BOOKS

BY GERTRUDE L. STONE AND
M. GRACE FICKETT


EVERY DAY LIFE IN THE COLONIES

DAYS AND DEEDS A HUNDRED YEARS AGO

FAMOUS DAYS IN THE CENTURY OF INVENTION


D. C. HEATH & CO., PUBLISHERS

FAMOUS DAYS IN THE
CENTURY OF INVENTION


BY
GERTRUDE L. STONE
INSTRUCTOR IN THE STATE NORMAL SCHOOL
GORHAM, MAINE

AND

M. GRACE FICKETT
INSTRUCTOR IN STATE NORMAL SCHOOL
WESTFIELD, MASSACHUSETTS



D. C. HEATH & CO., PUBLISHERS
BOSTON NEW YORK CHICAGO

Copyright, 1920,
By D. C. Heath & Co.

CONTENTS

FAMOUS DAYS IN THE CENTURY OF INVENTION

HOW THE SEWING MACHINE WON FAVOR

PART I

"It is! It is!" chattered the robins at half past three on an early June morning in 1845. Jonathan Wheeler sat up in bed with a start. This was the morning he had been waiting for all the spring, the morning he was to start for Boston with his father, mother, and Uncle William, and ride for the first time on a railway train.

"Is it really pleasant?" was his first thought. "It is! It is!" chirped the robins again. And Jonathan's eyes by this time were open enough to see the red glow through the eastern window. In a second he was out of bed, hurrying into his best clothes that his mother had laid out for him the night before.

Jonathan lived in a little town only thirty miles from Boston; but traveling was not then the easy and familiar experience of to-day. The nearest railway station was at South Acton, fifteen miles away. The Wheelers had planned to start from home in the early morning, and after dining with some friends in the railroad town, leave there for Boston on the afternoon train.

But in those days the Fitchburg railroad had not crossed the river, and had its terminal at Charlestown. From there passengers were carried by stage to the City Tavern in Brattle Street. It would be six o'clock that night before Jonathan could possibly see Boston.

But he lost no moment of his longed-for day. The bothersome dressing and eating were soon over; and Jonathan felt that his new experiences were really beginning when, at seven o'clock, from the front seat beside his father in the blue wagon, he looked down on his eight less fortunate brothers and sisters and several neighbors' children, who, with the hired man, were waiting to see the travelers depart.

"Good-bye! Good-bye, everybody!" called Jonathan, proudly. "I shan't see you for three days, and then I shall be wearing some store clothes!"

For the first few miles the conversation of his elders did not interest him much. He was so busy watching for the first signs of a railway train that the smoke from every far-away chimney attracted his attention; but after a while, when there was nothing to see but the thick growths of birch and maple each side the road, he heard his father saying:

"Well, Betsey, I think thee has earned this holiday. Thee has had a busy spring."

"It has been a busy time," agreed Mrs. Wheeler. "But all the house-cleaning is done and every stitch of the spring sewing. Since April I've cut and made sixteen dresses and six suits of clothes."

"Did thee read in the Worcester Spy last week, Betsey," inquired Uncle William, "of a sewing machine that bids fair to be a success?"

"A sewing machine!" echoed Mrs. Wheeler. "Does thee mean a machine that actually sews as a woman sews? That's too good to be true!"

"But it's bound to come, Betsey," said her husband reassuringly. "We're keeping house to-day much as the early settlers did. We've found better ways of travel, and labor-saving inventions are the next thing." Then, turning to his brother, he added, "Tell us, William, what the Spy said."

"Well, it seems there's a young man in Boston who has a good deal of ingenuity, and he actually has a sewing machine on exhibition at a tailor's there. For some days he's been sewing seams with it, the paper said, at the rate of three hundred stitches to the minute. Perhaps we shall find that tailor's shop to-morrow."

"I should like nothing better," answered Mrs. Wheeler. "Maybe we can buy Jonathan's trousers there."

