Men of Invention and Industry Part 23

He was, however, so much annoyed by the treacherously brittle nature of the speculum metal that he abandoned its use, and betook himself to gla.s.s. He found that before he could make a good achromatic telescope it was necessary that he should calculate his curves from data depending upon the nature of the gla.s.s. He accordingly proceeded to study the optical laws of refraction, in which his knowledge of geometry and mathematics greatly helped him. And in course of time, by his rare and exquisite manipulative skill, he succeeded in constructing a four-inch refractor, or achromatic telescope, of admirable defining power.

The excellence of his first works became noised abroad. Astronomical observers took an interest in him; and friends began to gather round him, amongst others the late Professor Phillips and the Rev. Vernon Harcourt, Dean of York. Cooke received an order for a telescope like his own; then he received other orders. At last he gave up teaching, and took to telescope making. He advanced step by step; and like a practical, thoughtful man, he invented special tools and machinery for the purpose of grinding and polis.h.i.+ng his gla.s.ses. He opened a shop in York, and established himself as a professed maker of telescopes. He added to this the business of a general optician, his wife attending to the sale in the shop, while he himself attended to the workshop.

Such was the excellence of his work that the demand for his telescopes largely increased. They were not only better manufactured, but greatly cheaper than those which had before been in common use. Three of the London makers had before possessed a monopoly of the business; but now the trade was thrown open by the enterprise of Cooke of York. He proceeded to erect a complete factory--the Buckingham Street works.

His brother took charge of the grinding and polis.h.i.+ng of the lenses, while his sons attended to the mechanism of the workshop; but Cooke himself was the master spirit of the whole concern. Everything that he did was good and accurate. His clocks were about the best that could be made. He carried out his clock-making business with the same zeal that he devoted to the perfection of his achromatic telescopes. His work was always first-rate. There was no scamping about it.

Everything that he did was thoroughly good and honest. His 4 1/4-inch equatorials are perfect gems; and his admirable achromatics, many of them of the largest cla.s.s, are known all over the world. Altogether, Thomas Cooke was a remarkable instance of the power of Self-Help.

Such was the story of his Life, as communicated by Mr. Nasmyth. I was afterwards enabled, through the kind a.s.sistance of his widow, Mrs.

Cooke, whom I saw at Saltburn, in Yorks.h.i.+re, to add a few particulars to his biography.

"My husband," she said, "was the son of a working shoemaker at Pocklington, in the East Riding. He was born in 1807. His father's circ.u.mstances were so straitened that he was not able to do much for him; but he sent him to the National school, where he received some education. He remained there for about two years, and then he was put to his father's trade. But he greatly disliked shoemaking, and longed to get away from it. He liked the sun, the sky, and the open air. He was eager to be a sailor, and, having heard of the voyages of Captain Cook, he wished to go to sea. He spent his spare hours in learning navigation, that he might be a good seaman. But when he was ready to set out for Hull, the entreaties and tears of his mother prevailed on him to give up the project; and then he had to consider what he should do to maintain himself at home.

"He proceeded with his self-education, and with such small aids as he could procure, he gathered together a good deal of knowledge. He thought that he might be able to teach others. Everybody liked him, for his diligence, his application, and his good sense. At the age of seventeen he was employed to teach the sons of the neighbouring farmers. He succeeded so well that in the following year he opened a village school at Beilby. He went on educating himself, and learnt a little of everything. He next removed his school to Kirpenbeck, near Stamford Bridge; and it was there," proceeded Mrs. Cooke, "that I got to know him, for I was one of his pupils."

"He first learned mathematics by buying an old volume at a bookstall, with a spare s.h.i.+lling. That was before he began to teach. He also got odd sheets, and read other books about geometry and mathematics, before he could buy them; for he had very little to spare. He studied and learnt as much as he could.

He was very anxious to get an insight into knowledge. He studied optics before he had any teaching. Then he tried to turn his knowledge to account. While at Kirpenbeck he made his first object-gla.s.s out of a thick tumbler bottom. He ground the gla.s.s cleverly by hand; then he got a piece of tin and soldered it together, and mounted the object-gla.s.s in it so as to form a telescope.

