of capital and of enterprise, owner of the Soho Engineering
Works, near Birmingham. The firm of Boulton and Watt became
famous, and James Watt lived till August 19, 1819--lived to see
his steam engine the greatest single factor in the new industrial
era that had dawned for English-speaking folk.

Boulton and Watt, however, though they were the pioneers, were by
no means alone in the development of the steam engine. Soon there
were rivals in the field with new types of engines. One of these
was Richard Trevithick in England; another was Oliver Evans of
Philadelphia. Both Trevithick and Evans invented the
high-pressure engine. Evans appears to have applied the high
pressure principle before Trevithick, and it has been said that
Trevithick borrowed it from Evans, but Evans himself never said
so, and it is more likely that each of these inventors worked it
out independently. Watt introduced his steam to the cylinder at
only slightly more than atmospheric pressure and clung
tenaciously to the low-pressure theory all his life. Boulton and
Watt, indeed, aroused by Trevithick's experiments in
high-pressure engines, sought to have Parliament pass an act
forbidding high pressure on the ground that the lives of the
public were endangered. Watt lived long enough, however, to see
the high-pressure steam engine come into general favor, not only
in America but even in his own conservative country.

Less sudden, less dramatic, than that of the cotton gin, was the
entrance of the steam engine on the American industrial stage,
but not less momentous. The actions and reactions of steam in
America provide the theme for an Iliad which some American Homer
may one day write. They include the epic of the coal in the