Jonathan had been an interested listener to this conversation; but just then he caught sight of a moving column of smoke, and for the rest of the drive he thought of little else but the engine he could scarcely wait to see. By ten o'clock came South Acton; then the long hours while his elders ate slowly and talked much; at last the wonderful, puffing, noisy engine and the strange, flat-roofed houses on wheels with their many little windows. Jonathan's world had grown very large indeed when he went to sleep that night at the City Tavern in Brattle Street.

The next morning at the breakfast table, with the aid of the Morning Advertiser and the Boston Transcript of the night before, the Wheelers made their plans for the day's shopping and sight-seeing.

"We'll do the shopping first," decided Mrs. Wheeler. "Here's an advertisement of ready-made clothing." And she read aloud what was, for those days, a rather startling advertisement, beginning:

PERPETUAL FAIR
AT
QUINCY HALL
OVER QUINCY HALL MARKET
BOSTON

"Let's go there," advised Uncle William. "Quincy Market isn't far from here." So the Wheelers' first stopping place that morning was Mr. Simmons's establishment at Quincy Market.

"Has thee any linen trousers for this little boy to wear with the dark blue jacket he has on?" inquired Mrs. Wheeler of the young man who came forward to serve them.

"We have, madam, I am sure." And deftly the polite young man picked out a pair of dark blue and white striped linen trousers from the middle of a neat pile of garments. Sure enough, the trousers were of the right size; and, to the Wheelers' astonishment, the price was less than they had expected to pay.

"There must be some profit, madam, you see," explained the clerk; "but if we could make these garments by machine, as a young man in the next room says he can, we could afford to sell them for almost nothing."

"We have heard of that young man and his machine. Will it be possible for us to watch him sew with it?" replied Mrs. Wheeler.

"Certainly, madam. Just step this way, if you please." And he ushered the Wheelers into an adjoining workshop, well filled with men and women, many of the men, as Jonathan found out later, being dealers in ready-made clothing in the larger towns near Boston.

"Oh, mother, there he is!" whispered Jonathan excitedly, and he hurried forward to see better.

A kindly-faced young man, not more than twenty-five years old, sat at a table before what seemed to Jonathan a sort of little engine without wheels. With one hand he was turning a crank and with the other he was guiding a seam on a pair of overalls. A bright needle flashed in and out of the blue cloth till it reached the end of the seam. Then the sewer stopped the machine, cut the thread, and handed the garment about for inspection.

"That took just one minute, Mr. Howe," announced a man who stood near, watch in hand.

"One minute!" echoed a woman standing beside Jonathan. "I could not sew that seam in fifteen minutes."

"How long would it take thee, mother?" whispered Jonathan, aside.

"I'm not sure, little boy," his mother whispered back. "I think I could do it in ten minutes."

"An experienced seamstress could not sew that seam in less than five minutes," then spoke Mr. Howe, as if in answer to a question.

"I don't quite believe that," objected one man.

"Well, why not have a race?" challenged Mr. Howe. "Mr. Simmons," he continued, addressing the proprietor, "will you let five of your best sewers run a race with me? I'll take five seams to sew while each of them does one. Are you willing?"

"Agreed!" said Mr. Simmons. And it was but the work of a moment to select an umpire and prepare the seams. Then the umpire gave the command to start and the race began.

It was an exciting contest. The girls sewed "as fast as they could, much faster than they were in the habit of sewing." Mr. Howe worked steadily but carefully.

"If he wins, how many times as fast as each girl is he sewing?" asked Jonathan's uncle suddenly, of the little fellow. Jonathan was too bright to be caught and answered quickly, "More than five, isn't he?"

"That's right, Jonathan. And he really is sewing more than five times as fast. Look!"

It was true. Mr. Howe held up his finished seam. Every girl was still at work. "The machine has beaten," announced the umpire. "And moreover," he added after careful inspection, "the work on the machine is the neatest and strongest."

"Now, gentlemen," said Mr. Howe, "may I not have your orders for a sewing machine? See what a money-saver it will be! I can make you one for seven hundred dollars. It will pay for itself in a few months, and it will last for years."

