FROM
8 A.M. TO 5 P.M.

He then went on with the reading:—

That was posted about in Ithaca, N. Y., just a few weeks after I came back from England.

Some fellow made a machine from the description he heard of mine, and he has been giving exhibitions of its work in various places. He says his machine can do the work of six hands and make a pair of pantaloons in forty minutes. And I have no doubt he tells the truth.

Only, Uncle Tyler, don't you see it's my machine and he is infringing on my patent? And more than that, right here in Boston machines have been built on my model and are in daily use. Now I know that I am without resources and that I have pretty well exhausted the patience of my friends. But surely my claims are valid.

Getting money to push them is the task I dread. Still I have already raised a hundred dollars to get my machine and letters patent out of pawn in London; and I have every hope that Mr. Anson Burlingame, who is soon to sail for England, will deliver them safely to me in the fall.

The next step is to see if the lawyers can find any flaws in my claims. If they can't, the suit I propose to bring is already in my favor; and I am sanguine enough to believe that the Howe sewing machine will yet be a household convenience.

Yours respectfully,
Elias Howe, Jr.

"Well," commented Mr. Howe, as he folded the letter slowly, "I didn't know how to answer that. He said he wanted advice. I know he wants money more, but of course he hates to ask for it. I deliberated a good while; but finally I wrote him that if the lawyers gave him assurance that his claims were valid, I would advance what money I could spare to further his suit."

There was silence in the room for a little while. Then Jonathan said earnestly:

"I wish I had some money to give Mr. Howe. Would he take my five dollars, do you think?" he asked of the inventor's uncle.

"See, I have it here; and I should be glad to give it to him without waiting to hear what the lawyers say. Do you think it would be all right to send it, Mr. Howe?" he inquired.

"And may I, Uncle William?" he added quickly, for he had almost taken his uncle's permission for granted.

Uncle William nodded; and Mr. Howe said, "You may never get it back, you know."

"I think I shall," answered Jonathan confidently. "And anyway I want to help Mr. Howe."

"Do you want to send it now?" inquired Mr. Howe.

Elias Howe

"If you please," replied Jonathan.

"Then you may write your letter here, while your uncle and I go for a walk."

Spencer, Mass.,
15^th 9^th mo., 1849.

Mr. Elias Howe, Jr.,
Cambridge, Mass.

My dear Mr. Howe:—

Perhaps thee remembers the boy who saw thee run a race with thy sewing machine against five seamstresses over Quincy Hall Market four years ago. Thy uncle told me of the hard time thee has had since. I am very sorry. I want to buy a sewing machine and I want to help thee. I am sending thee five dollars. It is all the money I have. I hope thee will use it to win thy suit. Sometime when thee sells sewing machines, I hope thee will sell me one for my mother five dollars less than the usual price. Thee can see thee will not have to pay this back for a long time, for it will be a good many years before I shall have money enough to buy a sewing machine.

Thy friend and well-wisher,
Jonathan Wheeler

There is little more to tell of Jonathan's visit to Spencer. After dinner that day he started with his uncle for Worcester, where they stayed all night. The next morning, after an early breakfast, they set out again, reaching home before the forenoon grew very hot.

PART III

Not many days after Jonathan's return, the first letter he ever received his father brought him from the post office. It hardly needed the post mark, Cambridge, to make Jonathan sure who had sent it. Let us open it with him:—

Cambridge, August 26, 1849.

My dear friend Jonathan,

Your letter with its inclosure of five dollars has been gratefully received. I remember you and your uncle, your father and your mother, with much pleasure. Ever since I ran that race in Boston I have been sure that the machine would work its way to success.

I am more confident now than ever. I have found some one who will buy out Mr. Fisher's interest; Mr. Burlingame will bring my old machine and letters patent from London; and every lawyer I have consulted says my claims are valid and I shall win my suit.

When I have succeeded, and the manufacture of sewing machines is under my control, I shall send for you to pick out a machine for your mother.

Again thanking you for your substantial interest, I am

Very faithfully yours,
Elias Howe, Jr.

This was in 1849. Mr. Howe's darkest days were over; but even then success came slowly and in rather a strange way. Mr. Howe's chief enemy was a Mr. Singer, who built machines and advertised them with remarkable success.

"You are infringing my patent," wrote Howe to Singer, upon hearing of the latter's activity.

"But you are not the inventor," replied Singer. "The Chinese have had a sewing machine for ages; an Englishman made one in 1790; a Frenchman built one in 1830; and what is more to the point, in 1832, a man named Walter Hunt, living in New York, invented a sewing machine with a shuttle stitch like yours. I can find Walter Hunt and prove my statement."

Well, Mr. Singer did find Walter Hunt and the fragments of his old machine. But "not all the king's horses nor all the king's men" could put those fragments together again so that the machine would sew. For four years, however, the trial in the courts continued. But at last, in 1854, when Mr. Howe had waited nine years after completing his first machine, the Wheelers and many others read with great satisfaction in the Worcester Spy:

"Judge Sprague of Massachusetts has decided that the plaintiff's patent is valid and that the defendant's machine is an infringement. Further, there is no evidence in this case that leaves a shadow of a doubt that, for all the benefit conferred upon the public by the introduction of a sewing machine, the public are indebted to Mr. Howe."

In 1855, Jonathan, now grown into a tall, manly youth of twenty, started with Uncle William on another journey, longer and more interesting than either had ever taken before. This time they went to New York, where they found Mr. Howe at the head of a prosperous business; and when they returned, they brought with them a Howe sewing machine of the very latest model, "a present from the inventor to Mrs. Wheeler, in gratitude for the sympathy and encouragement of her family."