Invention: The Master-key to Progress

Because of the gradual recognition of the value of sea-commerce in the British Isles, and the fact that the stormy seas adjacent necessitated the construction of ships at once sturdy and yet capable of speed, much study and experimentation were carried on during the eighteenth century, especially in England. In these experiments, the invention by Archimedes of the hydrostatic principle of buoyancy supplied the starting-point, and gave an excellent illustration of the influence of invention on history: for from experiments and investigations on floating bodies carried on in England, based on the invention of Archimedes, and followed by others of English origin, sprang England's merchant marine and England's navy and England's domination over a quarter of the land on the surface of the earth.

The eighteenth century closed with the invention of two very important mechanisms that reinforced the power of the human hand with power drawn from external sources: these were the threshing machine and the cotton gin; the former invented by Andrew Meikle in 1788, and the latter by Eli Whitney in 1793. It would be hard to decide with knowledge as to which has had the greater influence in constructing the machine of civilization; but it is not at all hard to realize that the machine of civilization could not have attained its present stage without the assistance of both.

One of the last important inventions of the century was that of an art entirely new, as distinguished from inventions like the cotton gin, that merely increased the value of an art already in existence. This was the invention of lithography, or printing from stone, made by Alois Senefelder in 1796. The first thing printed by him was a piece of music. While this invention was more brilliant than those of Meikle and Whitney, it was hardly so important. Nevertheless, it was important in a high degree and made a valuable addition to civilization.

An invention of a kind different from either Whitney's or Senefelder's was made on October 15, 1793, by Napoleon Bonaparte. He was at that time a young and ill-clad captain of artillery, attending a Council of War in Toulon. An idea for driving out the English had been conceived and embodied in a complete plan by a celebrated engineer, and it had been approved by the Committee on Fortifications. The youthful and prestigeless captain opposed this plan with a vehemence and convincingness that came to be familiarly known a few years later, and proposed in place of it a plan that he had himself conceived and embodied in a concrete form. His plan consisted in the main merely in mounting some guns on a point of land that he designated, from which they could command the British war-ships in the harbor; and it was so much simpler and in every way better, that, despite his obscurity and youth, it was adopted, and he himself was charged with carrying it into operation. This he did; and with such constructive skill and energy, that the British ships were driven from the harbor and the entire vicinity, and without doing any damage to the town. The British soldiers, then unsupported, immediately withdrew.

What was the determining difference between Napoleon's plan and that of the great engineer? The idea conceived.

CHAPTER VIII

THE AGE OF STEAM, NAPOLEON AND NELSON

In the early part of the nineteenth century began what has been called the Age of Steam; but before it ended, it was supplanted by the Age of Electricity. When the century opened, the steam engine of Watt existed in a practical and useful form, and the numberless experiments of the physicists in the preceding century had laid bare the main laws governing the force and the expansion of steam and air, and of gases and vapors in general. The laws of the expansion of solids and liquids were also understood in their main features, and the various inventions mentioned in the last chapter were in operation. Seizing on the facilities thus supplied, and noting the worldly success that certain discoverers and inventors had achieved, the inventors of the nineteenth century got speedily to work. The result was that the civilized world at the end of the nineteenth century was vastly different from the civilized world at the end of the eighteenth century.

In general terms, it may be declared that during the first half of the nineteenth century, the principal inventions were in the utilization of heat, especially in the form of steam engines; while during the latter half, the principal inventions were electrical: – though some very important electrical inventions were made before 1850. In this brief résumé, no attempt will be made to describe or even mention all the inventions made, or even all the important ones; for such an attempt would be impossible to carry out. Only a few super-important ones will be mentioned.

The first important successful application of the steam engine was embodied in the steamboat Charlotte Dundas that was produced in Scotland in 1801. Other steamboats had appeared before, but they had not been successful. The first was tried on the Soane River in France in 1781. Later, Fitch and Ramsay made some unsuccessful attempts in the United States. Then, in 1788, Patrick Miller, with the assistance of an engineer named William Symington, had constructed a steam vessel that attained a speed of five knots on a lake in Scotland. In the next year, Mr. Miller and Mr. Symington had put another steamboat on the water that developed a speed of nearly seven knots. None of these experiments could be called successful of itself; but the experience gained by them induced Lord Dundas to build the Charlotte Dundas and name it after his daughter. The Charlotte Dundas was a practical success from the start; for, in March, 1802, it towed two vessels of 70 tons each a distance of 19½ miles in six hours, while such a strong wind was blowing from ahead that no other vessel on the canal tried to move to windward.

Whether or not this constituted an actual invention the present author will not attempt to determine, even in his own mind. It is clear, however, that it was the direct issue of several inventions, and that it was the first embodiment in a concrete form of the successful and practical application of steam power to transportation on the water.

