in the mechanical applications of the power of steam can only be compared to that of Newton in astronomy and of Shakespeare in poetry.” Since the time of Watt, improvements have been made principally in matters of mere detail, and in the extension of the range of application of the steam-engine.

[35]The same story is told of Savery and of Worcester.[36]Robison’s “Mechanical Philosophy,” edited by Brewster.[37]“Reminiscences of James Watt,” Robert Hart; “Transactions of the Glasgow Archæological Society,” 1859.[38]“Lives of Boulton and Watt,” Smiles.[39]For the privilege of using the fly-wheel to regulate the motion of the engine, Boulton & Watt paid a royalty to Matthew Wasborough, who had patented it, and who held also the patent for its combination with a crank, as invented by Pickard and Steed.

[35]The same story is told of Savery and of Worcester.

[36]Robison’s “Mechanical Philosophy,” edited by Brewster.

[37]“Reminiscences of James Watt,” Robert Hart; “Transactions of the Glasgow Archæological Society,” 1859.

[38]“Lives of Boulton and Watt,” Smiles.

[39]For the privilege of using the fly-wheel to regulate the motion of the engine, Boulton & Watt paid a royalty to Matthew Wasborough, who had patented it, and who held also the patent for its combination with a crank, as invented by Pickard and Steed.

[40]“Lives of Boulton and Watt,” Smiles.

[41]“Life of Watt,” p. 512.

[42]For an exceedingly interesting and very faithful account of their work,see“Life of Richard Trevithick,” by F. Trevithick, London, 1872.

[43]Bataille. “Traité des Machines à Vapeur,” Paris, 1847.

“Those projects which abridge distance have done most for the civilization and happiness of our species.”—Macaulay.

First Railroad-CarFig. 40.—The First Railroad-Car, 1825.

Fig. 40.—The First Railroad-Car, 1825.

Introductory.—The commencement of the nineteenth century found the modern steam-engine fully developed in all its principal features, and fairly at work in many departments of industry. The genius of Worcester, and Morland, and Savery, and Desaguliers, had, in the first period of theapplication of the power of steam to useful work, effected a beginning which, looked upon from a point of view which exhibits its importance as the first step toward the wonderful results to-day familiar to every one, appears in its true light, and entitles those great men to even greater honor than has been accorded them. The results actually accomplished, however, were absolutely insignificant in comparison with those which marked the period of development just described. Yet even the work of Watt and of his contemporaries was but a mere prelude to the marvellous advances made in the succeeding period, to which we are now come, and, in extent and importance, was insignificant in comparison with that accomplished by their successors in the development of all mechanical industries by the application of the steam-engine to the movement of every kind of machine.

The first of the two periods of application saw the steam-engine adapted simply to the elevation of water and the drainage of mines; during the second period it was adapted to every variety of useful work, and introduced wherever the muscular strength of men and animals, or the power of wind and of falling water, which had previously been the only motors, had found application. A history of the development of industries by the introduction of steam-power during this period, would be no less extended and hardly less interesting than that of the steam-engine itself.

The way had been fairly opened by Boulton and Watt; and the year 1800 saw a crowd of engineers and manufacturers entering upon it, eager to reap the harvest of distinction and of pecuniary returns which seemed so promising to all. The last year of the eighteenth century was also the last of the twenty-five years of partnership of Boulton & Watt, and, with it, the patents under which that firm had held the great monopoly of steam-engine building expired. The right to manufacture the modern steam-engine was common to all. Watt had, at the commencement of the new century,retired from active business-life. Boulton remained in business; but he was not the inventor of the new engine, and could not retain, by the exercise of all his remaining power, the privileges previously held by legal authorization.

