418 JAMES WATT. 



source ; we must not leave them the power of saying that 

 we have only cited old branches of industry. I will, 

 therefore, now remark how much they were, not long 

 since, deceived in their lugubrious forebodings relative to 

 engraving on steel. A copper plate, they said, will not 

 give above two thousand impressions. A steel plate, by 

 yielding a hundred thousand without being worn, would 

 replace fifty copper plates. Will not these numbers prove 

 that the greater part of the former engravers (forty-nine 

 out of fifty) will feel obliged to abandon their profession, 

 to change their graver for the trowel or the hoe, or beg 

 charity in the public streets ? 



For the twentieth time, prophets of evil, be pleased 

 not to forget in your lucubrations, the principal element 

 of the problem which you undertake to solve ! Think 

 of the insatiable desire to be well off, that Nature has 

 implanted in the human heart ; remember that one wish 

 is no sooner satisfied, than it immediately gives rise to 

 another wish ; that our appetites of every sort increase 

 with the cheapness of the objects adapted for their indul 

 gence, and to a degree that defies the creative powers of 

 the most powerful machines. 



But to return to the engravings. An immense major 

 ity of the public did without them when they were dear ; 

 their price decreases, and all the world seeks for them. 

 They have become the necessary ornament of the best 

 books ; to middling books they give some chance of sale. 

 There are no almanacs even now, but what the old hid 

 eous figures of Nostradamus, by Matthew Laensberg, are 

 replaced by picturesque views which, in a few seconds, 

 transport our immovable citizens from the shores of the 

 Ganges to those of the Amazon, from the Himalayas to 

 the Cordilleras, from Pekin to New York. Look also at 