The next successful application was made by Robert Fulton, who built the Clermont in 1807. This vessel went into regular service in 1808, plying between New York and Albany, on the Hudson River.

The first steamboat to venture on the ocean was the Phœnix, that made the trip from New York to Delaware Bay by sea in 1808. It was built by Mr. R. L. Stevens, an engineer of Hoboken. If it accomplished nothing else, it supplied a precedent and gave encouragement to inventors everywhere. It made "le premier pas qui coute."

Meanwhile, in June, 1802, Mr. Thomas Wedgwood had published "An Account of a Method of Copying Paintings upon Glass, and of making Profiles by the Agency of Light upon Nitrate of Silver," with observations by Sir Humphry Davy. In the course of his paper, he declared that he had secured profiles of paintings made on glass by throwing the shadows of those paintings on paper covered with a solution of the nitrate; the paper showing the objects delineated in tones that were dark or light inversely as they were in the painting. He also took profiles of natural objects by throwing their shadows on the prepared paper: the parts of the paper covered by the shadows being white, while the parts outside the shadows became dark.

This seems to have been an actual invention, in that it followed a discovery made by Wedgwood that sunlight acted on nitrate of silver, and was the embodiment of an idea, then conceived by him, to utilize his discovery in making profile pictures. His invention was far from perfect, however; the greatest imperfection being the fact that the pictures could not be fixed; because, unless the paper was ever afterward kept away from the light, its whole surface would become dark, and the picture therefore cease to exist. In consequence, it aroused almost no interest whatever at the time. In 1814, M. Niepce invented a process that he called "heliography," by which he made pictures on silvered copper covered with a thin solution of asphaltum. In 1829, Daguerre and Niepce entered into a copartnership for developing heliography, and instituted experiments that led Daguerre to inventing the daguerreotype, made by a process quite new in detail, but based on the earlier inventions of both Wedgwood and Niepce. The daguerreotype was followed in 1850 by the present "photograph."

The invention of electroplating was made by Brugnatelli in Italy in 1803. The fact that electric currents could decompose certain liquids had been known since 1800, and also the further fact that oxygen and hydrogen, acids and alkalies, appeared at the positive and negative poles respectively of the wires in contact with the liquid. But Brugnatelli seems to have been the first to conceive the idea of utilizing these facts in a device whereby he could deposit metals at will at the negative end of a solution. In the embodiment of his conception, pieces (say of silver) were hung on rods in connection with the positive pole of the battery supplying the electric current, while the articles to be plated with silver were hung on rods connected with the negative pole. The value of this invention and its extensive use in the electrodeposition of metals at the present day are well known.

In the following year, Sir Humphry Davy, working along the general line of electrical decomposition of liquids, made a number of super-brilliant investigations. Possibly the most important result was his discovery of a new metal, to which he gave the name Potassium, formed at the negative pole by the electrical decomposition of moistened caustic potash. He followed this by decomposing caustic soda and discovering another new metal, that he named Sodium.

During the course of his experiments, Davy noted that when the two terminal wires from a large Voltaic battery were touched together and then drawn apart, not only did a spark pass, but a continuous discharge of great brilliancy, that did not cease until the wires were separated by a considerable distance. The extent of this distance was found later to be dependent on the number of cells in the battery. He noted also that the discharge did not follow a straight line, but was bent into an arc; and for this reason he gave it the name, "Voltaic arc." This light is still known by the name "arc light." Its importance does not seem to have been realized until after the dynamo-machine had been invented, and means thereby supplied for providing a greater amount of electric current, and at less expense than Voltaic cells were capable of delivering.

Davy's last great invention was his miner's safety lamp, made in 1816. There had been frequent explosions in the collieries, attended with great loss of life, and Davy was requested to try to ascertain how they could be prevented. After visiting the mines, he had samples of the gas that was found in them sent to him for investigation. He went about the work with scientific thoroughness and system, and ascertained that the gas would not explode if it were mixed with less than six times or more than fourteen times its volume of air; that air rendered impure by the combustion of a candle would not explode the gas; that, if a candle were burnt in a closed vessel, with small openings near the flame, no explosion would take place, even if the vessel were introduced into an explosive mixture; and that the gas from the mines would not explode inside a tube less than 1/8 inch in diameter. These data being secured, Davy conceived the idea of making a lamp in which a small oil light should be fixed and surrounded with a cylinder of wire gauze. He then embodied his conception in a concrete form, and the "Miners' Safety Lamp" resulted.

This was an invention of the first order; original, concrete and highly useful. After meeting the customary chorus of prejudice and opposition, it justified its existence by a quickly established record of effectiveness, and took its place among the useful adjuncts of the machine of civilization.

Meanwhile, several other adjuncts had appeared. Among these was the steel pen, a process of making malleable iron castings, the planing machine, a fireproof safe, the knitting machine and the band wood-saw.