"He next got a situation at the Rev. Mr. Shapkley's school in Micklegate, York, where he taught mathematics. He also taught in ladies' schools in the city, and did what he could to make a little income. Our intimacy had increased, and we had arranged to get married. He was twenty-four, and I was nineteen, when we were happily united. I was then his pupil for life.

"Professor Phillips saw his first telescope, with the object-gla.s.s made out of the thick tumbler bottom, and he was so much pleased with it that my husband made it over to him. But he also got an order for another, from Mr. Gray, solicitor, more by way of encouragement than because Mr. Gray wanted it, for he was a most kind man. The object-gla.s.s was of four-inch aperture, and when mounted the defining power was found excellent. My husband was so successful with his telescopes that he went on from smaller to greater, and at length he began to think of devoting himself to optics altogether. His knowledge of mathematics had led him on, and friends were always ready to encourage him in his pursuits.

"During this time he had continued his teaching at the school in the day-time; and he also taught on his own account the sons of gentlemen in the evening: amongst others the sons of Dr. Wake and Dr. Belcomb, both medical men. He was only making about 100L. a year, and his family was increasing. It was necessary to be very economical, and I was careful of everything. At length my uncle Milner agreed to advance about 100L. as a loan. A shop was taken in Stonegate in 1836, and provided with optical instruments. I attended to the shop, while my husband worked in the back premises. To bring in a little ready money, I also took in lodgers.

"My husband now devoted himself entirely to telescope making and optics. But he took in other work. His pumps were considered excellent; and he furnished all those used at the pump-room, Harrogate.

His clocks, telescope-driving[6] and others, were of the best. He commenced turret-clock making in 1852, and made many improvements in them. We had by that time removed to Coney Street; and in 1855 the Buckingham Works were established, where a large number of first-rate workmen were employed. A place was also taken in Southampton Street, London, in 1868, for the sale of the instruments manufactured at York."

Thus far Mrs. Cooke. It may be added that Thomas Cooke revived the art of making refracting telescopes in England. Since the discovery by Dollond, in 1758, of the relation between the refractive and dispersive powers of different kinds of gla.s.s, and the invention by that distinguished optician of the achromatic telescope, the manufacture of that instrument had been confined to England, where the best flint gla.s.s was made. But through the short-sighted policy of the Government, an exorbitant duty was placed upon the manufacture of flint gla.s.s, and the English trade was almost entirely stamped out. We had accordingly to look to foreign countries for the further improvement of the achromatic telescope, which Dollond had so much advanced.

A humble mechanic of Brenetz, in the Canton of Neufchatel, Switzerland, named Guinaud, having directed his attention to the manufacture of flint gla.s.s towards the close of last century, at length succeeded, after persevering efforts, in producing ma.s.ses of that substance perfectly free from stain, and therefore adapted for the construction of the object-gla.s.ses of telescopes.

Frauenhofer, the Bavarian optician, having just begun business, heard of the wonderful success of Guinaud, and induced the Swiss mechanic to leave Brenetz and enter into partners.h.i.+p with him at Munich in 1805.

The result was perfectly successful; and the new firm turned out some of the largest object-gla.s.ses which had until then been made. With one of these instruments, having an aperture of 9.9 inches, Struve, the Russian astronomer, made some of his greatest discoveries. Frauenhofer was succeeded by Merz and Mahler, who carried out his views, and turned out the famous refractors of Pulkowa Observatory in Russia, and of Harvard University in the United States. These last two telescopes contained object-gla.s.ses of fifteen inches aperture.

The pernicious impost upon flint gla.s.s having at length been removed by the English Government, an opportunity was afforded to our native opticians to recover the supremacy which they had so long lost. It is to Thomas Cooke, more than to any other person, that we owe the recovery of this manufacture. Mr. Lockyer, writing in 1878, says: "The two largest and most perfectly mounted refractors on the German form at present in existence are those at Gateshead and Was.h.i.+ngton, U.S. The former belongs to Mr. Newall, a gentleman who, connected with those who were among the first to recognise the genius of our great English optician, Cooke, did not hesitate to risk thousands of pounds in one great experiment, the success of which will have a most important bearing upon the astronomy of the future."[7]

