299 
S M E A T O N. 
SMATTER, s. Superficial or slight knowledge.—All 
other sciences were extinguished during this empire, ex¬ 
cepting only a smatter of judicial astrology. Temple. 
SMA'TTERER, s. One who has a slight or superficial 
"knowledge. Huloet.—Smatterers in other men’s matters, 
talebearers. Burton. —Every smatterer thinks all the circle 
of arts confined to the closet of his breast. Bp. Hall. 
SMA'TTERING, s. Superficial knowledge.—A quar¬ 
relsome man in a parish, especially if he have gotten a little 
smattering of law, is like a colic in the guts, that tears, ancl 
wrings, and torments a whole township. Bp. Hall.—A. 
smattering in knowledge (which is the measure of a wit) 
disposes men to atheism; whereas a full proportion would 
carry them through to the sense of God and religion. Good¬ 
man. 
To SMEAR, v. a. [pmepian, Saxon ; smeeren, Teut. 
From meapj. Sax. marrow; merghe, Teut. ; merg, Su. 
Goth, the same; the Icel. smior, Germ., &c., omnis generis 
pinguedo, as butter, ointments, &c., being from the same 
root, as marrow. Dr. Jamieson well observes, would be 
the first fat substance known.] To overspread with some¬ 
thing viscous and adhesive; to besmear. 
Then from the mountain hewing timber tall, 
Began to build a vessel of huge bulk. 
Smear'd round with pitch. Milton. 
To soil; to contaminate. 
Why had I not, with charitable hand. 
Took up a beggar’s issue at my gates ? 
Who smeared thus, and mir’d with infamy, 
I might have said no part of it is mine. Shakspeare. 
SMEAR/s. Anointment; any fat liquor or juice. Unused. 
SMEAR-DAB, a fish. 
SME'ARY, adj. Dawby; adhesive. 
A smeary foam works o’er my grinding jaws. 
And utmost anguish shakes my labouring frame. Rowe. 
SMEATH, s. A sea-fowl. 
SMEATON (John), an eminent civil engineer, was 
bom on the 28th of May, 1724, at Austhorpe, near 
Leeds. The strength of his understanding, and the ori¬ 
ginality of his genius, appeared at an early age. When 
he was under fifteen years of age, he made an engine for 
turning, and worked several things in ivory and wood, 
■which he presented to his friends. He made all his own 
tools for working in wood and metals, and he constructed a 
lathe, by which he cut a perpetual screw in brass, a thing 
but little known, and which was the invention of Mr. Henry 
Hindley of York, with whom Mr. Smeaton became ac¬ 
quainted, and indeed extremely intimate. Mr. Smeaton, 
by the time that he was eighteen years of age, acquired, 
by the strength of his genius and indefatigible industry, an 
extensive set of tools, and the art of working in most me¬ 
chanical trades, without the assistance of a master. A part 
of every day was usually occupied in forming some inge¬ 
nious piece of mechanism. His father was an attorney, 
and being desirous to bring up his son to the same profession, 
he brought him up to London with him in 1742, and at¬ 
tended the courts in Westminster-Hall; but after some time, 
finding that the law was not suited to his disposition, he 
wrote a strong memorial to his father on the subject, who 
immediately desired the young man to follow the bent of 
his inclination. In 1751 he began a course of experiments 
to try a machine of his own invention to measure a ship’s 
way at sea, and also made two voyages, in company with 
Dr. Knight, to try the effect of it, and also for the purpose 
of making experiments on a compass of his own construction, 
which was rendered magnetical by Dr. Knight’s artificial 
magnets. In 1753 he was elected a fellow of the Royal 
Society; and the number of papers which he published in 
their Transactions, will shew how highly he deserved the 
honour of being enrolled a member of that body. In 1759 
he received from the council of the Royal Society, by an 
unanimous vote, their gold medal for his paper, entitled 
“ An Experimental Inquiry concerning the natural Powers 
of Water and Wind to turn Mills and other Machines, de¬ 
pending on a circular Motion.” The paper was the result of 
experiments made on working models in the years 1752 and 
1753, though not communicated to the society till 1759; 
and in the interval he had opportunities of carrying into 
effect several of his inventions and theories, which rendered 
his paper of much more real value to the society and the 
public at large. In 1755, Eddystone Light-house was burnt 
down, and Mr. Smeaton being recommended to the pro¬ 
prietors of that building as an engineer in every way cal¬ 
culated to rebuild it, he undertook the work, which was 
completed in 1759, much to the satisfaction of the parties 
concerned. Still he was not fully employed as a civil 
engineer, for in the year 1764, while he was in Yorkshire, he 
offered himself as a candidate for the office of receiver to 
the Derwent-water estate; and in the course of the year he 
obtained the appointment in a manner most flattering to 
himself, inasmuch as his own merit carried the point in 
opposition to two other candidates who were strongly recom¬ 
mended and powerfully supported. He was very happy in 
this appointment, particularly in the assistance which he 
received from Mr. Walton, the other receiver, who took upon 
himself the management of the accounts, leaving Mr. Smea¬ 
ton leisure and opportunity to exert his abilities on public 
works. In the year 1773, he had so much business as a 
civil engineer, that he wished to resign this appointment; 
but his friends prevailed on him to continue in office two 
years longer. After this, Mr. Smeaton was employed on 
many works of great public utility. He made the river 
Calder navigable, a work that required talents of the very 
first order, owing to the impetuous floods in that river; he 
planned and attended to the execution of the great canal in 
Scotland, for conveying the trade of the country either to 
the Atlantic or German Ocean; and as a proof of the 
disinterestedness of his habits, having brought it to the 
place originally intended, he declined a handsome yearly 
salary, in order that he might attend to other business. On 
the opening of the great arch at London-bridge, the ex 
cavation around and under the starlings was so considerable, 
that the bridge was thought to be in great danger of falling. 
Mr. Smeaton was then in Yorkshire, and was sent for ex¬ 
press, and he arrived without any delay. “ I think,” says 
his biographer, “ that it was on a Saturday morning when 
the apprehension of the bridge was so general, that few 
persons would venture to pass over or under it. Mr. Smea¬ 
ton applied himself immediately to examine it, and to 
sound about the starlings as minutely as possible, and the 
committee being called together, adopted his advice, which 
was to repurchase the stones that had been taken from the 
middle Pier, then lying in Moorfields, and to throw them 
into the river to guard the starlings. In this way Mr. Smea¬ 
ton probably saved London-bridge from falling, and secured 
it till more effectual methods could be adopted.” 
Mr. Smeaton was appointed engineer to Ramsgate har¬ 
bour, and brought it into a state of great utility by various 
operations, of which he published an account in 1791. 
The variety of mills which Mr. Smeaton constructed, shews 
the great uses which he made of his experiments already re¬ 
ferred to ; for it was a rule with him, from which he never 
willingly deviated, not to trust to theory in any case, where 
he could have an opportunity to investigate a subject by 
real trial. He built a steam-engine at Austhorpe, and 
made a vast number of experiments with it to ascertain 
the power of Newcomen’s engine which he improved and 
brought to a far greater degree of perfection, both in its 
construction and powers, than it was before. Mr. Smeaton, 
during many years of his life, was a frequent attendant upon 
parliament, his opinion on various works begun or projected 
being continually called for. And in these cases the strength 
of his judgment and perspicuity of expression had full scope. 
It was his constant custom, when applied to plan or support 
any measure, to make himself fully master of the subject, to 
understand its merits and probable defects, before he would 
engage 