In 1726 Dr. Hales had announced that a gas capable of burning, and giving light while burning, could be distilled from coal. This announcement created great interest, and led to a long series of scientific investigations as to the possibility of utilizing it for house and street illumination, especially by a Mr. Murdock in the latter decade of the century. In 1802 Mr. Murdock made a public display of the result of his labors, by illuminating a factory with gas. In the year 1803–1804 the Lyceum Theatre in London was so lighted, and a year later some extensive cotton mills in Manchester. Public interest was so roused that investigations on a larger scale ensued, which resulted in lighting Westminster Bridge with gas in 1813, and the town of Westminster the following year. In 1816 street lighting by gas was common in London. The lighting of houses by gas followed later, but very slowly.

It is a little difficult to see that there was much invention of an original or brilliant kind involved in the gradual development of the art of illuminating by gas; but it cannot reasonably be denied that a considerable amount of invention must have been done in the aggregate, for the reason that a wholly novel art was created. If it was not invented, how was it brought into being? The best answer probably is that the art was not the result of one brilliant invention followed by others that improved upon it, but was rather the aggregate work of a number of minor inventions, each one of which carried the art forward, but by only one short step.

Other minor inventions produced the locomotive and the railroad. The first steam engines were stationary; but portable engines, now called locomotives, gradually came into being. They were engines mounted on platforms resting on wheels that, in turn, rested on the ground; the revolutions of the engines turning the wheels, and causing the advancement of the whole. In 1807 a wagon-way was laid down on which cars were run to and from a colliery, and this wagon-way passed close in front of a house in which lived a poor family named Stephenson, a member of which was a boy whose Christian name was George. In the following year, the wooden parts were taken up and replaced by a single line of iron rails with sidings. In 1811 a portable engine was constructed for running on these rails, and this was followed by another in the following year. George Stephenson made a locomotive for running on rails in 1814, and followed it by another in 1816, both for hauling coal.

It was now so obvious that locomotives could haul other things than coal, that a railroad was laid down between Manchester and Liverpool, and a prize of £500 was offered for the best engine. On October 6, 1829, the competition was held, though only three engines appeared. The prize was won by Stephenson's locomotive, the Rocket, which attained a speed of 29 miles per hour.

With the locomotive, as with illuminating gas, it is impossible to see any one original or brilliant invention. We do see, however, the result of the superposition on one brilliant invention (that of Hero's steam engine) of a number of minor inventions, and much constructive ingenuity and initiative.

An invention of a higher order had signalized the latter part of the eighteenth century, in the form of a printing press in which the speed of printing was greatly increased by the use of revolving cylinders; one holding the type on its outer surface, and the other covered with leather, the paper passing between, and receiving the printed impression by the pressure exerted between the two cylinders. In order that the type should fit on the curved surface of the cylinder, they were made narrower toward the bottom. The machine was invented by an Englishman named Nicholson. It was never put into practical use; but a machine embodying the revolving cylinder for receiving the force of the impression communicated to the paper, was invented and put into successful use later by a German named König. The type, however, was not put on a cylinder in this machine, but on a flat plate that passed back and forth under the revolving impression cylinder. Two of König's presses were bought for the London Times; and on November 28, 1814, one made 1,100 impressions per hour, a marvelous advance over speeds previously attained. From the standpoint of pure invention, it was not so admirable as Nicholson's; but being a later product, and being based on Nicholson's principle, it was naturally an improvement in construction and mode of operation.

In 1814 Sir David Brewster, while experimenting on the polarization of light, made an invention of the most original and concrete type, which required a high grade of scientific knowledge for its conception and development, but which was not intended for any utilitarian purpose, and yet was of too serious a character to be called a scientific toy. This was his famous kaleidoscope; an instrument described accurately by its name, for it enabled one to see beautiful things. It was very simple in construction and principle, and seems to have fallen short of greatness in only one element, that of usefulness. By a careful adjustment of two prisms at a definite angle to each other, Sir David showed that geometrical images of the utmost beauty and variety could be made of objects placed between the mirrors, especially if those objects were small objects, and if they were of different colors, like bits of colored glass. Knowledge of this escaping, thousands of kaleidoscopes were soon put on the market, and sold in all the principal cities, before Sir David had had time to get a patent. Though the instruments were unscientifically made, they gave beautiful pictures nevertheless; but the result was that the kaleidoscope was not appreciated at its full value. The inventor improved the instrument greatly, and developed it into one of the most beauty-producing appliances known, and one of the most extraordinary and unique. The most remarkable fact connected with it is that no real usefulness for it has ever yet been found. The present author ventures to predict that a clear field of usefulness will some day be found by some fortunate inventor.

