Lives of Boulton and Watt. Principally from the original Soho mss. Comprising also a history of the invention and introduction of the steam engine

Front matter

LIVES

BOULTON AND WATT,

WORKS BY THE SAME AUTHOR.

Contents

CHAPTEE I.

Anecdote of Matthew Boulton and George III. — Eoger Bacon on steam power — Early inventors, their steam machines and apparatus — Hero of Alexandria, Branca, De Cans — The Marquis of Worcester — His waterworks — His imprisonment — His difficulties — The water-commanding engine — His " Century of Inventions " — Obscurity of descriptions of his steam-engine — Persevering struggles — His later years and death

Page 1-26

Chap. I. MYSTERIOUS POWEE OF STEAM. 5

But Bacon was a seer rather than an expounder, a philosophic iDoet rather than an inventor ; and it was left to men of future times to find out the jDractical methods of applying the wonderful power which he had imagined and foretold.

The enormous power latent in water exposed to heat had long been known. Its discovery must have been almost contemporaneous with that of fire. The expansive force of steam would be obvious on setting the first partially-closed pipkin upon the fire. If closed, the lid would be blown off ; and even if the vessel were of iron, it would soon burst with appalling force. Was it possible to render so furious and apparently unmanageable an agent, docile and tractable ? Even in modern times, the explosive force of steam could only be compared to that of gunpowder ; and it is a curious fact, that both De Haute feuille and Papin proposed to employ gunpowder in preference to steam in driving a piston in a cylinder, considering it to be the more manageable power of the two.

Although it appears from the writings of the Greek physician, Hero, who flourished at Alexandria more than a century before Christ, that steam was well known to the ancients, it was employed by them merely as a toy, or as a means of exciting the wonder of the credulous. In his treatise on Pneumatics, Hero gives descriptions of various methods of employing steam or heated air for the purpose of producing apparently magical effects ; from which we infer that the agency of heat was employed by the heathen priests in the performance of their rites. By one of the devices which he describes, water was apparently changed into wine ; by another, the temple doors were opened by fire jolaced on the sacrificial altar ; while by a third, the sacrificial vessel was so contrived as to flow only when the money of the votary was cast into it. Another ingenious device consisted in the method employed to pour out libations.

THE WHIRLING .EOLIPILE.

Chap. I,

Upon the altar-fire being kindled, the air in the interior became expanded and, pressing npon the surface of the Hquid which it contained, forced it np a connectingpipe, and so ont of the sacrificial cup. The libation was made, and the peo23le cried, " A miracle 1 " But Hero knew the trick, and explained the arrangement by which it was accomplished : it forms the subject of his eleventh theorem.

The most interesting of the other devices described by Hero is the whirling ^olipile, or ball of iEolus, which, though but a toy, 23ossessed the proj^erties of a true steam-engine, and was most ^^robably the first ever invented. As Hero's book professes to be, for the most part, but a collection of the devices handed down by former writers, and as he does not lay claim to its invention, it is probable the iEolipile may have been known long before his time. The machine consisted of a hollow globe of metal, moving on its axis, and communicating with a caldron of water placed underneath. The globe was provided with one or more tubes projecting from it, closed at the ends, but open on one side. When a fire was lit under the caldron, and the steam was raised, it filled the globe, and, j)i'ojecting itself against the air through the openings in the tubes, the reactive force thus produced caused the globe to spin round upon its axis " as if it were animated from within by a living spirit." ^

The mechanical means by which these various objects were accomplished, as explained by Hero, show that the ancients were acquainted with the ordinary expedients for communicating motion, such as the wheel and axle, spur-wheels, toothed pinions and sectors, the lever-beam.

* The principle of the ^olipile is the same as that embodied in Avery and lluthven's engines for the production of rotary motion. " I'hese engines," says Bourne, "are more expensive in steam than ordinary engines, and travel at an inconvenient speed ; but in other respects they are quite as effectual, and their construction is extreme]}^ simi)le and inexpensive."

CiMAP. I.

BEANGA'S MACHINE.

and otlier well-known expedients ; while they also knew of the cylinder and piston, the three-way cock, slidevalves and valve-clacks,^ and many other ingenious mechanical details which have heen reinvented in modern times.