The progress which Mr. Cooke made in his enterprise was slow but steady. Shortly after he began business as an optician, he became dissatisfied with the method of hand-polis.h.i.+ng, and made arrangements to polish the object-gla.s.ses by machinery worked by steam power. By this means he secured perfect accuracy of figure. He was also able to turn out a large quant.i.ty of gla.s.ses, so as to furnish astronomers in all parts of the world with telescopes of admirable defining power, at a comparatively moderate price. In all his works he endeavoured to introduce simplicity. He left his mark on nearly every astronomical instrument. He found the equatorial comparatively clumsy; he left it nearly perfect. His beautiful "dividing machine," for marking divisions on the circles, four feet in diameter and altogether self-acting--which divides to five minutes and reads off to five seconds is not the least of his triumphs.

The following are some of his more important achromatic telescopes. In 1850, when he had been fourteen years in business, he furnished his earliest patron, Professor Phillips, with an equatorial telescope of 6 1/4 inches aperture. His second (of 6 1/8) was supplied two years later, to James Wigglesworth of Wakefield. William Gray, Solicitor, of York, one of his earliest friends, bought a 6 1/2-inch telescope in 1853. In the following year, Professor Pritchard of Oxford was supplied with a 6 1/2-inch. The other important instruments were as follows: in 1854, Dr. Fisher, Liverpool, 6 inches; in 1855, H. L. Patterson, Gateshead, 7 1/4 inches; in 1858, J. G. Barclay, Layton, Ess.e.x, 7 1/4 inches; in 1857, Isaac Fletcher, c.o.c.kermouth, 9 1/4 inches; in 1858, Sir W. Keith Murray, Ochtertyre, Crieff, 9 inches; in 1859, Captain Jacob, 9 inches; in 1860, James Nasmyth, Penshurst, 8 inches; in 1861, another telescope to J. G. Barclay, 10 inches; in 1864, the Rev. W. R.

Dawes, Haddenham, Berks, 8 inches; and in 1867, Edward Crossley, Bermerside, Halifax, 9 3/8 inches.

In 1855 Mr. Cooke obtained a silver medal at the first Paris Exhibition for a six-inch equatorial telescope.[8] This was the highest prize awarded. A few years later he was invited to Osborne by the late Prince Albert, to discuss with his Royal Highness the particulars of an equatorial mounting with a clock movement, for which he subsequently received the order. On its completion he superintended the erection of the telescope, and had the honour of directing it to several of the celestial objects for the Queen and the Princess Alice, and answered their many interesting questions as to the stars and planets within sight.

Mr. Cooke was put to his mettle towards the close of his life. A contest had long prevailed among telescope makers as to who should turn out the largest refracting instrument. The two telescopes of fifteen inches aperture, prepared by Merz and Mahler, of Munich, were the largest then in existence. Their size was thought quite extraordinary.

But in 1846, Mr. Alvan Clark, of Cambridgeport, Ma.s.sachusetts, U.S., spent his leisure hour's in constructing small telescopes.[9] He was not an optician, nor a mathematician, but a portrait painter. He possessed, however, enough knowledge of optics and of mechanics, to enable him to make and judge a telescope. He spent some ten years in grinding lenses, and was at length enabled to produce objectives equal in quality to any ever made.

In 1853, the Rev. W. E. Dawes--one of Mr. Cooke's customers--purchased an object-gla.s.s from Mr. Clark. It was so satisfactory that he ordered several others, and finally an entire telescope. The American artist then began to be appreciated in his own country. In 1860 he received an order for a refractor of eighteen inches aperture, three inches greater than the largest which had up to that time been made. This telescope was intended for the Observatory of Mississippi; but the Civil War prevented its being removed to the South; and the telescope was sold to the Astronomical Society of Chicago and mounted in the Observatory of that city.

And now comes in the rivalry of Mr. Cooke of York, or rather of his patron, Mr. Newall of Gateshead. At the Great Exhibition of London, in 1862, two large circular blocks of gla.s.s, about two inches thick and twenty-six inches in diameter, were shown by the manufacturers, Messrs.

