To add to Boulton's anxieties, he had received a summons to attend the Solicitor-General next week in opposition to Gainsborough, a clergyman who claimed to be the original inventor. "This is a disagreeable circumstance, particularly at this season, when you are absent. Harrison is in London and idleness is in our engine shop."
Watt wrote Boulton on July 28, 1776, apologising for his long absence and stating he was now ready to return, and would start "Tuesday first" for Liverpool, where he expected to meet Boulton. Meanwhile, the latter had been called to London by the Gainsborough business. A note from him, however, reached Watt at Liverpool, in which he says, "As to your absence, say nothing about it. I will forgive it this time, provided you promise me never to marry again."
In due time, Mr. and Mrs. Watt arrived and settled early in August, 1776, in Birmingham, which was hereafter to be their permanent home, although, as we shall see, Watt never ceased to keep in close touch with his native town of Greenock and his Glasgow friends. His heart still warmed to the tartan, the soft, broad Scotch accent never forsook him; nor, we may be sure, did the refrain ever leave his heart——
And may dishonour blot our name
And quench our household fires,
If me or mine forget thy name,
Thou dear land of my Sires,
Many a famous Scot has the fair South in recent times called to her—Stephenson, Ruskin, Carlyle, Mill, Gladstone and others—but never before or since, one whose work was the transformation of the world.
At last we have Watt permanently settled alongside the great works to which he was hereafter to devote his rare abilities until his retirement at the expiration of the partnership in 1800. His labors at Soho soon began to tell. The works increased their celebrity beyond all others then known, for materials, workmanship and invention.
The mines of Cornwall promised to become unworkable; indeed, many already had became so. The Newcomen engines could no longer drain the deepened mines. Several orders for Watt engines had been received, and as much depended upon the success of the first, Watt resolved to superintend its erection himself. Mrs. Watt and he started over the terrible road into Cornwall, and had to take up their abode with the superintendent of the mine, there being no other house for miles around. Naturally the builders and attendants of the Newcomen engine viewed Watt's invasion of their district with no kindly feelings. Great jealousy arose and Watt's sensitive nature was sorely tried. Many attempts to thwart him were met with, and, taken altogether, his life in Cornwall was far from agreeable.
The engine was erected, the day of trial came, mining men, engineers, mining proprietors and others assembled from all quarters to see the start. Many of the spectators interested in other engines would not have shed tears had it failed, but it started splendidly making eleven eight-foot strokes per minute, which broke the record. Three cheers for the Scotch engineer! It soon worked with greater power and more steadily, and "forked" more water than the ordinary engines with only about one-third the consumption of coal. Watt wrote:
I understand all the west country captains are to be here tomorrow to see the prodigy. The velocity, violence, magnitude, and horrible noise of the engine give universal satisfaction to all beholders, believers or not. I have once or twice trimmed the engine to end the stroke gracefully and to make less noise, but Mr. Wilson cannot sleep without it seems quite furious, so I have left it to the enginemen; and, by the by, the noise seems to convey great ideas of its power to the ignorant, who seem to be no more taken with modest merit in an engine than in a man.
Well said, modest, reserved philosopher with vast horse-power in that big head of yours, working in the closet noiselessly, driving deep but silently into the bosom of nature's secrets, pumping her deepest mines, discovering and bringing to the surface the genius which lay in steam to do your bidding and revolutionise life on earth! In this, the first triumph, there was recompense for all the trials Watt and his wife had endured in Cornwall.