Page:Passages from the Life of a Philosopher.djvu/99

Rh informing their Lordships of the fact;—adding that no advance had been made in its construction for above a year and a quarter; and requesting further instructions on the subject.

Mr. Babbage received a letter from the Treasury, expressing their Lordships' satisfaction at learning that the drawings, and parts of the Calculating Engine were removed to the fire-proof building, and stating that as soon as Mr. Clement's Accounts should be received and examined, they would

"Take into consideration what farther proceedings may be requisite with a view to its completion."

A few weeks afterwards Mr. Babbage received a letter from the Treasury, conveying their Lordships' authority to proceed with the construction of the Engine.

During the time which had elapsed since the Engineer had ceased to proceed with the construction of the Engine, Mr. Babbage had been deprived of the use of his own drawings. Having, in the meanwhile, naturally speculated upon the general principles on which machinery for calculation might be constructed, a principle of an entirely new kind occurred to him, the power of which over the most complicated arithmetical operations seemed nearly unbounded. On re-examining his drawings when returned to him by the Engineer, the new principle appeared to be limited only by the extent of the mechanism it might require. The invention of simpler mechanical means for executing the elementary operations of the Engine now derived a far greater importance than it had hitherto possessed; and should such simplifications be discovered, it seemed difficult to anticipate, or even to over-estimate, the vast results which might be attained. In the Engine for calculating by differences, such simplifications affected only about a hundred and twenty 2}}