Meanwhile, the ill-clad captain of artillery who had invented the plan by which the British were pushed out of Toulon with so much neatness and despatch, had nearly turned the civilized world upside down. No man save Alexander ever accomplished so much of that kind of work in so short a time. His work consisted of a number of acts performed by him, each of which was like his act at Toulon, in that it began with the conception of a brilliant idea, proceeded with the embodiment of the idea in a concrete plan, and ended with the carrying into operation of that plan. Napoleon was great in each of these lines of work. He had a brilliant and yet correct imagination, that enabled him to conceive ideas of extraordinary brilliancy, and also to select from them the ideas that were the most susceptible of being made into concrete plans of the kind that could be carried out successfully. He possessed great constructiveness, that enabled him to construct mentally a plan in which all the means available for his use were seized upon and put to their special tasks. He possessed finally great ardor, industry and courage, that enabled him to start his plan to going very quickly, and keep it going very rapidly, until it had performed its task. It would be idle to discuss at which of these three stages of the work he was the greatest, or to try to decide which stage of the three was the most important; because the three were links in a continual chain, and the chain depended on each equally for its strength: – as any chain does on its links.

It may be interesting, however, to realize that mere imagination is possibly the most elementary activity of the mind; mere imagination is evidenced by savages, for instance, and by children, more than by highly educated men. Constructiveness, on the other hand, is little to be found in savages or children, and is a product of education, and a result of the training of the reasoning faculties. Courage and impulsive energy again are elemental faculties, and are observable more in savages than in the civilized. It seems to be the effect of civilization, therefore, to develop the reasoning faculties, at the expense of both imagination and courage. In fact, it is clearly the effect of civilization to develop a cold and calculating materialism. Men are rare therefore, and have been rare in every age, who combine the three qualities of imagination, constructiveness and courage. Napoleon combined all three in harmonious proportions; and he possessed each one in its most perfect form.

His performance at Toulon was so spectacular that it attracted attention at once, and caused his promotion to the command of the artillery in Italy. Here he was able to suggest projects that received approval and brought successes. One plan conceived and developed by him, however, was disapproved. It consisted essentially of dividing the Piedmontese and Austrians, crushing the Piedmontese, and then driving the Austrians out of Italy into Austria and following them thither. Later, this plan was approved, and he himself was put in command in Italy. It was this plan, executed by the Bonaparte of those days, that began the career of the Napoleon of history. So original and brilliant had been the conception, so mathematically correct and practically feasible had been the plan which Bonaparte developed from it, and so furiously energetic were his operations in carrying out the plan, that the sluggish Piedmontese were defeated before they quite realized that war had been begun. A like catastrophe happened to the equally mentally and physically sluggish Austrians; then another catastrophe, and then another, and then still others; and in such rapid and bewildering succession, that in a year and a month after his arrival in Italy he had driven the Austrians out completely, formed the Cisalpine and Ligurian republics in the north of Italy, and signed the armistice of Leoben with the Austrians, within fifty miles of Vienna.

Napoleon's next invention was a project for ruining England by attacking her East Indian possessions by a campaign beginning with an invasion of Egypt. Everything proceeded in substantial accordance with the plan developed, until August 1, 1798. In the evening of that day the whole project was destroyed by Horatio Nelson.

It was destroyed in a battle near the mouth of the river Nile, that was decided in fifteen minutes, though it was not wholly concluded until it had been raging for nearly four hours. In fifteen minutes, the French fleet on which depended Bonaparte's communications with Europe, had been so severely damaged that the failure of Bonaparte's project was decided.

Nelson was a man like Bonaparte in certain qualities; in the qualities that are essential to great leadership, imagination, constructiveness and executiveness. The first clear evidence of these qualities he had displayed startlingly at the battle of Cape St. Vincent on February 14, 1797; – when, swiftly realizing that two separated parts of the hostile Spanish fleet were about to join, he suddenly conceived the idea of preventing the junction by committing an act that – unless it brought success – would probably cost him his commission and perhaps his life. Now, the mere conception of an idea so revolting to professional ethics would not occur to an unimaginative man: and still less would it be retained. But it did occur to Nelson; and Nelson retained it and looked it squarely in the face. To embody his idea in a practicable plan was a simple matter to his active and trained intelligence, while to execute the plan was an act so natural as to be almost automatic. Much to the amazement of the Commander of the fleet and all the officers and men in both the fleets, the little division commanded by Commodore Nelson was seen actually to leave the line of battle! Nelson had taken his life, his fortune and his sacred honor in his hand, and staked all on an endeavor to get between the two separated parts of the Spanish fleet. The British Commander quickly realized what his daring subordinate had in mind, and speedily came to his relief. A brilliant, though not materially decisive, victory was won. The already distinguished Commander-in-Chief was then made Earl St. Vincent, and the hitherto obscure Horatio Nelson brought into the forefront of naval heroes, with the rank of rear-admiral, a gold medal and a knighthood.