Page:Memoirs of a Trait in the Character of George III.djvu/223

166 of the machinery can be effected (which I am strongly inclined to think is the case, but have not had an perfection) that such small machines may be rendered capable of being of great service with respect to the Longitude at sea: and may, after being brought to perfection, be purchased at a much cheaper rate than his superior machines, and therefore praying the same may be taken into consideration.'

The smaller Watch intended for the pocket, and the original of the chronometers used for finding the Longitude at this day, is now in the Author's possession. It was made under the Inventor's inspection by a clever workman, whom he allowed to put his name on it, viz. John Jefferys, which is repeated on the cap, with the addition of the date, and this being 1753, shows it to have been constructed two years prior to its being brought forward. It was always John Harrison's pocket watch, except when Admiral Campbell borrowed it, to find his Longitude by, for which it answered nearly as well as the larger but more expensive Timekeepers.—In the context of the minutes quoted, he was ordered an advance of money to complete these works:—but after the discovery of the Longitude, all his future plans for bringing the means of it into general use were frustrated; and it becomes a blot never to be erased from the escutcheons of those Commissioners who, on the 9th February, 1765, delivered over this enterprising genius (metaphorically) in chains, to his disgraceful opponent, the P. R. S. to be dealt with in the best way that low revenge and a palpable ignorance of chronometry could contrive.

The conduct of the Commissioners on the date referred to, when its most injurious consequences to their country, and indeed to all commercial nations is considered, would have exposed them to the unqualified reprobation of posterity, had it not been unknown to this day; that—how many lives were sacrificed we cannot say, nor what an aggregate of property continued to be annually lost, for no reason but that this most ingenious man, who, if left unfettered to adopt the best