Burt A. The Evolution of the British Empire and Commonwealth From the American Revolution
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CHAPTER
II
New
Life
in
Old
England
BRITISH
PRESTIGE
reached
its
lowest ebb at
the end
of the American
Revolution.
The
loss of
the
best
part
of
the
empire
seemed
positive
proof
that Britain's
day
was done.
European
observers
were convinced
that
it
was,
and
many
Englishmen
thought
so too.
The
national self-
confidence was
rudely
shaken,
and
everybody
knows
that
Englishmen
do
not
easily
lose their
self-confidence.
Yet
the
days
of British
great-
ness,
far
from
being
ended,
were
about
to
begin.
New life
was
stirring
in
the
land,
new
life
that
was to make Britain lead the world.
A
silent
revolution,
which had
nothing
to
do
with the
American
Revolution,
was
transforming
the life of
the
country
into
something
new and
dynamic.
The
process,
which had commenced
long
before and
was
to
gather
marvelous
momentum
in
the
nineteenth
century,
was
at this time
becoming
quite
noticeable. Modern
industrial
society
was
being
born,
and it is
a
striking
fact
that this
occurred
in
England
long
before
it
did
elsewhere
half
a
century
or more.
Why
were all other
countries so
far behind
England
in
working
out
this new
phase
of our
western
civilization?
Part of
the answer
is
to
be
found in
the French
Revolution,
which
generally
retarded indus-
trial
development
on
the
continent
and stimulated it in
England.
But
this
European
upheaval merely
magnified
the
lead that
England
had
already gained
and was
increasing.
Her
advantage
was
clearly
demon-
strated
in her
commercial relations with the
infant United
States.
What
made
many
Englishmen
fear
that
they
had
passed
their
peak
as a
nation
was not
only
the
loss
of the war
and the
loss
of
their
colonies
but
also the loss of
their rich American
trade,
which
they
thought
was
almost
sure
to follow.
It was therefore most
encouraging
for
them
to
discover that
peace
restored
this
trade.
Indeed,
with
the
exception
of
a
few
particulars
in
which
European
rivals
supplanted
England,
it was
16
CHAPTER
TWO:
soon brisker than
ever.
Why?
Because
she
had
the
best
industries
in
the
world and there were
practically
none
in
America;
because
Ameri-
cans
demanded
credit,
which her
merchants
could
and
did
give,
as
Europeans
could
not;
and
because
she
offered
the
best
market for
American
produce,
But
what
enabled
her
to
gain
this
advantage?
One
important
factor
was
natural resources.
England
had
a
better
combination of
them than was to be found
under
any
one
government
on the
continent of
Europe.
She
had
long
produced
the best wool that
was known. Her
rivers and
streams
provided
power
adequate
to
the
needs of the
day
and,
what
was
then
of
great
importance,
water
of a
quality
best
suited for the
manufacture
of
textiles,
which has
always
been
one
of the
world's
greatest
industries. For
this
particular
purpose,
also,
even
the climate was
an
asset,
for in
certain
parts
of
England
the
atmosphere
contained
the
optimum
amount of
moisture.
England
also
had as
good pottery
and china
clays
as
had been
found
anywhere,
and
she
possessed
an
abundance of coal
and
iron.
Though
these last
two
items
had not
yet
assumed
anything
like
the
massive
proportions
of
the
twin
pillars
supporting
nineteenth
century
industrialism,
they
were
already
beginning
to
play
that
essential role. But
all
these
things
together
would have
been
of
little
avail
if there
had
not
been
some-
thing
else.
Private
enterprise
had
much
greater
freedom in
England
than
on
.
the
continent,
thanks
to
the nature
of
society
and of
government
in
the
little
island.
English
society
was
not,
like that
of
Europe,
divided
into
watertight compartments,
hereditary
castes.
All
the
sons
of a
conti-
nental
noble
were
nobles
too
and
could never
touch
business
lest
it
contaminate
their
lily-white
hands;
whereas
in
England
all
but
the
eldest
son
were
commoners
and were
destined
to
remain
commoners,
and there
was
no
corresponding
social
stigma
attached
to
money
making.
