Moving Power for Machinery. 347 
heaven, to be let down in measured and useful quantities, for 
all the purposes to which they are applicable. 
The irregular supply of water is not only very destructive of 
property, but very embarrassing to the greater part of mills. 
With many of them the scanty supply of the summer’s drought 
determines the extent of the concern ; or, should the owners be 
tempted by the more abundant supplies of winter and spring to 
make their erections to surpass the summer supply, the loss will 
often exceed the profit. 
This at least will be the case with manufactories that employ 
many hands, as work-people in general have to be fully paid, 
although the works are partially stopped for a part of every day 
during a scarcity of water. The fiax-spinners in Fife and An- 
gus have felt this so severely, that many of them have had re- 
course to the steam-engine to supply the deficiency of water in 
the dry months. While all the mill-owners know and feel the 
evil, and many of them are convinced that reservoirs of suffi- 
cient extent would remedy it, yet the difficulty of procuring the 
co-operation of all interested in the improvement of a mill-stream, 
and the great expence which will generally attend it, have, in 
many cases, prevented even the attempt to do what would not 
only be a profit to individuals, but a public good. It is true, 
that, in some situations, the expence of forming artificial reser- 
voirs might exceed the advantage to be gained by them ; but it 
is also true, that other situations are almost formed by nature 
for the purpose, and stand a reproach to the mill-owners from 
generation to generation. For an example of the last, I would 
refer to the Water of Leven, in Fifeshire, which has a natural 
reservoir in the beautiful and extensive Loch Leven, with a su- 
perficies of several square miles. This Loch, to a considerable 
extent, even without the assistance of art, regulates the supply 
by checking the summer-torrents, and gradually supplying the 
mills for several days after the rain is over. Nature in this in- 
stance only requires to be assisted, either by retaining more wa- 
ter in the loch in rainy weather, to be let out by sluices as it is 
wanted, or by artificially raising a greater supply from the loch 
in dry weather than what naturally runs out. The last is what 
I recommended to the mill-owners on the Leven, in a letter. 