The young Boulton and the young Watt were not the Boulton & Watt of earlier years; and, had they possessed all of the business talent and all of the inventive genius of their fathers, they could not have retained control of a business which was now growing far more rapidly than the facilities for manufacturing could be extended in any single establishment. All over the country, and even on the Continent of Europe, and in America, thousands of mechanics, and many men of mechanical tastes in other professions, were familiar with the principles of the new machine, and were speculating upon its value for all the purposes to which it has since been applied; and a multitude of enthusiastic mechanics, and a larger multitude of visionary and ignorant schemers, were experimenting with every imaginable device, in the vain hope of attaining perpetual motion, and other hardly less absurd results, by its modification and improvement. Steam-engine building establishments sprang up wherever a mechanic had succeeded in erecting a workshop and in acquiring a local reputation as a worker in metal, and many of Watt’s workmen went out from Soho to take charge of the work done in these shops. Nearly all of the great establishments which are to-day most noted for their extent and for the importance and magnitude of the work done in them, not only in Great Britain, but in Europe and the United States, came into existence during this second period of the application of the steam-engine as a prime mover.

The new establishments usually grew out of older shops of a less pretentious character, and were managed by men who had been trained by Watt, or who had had a still more awakening experience with those who vainly strove to makeup, by their ingenuity and by great excellence of workmanship, the advantages possessed at Soho in a legal monopoly and greater experience in the business.

It was exceedingly difficult to find expert and conscientious workmen, and machine-tools had not become as thoroughly perfected as had the steam-engine itself. These difficulties were gradually overcome, however, and thenceforward the growth of the business was increasingly rapid.

Every important form of engine had now been invented. Watt had perfected, with the aid of Murdoch, both the pumping-engine and the rotative steam-engine for application to mills. He had invented the trunk engine, and Murdoch had devised the oscillating engine and the ordinary slide-valve, and had made a model locomotive-engine, while Hornblower had introduced the compound engine. The application of steam to navigation had been often proposed, and had sometimes been attempted, with sufficient success to indicate to the intelligent observer an ultimate triumph. It only remained to extend the use of steam as a motor into all known departments of industry, and to effect such improvements in details as experience should prove desirable.

Leupold's EngineFig. 41.—Leupold’s Engine, 1720.

Fig. 41.—Leupold’s Engine, 1720.

The engines of Hero, of Porta, and of Branca were, it will be remembered, non-condensing; but the first plan of a non-condensing engine that could be made of any really practical use is given in the “Theatrum Machinarum” of Leupold, published in 1720. This sketch is copied inFig. 41. It is stated by Leupold that this plan was suggested by Papin. It consists of two single-acting cylinders,r s, receiving steam alternately from the same steam-pipe through a “four-way cock,”x, and exhausting into the atmosphere. Steam is furnished by the boiler,a, and the pistons,c d, are alternately raised and depressed, depressing and raising the pump-rods,k l, to which they are attached by the beams,h g, vibrating on the centres,i i. The water from the pumps,o p, is forced up the stand-pipe,q, and discharged at its top. The alternate action of the steam-pistons is securedby turning the “four-way cock,”x, first into the position shown, and then, at the completion of the stroke, into the reverse position, by which change the steam from the boiler is then led into the cylinder,s, and the steam inris discharged into the atmosphere.[44]

Leupold states that he is indebted to Papin for the suggestion of the peculiar valve here used. He also proposed to use a Savery engine without condensation in raising water. We have no evidence that this engine was ever built.

Newton's Steam-CarriageFig.42.—Newton’s Steam-Carriage, 1680.

Fig.42.—Newton’s Steam-Carriage, 1680.

The first rude scheme for applying steam to locomotion on land was probably that of Isaac Newton, who, in 1680, proposed the machine shown in the accompanying figure (42), which will be recognized as representing the scientifictoy which is found in nearly every collection of illustrative philosophical apparatus. As described in the “Explanation of the Newtonian Philosophy,” it consists of a spherical boiler,B, mounted on a carriage. Steam issuing from the pipe,C, seen pointing directly backward, by its reaction upon the carriage, drives the latter ahead. The driver, sitting atA, controls the steam by the handle,E, and cock,F. The fire is seen atD.

When, at the end of the eighteenth century, the steam-engine had been so far perfected that the possibility of its successful application to locomotion had become fully and very generally recognized, the problem of adapting it to locomotion on land was attacked by many inventors.