As the
great
Dr.
Johnson
once
remarked,
English
primogeni-
ture
had
the
advantage
of
making
only
one
fool
in
the
family.
Coming
down
the
scale,
we
find
that
commerce
and
industry
had
long
since
escaped
from
the
monopolistic
control
of
the
surviving
mediaeval
guilds
in
England,
but
not
on
the
continent;
and
that
the
people
living
on
the
land
had
been
emancipated
from
feudalism
in
England
as
they
had not
been
on
the
continent.
Equally great
was
the
difference in
government.
European
society
had
fallen
under
the
bondage
of
absolute
monarchy
since
the
close
of
the
middle
ages,
while
the
overthrow
of
the
despotic
Stuart
rulers
had
effectively
ended
the
central
government's
attempt
to
control
and
regu-
New
Life
in
Old
England
1 7
late
the
economic life of
England.
It
is therefore
not
in
the least
sur-
prising
that continental visitors
were most
surprised
by
the
spirit
of
freedom
that
pervaded
eighteenth
century England.
Moreover,
since
the
union of
England
and
Scotland to form
the
kingdom
of
Great
Britain,
this
was the
largest
free
trade
area
in
the
Old
World.
Germany
and
Italy
were
still divided into
many
small
fragments,
and countless
internal
customs barriers
clogged
the
economic
life
of
France
and
Spain.
The economic revolution
that
was
transforming
life
in
England
was
threefold.
An
agricultural
revolution
went
hand
in
hand
with
the
industrial
revolution,
each
supporting
the other
when
they
got going.
Agriculture
supplied
the food and the labor
needed
in
industrial
cen-
ters,
and
in
return
was accelerated
by
the
growing
appetite
of
the new
industrial
towns.
These
two
revolutions
were
scarcely
under
way
when
a
third
began
one in
transportation,
without
which
the
other two
would
have been stunted and
then all
three
helped
one
another
along.
The
mainspring
of
the
agricultural
revolution
was
the
enterprise
of
great
landlords
the
country
gentry
and
the
nobility,
who
wanted
to
improve
their
estates.
Here
we
notice
a
great
difference
from
the
society
of
France,
then
the
leading
European
state,
a
much
bigger
and
wealthier
country,
with
a
population
about
three
times
that
of
England
in the
1780's.
The
larger
landlords
in France
were
not
at
all
interested
in
their
estates,
on
which
they
seldom
resided,
except
as
a
source
of
revenue
to
support
them
in the luxurious
life
of the
royal
court.
They
scorned
country
life
as
a
boorish
existence,
and
they
seldom
traveled
abroad.
The
English
upper
classes,
on the other
hand,
loved
life
in
the
country,
where
they spent
most
of
their time.
They
also loved
travel
on
the
continent,
where
as
young
men
just
out
of
college
they
habitu-
ally
went on
a
grand
tour of
a
year
or
two.
One
of
the
most
fruitful
improvements
ever
made
in the
production
of
field
crops
came
as
an
inspiration
to
an
English
gentleman
watching
Frenchmen
cultivating
the
soil between
their vines.
Why
not sow
the
seed
in
rows
and
hoe
between
the rows?
It would
save seed and
pro-
duce
a
richer
harvest.
So he
invented
a drill
and a horse
hoe.
That
was
Jethro
Tull
in the
first
quarter
of
the
eighteenth
century,
but it
was
a
long
time
before
his new
method
became
common.
A
few
years
before
Tull's
death,
in
the second
quarter
of
the
century,
an
English
nobleman
was
kicked
out of
the cabinet
by
Walpole,
and
the
expelled
lord
took
his
revenge
on
the soil.
Much
of
his estate was
a
miserable
waste,
but
in
Holland
he had seen
men
make
something
of
just
such
18
CHAPTER
TWO:
land.
He
did
the
same
with
his
own,
dressing
the
sandy
stretches
with
marl,
adopting
the seed
drill
and
the
horse
hoe,
working
out
a
new
and
better
rotation
of
crops,
and
introducing
the
turnip.
This
kept
the
land
clean,
supported
more
stock,
and
gave
him
the
name
"Turnip"
Town-
shend.