Jonathan expected to hear many of the tailors present order a machine at once. But he was witnessing, although he did not know it till years afterward, "the pain that usually accompanies a new idea." The invention which was to make the greatest change of the century in the manufacturing world lay for several years unused and scorned by the public. The short-sighted tailors over Quincy Hall Market made one objection after another.

"It does not make the whole garment."

"My journeymen would be furious."

"Truly, it would beggar all handsewers."

"We are doing well enough as we are."

"It costs too much."

"Why, Mr. Howe, I should need ten machines. I should never get my money back."

Jonathan was sorry for Mr. Howe. "I'll buy a machine some day," he announced.

"Thank you, little boy," answered Mr. Howe. "I've no doubt you will."

But the tailors laughed and shook their heads.

Before they left the workshop, Jonathan's party had a long talk with Mr. Howe.

"We are from the country," they said, "with no money to buy a machine of this sort. But we are interested in it, and we believe it has a future. Will thee tell us more about it?"

"Gladly," said Mr. Howe. "I've been at work on the machine most of the time for the last five years—ever since I was twenty-one, in fact. I was born up in Worcester County, in Spencer. When I was eleven, I was bound out to a farmer, but I liked machinery better. I went to Lowell as soon as my parents were willing, and worked a while in a cotton mill. But I did not like that very well, it was so monotonous, and I came down here to work for Mr. Davis in Cornhill. One day a man who was trying to construct a knitting machine came in to see if Mr. Davis could make him a suggestion. But Davis really made the suggestion to me. 'Why don't you make a sewing machine?' he asked.

"'I wish I could,' the man answered, 'but it can't be done.'

"'Oh, yes,' cried Davis, 'I could make one myself.'

"'Well,' was the rejoinder, 'you do it, Davis, and I'll insure you an independent fortune.'

"Now I don't know that Davis or the other man has thought of the matter since. As for me, I've thought of little else. A year ago last October I had planned out the chief parts of the machine—the two threads, the curved, eye-pointed needle, and the shuttle. A rough model that I made convinced me that such a machine would work; and last December I prevailed upon my friend, Mr. Fisher of Cambridgeport, to let me, with my wife and children, live at his house and construct my machine in his garret. He gave me five hundred dollars besides for material. In return for those favors, I've agreed to give Fisher half my profits. But," he added rather gloomily, "so far it's been a bad bargain for Fisher."

"Is the machine patented?" inquired Uncle William.

"Not yet," answered Mr. Howe. "I need some money first, for, you know, I shall have to make a model to deposit at Washington."

The Wheelers thanked Mr. Howe for his kindness in satisfying their curiosity and wished him all good fortune.

"Sometime," added Jonathan's father, "I expect thy machine will find its way into homes as well as into shops."

"Indeed, Mr. Howe," added Mrs. Wheeler, "it would be the greatest boon the farmer's wife could ask."

"I prophesy, Betsey," said Uncle William, "that before many years thee will make Jonathan some overalls with a machine of thine own. Meantime," turning to Mr. Howe, "I want to buy him the pair thee sewed in the race. They were boys' trousers, were they not?"

"Yes," answered Mr. Howe, "and I'm sure Mr. Simmons will be glad to sell them to you. He does not put too high a value on them, you know," he added soberly. "Anyway, I shall be glad to know that my machine has sewed for so engaging a little fellow," he finished, with a pleasant smile.

As for Jonathan, he was almost too excited to speak. Two new pairs of "store" trousers in one day, and one of these sewed by a machine! "Thank you, Uncle William," he gasped. And he must say something to Mr. Howe. "Thank you, too, Mr. Howe. I shall surely buy a machine some day."

Jonathan returned to the country the next day, a much traveled little boy for the year 1845. All his experiences remained vividly in his memory: the wonderful railway train, the stage coach clattering over the city pavements, the waiter at the hotel who stood politely near the table and anticipated his wants—all these recollections made his farm life happier and his farm tasks easier. Of all his Boston memories, however, none were more vivid or more persistent than the sight of that marvelous sewing machine and its exciting race with the skilled sewers.

