also applied his talents to effecting the substitution of machinery for manual labour in combing wool, and took out his first patent on this subject in April 1790. The following anecdotes we quote from the ‘Pursuit of Knowledge,’ vol. ii.; we believe them to rest upon the best authority. “Dr. Cartwright’s children still remember often seeing their father about this time walking to and fro apparently in deep meditation, and occasionally throwing his arms from side to side; on which they used to be told that he was thinking of weaving and throwing the shuttle. From the moment indeed when his attention was first turned to the invention of the power-loom, mechanical contrivance became the grand occupying subject of his thoughts. With that sanguineness of disposition which seems to be almost a necessary part of the character of an inventor, he looked on difficulties, when he met with them in any of his attempts, as only affording his genius occasion for a more distinguished triumph: nor did he allow even repeated failures for a moment to dishearten him. Some time after he had brought his first loom to perfection, a manufacturer, who had called upon him to see it at work, after expressing his admiration of the ingenuity displayed in it, remarked, that wonderful as was Mr. Cartwright’s mechanical skill, there was one thing that would effectually baffle him, namely the weaving of patterns in checks, or in other words, the combining in the same web, of a pattern, or fancy figure, with the crossing colours which constitute the check. Mr. Cartwright made no reply to this observation at the time; but some weeks after, on receiving a second visit from the same person, he had the pleasure of showing him a piece of muslin of the description mentioned, beautifully executed by machinery. The man is said to have been so much astonished, that he roundly declared his conviction that some agency more than human must have been called in on the occasion.”