In
the
third
quarter
of
the
century
another
gentleman
farmer,
Robert
Bakewell,
produced
such
phenomenal
results
by
his
experi-
ments
in
mating
carefully
selected
sheep,
cattle,
and
horses
that
he
became
famous
as
the father
of
modern
animal
breeding.
The
example
set
by
these
and
many
other
innovators
made
experi-
mental
farming
a fashionable
hobby
in
the
early years
of
George
Ill's
reign,
and
the
king
himself
pursued
it so
enthusiastically
on
his
Wind-
sor
estate
that
he
was called
"Fanner
George."
Unlike
most
other
hobbies
in
which
only
wealthy
men can
indulge,
experimental
farming
was
profitable
and
patriotic
as well
as
pleasurable.
It
put
England
ahead
of
the
rest of
the
world
in
scientific
agriculture.
The
one
great
obstacle
that blocked
the
general
adoption
of the
new
methods
was
being
cleared
away.
This
was the
ancient
arrange-
ment
of
the
village,
the normal
agricultural
community.
Most
of the
land
was owned
by
the
villagers
and
not
by
the
squire
or
lord,
whose
hall stood
off
to one
side of their
cluster
of
cottages,
though
he
was
by
far
the
largest
holder.
Behind
the
dwellings
lay
the
arable land
in
great
open
fields,
divided
into
acre
strips
by
lines
of
unplowed
turf,
and each
inhabitant's land
was
scattered
all over
in
separate
strips.
Beyond
was
the uncultivated
waste,
on
which
each inhabitant had the
right
to
pasture
stock
in
rough
proportion
to
the number
of
strips
he
owned.
The
intermingled
ownership
of
the
strips
made
it
impossible
for
a man to do
what he
liked
with
his own
land. It
had
to be
worked
according
to
a
common
system,
which
required
the
cooperation
of all
and
was
regulated
by
custom. As the
system
could be
changed only
by general agreement,
one obstinate
villager
an
eternal breed
could
prevent
the introduction
of new
crops
and
techniques.
Similarly
the
right
of common
pasture
allowed a
promiscuity
among
beasts that
was
the
despair
of the
disciples
of
Bakewell.
To clear
the
way
for
improvements
in
the
growing
of
crops
and the
raising
of
stock,
there
came
a
reshuffling
of the
ownership
of
the
land
to
give
each
holder a
compact
block
which
he
could
enclose
and use
as he liked. This
is
known
as the
enclosure
movement.
It
had
been
going
on for
a
long
time,
at
first
very
slowly
because
for
each
village
the
consent of
all who
had a
stake in
the
village
was
required.
Then a
new
device
was
found
a
private
act
of
parliament
to
reapportion
the
New
Life
in
Old
England
1
9
lands
of
a
village.
This
was
easy
to
get
when interest in
agricultural
improvements
became
fashionable,
for
the members
of
parliament
were
themselves
large
landowners
who
stood to
gain
most
by
the
change.
Around
the
time
of
the
American
Revolution
such acts
were
being
passed
at the
rate of
forty
a
year
ten
times as
many
as a
generation
or
so
before and this
rate was
soon
doubled.
This
agricultural
revolution,
which
made
for
much
greater
effi-
ciency, improved
the
lot
of some
villagers,
but
not of
the
majority.
It
shook
them
down
to
a
lower
economic
and
social
level,
and
many
of
them
it
shook out
entirely.
Few small holders
had
the
money
to
pay
for
enclosing
their
land,
and fewer still
the
capital
and
knowledge
to
improve
it.
Those who
could not take
advantage
of the
new
arrange-
ment sold out
to
those
who
could,
and the
many
sank to
be mere
agri-
cultural
laborers for hire or
drifted off to
the towns.
The few rose to
be
capitalist
farmers,
and the one
man who could
afford most
got
most
the man
who
lived
in the
hall.
This
was characteristic
of the
coming
age,
in which the
rich
grew
richer and
the
poor poorer.
Rural
society
was
splitting.
The
old
system
had
fostered
the
community
spirit
and
protected
the
small
man,
but
this old
system
was
going
because it
penalized
enterprise.
