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It was passed round the table until it reached Gillott, who carefully inspected it and said, "It's a very good one; but I think I have one that'll 'lick' it." Putting his hand into the breast pocket of his coat, he brought out two or three shabby-looking screwed-up bits of paper.
On being taken out they are put in a sieve to drain, and then into a cylinder full of holes, invented by Mr. Gillott, which, rapidly revolving, extracts the last drop of moisture from the pens, on a principle that has been successfully applied to drying sugar, salt, and a vast number of other articles of the same nature. By this invention Mr. Gillott saves in oil from 200 to 300 pounds a-year.
Gillott was not, in any sense, a public man, and he took no active part in politics. He had a great dislike to public companies, and I believe never held a share in one. He had a very few old friends with whom he loved to associate. He was very hospitable, but he had a strong aversion to formal parties, and to every kind of ostentation.
The trustees of the Jephson Gardens, at Leamington, about the same time, advertised for sale some surplus plants of rare kinds, and Mr. Gillott paid the gardens a visit. He had selected a number of costly specimens, when his eye fell on a tree of surpassing beauty. He inquired its price, and was told that it was not for sale.
From Brindley, the constructor of the earliest great canal, to Joseph Gillott, the inventor of the very steel pen with which this book is written; from Arkwright the barber who fashioned the first spinning-machine, to Crompton the weaver, whose mule gave rise to the mighty Manchester cotton trade; from Newcomen, who made the first rough attempt at a steam-engine, to Stephenson, who sent the iron horse from end to end of the land, the chief mechanical improvements in the country have almost all been due to the energy, intelligence, and skill of our labouring population.
Gillott immediately packed off every Mueller picture he possessed to an auction room in London, with directions that they should be extensively advertised as his property, and sold without the slightest reserve. This step so frightened the Art-world that "Müllers" became a drug in the market, and poor Müller found himself neglected by his quondam friends.
I mentioned, in the sketch of Mr. Gillott, that all the members of the Edgbaston Quoit Club had very large heads, and that this fact seemed to bear out the phrenological theory, that size of head was indicative of mental power. As a further proof I may mention here, that the late Mr. Charles Geach had the largest head in Birmingham.
A coarser, but still a small point, is the "Gillott 192" a good pen with a fairly large range; and, for any others than the smooth papers, a pen smaller than this will probably be found undesirable for general use. A shade bigger than this is the "Gillott 303," a very good average size.
I will not mention the name of any of those now living, but two of the largest hats there belonged respectively to Walter Lyndon and Joseph Gillott. Mr. Gillott, we are told, in a newspaper published soon after his death, was "born of poor but honest parents."
Josiah Mason, in conjunction with Perry, of The Morning Chronicle newspaper, was experimenting, and two brothers, named respectively John and William Mitchell, were actually making, by a tedious method, a fairly good article. They were assisted in their work by a sister. By some fortunate accident, Gillott and Miss Mitchell met, and after a brief courtship they entered into an engagement to marry.
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