Hero's book lay hidden in manuscript and buried in libraries, until the revival of learning in Italy in the sixteenth century, when a translation of it appeared at Bologna in 1547. By that time printing had been invented ; and the multiplication of copies being thereby rendered easy, the book was soon brought under the notice of inquiring men throughout Europe. The work must, indeed, have excited an extraordinary degree of interest ; in proof of which it may be mentioned that eight different editions, in different languages, were published within a century. The minds of the curious and the scientific were thus directed to the subject of steam as a motive power. But for a long time they never got beyond the idea of Hero's ^olipile, though they endeavoured to apply the rotary motion produced by it in different ways. Thus, a German writer suggested that it should be used to turn spits, instead of turnspit dogs ; and Branca, the Italian architect, used the steam jet projected from a brazen head to drive

BRAXXA'S MACHINE an apparatus

^ See Bennet Woodcroft's ' Pneumatics of Hero of Alexandria,' from the original Greek, London, 1851.

8 SOLOMON DE CAUS. Chap. I.

contrived by liim for pounding drugs. The jet forced round the vanes of a wheel, so as to 23roduce a rotary motion, and this, being communicated to other wheels, set in motion a rod and stamper, after the manner shown in the preceding cut.

Solomon de Cans was another of the speculative inquirers whose attention was drawn to the subject of steam by the publication of Hero's book. De Caus was a native of Normandy, and for some time studied the profession of an architect in Italy ; from whence he returned to France early in the seventeenth century. Eeligious persecution was then raging, and, being a Protestant, he was glad to take refuge from it in England. He entered the service of the Prince of Wales, by whom he was for a time employed in designing grottoes, fountains, and hydraulic ornaments for the Palace Gardens at Richmond. While occupied in that capacity he gave lessons in design to the Princess Elizabeth ; and on her marriage to the Elector Palatine he accompanied her to Heidelberg, to take charge of the Castle gardens there. It was while residing at Heidelberg that De Caus wrote his well-known book on hydraulics, which was published at Frankfort in 1615.^

One of De Caus's expedients for raising water consisted of an apparatus in which he proposed to emjoloy the expansive power of steam for the purpose. In Hero's book it is shown how a column of water may be thrown up by means of compressed air ; and De Caus merely proposed to employ steam instead of air. His apparatus was very simple. It consisted of a spherical vessel fitted with two pipes, one of them provided with a cock and funnel ; the other, which reached down to near tlie bottom of the vessel, being open at the top to the external air. When the vessel was filled Avitli

^ Les Raisons des Forces Mou- I de Cans, Inp;enieur ct Architecte dii vantes, avec di verses machines tant | TJoy. Frankfort, 1015.

utiles que plaisantes, &c., ])ar Solomon

Chap. I.

DE CAUS'S STEAM APPARATUS.

water and a fire lit underneatli, the water was forced

up the 023en tube in a jet, greater or less in proportion

to the elasticity of the steam. When

both tubes were tightly closed, so

that neither steam nor water could

escape, the heat, says De Cans,

would shortly cause a compression

from within so violent that "the

ball will burst in pieces, with a noise

like a petard."

It will be observed that there was little mechanical contrivance, and no practical use in this apparatus ; it merely furnished an illustration of the extraordinary force of pent-up steam, and that was all. Though De Cans made many experiments with his steam-vessel, he never succeeded in making — if, indeed, he ever attempted to make — a working steam-engine of any kind. It is not improbable that he was dismayed, as others were, by the apparent violence of the imprisoned monster ; and it needed a more ingenious head than his to contrive a method of rendering him docile, and making him go quietly in harness.^

DE CAUS'S ST"EAM APPARATUS

^ De Cans eventually returned to France, and was appointed engineer to the King. During the later years of his life he was employed in carrying out plans for the better supply of Paris with water. The story so often told of De Caus having been shut up in the Bicetre turns out to be a fiction. Though a Huguenot, he was not persecuted by Pticbelieu, but Avas, on the conti'ary, employed by him ; and in 1624 he dedicated to that prelate his treatise entitled ' Horologes Solitaires.' Mr. Charles Read, editor of several interesting memoirs of early French Protestants, has recently brought to light and published in the * Gazette des Tribunaux ' the proofs of the patronage of De Caus by

