“Jim returns to school this evening,” wrote Boulton, to Watt in Cornwall; “he has behaved exceedingly well, and not a single bill of indictment has been found against him. He had got it into his head that he would not be an engineer, which I did not contradict, but I gave him and Matt the small wooden water-wheel, which they proceeded to erect below my duck-pond, and there worked a forge; but not having water enough, necessity has put them upon erecting a Savery’s engine, which is not yet finished, though they are both exceedingly keen upon it. We have killed many poor robins by pouring fixable air upon them, and had some amusement in our electrical and chemical hobby-horsery, which the young ones like much better than dry Latin. Jim desires me to ask you to give him leave to learn French.”
At the same time Boulton’s own son was making good progress under the Rev. Mr. Stretch, to whom Boulton wrote,—
“Baron Reden has gone to the North. On his return, he will leave his son with you for a year or two, and then invites Matt to return with him to Germany. Youth is the time to learn languages, and the Baron’s offer is certainly a great temptation ... let him [Matt] not neglect the present, but apply himself so as to become well grounded in Grammar and Latin ... he is capable, but not of close application, to which he must be inured, as no proficiency of any kind can be acquired without it.”
The Baron’s offer was not, however, accepted; but desirous that his son should acquire proficiency in French, Boulton took him over to Paris, towards the end of 1786, and placed him under a competent master. Many kindly letters passed between father and son during the latter’s stay at Paris. The young man spent rather more money than his father thought could do him good. He therefore asked him to keep an account of his personal expenses, which “must balance exactly,” and implored him above all things to “keep out of bad company.”
“The future reputation and happiness of your life,” wrote the anxious father, “depend upon your present conduct. I must therefore insist that you do not go strolling about Sodom and Gomorrah under any pretence whatever.... It will not be pleasant to you to read this, but I must do my duty to you or I shall not satisfy my own conscience. I therefore hope you will do your duty to yourself, or you cannot do it to me. There is nothing on earth I so much wish for as to make you a man, a good man, a useful man, and consequently a happy man.”[330]
The father’s anxieties abated with time; the son applied himself assiduously to French and German, and gave promise of becoming a man of ability and character. Writing to his friend Matthews, Boulton said—“Matt is a tolerable good chemist.... He hath behaved very well, and I shall be glad when the time arrives for him to assist me in the business.” In the summer of 1788, young Boulton paid his father a holiday visit at Soho, returning again to Paris to finish his studies. Writing of his departure, to Matthews in London, the father said—“I hope that my son is set off for Dover: my heart overflows with blessings and love to him.”[331]
The education of young Watt was equally well cared for. After leaving school at Birmingham, his father sent him for a year to Mr. Wilkinson’s ironworks at Bersham, to learn carpentry in the pattern shop.[332] He then returned to his father’s, from whence he was sent to school at Geneva, where he remained for three years perfecting himself in the modern languages. On his return to England in 1788, we find Boulton writing to Mr. Barrow of Manchester, asking him to obtain a position for young Watt in some respectable counting-house, with a view to his acquiring a thorough commercial training. He was eventually placed in the house of Messrs. Taylor and Maxwell, where he remained for about two years, improving himself in his knowledge of business affairs. His father’s reputation and standing, as well as his own education and accomplishments, served to introduce the young gentleman to many friends in Manchester; and, although far from extravagant in his habits, he shortly found that the annual sum allowed him by his father was insufficient to pay for his board, clothing, and lodging, and at the same time enable him to keep clear of debt. Knowing Boulton’s always open hand and heart, and his sympathy for young people, the embarrassed youth at once applied to him for help. Why he did not apply to his father will be best understood from his own letter:—
“I am at this moment,” he explained, “on the best footing possible with my father, but were I to inform him of my necessities, I do not know what would be the consequence. Not that I suppose the money in itself would be an object to him, but because he would look upon it in the light of encouraging what he would call my extravagances. Never having been a young man himself, he is unacquainted with the inevitable expenses which attend my time of life, when one is obliged to keep good company, and does not wish to act totally different from other young men. My father’s reputation, and his and my own station in life, require that I should live at least on a decent footing. I am not conscious of having committed any foolish extravagances, and I have avoided company as much as possible; but I have also constantly avoided the reputation of avarice, or of acting meanly on any occasion. My father, unfortunately for me, measures the present times and circumstances by those when he was of my age, without making the proper allowances for their immense disparity; consequently it is in vain for me to endeavour to convince him of the necessity of my conduct.”[333]
He concluded by expressing his sense of Mr. Boulton’s many friendly acts towards him, and confessing that there was no other person on whom he could so confidently rely for help in his emergency. The reply of Boulton was all that he could desire. With sound fatherly advice,[334] such as he would have given to his own son under similar circumstances, he sent him a draft for 50l., the amount required by young Watt to clear him of his debts.
Among the friendships which he formed at Manchester, was one of an intimate character with Mr. Cooper, a gentleman engaged in an extensive business, fond of books, and a good practical chemist. We find young Watt requesting Boulton to recommend to Mr. Cooper “a person to keep his library in order and to make experiments for him, he not having time enough to attend to the details of them himself.”[335] Cooper was besides a keen politician, and took an active interest in the discussion of the important questions then agitating the public mind. Watt was inflamed by the enthusiasm of his friend, and with the ardour of youth entered warmly into his views as to the regeneration of man and the reconstruction of society.