Chance of Birmingham. These discs were found to be of perfect quality, and suitable for object-gla.s.ses of the best kind. At the close of the Exhibition, they were purchased by Mr. Newall, and transferred to the workshops of Messrs. Cooke and Sons at York. To grind and polish and mount these discs was found a work of great labour and difficulty. Mr.

Lockyer says, "such an achievement marks an epoch in telescopic astronomy, and the skill of Mr. Cooke and the munificence of Mr. Newall will long be remembered."

When finished, the object-gla.s.s had an aperture of nearly twenty-five inches, and was of much greater power than the eighteen-inch Chicago instrument. The length of the tube was about thirty-two feet. The cast-iron pillar supporting the whole was nineteen feet in height from the ground, and the weight of the whole instrument was about six tons.

In preparing this telescope, nearly everything, from its extraordinary size, had to be specially arranged.[10] The great anxiety involved in these arrangements, and the constant study and application told heavily upon Mr. Cooke, and though the instrument wanted only a few touches to make it complete, his health broke down, and he died on the 19th of October, 1868, at the comparatively early age of sixty-two.

Mr. Cooke's death was felt, in a measure, to be a national loss. His science and skill had restored to England the prominent position she had held in the time of Dollond; and, had he lived, even more might have been expected from him. We believe that the Gold Medal and Fellows.h.i.+p of the Royal Society were waiting for him; but, as one of his friends said to his widow, "neither worth nor talent avails when the great ordeal is presented to us." In a letter from Professor Pritchard, he said: "Your husband has left his mark upon his age. No optician of modern times has gained a higher reputation; and I for one do not hesitate to call his loss national; for he cannot be replaced at present by any one else in his own peculiar line. I shall carry the recollection of the affectionate esteem in which I held Thomas Cooke with me to my grave. Alas! that he should be cut off just at the moment when he was about to reap the rewards due to his unrivalled excellence. I have said that F.R.S. and medals were to be his. But he is, we fondly trust, in a better and higher state than that of earthly distinction. Best a.s.sured, your husband's name must ever be a.s.sociated with the really great men of his day. Those who knew him will ever cherish his memory."

Mr. Cooke left behind him the great works which he founded in Buckingham Street, York. They still give employment to a large number of skilled and intelligent artizans. There I found many important works in progress,--the manufacture of theodolites, of prismatic compa.s.ses (for surveying), of Bolton's range finder, and of telescopes above all. In the factory yard was the commencement of the Observatory for Greenwich, to contain the late Mr. La.s.sell's splendid two feet Newtonian reflecting telescope, which has been presented to the nation.

Mr. Cooke's spirit still haunts the works, which are carried on with the skill, the vigour, and the perseverance, transmitted by him to his sons.

While at York, I was informed by Mr. Wigglesworth, the partner of Messrs. Cooke, of an energetic young astronomer at Bainbridge, in the mountain-district of Yorks.h.i.+re, who had not only been able to make a telescope of his own, but was an excellent photographer. He was not yet thirty years of age, but had encountered and conquered many difficulties. This is a sort of character which is more often to be met with in remote country places than in thickly-peopled cities. In the country a man is more of an individual; in a city he is only one of a mult.i.tude. The country boy has to rely upon himself, and has to work in comparative solitude, while the city boy is distracted by excitements. Life in the country is full of practical teachings; whereas life in the city may be degraded by frivolities and pleasures, which are too often the foes of work. Hence we have usually to go to out-of-the-way corners of the country for our hardest brain-workers.

Contact with the earth is a great restorer of power; and it is to the country folks that we must ever look for the recuperative power of the nation as regards health, vigour, and manliness.

Bainbridge is a remote country village, situated among the high lands or Fells on the north-western border of Yorks.h.i.+re. The mountains there send out great projecting b.u.t.tresses into the dales; and the waters rush down from the hills, and form waterfalls or Forces, which Turner has done so much to ill.u.s.trate. The river Bain runs into the Yore at Bainbridge, which is supposed to be the site of an old Roman station.

Over the door of the Grammar School is a mermaid, said to have been found in a camp on the top of Addleborough, a remarkable limestone hill which rises to the south-east of Bainbridge. It is in this grammar-school that we find the subject of this little autobiography.