Turning
to
the
industrial
revolution,
we
find
that the first
great
lead
came in the
making
of
textiles,
and
there
particularly
in cotton.
The
beginning
was
an
invention
that
recalls
what
every
woman
knows,
though
she
may
not be able
to
explain
it.
By
far the commonest width
of
woven fabrics
has
been three
quarters
of a
yard.
The measure is
many
centuries
old,
being
the
limit
around which
a
weaver could reach
when
he had
to
pass
the shuttle
through
the
warp by
hand. For
any-
thing
wider
he
had
to have another
man to
help
him
until
1733,
when
John
Kay,
a maker of loom
parts,
invented
the
flying
shuttle,
which
was
flipped
from side to side
along
a
board.
The
use of
the
flying
shuttle
spread
very slowly,
like
contemporary improvements
in
agricul-
ture. One
important
reason was
that it
constricted
an industrial bottle-
neck
that
was
already
bad,
for
one
weaver
had
required
the
output
of
several
spinners
to
keep
him
busy
and now
he
would
require
more.
In
spite
of
all
the efforts of
Kay
and
many
others,
spinning
did
not
catch
up
until
a
generation
later.
Then
James
Hargreaves,
a
weaver,
patented
his
spinning
jenny,
a sort of
multiple
spinning
wheel that
produced
eight,
and soon
many
more threads
at
once. The
jenny
was
so
simple
and
so
easy
to
turn
that a
child could
operate
it. About
the
same time Richard
Arkwright,
a
wig
maker
who stole
other
people's
20
CHAPTER
TWO:
ideas
and
ultimately
became
a millionaire
factory
owner,
produced
his
"water
frame/'
so called from
the
power
that
ran
it,
which
employed
rollers to
spin
a finer and firmer
thread,
much
desired
in
weaving.
Within
a
decade,
in the midst of
the American
war,
Samuel
Crompton,
a
spinner
who
used
the
jenny,
crossed
it with
the
water
frame
and
got
the
spinning
mule,
which
combined
the
best
features
of both
parents.
Now
the balance was
upset
the
other
way,
since
all
weaving
was
still done with the
hand loom.
The"
industry
needed
a
power
loom
badly,
and this came from
an
unexpected
source.
One
day
a
country
parson
named
Edmund
Cartwright,
a
literary
man who
had
never
seen
a
loom in his
life,
heard some
despondent
manufacturers
say
that
a
power
loom
could not be
made. Roused
by
the
challenge,
he
made
one
himself
with
the
aid
of a
cabinetmaker
and
a
smith,
and he
patented
it in 1785.
That
was
only
a few months after
a
copper-plate
printer
invented
the
cylindrical
printing
of cotton
goods,
which
was
incidentally
the
origin
of the
process
now used
in
turning
out
our
newspapers.
Another
fundamental
innovation followed
in
1786,
when
chemical
bleaching
was
introduced.
In the
manufacture of
pottery,
England
could not
compare
with
the
continent
until
the
industry
was
revolutionized
by
Josiah
Wedgwood,
by
far the
greatest
and most
influential
figure
in
the
whole
history
of
the
business. At
the
tender
age
of nine
this son
of a
potter
left
school
to learn
the
family
trade,
and
when
he
established his
own
works
twenty years
later,
in
1759,
his
original
mind and
his
ceaseless
experi-
mentation
began
to
bring
startling
results. He
was
ever
trying
out
new
clays,
new
glazes,
new
ovens,
new
firing
controls,
new
colors,
new
designs,
new
artists,
new
perfection.
He
was
blessed
by
poor
and
rich
alike. He
supplied
the
cottages
of
the
former
with
dishes
that
were
cheap
as
well as
serviceable,
something
they
had never
had
before;
and
he
furnished the
mansions
of
the
wealthy
with
finer
and
more
artistic
wares
than
they
had
ever
seen,
wares
of
all
kinds
from
dinner
sets
to
snuff
boxes
and
cameos.