Richelieu, and reproduced the original documents, which he discovered slumbering in the dust of the State Records at Paris. In 1621 De Caus is found proposing to Louis XHI. to adopt measures for cleansing Paris and the faubourgs of dirt and uncleanness, by a system of reservoirs established at elevated points, and by fountains at various places which he indicated. 1'he king and his council sent the propositions to the chief magistrate of Paris, and Mr. Read transcribes the deliberation which took place on the subject at the City Council, as handed down in the records deposited in the Imperial Archives. De Caus died at Paris, and was buried in the church of La Trinite' in February, 1626.

10 THE MAEQUIS OF WORCESTER. Chap. T.

It is probable that the first contriver of a working steam-engine was Edward, second Marquis of Worcester, one of the first and most illustrious of a long line of unfortunate inventors. Tlie career of that nobleman — born tliougli he was to high rank and great estate — was chequered and sad in no ordinary degree. Edward Somerset was the . eldest son of Henry Lord Herbert, afterwards Earl of Worcester, and consequently heir to that title. He was born in London in 1601. His early years were principally spent at Raglan Castle, his father's country seat, where his education was carefully attended to. In the course of his jDupilage he made occasional visits to the continent, accompanied by his tutor, for the purpose of acquiring that degree of polish and culture considered necessary for a person of his social position. On the accession of his father to the Earldom of Worcester, in 1627, Edward became Lord Herbert by courtesy ; and in the following year he married, and went to reside at Raglan Castle.

From an early period of his life Lord Herbert took especial pleasure in mechanical studies, and in the course of his foreign tours he visited and examined the famous works of construction abroad ; for as yet there were none such in England. On settling down at Raglan, he proceeded to set up a laboratory, or workshop, wherein to indulge his mechanical tastes, and perhaps to while away the tedium of a country life. To assist him in his labours, he engaged a clever foreign mechanic, named Casjmr Kaltoff, wlio remained in his service for many years, and materially helped him in his various contrivances. Among the works executed by Lord Herbert and his assistant at Raglan, was the liydraulic apparatus by means of which the castle was supplied with water. From an incidental reference to the "water-works" by a contemporary writer, we learn that they consisted of a series of engines and wheels, by means of wliic^h water was raised tlirougli pipes to a

Chap. I.

HTS AVATER-WOUKS.

cistern placed on tlie snmniit of tlie central tower.^ It is probable that the planning and construction of these works induced Lord Herbert to prosecute the study of hydraulics, and to enter upon that series of experiments as to the power of steam which eventually led to the contrivance of his " Water-commanding Engine."

In 23ursuits and studies such as these, Lord Herbert spent about seven years at Eaglan Castle. But his wife dying in 1635, the place became connected in his mind with too painful associations, and he shortly after left it to reside in London. On his arrival there, he proceeded to put to the practical test a plan of perpetual motion which he had long studied, and now thought he had brought to perfection. He accordingly had his self-moving wheeP set up in the Towner; but though it moA^ed, its motion did not prove perpetual, and it shortly dropped out of sight, to be no more heard of.

^ Dr. Bayly, in his ' Apothegms ' (1682), p. 87, describes the Iright given to some Puritan visitors on the occasion of their searching Raglan Castle for arms, the Marquis of Worcester being a known Papist. " Having carried them up and down the castle, his lordship at length brought them over a high bridge that arched over the moat between the castle and the great tower, wherein the Lord Herbert had lately contrived certain water- works, which, when the several engines and wheels were set agoing, much quantity of water through the hollow conveyances of the aqueducts was to be let down from the top of an high tower." When all was ready for the surprise, the water was let in, and it made such a hideous and fearful noise by reason of the hoUowness of the tower, and the neighbouring echoes of the castle, that the men stood amazed and terror-struck. At this point up c.ime a man staring and running, who exclaimed, " Look to | yourselves, my masters, for the lions tire got loose." Whereupon the Puritans fled down the narrow staircase in such haste that they lost footing and fell, tumbling one over the other, and never halted until they had got the castle out of sight. Mr. Dircks, in his able and exhaustive ' Life, Times, and Scientific Labours of the Marquis of Worcester,' London, 1865, says that this hydraulic apparatus " probably depended for its operation on the influence of heat from burning fuel acting on a suitably constructed boiler, and so arranged as to be able to apply the expansive force of steam to the driving of water through vertical pipes to a considerable elevation." But it does not seem to us that the facts stated are sutficient to warrant this assumption.

