SAMITEL CROMPTON. * To be more or less misunderstood, thwarted, wronged,

and per- secuted, is the lot of all inventors, and all great benefactors of their kind. The true prophets are stoned and the false are pam- pered. This has ever been, and probably ever will be, the habit of mankind. The men of genius who succumb to the blind world's injustice are a vast majority ; the few who surmount it generally owe their success to qualities which are not always combined with great powers of intellect. This truth is pointedly enforced by Mr. French in his interesting memoir of Samuel Crompton.

"The life of Samuel Crompton is commended to working men as a subject for serious reflection. Holding up much for their encouragement, there is also in it much of warning, as it demonstrates that ability of the highest order, even when supported by education, industry, sobriety, and frugality, does not exonerate any man from the duty of acquiring a knowledge of his fellow-men, and of learning how to deal with them in the business of life. His practical disregard of this knowledge was the stumbling block that im- peded every action of Samuel Crompton's life. Had he studied human nature with one tithe of the persevering skill and energy with which he de- voted himself to his mechanical pursuits, his name would have ranked now among the highest in the nation, and his posterity among the wealthiest of its commercial aristocracy."

Samuel Crompton, the inventor of the spinning mule, which from first to last has done ten times more to promote the extension of the cotton manufacture than all that Arkwright ever planned, was born near Bolton, in the year 1753. His parents occupied a small farm in the neighbourhood of that town, and, as was the custom in those days, employed their leisure time in carding, spinning, and weaving cotton. Till his twenty-first year Samuel worked at the loom, spinning his own weft on one of those small spinning jennies, which Hargreaves, a native of Blackburn, in- vented in 1767. As the character of every man depends much upon the way in which the period of boyhood and youth has been spent, Mr. French has wisely given us a glimpse of his hero at that early stage.

A PREMATURE THINKER.

We do not suppose that at this time our hero had much opportunity for reading; but there can be little doubt that at his solitary loom in the old mansion he had abundant time for, and in truth acquired then, the habit of thinking—a habit much less common and much more valuable than is usually imagined. Nor can we learn that he had any companions at his labour, or that he associated with young people of his own age. His mother, thoup always kind, was strict in discipline and kept him close to his work, insisting on a certain length being woven daily. Under these cir- cumstances it was natural that Samuel Crompton should become some- what i prematurely a thinker, and it was not less so that his want of so- cial ntercourseproduced a shyness of manner which adherred to him through life. Debarred from company, and accustomed to solitude, he now began to have a taste for music ; and in consequence of this was fed to the first trial of his mechanical skill in making a violin, which he commenced learning to play upon. He soon scraped a very intimate acquaintance with his fiddle, which became to him truly a bosom friend, proving in after life the solace of many a solitary hour, and a source of consolation after many a bitter disappointment. With this musical friend he on winter nights prac- tised the homely tunes of the time by the dim light of his mother's kitchen fire or thrifty lamp ; and in many a summer twilight he wandered contem- platively among the green lanes or by the margin of the pleasant brook that swept round her romantic old residence.

This habit of intense thinking, while it fostered his indivi- duality, was not calculated to prepare him for fighting the battle of life with much probability of success, especially in so rough a battle-field as that which Lancashire must have been at that period, and still continues to be. Not that he was without ambition. Like all self-made men he had doubtless his dreams of future greatness and distinction. As Mr. French re-

., The Life and Times of Samuel Crompton, Inventor of the Spinning Machine called the Mule. By Gilbert J. French. Published by Simpkin, Marshall, and Co. marks,—" The scientific) discoveries of Priestley and Black reached him probably in faint whispers only, but they were whispers to which his acute ear would be ardently opened. . . . Arkwright, whose reputation as an inventor now rung through Lancashire, was personally known to him, and had in all proba- bility often exercised his tonsorial skill upon his head when prac- tising as a barber in Deansgate." What more natural, under these circumstances, than that the thoughtful weaver should turn his attention to the solution of that problem upon which the ac- tive minds of Lancashire were then so busily engaged—how to increase the supply—not of raw cotton, as at the present day— but of cotton yarn:—

THE HALL-f -TH.-WOOD WHEELS.

