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old library at Soho. These we will, however, leave for the 
present, and proceed with the pictures on paper. 
According to the evidence of letters and other documents 
produced hy Mr. Smith, Matthew Boulton was in possession 
of a secret plan for producing what he called “ mechanical 
pictures ” — the inventor, or partial inventor, of the process 
being a person of the name of Eginton, who appeared to 
superintend this department of the Soho establishment. 
These pictures (all apparently copies of paintings) were pro- 
duced rapidly, and at very low prices — from seven shillings 
and sixpence upwards, according to the size. They appear 
to have all the touches of a painting. Sometimes they were 
transferred to canvas and painted in oil colours, sometimes 
tinted on the paper itself, sometimes transferred to copper 
plates. Orders appear to have been given to artists for the 
sole purpose of having the paintings to copy or reproduce. 
They were sold in considerable numbers, and could, it 
appears, be produced of various sizes according to order. 
The pictures on paper were all reversed, the figures left- 
handed. When more than one sheet of paper was required 
for a subject, the picture was not joined in a straight line, 
but curved, so that the junction fell in the shadow, as in the 
leadiug of painted windows. Eginton was a glass painter, 
and perhaps took his idea from that source. 
There is much interesting matter published concerning a 
proposed government pension to Eginton, and a letter to the 
Earl of Dartmouth on the subject from Matthew Boulton ; 
also letters from Mr. M. P. W. Boulton and others ; but, as 
they have no dii'ect bearing on the mode of producing the 
pictures, I merely allude to them here. 
Although it is well known that Watt, Boulton, Davy, 
Wedgwood, and other members of the Lunar Society ex- 
perimented in photography, and tried to fix the images 
formed in the camera, we have the direct statement that, up 
to the year 1802, Wedgwood had been unsuccessful — that no 