2 Mr. Dircks says " it was a machine consisting of a wheel 14 feet in diameter, carrying forty weights of forty pounds each, and is supposed to have rotated on an axle supported on two ]3illars or upri.dit frames," as indicated in the ' Centuiy of Inventions,' Art. 56.

12 THE GREAT REBELLION. Chap. I.

After the lapse of four years, Lord Herbert again married, taking to wife the Lady Margaret, second daughter of the Earl of Thomond. In the year after his second marriage, the celebrated Long Parliament began its sittings. Questions of great public import were agitating the minds of thinking men, and the nation was gradually becoming divided into two hostile parties, soon to be arrayed against each other in deadly strife. A Eoyalist and a Eoman Catholic like his father. Lord Herbert at once ranged himself on the side of the King. On the outbreak of the Civil War, we find both father and son actively employed in mustering forces, and preparing to hold the western counties against the Parliament. Raglan Castle was strongly garrisoned, and fortifications were thrown up around it, so as to render it secure against assault. The Earl, now Marquis of Worcester, was appointed Generalissimo of the Western Forces, while his son. Lord Herbert, was made Greneral of South Wales. From this ofSce he was shortly after called by the King, who, creating him Earl of Glamorgan, despatched him on a mission to Ireland, with the object of stirring up the loyalists of that kingdom, and inducing them to come to his help. This delicate office he is said to have performed with more zeal than discretion. Indeed, the studious habits of his early life must in a measure have unfitted him for the conduct of so important an affair ; and the bungle he made of it was such that the King felt himself under the necessity of repudiating the acts which the Earl had done in his name.

It is unnecessary that we should follow the fortunes of the house of Raglan in the course of the civil war. Suffice it to say that the King's cause was utterly lost ; that Raglan Castle was besieged, taken, and dismantled ; that the Marquis of Worcester, having advanced to the King at different times as much as 122,500/., had completely impoverished himself; and that when the Earl

Chap. I. IMPKISONED IN THE TOWER. 13

succeeded to liis father's title, and became second Marquis of Worcester, in 1646, he inherited an exhausted exchequer, a confiscated estate, and a ruined home. The services he had rendered to the King were remembered against him ; and to escape the vengeance of his pohtical enemies he took refuge in France. There he Hved in poverty and in exile for a period of about five years. At length, drawn to England by the powerful attractions of wife and family, and probably also commissioned to i^erform a service for the exiled Charles II., the Marquis secretly visited London in 1655, where he was shortly after detected, apprehended, and imprisoned in the Tower. He sought and found solace, during his confinement, in study and contemplation, reverting to his early experiments in mechanics ; and he occupied the long and weary hours in committing to paper descriptions of his many ingenious devices, which he afterwards published in his ' Century of Inventions.' The Marquis's old and skilled mechanic, Caspar Kaltofif, continued faithful to him in his adversity, and was permitted to hold free communication with him ; from which we infer that his imprisonment was not of a very rigid character.

After lying in the Tower for about two years, the Marquis was liberated on bail, in October, 1654, when he proceeded to take steps to erect his long-contemplated Water-commanding Engine. Even while a prisoner, we find him negotiating with the then owner of Yauxhall for its purchase, with a view, to the establishment there of a school of skilled industry ; thus anticipating by nearly two centuries the School of Mines and Manufactures at South Kensington. In the month preceding his enlargement we find Hartlib writing to the Hon. Robert Boyle, — '' The Earl of Worcester is buying Fauxhall from Mr. Trenchard, to bestow the use of that house upon Caspar Calchoff and his son as longas they shall live, for he intends to make it a College of