He must be allowed to tell the story of his life--which he describes as 'Work: Good, Bad, and Indifferent--in his own words:

"I was born on November 20th, 1853. In my childhood I suffered from ill-health. My parents let me play about in the open air, and did not put me to school until I had turned my sixth year. One day, playing in the shoemaker's shop, William Farrel asked me if I knew my letters. I answered 'No.' He then took down a primer from a shelf, and began to teach me the alphabet, at the same time amusing me by likening the letters to familiar objects in his shop. I soon learned to read, and in about six weeks I surprised my father by reading from an easy book which the shoemaker had given me.

"My father then took me into the school, of which he was master, and my education may be said fairly to have begun. My progress, however, was very slow partly owing to ill-health, but more, I must acknowledge, to carelessness and inattention. In fact, during the first four years I was at school, I learnt very little of anything, with the exception of reciting verses, which I seemed to learn without any mental effort. My memory became very retentive. I found that by attentively reading half a page of print, or more, from any of the school-books, I could repeat the whole of it without missing a word. I can scarcely explain how I did it; but I think it was by paying strict attention to the words as words, and forming a mental picture of the paragraphs as they were grouped in the book. Certain, I am, that their sense never made much impression on me, for, when questioned by the teacher, I was always sent to the bottom of the cla.s.s, though apparently I had learned my exercise to perfection.

"When I was twelve years old, I made the acquaintance of a very ingenious boy, who came to our school. Samuel Bridge was a born mechanic. Though only a year older than myself, such was his ability in the use of tools, that he could construct a model of any machine that he saw. He awakened in me a love of mechanical construction, and together we made models of colliery winding-frames, iron-rolling mills, trip-hammers, and water-wheels. Some of them were not mere toys, but constructed to scale, and were really good working models. This love of mechanical construction has never left me, and I shall always remember with affection Samuel Bridge, who first taught me to use the hammer and file. The last I heard of him was in 1875, when he pa.s.sed his examination as a schoolmaster, in honours, and was at the head of his list.

"During the next two years, when between twelve and fourteen, I made comparatively slow progress at school. I remember having to write out the fourth commandment from memory. The teacher counted twenty-three mistakes in ten lines of my writing. It will be seen from this, that, as regards learning, I continued heedless and backward. About this time, my father, who was a good violinist, took me under his tuition.

He made me practice on the violin about an hour and a half a day. I continued this for a long time. But the result was failure. I hated the violin, and would never play unless compelled to do so. I suppose the secret was that I had no 'ear.'

"It was different with subjects more to my mind. Looking over my father's books one day, I came upon Gregory's 'Handbook of Inorganic Chemistry,' and began reading it. I was fascinated with the book, and studied it morning, noon, and night--in fact, every time when I could s.n.a.t.c.h a few minutes. I really believe that at one time I could have repeated the whole of the book from memory. Now I found the value of arithmetic, and set to work in earnest on proportion, vulgar and decimal fractions, and, in fact, everything in school work that I could turn to account in the science of chemistry. The result of this sudden application was that I was seized with an illness. For some months I had incessant headache; my hair became dried up, then turned grey, and finally came off. Weighing myself shortly after my recovery, at the age of fifteen, I found that I just balanced fifty-six pounds. I took up mensuration, then astronomy, working at them slowly, but giving the bulk of my spare time to chemistry.

"In the year 1869, when I was sixteen years old, I came across Cuthbert Bede's book, ent.i.tled 'Photographic Pleasures.' It is an amusing book, giving an account of the rise and progress of photography, and at the same time having a good-natured laugh at it. I read the book carefully, and took up photography as an amus.e.m.e.nt, using some apparatus which belonged to my father, who had at one time dabbled in the art. I was soon able to take fair photographs. I then decided to try photography as a business. I was apprenticed to a photographer, and spent four years with him--one year at Northallerton, and three at Darlington. When my employer removed to Darlington, I joined the School of Art there.