"What has become of Mr. Howe?" thought Jonathan more than once. "Has he given up trying to persuade people that sewing by hand was often a needless drudgery?" For a year and a half Jonathan could only wonder. Then, one day in February, 1847, Uncle William read in the Boston Advertiser that Elias Howe and his brother had taken passage in a packet for England to interest Londoners in the curious machine that could work faster and more skillfully than human fingers.

PART II

Three years later Uncle William took Jonathan on another journey, this time to a small town west of Worcester and about thirty miles from home. The trip was made, so Uncle William said, to consult with a county commissioner there about the prospect of a much needed road; but Mrs. Wheeler, when she remembered that Mr. Howe had mentioned Spencer as his birthplace, remarked knowingly to her husband:

"Not that I would question Brother William's motive, but thee knows, Daniel, that he was the most interested man in that room over the Quincy Hall Market. He may need to see the commissioner, but I think he's more interested in the fortunes of young Howe."

"I believe thee's right," answered her husband. "And I hope," he added, "that William will come back with good news about that young fellow and his machine."

There was no railway train this time for Jonathan. It was an interesting journey, nevertheless, through a beautiful hill country with varied scenery. Jonathan and his uncle both enjoyed their ride in the comfortable one-horse chaise and their dinner at the Worcester inn. In the afternoon they drove out to Spencer and put up at the tavern there; and after supper they went to bed in the very room where President Washington once had slept.

"Now, if I could only see Mr. Howe on the street to-morrow morning!" thought Jonathan as he dropped asleep.

Mrs. Wheeler would not have been greatly surprised at Uncle William's procedure the next morning. The visit to the county commissioner was made immediately after breakfast and the information that Uncle William desired easily and quickly obtained.

"By the way," inquired Uncle William when the business interview was over, "do you know anything of a young fellow named Elias Howe?"

"Elias Howe? Why, yes, I believe so. There are so many Howes here I had to think a minute. You mean Elias, Jr., I guess. They did live down in the south part. The young fellow had some scheme of sewing by machinery. Couldn't make it work, I believe."

"Is his father living here?"

"No, not now. Another son invented a machine for cutting palm leaf into strips for hats and Howe moved to Cambridge to help the thing along. Don't believe he'll ever come back."

"My nephew and I saw young Howe in Boston four years ago with his sewing machine. We've both been much interested to hear more about his fortunes. Has he some relatives here who could tell us?"

"Why, yes, his uncle Tyler lives here, his father's brother. His house is right over there. Better call on him. He's a pleasant fellow—every Howe is—and he likes to talk."

"Shall we?" asked Uncle William of Jonathan.

Jonathan's feeling in the matter was not uncertain, but all he said was, "I should like to, Uncle."

"Glad to see you both," was the hearty greeting of Mr. Tyler Howe, upon hearing Uncle William's introduction of himself and his nephew. "Well, Elias is a smart boy and a good one, but he's pretty well down on his luck just now. So you saw him in Boston? Four years ago, wasn't it? Since then he's had a discouraging time.

"After he exhibited his machine in the shop where you saw him, he spent three or four months in Fisher's garret, making another machine to deposit in the patent office. The next year he and Fisher went to Washington, where they had no trouble in getting a patent, but no luck at all in interesting people in the sewing machine. They exhibited it once at a fair, but the crowd was amused, that's all.

"By the time Fisher got back to Cambridge, he washed his hands of the whole matter. I don't much wonder. He'd spent all of two thousand dollars and hadn't had a cent in return. Then Elias had only his family to turn to. With his wife and children he moved to his father's and began to plan how to interest England in the invention America had rejected.

"He made a third machine, and with that as a sample, his brother Amasa sailed for England in October, about a month after Elias came back from Washington. For a time it seemed as if the trip would be worth while. Amasa showed the machine to a William Thomas, who had a shop in Cheapside, where he manufactured corsets, umbrellas, carpet bags, and shoes. You can see that the sewing of such articles must be extremely difficult, and Thomas was really interested in the machine.