14 ^STRAITENED IN MEANS. Chap. I

Artizans."^ His main difficulty, however, consisted in raising the necessary means for carrying* his excellent project into effect. He was, indeed, so reduced in his circumstances as to he under the necessity of petitioning his political enemies for the bare means of Hving ; and we find Cromwell, in the course of the year following his liberation from prison, issuing a warrant for the payment to him of three pounds a week " for his better maintenance." The Marquis also tried the experiment of levying contributions from his friends ; but they w^ere, for the most part, as poor as himself. He next tried the wealthy men of the Parhamentary party, and succeeded in obtaining several advances of money from Colonel Copley, who took an active interest in the prosecution of various industrial undertakings.^ The following letter from the Marquis to Copley shows the straits to which he was reduced : —

" Dear Friend, — I knowe not with, what face to desire a curtesie from you, since 1 have not yet payed yon the five powndes, and the ma^Tie businesse soe long protracted, whereby my reality and kindnesse should with thankfullnesse appeare ; for though the least I intende you is to make up the somme already promised to a thousand powndes yearly, or a share ammounting to four more, which, to nominate before the perfection of the woorke, were but an individuum vagurn, and, therefore, I deferre it, and upon noe other score. Yet in this interim, my disappointments are soe great, as that I am forced to begge, if you could possible, eyther to helpe me with tenne poTvaides to this bearer, or to make use of the coache, and to goe to Mr, Gierke, and if he could this day help me to fifty powndes, then to paye your selfe the five powndes 1 owe you out of them. The Alderman has taken three days' time to consider of it. Pardon the great trouble I give you, which I doubt not but in time to deserve, by really appearing

" Your most thankfull friend,

" WORCIiSTEK.

" 2Hth March, 1(J56.

" To my lionourcd friend, Colloiicl Christopheu Coitley, these."

The original of this letter is endor;sed " My Lord of

^ ' Weld's Koyal Society,' i. 53. - ' Industrial Biography,' p. 57.

(HAP. 1. HOPES REVIVED. 15

Worcester's letter about my share in his engine/' from which it would appear that the Marquis induced his friends to advance him money on the promise of a certain proportion of shares in the undertaking. He also pressed his invention upon the notice of Government, representing that he was in a position to do his Highness the Protector '^ more service than any one subject of his three nations." But neither the Protector nor his Ministers took any further notice of the Marquis or his project. It is probable that they regarded him as a bore, and his water-commanding engine as the mere dream of a projector.

The Marquis himself continued to be as confident as ever of the ultimate success of his scheme. He believed that it would yet realise him an immense fortune. Writing of the engine to the Earl of Lotherdale, he described it as " the greatest invention for profit that I ever yet heard of vouchsafed to a man, especially so unworthy and ignorant as I am." But the Marquis was not so humble as he affected to be, believing in his heart that he had invented, without exception, the most wonderful machine of the age. Still it remained a mere project. Without the means of erecting an engine, it promised to remain such; and all his efforts to rai^e the necessary funds had thus far proved unavailing.

The Restoration of Charles H., in 1660, revived his hopes. Now that the King enjoyed his own again, the Marquis believed that he, too, would come into possession of the means for carrying out his project. For thirteen years he had lived in exile, in prison, and in poverty : but brighter days had dawned at last ; and he indulged in the hope that compensation would at length be made to him for his sufferings in the cause of the Stuarts, and that he would now bask in the sunshine of Royal favour. He made all haste to represent his case to the king, and to claim restitution for his heavy losses in the late war. But there were thousands of like sup-

HIS INVENTIONS PEOTECTED.

Chap. I.

pliants all over the kingdom, and redress came slowly. The Marquis was, however, shortly put in possession of such parts of his estates as had not been sold by the Protector ; but he found them for the most part cleared of their timber, and comparatively valueless. The castle at Raglan was in ruins. He himself was heavily burdened with debt, and his creditors were becoming increasingly importunate for money. It was thus long before he could shake himself clear of his embarrassments, and devote himself to the great object of his life, the prosecution of his water-commanding engine.