"Having read an account of the experiments of M. E. Becquerel, a French savant, on photographing in the colours of nature, my curiosity was awakened. I carefully repeated his experiments, and convinced myself that he was correct. I continued my experiments in heliochromy for a period of about two years, during which time I made many photographs in colours, and discovered a method of developing the coloured image, which enabled me to shorten the exposure to one-fortieth of the previously-required time. During these experiments, I came upon some curious results, which, I think, might puzzle our scientific men to account for. For instance, I proved the existence of black light, or rays of such a nature as to turn the rose-coloured surface of the sensitive-plate black--that is, rays reflected from the black paint of drapery, produced black in the picture, and not the effect of darkness.

I was, like Becquerel, unable to fix the coloured image without destroying the colours; though the plates would keep a long while in the dark, and could be examined in a subdued, though not in a strong light. The coloured image was faint, but the colours came out with great truth and delicacy.

"I began to attend the School of Art at Darlington on the 6th of March, 1872. I found, on attempting to draw, that I had naturally a correct eye and hand; and I made such progress, that when the students'

drawings were examined, previously to sending them up to South Kensington, all my work was approved. I was then set to draw from the cast in chalk, although I had only been at the school for a month. I tried for all the four subjects at the May examination, and was fortunate enough to pa.s.s three of them, and obtained as a prize Packett's 'Sciography.' I worked hard during the next year, and sent up seventeen works; for one of these, the 'Venus de Milo,' I gained a students.h.i.+p.

"I then commenced the study of human anatomy, and began water-colour painting, reading all the works upon art on which I could lay my hand.

At the May examination of 1873, I completed my second-grade certificate, and at the end of the year of my students.h.i.+p, I accepted the office of teacher in the School of Art. This art-training created in me a sort of disgust for photography, as I saw that the science of photography had really very little genuine art in it, and was more allied to a mechanical pursuit than to an artistic one. Now, when I look back on my past ideas, I clearly see that a great deal of this disgust was due to my ignorance and self-conceit.

"In 1874, I commenced painting in tempora, and then in oil, copying the pictures lent to the school from the South Kensington Art Library. I worked also from still life, and began sketching from nature in oil and water-colours, sometimes selling my work to help me to buy materials for art-work and scientific experiments. I was, however, able to do very little in the following year, as I was at home suffering from sciatica. For nine months I could not stand erect, but had to hobble about with a stick. This illness caused me to give up my teachers.h.i.+p.

"Early in 1876 I returned to Darlington. I went on with my art studies and the science of chemistry; though I went no further in heliochromy.

I pushed forward with anatomy. I sent about fifteen works to South Kensington, and gained as my third-grade prize in list A the 'Dictionary of Terms used in Art' by Thomas Fairholt, which I found a very useful work. Towards the end of the year, my father, whose health was declining, sent for me home to a.s.sist him in the school. I now commenced the study of Algebra and Euclid in good earnest, but found it tough work. My father, though a fair mathematician, was unable to give me any instruction; for he had been seized with paralysis, from which he never recovered. Before he died, he recommended me to try for a schoolmaster's certificate; and I promised him that I would. I obtained a situation as master of a small village school, not under Government inspection; and I studied during the year, and obtained a second cla.s.s certificate at the Durham Diocesan College at Christmas, 1877. Early in the following year, the school was placed under Government inspection, and became a little more remunerative.

"I now went on with chemical a.n.a.lysis, making my own apparatus.

Requiring an intense heat on a small scale, I invented a furnace that burnt petroleum oil. It was blown by compressed air. After many failures, I eventually succeeded in bringing it to such perfection that in 7 1/2 minutes it would bring four ounces of steel into a perfectly liquefied state. I next commenced the study of electricity and magnetism; and then acoustics, light, and heat. I constructed all my apparatus myself, and acquired the art of gla.s.s-blowing, in order to make my own chemical apparatus, and thus save expense.

"I then went on with Algebra and Euclid, and took up plane trigonometry; but I devoted most of my time to electricity and magnetism. I constructed various scientific apparatus--a syren, telephones, microphones, an Edison's megaphone, as well as an electrometer, and a machine for covering electric wire with cotton or silk. A friend having lent me a work on artificial memory, I began to study it; but the work led me into nothing but confusion, and I soon found that if I did not give it up, I should be left with no memory at all. I still went an sketching from Nature, not so much as a study, but as a means of recruiting my health, which was far from being good.