well as to that of spinning, and contrive looms
to work up the yarn as fast as the spindle
should produce it? The notion was laughed
at. The thing was pronounced, from the
minute intricacy of the movements required
in weaving, to be ludicrously impossible; and
"some gentlemen from Manchester"
(presumed to be specially well-informed on such
a subject because of their locality) carried
the argument very decisively against
Cartwright's view. Nevertheless, he was not
convinced. He instanced the automaton
chess-player for proof that there could be no
real impossibility in applying power to any
part of the most complicated machine; but
the Manchester gentlemen, probably not
being chess-players, could not the more be
persuaded that even that highest attainable
skill of mechanism could accomplish the
extraordinary variety of movement required
in a weaver's loom.

Cartwright went home after this
conversation, brooding over it. His own simple
remark had struck out for himself a truth
which, as he turned it over in his mind,
opened upon him more and more. For six
or seven months he worked incessantly at
models, at first rough and awkward even
to ridicule, but steadily improving step by
step; and at last, in April 1785, he took out
a patent for the first of all the power-looms.
It was a rude enough thing compared with
the exquisite machinery used now, but it was
the germ of all that followed; it received,
in the three succeeding years, amendments
from himself which were each the subject
of a patent; and it cannot be doubted
that Cartwright had here entitled himself,
if ever man did, to the temporary rewards
and lasting fame of a most important
invention.

But the first he certainly did not get, and
the last he hardly lived to see acknowledged.
His principal satisfaction was the somewhat
melancholy one of being treated after the
manner of all inventors from the beginning of
time. Poor Crabbe saw his friend's fortune
made outright as soon as he had a clear
comprehension of what his discovery was; and
"God bless you in it!" he warmly wrote.
"Only remember, when you grow very rich,
that we were friends before; and do not look
down on us as the summer birds that will
then come and serenade you daily. . . Every
new hope you give me of your success
makes me happy; nor am I disinterested,
since I expect to be maintained handsomely
as a decayed poet." But, alas! the serenade
of the summer birds was never heard
in Cartwright's dwelling; and for
"decayed poet" we are soon to read "decayed
projector."

Cartwright's quiet, his peaceful studies, his
happy contented ways, vanished completely
with the dawning of the not inglorious hour
in which he had reason to think himself a
public benefactor. The public he would have
served, rose against him straightway. His
invention was to enrich all manufacturers,
and of course manufacturers were its first and
bitterest foes. There was nothing for it, if
he would not be driven poorly back from the
plough on which he had laid his hand, but to
become manufacturer himself. His pleasant
parsonage was abandoned; he sadly separated
himself from his parishioners, endeared to
him by many ties; and, impelled by the spirit
which now wholly possessed him, he built
weaving and spinning factories in Doncaster,
flung into the venture whatever he possessed,
and began the struggle which was only to
close with his life.

As if he were entering a country to lay
it waste, instead of carrying into it abundance
and the means of countless increase, he
had to dispute desperately every inch of
ground. His cottons were wilfully damaged,
his workmen were seduced, his patent rights
invaded. Still he persevered, and from every
fresh rebuff his inventive ardour received but
new encouragement. In seven years from
the time which changed the peaceful country
clergyman into the active director of factories,
workmen, and machines, he had taken out
no fewer than nine patents. At a cost
ruinous to his fortune, he had obtained
them for weaving, for wool-combing (a most
striking and valuable invention), for improvements
in spinning, in callendering linens,
in making ropes, in cutting of velvet pile,
and for other matters of the like description;
he had also largely added to his works in
Doncaster, which he personally managed and
superintended in all their details;—in short,
he had laid broad and deep the foundations
of enormous wealth, while he was himself
getting poorer and poorer every day;—when
suddenly the prospect seemed to brighten. A
wealthy house in Manchester contracted for
the use of four hundred of his looms. The
mill was built to receive them, and had not
been many days at work when it was burnt
to the ground. Such were the warnings then
administered to men who had intellect and
courage to reason beyond the prejudices of
their class. The struggle at last seemed
hopeless. Poor Cartwright assigned his
property at Doncaster in trust for his creditors,
and betook himself to London.

He had one true friend in the midst of his
misfortunes. He could write verses still. His
muse might be homely, but she was faithful,
and at all times ready with suit and service
when invoked. Even while building his mills
at Doncaster he was also building up a
new edition of his poems; and on his way to
London, a broken and discomfited but not a
despairing or querulous man, he wrote a
good, simple-minded, single-hearted sonnet,
admitting his discomfiture, but refusing to
stand helplessly wringing his hands over it.

With firm, unshaken mind that wreck I see,
Nor think the doom of man should be reversed for me