forming locks was a continued series of mechanical contrivances with purpose aforethought. When Watt first imagined the steam engine he did not invent the power of steam; that was known long before, and had existed from the time that fire and water had existed. But he formed to himself the plan by which he hoped to realise the result of making steam an efficient human servant through the agency of a perfect machine. The general idea of this machine existed in his mind a long time before he brought it into practice; and the slow process by which this was accomplished is evidenced by the fact that the term of his patent right was extended by Act of Parliament, on the ground that he had not had sufficient time to reap benefit from it. An anecdote of Watt serves not only to prove this, but also his high-minded philosophy, which was far beyond the miserable vanity of ordinary inventors, who aim at astonishing their fellows rather than instructing or benefiting them. After success had elevated Watt to the public eminence he so deserved, a nobleman who dined in his company expressed himself in terms of wonder on what Mr. Watt had accomplished. Watt coolly remarked, “The public look only on my success, and not on the intermediate failures and uncouth constructions which have served as steps to climb to the top of the ladder.” The power of mechanical conception is very widely extended; it is a modification of the same power which composes romances. The magic horse in the fairy tale, which turned and was guided by means of a pin in the neck, was a mechanical conception. If the same person who conceived that had worked it out into practice it would have been an evidence of genius, viz. imagination discovering truth by analogical inference. Invention, then, of the highest kind must be composed of four qualities—imagination, to conceive a new and complicated machine; knowledge, to gather materials; judgment, to select and combine them; and perseverance without wearying till the truth be obtained. Those things which commonly go by the name of new inventions are very often mere modifications of what has been done before. “Improvements” is the technical term applied to them. The task a man has to go through in conceiving, designing, perfecting, and patenting a complicated mechanical invention is by no means inviting. Even when he possesses the hand to execute what the head has contrived, only a portion of his difficulties are overcome. A first idea is fascinating, and apparently easy of execution. It is thought over again and again; all difficulties are apparently surmounted and all obstacles removed; it is, in the imagination of the inventor, perfect. He may, perchance, know how to draw; but if not, he must employ some one to make his drawings for him. In this case, to avoid piracy, he must take out a provisional patent. For this he has to pay some considerable sum, and for a purpose whose success is uncertain.