Dr. Robison had, as far back as in 1759, proposed it to James Watt during one of their conferences, at a time when the latter was even more ignorant than the former of the principles which were involved in the construction of the steam-engine, and this suggestion may have had some influence in determining Watt to pursue his research; thus setting in operation that train of thoughtful investigation and experiment which finally earned for him his splendid fame.

In 1765, that singular genius, Dr. Erasmus Darwin, whose celebrity was acquired by speculations in poetry and philosophy as well as in medicine, urged Matthew Boulton—subsequently Watt’s partner, and just then corresponding with our own Franklin in relation to the use of steam-power—to construct a steam-carriage, or “fiery chariot,” as hepoetically styled it, and of which he sketched a set of plans. A young man named Edgeworth became interested in the scheme, and, in 1768, published a paper which had secured for him a gold medal from the Society of Arts. In this paper he proposed railroads on which the carriages were to be drawn by horses,or by ropes from steam-winding engines.

Read's Steam CarriageFig. 43.—Read’s Steam-Carriage, 1790.

Fig. 43.—Read’s Steam-Carriage, 1790.

Nathan Read, of whom an account will be given hereafter, when describing his attempt to introduce steam-navigation, planned, and in 1790 obtained a patent for, a steam-carriage, of which the sketch seen inFig. 43is copied from the rough drawing accompanying his application. In the figure,A A A Aare the wheels;B B, pinions on the hubs of the rear wheels, which are driven by a ratchet arrangement on the racks,G G, connected with the piston-rods;C ois the boiler;D D, the steam-pipes carrying steam to the steam-cylinder,E E;F Fare the engine-frames;His the “tongue” or “pole” of the carriage, and is turned by a horizontal steering-wheel, with which it is connected by the ropes or chains,I K,I K;W Ware the cocks, which serve to shut off steam from the engine when necessary, andto determine the amount of steam to be admitted. The pipesa aare exhaust-pipes, which the inventor proposed to turn so that they should point backward, in order to secure the advantage of the effort of reaction of the expelled steam. (!)

Read made a model steam-carriage, which he exhibited when endeavoring to secure assistance in furtherance of his schemes, but seems to have given more attention to steam-navigation, and nothing was ever accomplished by him in this direction.

Cugnot's Steam-CarriageFig. 44.—Cugnot’s Steam-Carriage, 1770.

Fig. 44.—Cugnot’s Steam-Carriage, 1770.

These were merely promising schemes, however. The first actual experiment was made, as is supposed, by a French army-officer,Nicholas Joseph Cugnot, who in 1769 built a steam-carriage, which was set at work in presence of the French Minister of War, the Duke de Choiseul. The funds required by him were furnished by the Compte de Saxe. Encouraged by the partial success of the first locomotive, he, in 1770, constructed a second (Fig. 44), which is still preserved in the Conservatoire des Arts et Métiers, Paris.

This machine, when recently examined by the author, was still in an excellent state of preservation. The carriage and its machinery are substantially built and well-finished, and exceedingly creditable pieces of work in every respect. It surprises the engineer to find such evidence of the highcharacter of the work of the mechanic Brezin a century ago. The steam-cylinders were 13 inches in diameter, and the engine was evidently of considerable power. This locomotive was intended for the transportation of artillery. It consists of two beams of heavy timber extending from end to end, supported by two strong wheels behind, and one still heavier but smaller wheel in front. The latter carries on its rim blocks which cut into the soil as the wheel turns, and thus give greater holding power. The single wheel is turned by two single-acting engines, one on each side, supplied with steam by a boiler (seen in the sketch) suspended in front of the machine. The connection between the engines and the wheels was effected by means of pawls, as first proposed by Papin, which could be reversed when it was desired to drive the machine backward. A seat is mounted on the carriage-body for the driver, who steers the machine by a train of gearing, which turns the whole frame, carrying the machinery 15 or 20 degrees either way. This locomotive was found to have been built on a tolerably satisfactory general plan; but the boiler was too small, and the steering apparatus was incapable of handling the carriage with promptness.

