Here then, the biographers of John Harrison, who being wholly unacquainted with these scenes, attribute his troubles to "the delicacy of the Commissioners in deciding between him and the public" may learn that the scrupulous sensations with which they endow them, had no veritable existence. The disinterested part of the Board were either outvoted, or too indolent to interfere when so clever a Manager as the President of the Royal Society, to wit, was willing to be fac totum to the whole concern: while those who were notoriously at variance with the Claimant, at the head of the party opposed to the success of the mechanics, could give a licence to their personal animosity, under the commonplace resort pro bono publico. It is certain the authority and immunities of the Board of Longitude were now either delegated to, or assumed by, an individual, whose effrontery was commensurate with his self-importance, and who even vaunted that the Act to amend, explain and alter, that of Queen Anne, was his own; and, after it was brought into
sentiment—"It gives me pleasure to be praised by you, whom all men praise:" and the "doubts and difficulties" would have been no further heard of, except at Coventry. But the Claimant was wholly unfitted for any adroitness at such a manoeuvre; it would have seemed to him like putting on a fool's coat; his was a straight forward course; he would not compromise his sincerity, though it might have been demonstrated, that the rugged path in which he toiled and lost himself would soon have become as smooth and level as a bowling green before him.