His
London
showroom
was
a
fashionable
resort;
and
the
European
fame
of his
products
was
such
that
Catherine
the
Great of
Russia
ordered from
him
a
service
of
nearly
a
thousand
pieces,
each
depicting
a
different
English
scene.
Iron
was also
coming
into
its
own
in
England,
though
at
the
beginning
of
the
century
she
had
been
lagging
behind
the
Continent
in
this
industry.
Charcoal
was
then
necessary
for
smelting,
and
England's
supply
of this
fuel was
disappearing
with
the
exhaustion
of
her
forests.
Then
a
small
local
ironmaster
came
to
the
rescue,
Abraham
Darby,
New
Life
in
Old
England
2 1
the
first of
three
of that
name.
He
discovered that he
could
use
coal
by coking
it,
and later
without
coking
it.
Around the middle of the
century
his
son,
Abraham
Darby
II,
developed
this newer
method
with
great
success
when
he
harnessed
water
to
provide
a more
powerful
blast.
His
son,
Abraham
Darby
III,
made no
striking
improvement
in
production;
but in
1779
he
pointed
the
way
to
future
expansion
by
building
the first
iron
bridge,
something
that
would have been
incon-
ceivable
only
a
few
years
before.
Of
the
many
large
iron
works
that
had
by
this time
grown
with the
introduction of
improved
methods,
perhaps
the most
famous was
that
established in
1760
by
an
English
physician
in
Scotland.
This
foundry
of
Dr.
John
Roebuck
on
the
little
river
Carron
made a
specialty
of
turning
out
guns.
It
was the
birthplace
of
the
"carronade,"
which was
adopted by
the
British
navy
during
the
American war
and
afterward
by
other
navies,
including
the
American.
It
was
immediately
after
that war
that
Henry
Cort
gave
the iron
industry
two
big
boosts.
One
was
the
introduction
of
grooved
rollers
operating
in
pairs,
which
squeezed
out the
dross and
formed the hot
metal into
plates
or
rods or
rails
or
other
desired
shapes.
The
other
was
simplifying
the
conversion of
the
brittle
cast
iron into
the
tougher
wrought
iron and steel.
Cort
did this
by
devising
the
reverberatory
puddling
furnace,
in
which
a
flame
was
made
to
play upon
the iron
from above
and
the
molten
metal
was
stirred so
that the
surplus
carbon
was burned out
of
it.
Power
was of
course
necessary
to make
the iron
industry
what it
had
become,
and the steam
engine
could not have
become
what it
already
was
without the earlier
improvements
in the
production
of
iron.
The
steam
engine
was
not
fathered
by
the
legendary
teakettle,
nor
was
it
conceived
by
James
Watt
sitting by
the fire.
It
was a
child
of
the
mines,
born
a
generation
before Watt was.
Around
1700,
when
the
shallow
mines
of
England
were
being
ex-
hausted
and
the
traditional
pump
could not
cope
with
flooding
at
lower
levels,
the
operators
were
saved from
ruin
by
the
invention of
a
pump
worked
by
steam
power.
A
vertical
cylinder
open
at its
upper
end
was
fitted
with a
piston,
which
was
pushed
up
by
steam
injected
below
the
piston.
Then
the steam was
cut
off
and cold
water
from a
cistern
above
was
squirted
into
the
cylinder,
condensing
the
steam
within
to form a
vacuum that
pulled
the
piston
down.
This
Newcomen
engine,
so
called
after the blacksmith
who
made the
original
model,
was
soon
at
work
all
over the
coal
fields,
for there it
was
quite
indispensable.
But
no-
22
CHAPTER
TWO:
where
else was it
indispensable,
or
of
any
use
at
all.
The
power
it
developed
was
not
worth the
fuel it
devoured,
except
at a
pit
head.
What
Watt
did,
more
than
half a
century
afterward,
was
to
take
this
crude
device
and make
a
real
engine
out of
it. He
was able
to
do
this
because
he
was no
ordinary
man.
This
son of
a
Scottish
ship-
wright
first
attracted
attention
as the
maker of scientific
instruments
in
the
University
of
Glasgow.