"But Amasa, I'm afraid, hasn't proved himself much of a business man. He sold Mr. Thomas outright for two hundred fifty pounds sterling (that's twelve hundred fifty dollars of our money, Jonathan) the machine he had brought with him and the right to use as many more as were necessary in the business."

"Then the notice in the paper was a mistake. So Elias didn't go to Europe?" inquired Uncle William.

"Yes, the notice was true. You see, the man Thomas did most of his trade in corsets, and the machine was better adapted to sewing overalls and shirts. So Thomas agreed to give Elias three pounds a week if he would go over to London and adapt the machine for use on corsets and other stiff material. Thomas also agreed to pay the expenses of workshop, tools, and material.

"Amasa came back to America with this news, and then he and Elias, with the precious first machine, started together for London in February, just as the paper said. They had so little money that they had to go in the steerage and cook their own food. But in London things went well for a time, and Thomas even advanced the money for Elias's family to join him. However, the good fortune was short-lived. In eight months Elias had adapted his machine to Thomas's requirements, and then Thomas ungratefully discharged him for good and all.

"Things were pretty dark for Elias by this time. Thomas had agreed, but only by word of mouth, to patent the invention in England, and to pay Elias three pounds on every machine that was sold. There are scoundrels everywhere, I suppose; but that Thomas has proved one of the meanest men I ever heard of. Sewing machines are fairly common in London now, and on every one of those Thomas has realized about ten pounds, but Elias hasn't had a shilling.

"Of course, when Thomas discharged him, he had nothing to do but move his family into cheaper quarters, borrow a few tools, and begin the construction of a fourth machine. He could not finish it without more money, so he moved his family into one very small room and worked as fast as he could. But even then he could not buy food for his wife and children and material for his machine. There was nothing to do but send his family home and work at the machine till he could sell it and get his own passage money.

"Elias has been in a good many straits for a young fellow, but he has a marked gift for making friends. At this time he grew to know pretty well a coach maker, named Charles Inglis, who unfortunately was a poor man too, but who often lent him what money he could during those evil days, and what was better, kept faith in him.

"The night that Mrs. Howe and the children left England, it was so very wet and stormy that Mrs. Howe, who was almost in consumption, could not walk to the ship. Inglis lent Elias a few shillings for the cab hire, and Elias promised him some clothing in return. The clothing was what the washerwoman had brought home that morning, but had taken away again, because there was no money to pay her.

"Then came days of pinching poverty for Elias; but not quite such unhappy ones, I think, now that the wife and children were soon to be with the relatives in Cambridge. Elias knew that the Howes were too proud to let his family starve; and as for himself, he would borrow a shilling at a time of Inglis and buy beans to cook in his own room.

"Finally he finished the machine. Instead of getting the fifty pounds that it was worth, he had to sell it for five pounds, and even then for a mere promise to pay. Inglis soon managed to get four pounds of the money in cash for him, but that four pounds was by no means enough to pay Elias's debts and buy his passage. There was nothing to do but pawn his precious first machine and the letters-patent. That done, he drew his baggage on a hand cart to a freight vessel, and he and Inglis took passage in the steerage of another ship bound for America.

"Elias reached New York last April with half a crown in his pocket, but he found employment in a machine shop almost at once. Then came the sad news that his wife, who had been ill when she left England, was dying in Cambridge.

"Elias had no money for a railroad journey. He had to wait friendless, except for Inglis, in a great city, wholly despairing of ever seeing his wife again and feeling that he had risked everything to gain nothing. His father, however, as soon as he knew of his destitution, sent him ten dollars, and Elias reached Cambridge just in time to speak to his wife before she died. He had no clothes, though, but his shabby working suit, and could not have gone to the funeral if his brother had not lent him a coat.

