“P^d. 3_s._ 6_d._ for wagon carage to Edenbrough of chist. P^d. to son James 2_l._ 2_s._ P^d. Plaster and Pomet, 1_s._ 4_d._ P^d. 4 doz. pencels, 1_s._ 6_d._” The “plaster and pomet” may possibly have been provided in view of the long journey on horseback and its contingencies. It was arranged that the youth should travel in the company of a relative, Mr. Marr, a sea-captain, who was on his way to join his ship, then lying in the Thames. They set out on the 7th of June, travelling by way of Coldstream and Newcastle, where they joined the great north road, then comparatively practicable to the south of Durham. They reached London safely on the 19th, having been about a fortnight on the road. Mr. Marr immediately proceeded to make inquiries for a mathematical instrument maker with whom to place his young friend. But it was found that a serious obstacle presented itself in the rules of the trade, which prescribed that those employed must either be apprentices serving under a seven years’ apprenticeship, or, if journeymen, that they should have served for that term. Watt, however, had no intention of binding himself to serve for so long a period, and he had no pretensions to rank as a journeyman. His object was to learn the business in the shortest possible time, and then return to Glasgow and set up for himself. The two went about from shop to shop, but only met with rebuffs. “I have not yet got a master,” Watt wrote to his father about a fortnight after his arrival; “we have tried several, but they all made some objection or other. I find that, if any of them agree with me at all, it will not be for less than a year; and even for that time they will be expecting some money.”