CHAP. II. 



RENNIE'S MASTER ANDREW MEIKLE. 



117 



Meikle quietly pocketed the affront, but set his machinery 

 to work early next morning ; and when the butler got 

 out of bed, he found himself up to his knees in water, 

 so successfully had the engineer performed his promise. 



Meikle lived to an extreme old age, and was cheerful 

 to the last. He was a capital player on the Northumbrian 

 bagpipes. The instrument he played on was made by 

 himself, the chanter being formed out of a deer's shank- 

 "bone. When ninety years old, at the family gatherings 

 on " Auld Hansel Monday," his six sons and their 

 numerous families danced about him to his music. He 

 died in 1811, in his ninety-second year, and was buried 

 in Prestonkirk churchyard, close by Houston Mill, where 

 a simple monument is erected to his memory. 1 



Such was the master who first trained and disciplined 

 the skill of John Rermie, and implanted in his mind an 

 enthusiasm for mechanical excellence. Another of his 

 apprentices was a man who exercised almost as great 

 an influence on the progress of mechanics, through the 

 number of first-rate workmen whom he trained, as did 

 Rennie himself in the art of engineering. We allude to 

 Peter Nicholson, an admirable mechanic and draughts- 

 man, the author of numerous works on carpentry and 

 architecture, which to this day are amongst the best 

 of their kind. We now pursue the career of Andrew 

 Meikle's most distinguished pupil. 



1 It is remarkable that Scotch bio- 

 graphy should be altogether silent re- 

 specting this ingenious and useful 

 workman. In the most elaborate of 

 the Scotch biographical collections 

 that of Robert Chambers, in four large 

 volumes not a word occurs relating 

 to Meikle. An article is devoted to 

 Mickle, the translator of another 

 man's invention in the shape of a* 



poem, the ' Lusiad ;' but the name of 

 the inventor of the thrashing-machine 

 is not even mentioned ; affording a 

 singular illustration of the neglect 

 which this department of biography 

 has heretofore experienced, though it 

 has been by men such as Meikle that 

 this countiy has in a great measure 

 been made what it is. 



