pages 87

The Cotton District                   87

famous "spinning-jenny,"1 a machine which did as much work in the same time as a dozen pair of hands. Abreast of it came the warping- mill, the carding-engine, and the roving-frame: the latter particularly opportune, since the difficulty had always been to disentangle the fibres of the cotton prior to twisting, and to lay them exactly parallel. Arkwright now came on the scene. He himself never invented anything; but he had marvellous powers of combination, such as enabled him to assimilate all that was good in the ideas of other men, and to give them unity and new vitality. The result was machinery that gave exquisite evenness and attenuation to the "rovings," and a patent having been granted 15th July 1769, Arkwright is properly regarded as the founderof the modern modes of manufacture. Arkwright possessed, in addition, a thoroughly feminine capacity for good management and perseverance, with that most excellent adjunct, the art of obtaining ascendancy over capitalists. Among the immediate results were the disuse of linen warp, the new frames enabling cotton warp to be made strong enough; and the con-

1 'That the spinning-jenny was so named after a wife or daughter of one of the inventors is fable. The original wheel was the "jenny," a term corresponding with others well known in Lancashire, - the "peggy" and the "dolly," - and the new contrivance became the "spinning -jenny"