Determined
to
improve
upon
what
had
been
done
anywhere,
he
mastered
three
foreign
languages
to learn
what
had
been
done
abroad;
but
the
wide
knowledge
he
gained
was
as
nothing compared
with
his
rare
scientific
attainment.
As a
mechanical
engineer,
he
was
the
wizard
of the
age.
Watt
began
to work
upon
the
Newcomen
engine
about
1763
and
within
twenty
years,
by
dint of
many
inventions,
he
gave
us
the
modern
steam
engine.
By
adding
a
separate
condenser,
he
eliminated
die
enormous
waste
of
cooling
and
reheating
the
cylinder
each
time
the
piston
moved back
and
forth.
By
closing
the
open
end of the
cylinder
and
injecting
steam
there
too,
he
made
half
an
engine
into
a
whole
one,
and he
made
it
work
much
faster.
By
converting
the
straight
motion
within
the
cylinder
to a
circular
one
outside,
he
endowed
the
engine
with
almost
infinite
possibilities.
Of his
less
notable
but
still
very
important
inventions,
we
may
notice
two
that
he
made
quite
early.
One was
steam-tight
packing
for
pistons
and
piston
rods,
and
the
other
was the
method of
preserving
the
heat
of
the
cylinder
by
enclosing
the
cylinder
in a
steam
jacket
with
insulation
on
the
outside.
Watt
built
his
first
engine
for
Roebuck
of
the
Carron
works,
who
provided
the
capital
in
return
for a
share in
the
profits
on
the
engine.
But it
was
not
successful.
The
best
mechanics
could
not
yet
produce
a
true
cylinder;
and
the
packing
of
the
piston
could not
make
up
for
a
variation
of
nearly
half
an
inch
in
diameter.
When
Roebuck
failed,
he
turned
over
his
interest
in
the
steam
engine,
which
Watt
had
pat-
ented,
to
an
enterprising
creditor.
This
was
Matthew
Boulton,
whose
iron
works
at
Soho
near
Birmingham
had
recently
become
famous.
Watt
and
his
engine
Beelzebub
migrated
to
Soho
in
1774,
the
very
year
when
true
cylinders
became
possible
with
the
invention
of
an
im-
proved
borer
for
cannon;
and
the
new
firm
of
Boulton
and
Watt
began
the
new
industry
of
manufacturing
steam
engines.
At
first
the
engines
were
used
chiefly
for
pumping,
particularly
in
Cornwall
where
they
rescued
the
tin
mines
from
drowning;
but
in
1785
they
began
to
be
used in
industry
generally.
The
third
revolution,
that
in
inland
transportation,
was
likewise
the
New
Life
in
Old
England
23
work
of
private
enterprise,
but it
was
not
unique,
as were
the
agricul-
tural
and
industrial
revolutions.
In
the
1780's
there was
still,
as
there
had
long
been,
a
much
better
road
and
canal
system
in
France,
where
the
government
had
assumed
responsibility.
Yet
without
the
new
Eng-
lish
system,
there
would
have
been
much
less
profit
in
improved
agri-
cultural
production
and
England's
industrial
development
would
have
been
stunted.
In 1760
England
had
not a
single
canal;
and
most of
the
roads,
left
to
the
care
of
negligent
local
authorities,
were
in
a
shocking
state. A
road was
often "a
mere
horse
track
across a
miry
common,
or a
watery
hollow
lane
twisting
between
high
banks."
Once a
whole
hunting party
chased a
stag
over
the
top
of a
loaded
wagon
without
touching
the
vehicle. It
was
not
uncommon
in
winter
for
communication
between
districts
to
be
halted
for
months at
a time.
Indeed,
the
roads were
generally
so
bad that
the
usual
means
of inland
transportation
was
the
backs
of horses
or
donkeys,
not
wheels.
Imagine
coal,
grain,
ironware,
potteries,
and cloth
having
to
be
"shipped"
this
way!
Small wonder
Wedgwood
threw
much
of
his
remarkable
public spirit
into
agitating
for
road
improvements
and
canal
construction
f
Here
and there
a
turnpike
road
had been
built
by
a
private company
that
collected tolls for its
use;
but
it was not
until this time
that
turn-
pike
roads
began
to be
common.