It was in the year 1774, Samuel Crompton being then only twenty-one years of age, that he commenced the construction of the spinning machine which was ultimately called the "mule," but which for many years was known by the name of the "Hall-F -th'-Wood Wheels ; " and it took him five entire years to bring his improvement to maturity. During this time he worked alone, having no companion in his labours, and, so far as we can learn, no one in his confidence to whom he could look for sympathy or as- sistance. His own account of this period of his life is thus briefly stated:— " The next five years had this addition added to my labour as a weaver, oc- casioned by the unpaleet state of cotton spinning, viz., a continual endea- vour to realize a more perfect principle of spinning; and though often baffled I as often renewed the attempt, and at length succeeded to my ut- most desire at the expense of every shilling I had in the world." It must be clearly seen that the labour he bestowed, and the time he spent in seek- ing after this desired improvement, was an addition to his regular every- day work and in his enthusiasm he did not scruple to deprive himself of many of the usual hours of rest. Indeed this it was which first called the attention of his family and neighbours to his proceedings. Strange and un- accountable sounds were heard in the old Hall at most untimely hours ; lights were seen in unusual places; and a rumour became current that the place was haunted. Samuel was however soon discovered to be himself the embodied spirit (of invention) which had caused much fear and trouble to his family ; even when relieved from the alarm of a ghost, they yet found that they had among them a conjuror ! for such was the term applied in contempt to inventors in those days, and indeed for a long time afterwards, THE MACHINE-BREAKERS.

Just as Samuel Crompton was on the very eve of completing his first mule in 1779, and anxiously desirous to test it by putting it to actual work, the Blackburn spinners and weavers who had previously driven riotous Har- greaves from his home were again excited to renew their former riotous pro- ceedings, their own ignorant prejudices against machinery being increased by the erroneous opinions of many of the middle and upper classes who now entertained the greatest possible dread of the changes in trade and manu- facture which they saw approaching. Everyjenny for many miles round Blackburn was destroyed, excepting such only as had less than twenty spindles. When this storm was raging Samuel took his new machine to pieces and concealed the various parts in a loft or garret near the clock in the old Hall. There they remained hid for many weeks ere he dared to put them together again. But in the course of the same year the Hall-P-th'- Wood wheel was completed, and the yarn spun upon it used for the manu- facture of muslins of an extremely fine and delicate texture.

About this period Samuel Crompton married, and, with the assistance of his wife, he continued to spin cotton yarn upon his new machine of so fine a quality as to command fabulous prices throughout Lancashire. The demand for the new yarn was so great, however, that they could not supply one-tenth part of what their customers required. The consequence was that the Hall-i'- th'-Wood—an old mansion near Bolton, in which Crompton then resided—was besieged by manufacturers and weavers, most of whom came to purchase yarn, but many persons also through curiosity to find out the wonderful process by which it was pro- duced. " All kinds of stratagems were practised to obtain ad- mission to the house ; and when this was denied, many climbed up to the windows outside by the aid of harrows and ladders to look in at the machine. Crompton erected a screen to protect himself from this kind of observation, but even that did not at all times serve the intended purpose. One inquisitive adventurer is said to have ensconced himself for some days in the cockloft, where he watched Samuel at work, through a gimlet-hole pierced through the ceiling. Among other persons who tried to get at Crompton's secret was the celebrated Richard Arkwright, who is said to have taken advantage of the inventor's absence on one occasion to make a clandestine visit to the Hall-i'-th'-Wood.

Soon after Arkwright's visit, Crompton came to the conclusion that it would be best to give up his invention to the public. " At the urgent solicitations and liberal but deceitful promises of numerous neighbouring manufacturers, he surrendered to them not only the secret of the principle upon which he spun the much prized yarn, but the machine itself upon which the operation was performed." His reward for doing so was a paltry subscription of some sixty or seventy pounds. A. few years later an excellent offer was made to him by the first Sir Robert Peel, who was at that time a member of the Bolton firm of Peel, Ainsworth, and Co., who made two attempts to secure the services of Crompton, first of all by the offer of a lucrative situation of trust in his establishment, and afterwards by an offer of partnership. " Both of these offers Mr. Crompton declined, partly it is believed from a somewhat morbid desire for independence that clung to him through life, partly from a jealous suspicion of persons in superior social position, caused by the cruel treatment he received when he surrendered his first mule."

The subsequent story of Crompton's life is one which inspires regret to find so worthy a man so ill rewarded "for all his labour

under the sun." We have already adverted to the causes of his

ill success. He did not understand the great secret of success in life—that no amount of originality will atone for want of know- ledge of the world. May we not even say that the man of great originality would require a larger amount of knowledge of the world than ordinary men, whereas he generally has less.

Mr. French has made an admirable volume of biography out of very scanty materials. The occasional notices he has given of the mode of life in Bolton during the latter part of the last eon , the transition era of the factory age, are interesting and valuabblle as Contributions to the history of provincial life and manners. Bolton has good reason to be proud of Crompton, and it must be gratifying to the inhabitants of that thriving town to find that the task of giving to the world a good biography of one whose name will be inscribed in the list of the greatest benefactors of man- kind, has been so worthily performed by a fellow-townsman.