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BY
ANDREW URE, M.D.
F.R.S. M.G.S. M.A.S. LOND.; M. ACAD. N.S. PHILAD.; S. PH. SOC. N. GERM.
HANOV.; MULII. ETC. ETC.
ILLUSTRATED WITH TWELVE HUNDRED AND FORTY
ENGRAVINGS ON WOOD.
Second Edition.
LONDON:
PRINTED FOR
LONGMAN, ORME, BROWN, GREEN, & LONGMANS,
PATERNOSTER-ROW.
1840.
London:
Printed by A. Spottiswoode,
New-Street-Square.
It is the business of operative industry to produce, transform, and distributeall such material objects as are suited to satisfy the wants ofmankind. The primary production of these objects is assigned to thehusbandman, the fisherman, and the miner; their transformation to themanufacturer and artisan; and their distribution to the engineer, shipwright,and sailor.[1] The unworked or raw materials are derived,—1.from the organic processes of vegetables and animals, conductedeither without or with the fostering care of man; 2. from the boundlessstores of mineral and metallic wealth, arranged upon or within thesurface of the earth by the benignant Parent of our being, in the fittestcondition to exercise our physical and intellectual powers in turningthem to the uses of life.
[1] For correct and copious information upon agricultural production, I have greatpleasure in referring my readers to Mr. Loudon’s elaborate Encyclopedias of Agriculture,Gardening, and Plants; and for mercantile production and distribution, to Mr. M’Culloch’sexcellent Dictionary of Commerce and Commercial Navigation.
The task which I have undertaken in the present work, is to describeand explain the transformations of these primary materials, by mechanicaland chemical agencies, into general objects of exchangeable value;leaving, on the one hand, to the mechanical engineer, that of investigatingthe motive powers of transformation and transport; and, on the otherhand, to the handicraftsman, that of tracing their modifications into objectsof special or local demand. Contemplated in this view, an art or manufacturemay be defined to be that species of industry which effects acertain change in a substance, to suit it for the general market, by combiningits parts in a new order and form, through mechanical or chemicalmeans. Iron will serve the purpose of illustrating the nature of the distinctionshere laid down, between mechanical engineering; arts andmanufactures; and handicraft trades. The engineer perforates the groundwith a s