WILLIAM MURDOCK: HIS LIFE AND INVENTIONS.
"Justice exacts, that those by whom we are most benefited Should be most admired."--Dr. Johnson.
"The beginning of civilization is the discovery of some useful arts, by which men acquire property, comforts, or luxuries. The necessity or desire of preserving them leads to laws and social institutions... In reality, the origin as well as the progress and improvement of civil society is founded on mechanical and chemical inventions."--Sir Humphry Davy.
At the middle of last century, Scotland was a very poor country.
It consisted mostly of mountain and moorland; and the little arable land it contained was badly cultivated. Agriculture was almost a lost art. "Except in a few instances," says a writer in the 'Farmers' Magazine' of 1803, "Scotland was little better than a barren waste." Cattle could with difficulty be kept alive; and the people in some parts of the country were often on the brink of starvation. The people were hopeless, miserable, and without spirit, like the Irish in their very worst times. After the wreck of the Darien expedition, there seemed to be neither skill, enterprise, nor money left in the country. What resources it contained were altogether undeveloped. There was little communication between one place and another, and such roads as existed were for the greater part of the year simply impassable.
There were various opinions as to the causes of this frightful state of things. Some thought it was the Union between England and Scotland; and Andrew Fletcher of Saltoun, "The Patriot," as he was called, urged its Repeal. In one of his publications, he endeavoured to show that about one-sixth of the population of Scotland was in a state of beggary-- two hundred thousand vagabonds begging from door to door, or robbing and plundering people as poor as themselves.Fletcher was accordingly as great a repealer as Daniel O'Connell in after times. But he could not get the people to combine. There were others who held a different opinion. They thought that something might be done by the people themselves to extricate the country from its miserable condition.
It still possessed some important elements of prosperity. The inhabitants of Scotland, though poor, were strong and able to work. The land, though cold and sterile, was capable of cultivation.
Accordingly, about the middle of last century, some important steps were taken to improve the general condition of things. Afew public-spirited landowners led the way, and formed themselves into a society for carrying out improvements in agriculture.
They granted long leases of farms as a stimulus to the most skilled and industrious, and found it to their interest to give the farmer a more permanent interest in his improvements than he had before enjoyed. Thus stimulated and encouraged, farming made rapid progress, especially in the Lothians; and the example spread into other districts. Banks were established for the storage of capital. Roads were improved, and communications increased between one part of the country and another. Hence trade and commerce arose, by reason of the facilities afforded for the interchange of traffic. The people, being fairly educated by the parish schools, were able to take advantage of these improvements. Sloth and idleness gradually disappeared, before the energy, activity, and industry which were called into life by the improved communications.
At the same time, active and powerful minds were occupied in extending the domain of knowledge. Black and Robison, of Glasgow, were the precursors of James Watt, whose invention of the condensing steam-engine was yet to produce a revolution in industrial operations, the like of which had never before been known. Watt had hit upon his great idea while experimenting with an old Newcomen model which belonged to the University of Glasgow. He was invited by Mr. Roebuck of Kinneil to make a working steam-engine for the purpose of pumping water from the coal-pits at Boroughstoness; but his progress was stopped by want of capital, as well as by want of experience. It was not until the brave and generous Matthew Boulton of Birmingham took up the machine, and backed Watt with his capital and his spirit, that Watt's enterprise had the remotest chance of success. Even after about twelve years' effort, the condensing steam-engine was only beginning, though half-heartedly, to be taken up and employed by colliery proprietors and cotton manufacturers. In developing its powers, and extending its uses, the great merits of William Murdock can never be forgotten. Watt stands first in its history, as the inventor; Boulton second, as its promoter and supporter; and Murdock third, as its developer and improver.
William Murdock was born on the 21st of August, 1754, at Bellow Mill, in the parish of Auchinleck, Ayrshire. His father, John, was a miller and millwright, as well as a farmer. His mother's maiden name was Bruce, and she used to boast of being descended from Robert Bruce, the deliverer of Scotland. The Murdocks, or Murdochs--for the name was spelt in either way--were numerous in the neighbourhood, and they were nearly all related to each other. They are supposed to have originally come into the district from Flanders, between which country and Scotland a considerable intercourse existed in the middle ages. Some of the Murdocks took a leading part in the construction of the abbeys and cathedrals of the North;others were known as mechanics;but the greater number were farmers.
