| Description | (2 pcs.)
(Incomplete.)
Soho 10 Octr-1802
Mr Watt
My Dear Sir
I was quite rejoiced in the perusal of your excellent letter from Frankfort of ye 25th Sepr. Indeed I could not be otherwise as I perceivd that you & Mrs Watt were in good health & spirits. The Weather & the Country being fine the Inns tolorable good & above all the restoration of Gregory health Crowns the Whole.
I only regret that you have not been so fortunate as to meet, but as you have now found a Clue to each other, I hope the arival of every post will afford you mutual pleasure untill you are within the reach of mutual embrace which I yet flatter my self will be the case before you quite the Continent.
Although some of your Roads have not been so good as one would wish, I consider they have afforded you a better opportunity of Viewing a beautyfull Country than by rapidly Galloping through it; and upon the whole I am glad you made this Journey in preference to the old beated track to Scotland. It will have added to your & Mrs. Watts already great Stock of Ideas & thereby increase the comfortability of your own Fire side in the Meridian of Winter.
As to my Self I have the satisfaction to inform you that all my dark Symptoms are Vanished & that I am in tolorable good health except a little feebleosity about the small of my back which renders it necessary for me to pass a great part of my time in, or upon the Bed: yet nevertheless I go down to the Manufactory & the Mint once of twice a day without injuring my self as heretofore, but not without some fateague: however as I am now takeing Bark twice a day I find a daily increase of Strength & flatter my self with the plan of takeing a Journey to Paris in April or May next.
I understand that it is the wish of ye French Govermt to recoin the whole of their Gold Silver & Copper Money & a French man lately told me it would require to be Coind into a Thousand Million of pieces which is = to 30 piece to every man Womn & Child in the Republick (this is a randum Idea).
They have 13 Mints but at the rate they work the renovation of the Coin will not be compleated in a great many Years & yet if they had such a Mint & such other necessary apparatus as I could directe the Erection of, I think the whole 1000 Million may be coind in Three Years from the time of setting to work wth. a moderate number of presses.
I have within this fortnight been makeing some Exts relative to ye maximum speed of my Coining Machines & find that I can strike regularly 53 of my Copper two peny pieces or 56 English Crown pieces per Minute & that I can also regularly strike India Copper pieces of half the diamr. at the rate of 106 to 112 per Minute or from 6360 to 6720 per hour with 1 press in Collars but as some time will be lost in Changing Dies you may deduct 20 per Cent for such loss of time & that I find, by daily practice, will cover all such incidents: but when pieces of half an Inch Diamtr are minted I have recourse to my new small Press which will strike from 110 to near 200 per Minute.
I have lately had 2 different parties with me from France a Fishing, but as I find that neither party have made any Contract with their Govermt or have any authority from it to make any proposals or Contract with me, so I on my part have made no proposal to them, particularly as I find they have made better presses than I have & can Erect a more effacatious Mint. If any Established Solid Rich Bankers would enter into a Contract with Govt. to execute the Whole I would treat with them but not with men whose warmth of imagination is greater than their Judgments or Funds & who are neither Experienced in all those Arts that are requisite in Coinage, nor in the Conduct of Great Manufactories, or in the Commercial Part appertaining thereto.
I should not have succeeded so well as I have done in this Country if I had not contracted to supply the People instead of the Govermt.
A puff of Mr Droz & the Minister of the Interior was published in ye English Papers to which I sent Z: Walker my Answer but not to publish: which he will shew to You as well as another Paper I have sent him by this Post.-I should be much obliged to you if you would Button up very close & know as little & say as little as possible upon the subject of Coinage Machinery as there are a number of Inventors now very busy & each Claims a superiority over Mr Droz, or one, or all the Monneyers of the Grand Hotel; but they are all busy in Pimping & Spying.
I think I could put a few Thousands in my Pocket & save to the French tens of Thousands if we could agree.
My press is far more exact more perminent & more dureable (although there is one part of it I dearly purchased from him) but my means of working them is now infinitely beyond anything they have ever thought of & my Mint is now in far better order than ever. If the French should ever adopt the Idea of my Mint they will publish in their Chronicles of [? falsettes] as their own Invention I am therefore desireous that they should pay tribute to me as well as to Ceazer.
I think it right to give Zack some information as to the effects of my mint & beg youl look at the Paper I have sent him. I owe Mr Berthollet a letter which I will repay him soon, & if you see him pray tell him so. |