"That was the last time I saw Elias, and then I should scarcely have known him. By nature, he is, you know, a pleasant-faced, happy fellow; but then he looked as if he had had a long, painful sickness. There wasn't a trace of his old self left. And as if he hadn't had trouble enough, word arrived before I left Cambridge that the vessel to which he had carted his household goods had been wrecked off Cape Cod.

"Most people would have given up, I think, under all these trials, but Elias has a good deal of the Howe perseverance. He immediately got a position in Boston as a journeyman machinist at weekly wages."

"And where is he now?" inquired Uncle William sympathetically.

"I had a letter from him the other day. Should you like to hear it?"

Taking the answer for granted, Mr. Howe opened his desk and took out the letter. Then he read as follows:—

Cambridge, Mass., June 20, 1849

My dear Uncle,

You will be interested, I know, in what I have to write; and I think you will agree with me that I shall yet retrieve all my ill-luck. Any advice you may have for me I shall cheerfully receive.

First look at the enclosed hand bill.

And Mr. Howe interrupted the reading to pass Uncle William and Jonathan a small hand bill like this:—

A GREAT
CURIOSITY!!
THE
YANKEE SEWING MACHINE
IS NOW
EXHIBITING
AT THIS PLACE
FROM
8 A.M. TO 5 P.M.

He then went on with the reading:—

That was posted about in Ithaca, N. Y., just a few weeks after I came back from England.

Some fellow made a machine from the description he heard of mine, and he has been giving exhibitions of its work in various places. He says his machine can do the work of six hands and make a pair of pantaloons in forty minutes. And I have no doubt he tells the truth.

Only, Uncle Tyler, don't you see it's my machine and he is infringing on my patent? And more than that, right here in Boston machines have been built on my model and are in daily use. Now I know that I am without resources and that I have pretty well exhausted the patience of my friends. But surely my claims are valid.

Getting money to push them is the task I dread. Still I have already raised a hundred dollars to get my machine and letters patent out of pawn in London; and I have every hope that Mr. Anson Burlingame, who is soon to sail for England, will deliver them safely to me in the fall.

The next step is to see if the lawyers can find any flaws in my claims. If they can't, the suit I propose to bring is already in my favor; and I am sanguine enough to believe that the Howe sewing machine will yet be a household convenience.

Yours respectfully,
Elias Howe, Jr.

"Well," commented Mr. Howe, as he folded the letter slowly, "I didn't know how to answer that. He said he wanted advice. I know he wants money more, but of course he hates to ask for it. I deliberated a good while; but finally I wrote him that if the lawyers gave him assurance that his claims were valid, I would advance what money I could spare to further his suit."

There was silence in the room for a little while. Then Jonathan said earnestly:

"I wish I had some money to give Mr. Howe. Would he take my five dollars, do you think?" he asked of the inventor's uncle.

"See, I have it here; and I should be glad to give it to him without waiting to hear what the lawyers say. Do you think it would be all right to send it, Mr. Howe?" he inquired.

"And may I, Uncle William?" he added quickly, for he had almost taken his uncle's permission for granted.

Uncle William nodded; and Mr. Howe said, "You may never get it back, you know."

"I think I shall," answered Jonathan confidently. "And anyway I want to help Mr. Howe."

"Do you want to send it now?" inquired Mr. Howe.

"If you please," replied Jonathan.

"Then you may write your letter here, while your uncle and I go for a walk."

Spencer, Mass.,
15^th 9^th mo., 1849.

Mr. Elias Howe, Jr.,
Cambridge, Mass.

My dear Mr. Howe:—

Perhaps thee remembers the boy who saw thee run a race with thy sewing machine against five seamstresses over Quincy Hall Market four years ago. Thy uncle told me of the hard time thee has had since. I am very sorry. I want to buy a sewing machine and I want to help thee. I am sending thee five dollars. It is all the money I have. I hope thee will use it to win thy suit. Sometime when thee sells sewing machines, I hope thee will sell me one for my mother five dollars less than the usual price. Thee can see thee will not have to pay this back for a long time, for it will be a good many years before I shall have money enough to buy a sewing machine.

