416 



JAMES WATT. 



than is done by printing. When Arkwright, an ingenious 

 barber of Preston, (who, by the way, left each of his chil 

 dren two or three millions of francs of income,) rendered 

 it both useful and profitable to substitute revolving cylin 

 ders for the fingers of the women who used to spin, the 

 annual product of the cotton manufacture in England did 

 not exceed 50,000,000 francs (2,000,000*), now it ex 

 ceeds 900,000,000 francs (36,000,000*). In the county 

 of Lancaster alone, they annually deliver to the calico 

 manufacturers a quantity of yarn that 21,000,000 clever 

 spinners could not accomplish with only the aid of the 

 rock and spindle. Moreover, although in the art of spin 

 ning mechanical means have been pushed, we may say, 

 to their utmost degree of perfection, 1,500,000 people 

 now find occupation there, where, before the inventions 

 of Arkwright and of Watt, there were only 50,000.* 



A certain philosopher exclaimed, in a deep fit of de 

 spondency, &quot;Nothing new is published in the present 

 day, unless we call new that which has been forgotten.&quot; 

 If the philosopher alluded only to erro^ and prejudices, 

 he spoke truth. Time has been so fruitful in this line, 

 that no one can any more claim priority. For ex 

 ample, the pretended modern philanthropists have not 

 the merit (if there be any merit in it) of inventing the 

 systems that I am examining. Rather look at that poor 

 William Lea (Lee), working the first stocking-frame in 

 the presence of James I. The mechanism appeared ad 

 mirable ; why was he repulsed ? It Avas under the pre- 



* Mr. Edward Baines, author of a much esteemed work on the Brit 

 ish cotton manufactures, has had the whimsical curiosity to learn what 

 length of thread is annually used in weaving the cotton manufactures. 

 This entire length he finds to be equal to ffty-one times the distance of 

 the sun Jrom the earth ! (fifty-one times thirty-nine millions of post 

 leagues, or about two thousand millions of such leagues.) 