The death of one of Cugnot’s patrons, and the exile of the other, put an end to Cugnot’s experiments.

Cugnot was a mechanic by choice, and exhibited great talent. He was a native of Vaud, in Lorraine, where he was born in 1725. He served both in the French and the German armies. While under the Maréchal de Saxe, he constructed his first steam locomotive-engine, which only disappointed him, as he stated, in consequence of the inefficiency of the feed-pumps. The second was that built under the authority of the Minister Choiseul, and cost 20,000 livres. Cugnot received from the French Government a pension of 600 livres. He died in 1804, at the age of seventy-nine years.

Murdoch's ModelFig. 45.—Murdoch’s Model, 1784.

Fig. 45.—Murdoch’s Model, 1784.

Watt, at a very early period, proposed to apply his ownengine to locomotion, and contemplated using either a non-condensing engine or an air-surface condenser. He actually included the locomotive-engine in his patent of 1784; and his assistant, Murdoch, in the same year, made a working-model locomotive (Fig. 45), which was capable of running at a rapid rate. This model, now deposited in the Patent Museum at South Kensington, London, had a flue-boiler, and its steam-cylinder was three-fourths of an inch in diameter, and the stroke of piston 2 inches. The driving-wheels were 91∕2inches diameter.

Nothing was, however, done on a larger scale by either Watt or Murdoch, who both found more than enough to claim their attention in the construction and introduction of other engines. Murdoch’s model is said to have run from 6 to 8 miles an hour, its little driving-wheels making from 200 to 275 revolutions per minute. As is seen in the sketch, this model was fitted with the same form of engine, known as the “grasshopper-engine,” which was used in the United States by Oliver Evans.

“To Oliver Evans,” says Dr. Ernest Alban, the distinguished German engineer, “was it reserved to show the true value of a long-known principle, and to establish thereon a new and more simple method of applying the power of steam—a method that will remain an eternal memorial toits introducer.” Dr. Alban here refers to the earliest permanently successful introduction of the non-condensing high-pressure steam-engine.

EvansOliver Evans.

Oliver Evans.

Oliver Evans, one of the most ingenious mechanics that America has ever produced, was born at Newport, Del., in 1755 or 1756, the son of people in very humble circumstances.

He was, in his youth, apprenticed to a wheelwright, and soon exhibited great mechanical talent and a strong desire to acquire knowledge. His attention was, at an early period, drawn to the possible application of the power of steam to useful purposes by the boyish pranks of one of his comrades, who, placing a small quantity of water in a gun-barrel, and ramming down a tight wad, put the barrel in the fire of a blacksmith’s forge. The loud report whichaccompanied the expulsion of the wad was an evidence to young Evans of great and (as he supposed) previously undiscovered power.

Subsequently meeting with a description of a Newcomen engine, he at once noticed that the elastic force of confined steam was not there utilized. He then designed the non-condensing engine, in which the power was derived exclusively from the tension of high-pressure steam, and proposed its application to the propulsion of carriages.

About the year 1780, Evans joined his brothers, who were millers by occupation, and at once employed his inventive talent in improving the details of mill-work, and with such success as to reduce the cost of attendance one-half, and also to increase the fineness of the flour made. He proved himself a very expert millwright.

In 1786 he applied to the Pennsylvania Legislature for a patent for the application of the steam-engine to driving mills, and to the steam-carriage, but was refused it. In 1800 or 1801, Evans, after consultation with Professor Robert Patterson, of the University of Pennsylvania, and getting his approval of the plans, commenced the construction of a steam-carriage to be driven by a non-condensing engine. He soon concluded, however, that it would be a better scheme, pecuniarily, to adapt his engine, which was novel in form and of small first cost, to driving mills; and he accordingly changed his plans, and built an engine of 6 inches diameter of cylinder and 18 inches stroke of piston, which he applied with perfect success to driving a plaster-mill.

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