148 MR. J. C. DYER ON THE ORIGIN OF 



of fiill working-size^ and got it put into operation at the 

 large hat-making works of the Messrs. Hicks in the 

 Borough. Some months after, those gentlemen reported 

 that the machine appeared to work to their entire satisfac- 

 tion, but not to their workmen's ! These latter had a 

 sort of monopoly in the art of cutting the furs by hand- 

 shears or knives, and they would not stand haviug the 

 machine- cutting continued in the works. It finally ap- 

 peared that the cost of cutting the furs by hand was too 

 small an item in the general expenses of hat-making to 

 justify any interruption of the works for the small saving 

 to be efiected by the patent machine, which therefore they 

 declined to adopt in their establishment. Upon the con- 

 clusion of this experiment I was led to view the fur-cutting 

 patent as an entire failure, and that to submit to lose all 

 that had been expended on it were better than to press it 

 further on the trade. If, therefore, the invention had not 

 subsequently fructified in other hands, and for other pur- 

 poses, I should never have thought it worth while to bring 

 it into public notice beyond that unsuccessful trial. 



In the foregoing account we have seen that the in- 

 ventor of this fur-cutting machine was " unknown to fame'' 

 at the time of its transmission to England ; and since then 

 I have not received any further information concerning 

 his being in any wise distinguished as a mechanician ; yet 

 his name should be recorded in the history of modern in- 

 ventions, as an honoured contributor to the advance of 

 practical mechanics, if he be the real author of this ap- 

 plication of the spiral cutters in successive contact with a 

 straight one to perform the work of shearing fibres from 

 the surfaces to which they are attached. I should here 

 observe that the original machine was adapted to cut the 

 pelts or skins into narrow slips from the furs, rather than 

 the latter from pelts ; but it soon became evident that this 

 principle f)i shearing was equally applicable, and would 



