periment answered, the Commissioners present were of opinion I should without further trouble receive my reward;" but my Son attending the Board with this proposition was told by Lord Sandwich at that time president, that it would be mere tautology, for that their giving instructions implied the same thing, and that if the Watch kept its time within the limits of the Act there could be no doubt of my being entitled to and receiving the reward, and nobody could take it from me.[1] Upon the faith
- ↑ The Earl of Sandwich did not deny the fact, but with an inconsistency savouring more pf the Jack-a-dandy than the Jack Tar or a good seaman, which he desired to be thought, he was offended at being reminded of it. With a caprice too, which we hope is uncommon among the nobility, from being
and, if we insist upon it, which ever we please must go.—Mr. Harrison, said, if that is the case, you may send the first, which is by far the most imperfect: but certainly I am not to abide by such determination. But Professor Blisse, Dr. Hornsby and Dr. Shepherd, insisted upon it, that they had a right to send which they pleased. And then Mr. Harrison said, that with submission to this honourable Board, he did not think they had any such right, for it was he that was to say which instrument would be most proper. They were to be judges to what degree of exactness it came: so that, if he was to take an old shoe; and by their orders to go with it; and at his return it should have been found to answer, that certainly would be fulfilling the Act. Upon this it was agreed that the Watch only should go.'—The Mechanic will be allowed to have been the better manufacturer in the argument here; his stuff is of a more durable texture than that of the logicians by trade, although, like Mr. Shandy, senior, he did not know the names of his tools."