One of his first cares, on the partial recovery of his property, was to obtain a legal protection for his inventions ; and in the year following the Restoration we find him taking out a patent for four of his schemes, — a watch or clock, guns or ]3istols, an engine to give security to a coach, and a boat to sail against wind and tide. In the session of Parliament, 1662-3, he obtained an Act securing to himself the profits of the water-commanding engine. About the same time he gave to the world his famous ' Century,' ^ which contains his own account of his various inventions. In the second dedication of the book to the members of both Houses of Parliament he states that he had already expended the large sum of 10,000/. on experiments ; but he professed that he esteemed himself sufficiently rewarded by the passing of " the Act of the Water-commanding Engine," and, his debts once paid, he intended to devote the rest of his life to the service of his King and country. The 'Century' is a mere summary of things alleged to have been tried and perfected, conveyed in vague and mysterious language, and calculated rather to excite

^ 'A Century of the Names and Scantlings of such Inventions as at present I can call to mind to have tried and perfected, which (my former Notes being lost) I have, at the instance of a powerful Friend, endeavoured now, in the year 1655, to set these down in such a way as may sufficiently instruct me to put any of them in practice.' London, 1663.

Chap. I.

SUGGESTIONS IN THE 'SCANTLINGS.'

wonder than to furnish information. The descriptions were unaccompanied bj plans or drawings, so that we can only surmise the means by which he proposed to carry his schemes into effect. It is possible that he purposely left the descriptions of his inventions vague, in order that he might not be anticipated in their application ; for it is certain that at the time the book was written the Marquis had not taken out his first patent, nor obtained the Act securing to him the profits of his engine.

There can, however, be no doubt that, vague and mysterious though the 'Scantlings' be, they indicate a knowledge of mechanical principles considerably in advance of the age, as well as a high degree of mechanical ingenuity. The hundred Articles into which the book is divided contain suggestions, in shorthand descriptions, of things so various as ship - destroying machines, telegraphs, combination and escutcheon locks,^ improvements in fire-arms, universal alphabets, seals and watches, various kinds of cipher, a boat rowing against wind and tide, automata, and mechanical appliances of different kinds, including the ''' stupendious and semi-omnipotent" engine. Some of them read like descrij)- tions of conjuring tricks, such as the artificial bird, the hour water-ball, the flying man, the brazen head, the dicing-box, and various automata. Others are full

' The writer of the elaborate article "Lock," in the supplement to the ' Penny Cyclopaedia ' (ii. 217), in describing the combination lock^ says : "• The Marqnis of Worcester, in whose ' Century of Inventions ' several different kinds of lock, which lay claim to the most marvellous properties, are enumerated, would appear, from his 72nd article, to have devised an improvement on this apparatus ; as he refers to ' an escutcheon to be placed before any of these locks,' one of the properties of which he describes as being; that ' the owner, thoudi a woman, may, with her delicate hand, vary the ways of coming to open the lock ten millions of times beyond the knowledge of the smith that made it, or of me who invented it.' The details of this invention are not given ; but in the third volume of the ' Transactions of the Society of Arts,' pp. 160-5, is an escutcheon of similar character, invented by Mr. Marshall, and rewarded by the Society in 1784. The details of this ingenious contrivance are fully given in the volume referred to."

C

ENGINE AT YAUXHALL.

Chap. I.

of prophetic insight, and contain anticipations of mechanical marvels, which, however wonderful they may at that time have appeared, have since been fully realised. The style in which the treatise was written, however, presented so remarkable a contrast to the contemporary writings of Newton, Boyle, Pascal, Gruericke, and others, that it is not improbable it had the effect of prejudicing the minds of scientific men against the writer, and led them to regard his schemes as those of a wild projector, and hence to treat his propositions with neglect, if not with contumely.

So soon as the Marquis had become possessed of the requisite funds, he proceeded to erect an engine at Yauxhall to illustrate the uses of his principal invention. He was assisted, as before, by his old workman, Caspar Kaltoff. It is probable that the engine was erected by the beginning of 1663 ; for in the course of that year M. Sorbiere paid his visit to England, and found the Marquis's "hydraulic machine" at work. He describes it as capable of raising, by the strength of one man only, within a minute of time, four large buckets of water to a height of forty feet, through a joipe eight inches in diameter. He proceeds to compare it with another machine at Somerset House, worked by one or two horses, which he considers the more effective machine of the two.^ This account of the Marquis's in-