[ [332] “I have sent my son to Mr. Wilkinson’s ironworks at Bersham, in Wales, where he is to study practical book-keeping, geometry, and algebra, at his leisure hours; and three hours in the day he works in a carpenter’s shop. I intend he should stay there a year; what I shall do with him next I know not, but I intend to fit him for some employment not so precarious as my own.”—Watt to Mrs. Campbell, 30th May, 1784.
[ [333] Watt, jun., to Boulton, 4th December, 1789.
[ [334] Mr. Boulton having been absent at Bath, some time elapsed before young Watt’s letter reached him. Receiving no reply, the youth became apprehensive that his letter had fallen into his father’s hands, and wrote a second letter expressing his fears. Thus Boulton replied to both letters at the same time, informing his correspondent for his satisfaction that they had reached him “unopened.” He proceeded—
“I now send agreeably to your request, my draft for 50l.—payable to myself, that I might thereby conceal your name from all persons; and you may tranquillise yourself in respect to your father, as I promise you he shall not know aught of the transaction.
“Although I would not willingly give you pain, yet I must honestly tell you that I am not very sorry you experienced some pain and anxiety by my delay; that you may not only feel how uncomfortable it is to be in debt, but that you may experience ere long how pleasant and how cheerful is independence, which no man can possess who is in that condition.
“It is possible your father’s ideas may be too limited in regard to the quantum necessary for your expenses; but I think it equally probable that yours may be too diffuse, and therefore can’t help wishing it in my power to expand the one and contract the other.
“I know and speak from experience, that the principal articles of expenditure in the generality of young men who live in large towns are such as produce the least additions to their happiness or reputation; for which as well as for some others I know of, I cannot help urging you to cut your coat according to your cloth, as the sure means of preserving the good opinion of your father, and as the most likely to induce him to open his hand more liberally to you.
“It’s a subject I can’t speak to him upon without raising his suspicions, but you may state to him such arguments as may seem meet to yourself in favour of a further allowance, and if he speaks to me upon the subject, I will do the best I can for you.
“I wish you to keep in view that all our great Cornish profits have died away till now they are very small,—that your father is building an expensive house,—and that he is married. For these and other reasons, I wish you to alter the scale of your expenses, as the surest means of securing your credit and your happiness, which I am desirous of promoting or I should not have expressed myself so freely and so unreservedly....
“I remain, dear Watt,