AMERICAN INDUSTRIES SINCE COLUMBUS. 299 



Human intelligence required for the successful performance of 

 combing expertness and experience in high combination. Wool- 

 combers came to be a class by themselves in England a class 

 magnifying its own importance and skill quite the aristocracy 

 of the manufacture. For years after the experiments of the in- 

 ventors were well under way, and even after machines were in 



Fig. 15. A Noble Comb. 



actual use, the hand-combers remained confident that no auto- 

 matic machine could supersede their boasted expertness of hand. 

 Failure after failure seemed to warrant their confidence. The 

 combing machine is one in which the power of the capitalist, no 

 less than the genius of the inventor, has been exemplified. It cost 

 more to complete, and has yielded more in the way of profit to its 

 inventors, than any other machine of the century. To Dr. Ed- 

 mund Cartwright, the inventor of the power-loom, belongs the 

 honor of creating the germ of the subsequent machines. His first 

 machine, patented in 1789, consisted of a cylinder, armed with 

 rows of teeth, revolving in such a manner that its teeth would 

 catch and clear out the wool contained in the teeth of a fixed and 

 upright comb. His second machine, patented in 1790, superseded 



