Mr. Marr continued to exert himself on behalf of the youth. Anxious to be employed in any way rather than not at all, Watt offered his services gratuitously to a watchmaker named Neale, with whom Mr. Marr did business, and he was allowed to occupy himself in his shop for a time, cutting letters and figures in metal. At length a situation of a more permanent character was obtained for him; and he entered the shop of Mr. John Morgan, a respectable mathematical instrument maker in Cornhill, on the terms of receiving a year’s instruction in return for a fee of twenty guineas and the proceeds of his labour during that time. He soon proved himself a ready learner and skilful workman. That division of labour, the result of an extensive trade, which causes the best London carriages to be superior to any of provincial construction, was even then applied to mathematical instruments. “Very few here,” wrote Watt, “know any more than how to make a rule, others a pair of dividers, and such like.” His first employment was in making brass scales, rules, parallels, and the brass-work of quadrants; and by the end of a month he was able to finish a Hadley’s quadrant in better style than any apprentice in the shop. From rule and quadrant making he proceeded to azimuth compasses, brass sectors, theodolites, and the more delicate kinds of instruments. At the end of the year he wrote home to his father that he had made “a brass sector with a French joint, which is reckoned as nice a piece of framing-work as is in the trade;” and he expressed the hope that he would soon be able to work for himself, and earn his bread by his own industry. Up to this time he had necessarily been maintained by his father, on whom he drew from time to time. Mr. Watt’s memorandum-books show that on the 27th of June he remitted him 10_l._; on the 24th of August following he enters: “Sent George Anderson by post 8_l._ to buy a bill of 7_l._ or 8_l._ to send Wheytbread and Gifferd, and ballance of my son’s bill, 2_l._ 2_s._ 3_d._, for which ame to remite him more;” and on the 11th September following, the balance was forwarded through the same channel. On the 24th October, 4_l._ 10_s._ was in like manner sent to George Anderson “on son James’s second bill;” and on the 31st December, 10_l._ was remitted, “to be put to the credit of son James’s last bill.” To relieve his father as much as possible for the cost of his maintenance in London, Watt lived in a very frugal style, avoiding all unnecessary expenses. His living cost him only eight shillings a week; and he could not reduce it below that, he wrote to his father, “without pinching his belly.” He also sought for some remunerative work on his own account; and when he could obtain it he sat up at night to execute it.