We may now call Peter Cooper a mechanic.
A mechanic is one who has skill in using tools in shaping wood, metals, etc.
Peter now found a situation in a woolen mill at Hempstead, Long Island.
Here he received nine dollars a week.
Still he kept trying to find better ways of doing things.
He invented a machine for shearing cloth, and from that earned five hundred dollars in two years.
With so much money as this he could not rest until he had visited his mother.
He found his parents deeply in debt.
He gave them the whole of his money, and promised to do more than that.
His father had not made a mistake in naming him after the Apostle Peter.