Mechanic Arts. 39 1 



chanic arts, will be readily appreciated by every 

 intelligent reader. 



But besides these general remarks, it will be 

 proper to take notice of some of the principal in- 

 ventions and improvements of the mechanical kind, 

 by which the last age is distinguished. 



The different kinds of machinery for Carding 

 and Spinning Cotton, v^hich modern times have 

 produced, have proved a source of incalculable ad- 

 vantage to manufacturers, and do honour to the 

 age. Less than forty years ago, the only machine 

 much used for reducing cotton wool into yarn, was 

 the One-thread'tvheeL Other methods, indeed, 

 had been thought of, and proposed for promoting 

 a more easy and expeditious process; but without 

 any extensive or permanent success. At length, 

 about the year 1767, Mr. James Hargrave, an 

 English weaver, constructed a machine, by means 

 of which any number of threads, from twenty to 

 eighty, might be spun at once, and for which he 

 obtained a patent. This machine is called a Jenny, 

 and deservedly holds a high place among modern 

 inventions. The astonishing abridgement of la- 

 bour which it produces has been too much and 

 generally celebrated to require illustration here. 

 Soon after the invention of this machine, Mr. 

 Hargrave contrived a new method oi carding 

 cotton, more easy and expeditious than the 

 old way of carding by the hand, which was now 

 found inadequate to the rapid progress and large 

 demands of the improved mode of spinning. He 

 was succeeded by several other ingenious artists, 

 who laboured with success, and who produced 

 that expeditious plan of carding, by what are com- 

 monly called Cijlinder-cards, which is now so ex-* 

 tensively and profitably practised. 



The next and miost remarkable improvements 

 ia this kind of machinery v/ere made by Mr. Ark- 