They
now
began
to
multiply
so
fast
that
a
law was
passed
in
1773
to
obviate the
necessity
of
a
separate
act
of
parliament
for each
one.
The
general
condition
of the
roads
was
much
improved by
the
end of
the next
decade. The
metaled
surface
had
yet
to be
invented
by
Macadam but
a
better
solution
of
England's
transportation problem
had
already
been
found.
England's
first
canal
was
opened
in 1761 and
was
only
seven miles
long.
It connected
Manchester
with
the collieries of the Duke
of
Bridgewater.
This
progressive
nobleman,
on
finding
that the
cost of
getting
his
coal
to Manchester in sacks on the
backs of horses
was
nine
or ten
shillings
a
ton,
had
the
canal built
at his
own
expense.
The
construction
was
quite
a feat
for,
among
other
difficulties,
the
new
waterway
had
to
be
carried over a
river
by
means
of an
aqueduct
about
forty
feet
high;
but
the man
who
planned
and executed it
was
a
genius,
though
he
could
neither
read
nor write
Richard
Brindley.
The
great
success of
this
canal,
which
cut
the Manchester
price
of coal in
half,
encouraged
the
duke
to have
Brindley
extend the
canal to
the
Mersey
River,
thus
connecting
Manchester with
Liverpool
and
reducing
freight
rates
between
them to one sixth of
what
land
carriers
charged.
24
CHAPTER
TWO
These wonders
worked
by
the combination
of
Bridgewater's
"brass"
and
Brindley's
brains
inaugurated
the
great
canal-building
era
in
Eng-
land.
Before
the
illiterate
genius
died
in
1772,
he
designed
nearly
four
hundred
miles
of
canals;
and
by
the
end
of
the
next
decade
little
England
had
between
two
and
three
thousand
miles
of
canals,
the
digging
of
which
has
given
us
the
name
"navvy,"
because
the
armies of
men
who
toiled
with
pick
and shovel
were
working
on
the
navigation
system.
What
railways
did
for
America
in
the last
hundred
years,
canals
did
for
England
in this
earlier
day.
They opened
the
country
and
made
its
development
possible.
Over
the
network
of artificial
waterways,
the
bulkiest
and
the
heaviest
freight
of
the new industrial
era was
easily
and
cheaply
borne
by long barges
drawn
by
horses
on
the
towpaths.
England
was
being
made over
into a new
country.
The
old
and
relatively
stable
order
was
undergoing
a
rapidly
accelerated
change.
Things
were
in a state
of
flux,
new
developments
were
coming
thick
and
fast,
and the
future
offered boundless
opportunities.
A
new
cre-
ative
spirit
was
abroad
in the land. It
makes
one think
of
the
spirit
that
permeated
American
society
several
generations
afterward,
in
the
most
expansive years
of the nineteenth
century
when
immigrants
and
capital
were
pouring
into
the
United
States,
when the
West
was
filling
with a
rush,
and
when
giant
industries were
springing
up
in
the
East
to
supply
the demands of the enormous new
domestic
market.
Yet
the
earlier
English
experience
was
in
a
way
even
more
remark-
able;
for
England
got
no new
population,
no
new
capital
from
other
lands,
and
it
had no
West.
It was
an
old
country
and a
small
one.
But its
own
inventive
genius
was
ushering
in a
new
age
in
the
history
of
the
world:
the
age
of
machines,
the
age
of
power,
the
age
of
mar-
velous
production,
the
age
of
phenomenal
wealth,
the
great
age
of
individual
enterprise.
Of
course
England
had
to
pay
the
price
of
the
pioneer,
as we
shall
see,
but
the
complicated
social
and
political
prob-
lems
produced
by
maturing
industrialism
had
not
begun
to
press,
and
the
dead
weight
of
the older
society
was
gone
in
this
transitional
period
when a
new
England
was
arising
at the
very
time
when
a
new
America
was
finding
its
feet.
The
average
educated
Englishman,
how-
ever,
had
little
confidence
in
the
future
when
the
empire,
built
by
several
generations
of
his
people
until
it
was
greater
than
any
rival,
had
just
crashed in
ruins*