THE SEWING-MACHINE 



attempted to make the machines do the work of sewing 

 along somewhat the same lines as it was done by hand 

 that is, through-and -through sewing, with a needle 

 having an eye at the opposite end from the point. 

 Until this idea was abandoned there was little hope 

 of producing a practical mechanical substitute for 

 hand-sewing. For the operation of sewing as per- 

 formed by the seamstress is far too complicated to 

 be performed by machinery, and the kind of stitch 

 employed is not practical for mechanical sewing- 

 machines. But, as we now know, neither the principle 

 of sewing employed by the seamstress, nor the kind of 

 stitch she uses, are necessary, and it was not until this 

 idea was grasped by inventors the idea that new 

 principles might be employed that the sewing-machine 

 became a practical possibility. 



The first attempts tending in the right direction 

 seem to have been taken in England by Charles F. 

 Weisenthal, in 1755, who patented a machine for 

 sewing hand-embroidery. This machine used a double- 

 pointed needle with an eye located in the center, 

 but no attempts were made to adopt it for sewing 

 cloth. Various machines, employing something the 

 same principle, some of them using rows of needles in 

 place of a single one, followed this first, a few of them 

 fairly successful for embroidery work. Most of these 

 machines were designed in England, American in- 

 ventors not yet having entered the field. 



As early as 1790 an Englishman named Thomas 

 Saint conceived an idea which, had it been carried out, 

 would certainly have led to the perfecting of a prac- 



