16 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



I. 



THE STEAM-ENGINE AS A SIMPLE MACHINE. 



[" A machine, receiving at distant times and from many hands new combi- 

 nations and improvements, and becoming at last of signal benefit to mankind, 

 may be compared to a rivulet, swelled in its course by tributary streams until 

 it rolls along a majestic river, enriching in its progress provinces and kingdoms. 

 In retracing the current, too, from where it mingles with the ocean, the pre- 

 tensions of even ample subsidiary streams are merged in our admiration of the 

 master-flood. But, as we continue to ascend, those waters which, nearer the 

 sea, would have been disregarded as unimportant, begin to rival in magnitude, 

 and divide our attention with, the parent stream ; until, at length, on our ap- 

 proaching the fountains of the river, it appears trickling from the rock, or ooz- 

 ing from among the flowers of the valley. So, also, in developing the rise of a 

 machine, a coarse instrument or a toy may be recognized as the germ of that 

 production of mechanical genius whose power and usefulness have stimulated 

 our curiosity to mark its changes and to trace its origin. The same feelings of 

 reverential gratitude which attached holiness to the spots whence mighty riv- 

 ers sprung, also clothed with divinity, and raised altars in honor of the saw, 

 the plough, the potter's wheel, and the loom." Stuart.] 



[...." And, last of all, with inimitable power, and ' with whirlwind- 

 sound,' comes the potent agency of steam. In comparison with the past, what 

 centuries of improvement has this single agent comprised in the short compass 

 of fifty years ! Everywhere practicable, everywhere efficient, it has an arm a 

 thousand times stronger than that of Hercules, and to which human ingenuity 

 is capable of fitting a thousand times as many hands as belonged to Briareus. 

 Steam is found in triumphant operation on the seas ; and, under the influence of 

 its strong propulsion, the gallant ship 



' Against the wind, against the tide, 

 Still steadies with an upright keel.' 



It is on the rivers, and the boatman may repose on his oars ; it is on highways, 

 and exerts itself along the courses of land-conveyance ; it is at the bottom of 

 mines, a thousand feet below the earth's surface ; it is in the mill, and in the 

 workshops of the trades. It rows, it pumps, it excavates, it carries, it draws, 

 it lifts, it hammers, it spins, it weaves, it prints. It seems to say to men, at 

 least to the class of artisans : ' Leave off your manual labor ; give over your 

 bodily toil ; bestow but your skill and reason to the directing of my power, and 

 I will bear the toil, with no muscle to grow weary, no nerve to relax, no breast 

 to feel f aintness ! ' "What further improvement may still be made in the use of 

 this astonishing power it is impossible to know, and it were vain to conjecture. 

 What we do know is, that it has most essentially altered the face of affairs, and 

 that no visible limit yet appears beyond which its progress is seen to be impos- 

 sible." Daniel Webster.] 



SECTION I. The Period of Speculation. Hero to Worcester, 

 b. c. 200 to a. d. 1700. 1. The history of the steam-engine is 

 a subject that interests greatly every intelligent mind. 



As Religion has always been, and still is, the great moral agent in 



the same author, and is about to be published, finely illustrated, in the " International 

 Series." 



