Recognizing the defects in his process, Bessemer set about overcoming them, and at the end of two years he had so succeeded in perfecting his methods that his product, equal in every respect to that of the older process, could be manufactured at a great saving of time and money. But the ironmasters were now skeptical, and refused to be again inveigled into applying for licenses. Bessemer, therefore, with the aid of friends, erected extensive steel works of his own at Sheffield, and began manufacturing steel in open competition with the other steel operators. The price at which he was able to sell his product and realize a profit was so much below the actual cost of manufacture by the older process, that there was soon consternation in the ranks of his rivals. For when it became known that the firm of Henry Bessemer & Co. was selling steel at a price something like one hundred dollars a ton less than the ordinary market price, there was but one thing left for the ironmasters to do--surrender, and apply for licenses to be allowed to use the new process. By this means, and through the profits of his own establishment, Bessemer eventually amassed a well-earned fortune. Moreover, he was honored in due course by a fellowship in the Royal Society, and knighted by his government. One other name is usually associated with that of Bessemer in the practical development of the inventor's original idea. That is the name of Robert Mushet, and the "Bessemer-Mushet" process is still in use. Mushet's improvement over Bessemer's original process was that of adding a certain quantity of _spiegeleisen_, or iron containing manganese, which, for some reason not well understood, simplifies the process of steel making. Mushet, therefore, must be considered as the discoverer of a useful, though not an absolutely essential, accessory to the Bessemer process. OPEN-HEARTH METHOD In the open-hearth method the metal from the blast-furnaces is not sent to the converter, but is poured into oven-like structures built of fire brick, and in these heated to a terrific temperature. This heat has the same effect upon the metal as the blast of air in the Bessemer converter, and this open-hearth process has become very popular for manufacturing certain kinds of steel. While in the method of application this process differs greatly from that of Bessemer, it differs largely in the fact that the oxygen necessary to burn off the carbonic oxide, silicon, etc., is made to play over the molten mass instead of passing through it.