338 A BRIEF MEMOIR 



in this mule, and his experiment of its success 

 was with a horse-gin or mill, so that Wright's 

 double mule gradually superseded the use of the 

 single mule ; as, by his manner of placing them, 

 the spinner could superintend and operate upon 

 four times the quantity of spindles, compared 

 with the former method.* 



A few years after this, Benjamin Butler, of 

 Bolton, dispensed with the framing of the rim 

 or wheel, extended the axis to the middle of the 

 roller-beam, and connected it by gearing with 

 a little coupling shaft, which the front roller 

 coupled each way. The shaft or axis of the 

 rim was engaged and disengaged every stretch, 

 to enable the rim to effect the necessary revolu- 

 tions of the spindle to complete the thread. To 

 put up the spun thread, he attached a small rim 

 to the carriage about the middle of it, and 

 brought the drum-band over it; thus the little 

 rim was connected with that band which gave 

 motion to the spindles, and had a handle upon 

 it, by wliich the spinner could govern the spin- 

 dles in the act of wrapping up the thread. This 

 was called the Fanny wheel or mule, but since 

 that time various modifications of this kind have 



* The squaring band though insignificant in itself was of 

 no little importance to the mule. It acts like a parallel rule 

 in guiding out the^ carriage. 



