ringers were also liable
for damages. As was to have been expected, however, the firm remembered
that to be merciful in the hour of victory and not to punish too hard a
fallen foe, was a cardinal virtue. The settlements they made were
considered most liberal and satisfactory to all. Watt used frequently
long afterward to refer to his specifications as his old and well-tried
friends. So indeed they proved, and many references to their wonderful
efficiency were made.

With the beginning of the new century, 1800, the original partnership of
the famous firm of Boulton and Watt expired, after a term of twenty-five
years, as did the patents of 1769 and 1775. The term of partnership had
been fixed with reference to the duration of the patents. Young men in
their prime, Watt at forty and Boulton about fifty when they joined
hands, after a quarter-century of unceasing and anxious labor, were
disposed to resign the cares and troubles of business to their sons. The
partnership therefore was not renewed by them, but their respective
shares in the firm were agreed upon as the basis of a new partnership
between their sons, James Watt, Jr., Matthew Robinson Boulton and
Gregory Watt, all distinguished for abilities of no mean order, and in a
great degree already conversant with the business, which their wise
fathers had seen fit for some years to entrust more and more to them.

In nothing done by either of these two wise fathers is more wisdom shown
than in their sagacious, farseeing policy in regard to their sons. As
they themselves had been taught to concentrate their energies upon
useful occupation, for which society would pay as for value received,
they had doubtless often conferred, and concluded that was the happiest
and best life for their sons, instead of allowing them to fritter away
the precious years of youth in aimless frivolity, to be followed in
later years by a disappointing and humiliating old age.

So the partnership of Boulton and Watt was renewed in the union of the
sons. Gregory Watt's premature death four years later was such a blow to
his father that some think he never was quite himself again. Gregory had
displayed brilliant talents in the higher pursuits of science and
literature, in which he took delight, and great things had been
predicted from him. With the other two sons the business connection
continued without change for forty years, until, when old men, they also
retired like their fathers. They proved