[CHAPTER VIII.]
ROBERT'S RETURN—A CURIOUS ENCOUNTER—THE PRIZE ENGINE.
One step forward; yes, a great one too, Stephenson thought. His beloved locomotive was to have a chance of being properly introduced to the great English public; and he felt that it only needed to be known to be valued. The building of it was a matter of no small moment, and he wanted above all things a tried and skilful hand to superintend and put into its construction every conceivable improvement. It must be the best engine yet built.
Where should he find the right man? No one would answer like his son Robert, and Robert he determined to send for. Robert, you remember, went to South America three years before. There he had regained his health, and on receiving his father's letter made immediate preparations to return to England.
On his way, at a poor little comfortless inn, in a poor little comfortless seaport on the gulf of Darien, where he was waiting to take ship, he met two strangers, one evidently an Englishman, who by his appearance looked as if the world had gone hard with him. A fellow-feeling drew the young man towards his poor countryman, and on inquiry, who should it prove to be, but the old Cornwall tin-miner, Captain Trevethick, whose first steam-carriage awoke so much curiosity in London nearly a quarter of a century before.
He had sown his idea to the winds. Others had caught it up, cherished it, pondered over it, examined it, dissected it, improved it, embodied it, and by patient study and persistent endeavour had reduced it to a practical force. And Robert Stephenson was now on his way to inaugurate it as one of the great commercial values of the kingdom and of the world. The poor inventor, what had he done meanwhile? While others worked had he slept? Oh, no! He had tried an easier and shorter road to fame and fortune. You remember he left his "dragon," as some people called his locomotive, in London, quite careless what became of it, and went scheming and speculating in other things. Several years after, in a shop window, it attracted the attention of a French gentleman passing by. He was from Peru, and had just come to England to get a steam-engine for pumping water from some gold-diggings in the new world. Delighted with the model, he bought it for twenty guineas. Taking it with him to Lima, an engine was built on the plan of it, which worked admirably. The gentleman was then sent back to England to hunt up and bring out the inventor himself. The captain was found, and came forth from his obscurity into sudden notice and demand. The gentleman engaged him to make five pumping-engines according to his model, which he did, and shipped them to Lima, the captain himself soon following.
At Lima he was received with great honours, and a public rejoicing. A guard of honour was appointed to wait on him; and in view of the wealth he was supposed to be able to engineer from their mines, a massive silver statue of him, as the benefactor of Peru, began to be talked of.
Of course poor Trevethick thought his fortune made, and no doubt looked back with pity on his humble English life. Friends at home spread the news of his successes, and when they stated that the smallest estimate of his yearly income amounted to one hundred thousand pounds, no wonder he was pronounced a success! Tardier steps to fortune seemed tedious; and many of his old associates perhaps sighed over the wholesome toil of a slower-paced prosperity.
Years passed on, and the poor captain next turns up at Cartagena, penniless and pitiable. In crossing the country he had lost everything. Fording rivers, penetrating forests, and fighting wild beasts, had left him little else than a desire to reach England again; and Robert Stephenson gave him fifty pounds to help him home. Sudden fortunes are apt as suddenly to vanish; while those accumulated by the careful husbandry of economy, industry, and foresight reward without waste. So character is stronger than reputation. For one is built on what we are, the other on what we seem to be; and, like a shadow, reputation may be longer or shorter, or only a distorted outline of character. One holds out, because it is real; the other often disappears, because it is but shadow.
Robert reached home in December, 1827, right heartily welcomed, we may well believe, by his father, who was thankful to halve the burden of responsibility with such a son. To build the prize locomotive was his work.