ABSTRACT
For sixty years, that is to say from 1712 onwards, the atmospheric engine remained the only efficient means of draining mines or supplying towns with water. But as regards improvements in the engine, apart from those introduced by Thomas Newcomen himself, this period might almost be passed over in silence as a barren one, were it not that it was a period of extraordinary technical advance in nearly every industry in this country, an advance in which the steam engine, in the limited role that it played so far, was of importance because by its means coal was cheaply won, and such fuel was required for nearly every industry. Pumping water on to a waterwheel was the only known practical way of obtaining rotative motion from an engine for many a long year, and was practised even after the introduction of the rotative engine by James Watt.
