r 



116 GOODYEAR ON GUM-ELASTIC. 



gredients that are now known to cause fermentation or decom- 

 position, when heat and sulphur are not used. 



Being desirous to beautify the fabrics with a variety of colors, 

 the writer used metallic and other colors indiscriminately for 

 this purpose. 



At this time, (intending to pursue the business as a man- 

 ufacturer,) he commenced the manufacture of a variety of fancy 

 articles, and several thousand life-preservers were made, which 

 were sold and distributed through the country. These various 

 articles were compounded with large quantities of white lead 

 and other deleterious coloring matter, which caused them to de- 

 compose after the lapse of a short time, and thus that which he 

 had represented as a useful discovery, and which was so in fact, 

 was pronounced by the public to be a complete failure. Instead 

 of realizing the large fortune which, by all acquainted with his 

 prospects, was considered certain, his whole invention would not 

 bring him a week's living. Again he saw those dear to him, 

 together with his aged parents, stripped of the comforts with 

 which they were surrounded. Every thing that he possessed 

 was brought to the hammer for the discharge of private bills. 



The inventor very soon became satisfied that the supposed 

 failure of the invention was wholly in consequence of the color- 

 ing materials used, but it was at that time useless to affirm it, 

 and he did not attempt to reverse the sentence of pubhc opinion, 

 because he was under the necessity of encountering the evils 

 of the misfortune before he had an opportunity of making the 

 real merits of the improvement known. The misfortune and 

 disappointment of the writer by this occurrence was indeed 

 serious. He was not only reduced to extreme poverty, with a 

 large family to provide for ; but, if he continued his experiments, 

 he could no longer expect the countenance or sympathy of his 

 friends or acquaintance, as he had already spent four years in 

 fruitless attempts to make improvements in the manufacture 

 that had proved so ruinous to the community, having, as was 

 generally known, applied himself industriously to his experiments 

 during the whole time, doing nothing else. It was generally 



o©" 