Thy friend and well-wisher,
Jonathan Wheeler

There is little more to tell of Jonathan's visit to Spencer. After dinner that day he started with his uncle for Worcester, where they stayed all night. The next morning, after an early breakfast, they set out again, reaching home before the forenoon grew very hot.

PART III

Not many days after Jonathan's return, the first letter he ever received his father brought him from the post office. It hardly needed the post mark, Cambridge, to make Jonathan sure who had sent it. Let us open it with him:—

Cambridge, August 26, 1849.

My dear friend Jonathan,

Your letter with its inclosure of five dollars has been gratefully received. I remember you and your uncle, your father and your mother, with much pleasure. Ever since I ran that race in Boston I have been sure that the machine would work its way to success.

I am more confident now than ever. I have found some one who will buy out Mr. Fisher's interest; Mr. Burlingame will bring my old machine and letters patent from London; and every lawyer I have consulted says my claims are valid and I shall win my suit.

When I have succeeded, and the manufacture of sewing machines is under my control, I shall send for you to pick out a machine for your mother.

Again thanking you for your substantial interest, I am

Very faithfully yours,
Elias Howe, Jr.

This was in 1849. Mr. Howe's darkest days were over; but even then success came slowly and in rather a strange way. Mr. Howe's chief enemy was a Mr. Singer, who built machines and advertised them with remarkable success.

"You are infringing my patent," wrote Howe to Singer, upon hearing of the latter's activity.

"But you are not the inventor," replied Singer. "The Chinese have had a sewing machine for ages; an Englishman made one in 1790; a Frenchman built one in 1830; and what is more to the point, in 1832, a man named Walter Hunt, living in New York, invented a sewing machine with a shuttle stitch like yours. I can find Walter Hunt and prove my statement."

Well, Mr. Singer did find Walter Hunt and the fragments of his old machine. But "not all the king's horses nor all the king's men" could put those fragments together again so that the machine would sew. For four years, however, the trial in the courts continued. But at last, in 1854, when Mr. Howe had waited nine years after completing his first machine, the Wheelers and many others read with great satisfaction in the Worcester Spy:

"Judge Sprague of Massachusetts has decided that the plaintiff's patent is valid and that the defendant's machine is an infringement. Further, there is no evidence in this case that leaves a shadow of a doubt that, for all the benefit conferred upon the public by the introduction of a sewing machine, the public are indebted to Mr. Howe."

In 1855, Jonathan, now grown into a tall, manly youth of twenty, started with Uncle William on another journey, longer and more interesting than either had ever taken before. This time they went to New York, where they found Mr. Howe at the head of a prosperous business; and when they returned, they brought with them a Howe sewing machine of the very latest model, "a present from the inventor to Mrs. Wheeler, in gratitude for the sympathy and encouragement of her family."

LONG-DISTANCE TALKING

PART I

Late one June afternoon Arthur Burton was leaning against a table in the eastern gallery of the main hall at the Philadelphia Exposition. It had been a wonderful day, but it was past dinner time, and he was hot, tired, and hungry. He had seen more wonders that day than he had witnessed in all his life before; but now his uncle and the other judges were in the midst of the Massachusetts educational exhibit, which wasn't half so interesting as the first electric light, or the first grain reaper, or the iceboats. So Arthur had moved away from the new-fashioned school desks and the slate blackboards, and was waiting rather wearily.

Suddenly he straightened up. Entering the door near by was the most distinguished visitor at the Centennial, the tall, handsome Dom Pedro, Emperor of Brazil, with the Empress and a bevy of courtiers. To Arthur's amazement, His Majesty walked directly up to the table against which he himself was standing; and looking beyond the little boy, he said with outstretched hand and a pleasant smile:

"How do you do, Mr. Bell? I am very glad to see you and your work."

Till then Arthur had scarcely noticed a sallow, dark-haired young man who had been sitting behind the little table, nor had he paid the slightest attention to some pieces of wood and iron with wire attached lying on the table. But now, the young man and his material had become decidedly interesting.