He was now doing what he had been doing every day for twenty years up there--bowing his body ceaselessly and rapidly almost to his feet.

It was his way of praying.

I timed him with a stop watch, and he made 1,244 revolutions in 24 minutes and 46 seconds.

It seemed a pity to have all this power going to waste.
It was one of the most useful motions in mechanics, the pedal movement; so I made a note in my memorandum book, purposing some day to apply a system of elastic cords to him and run a sewing machine with it.

I afterward carried out that scheme, and got five years' good service out of him; in which time he turned out upward of eighteen thousand first-rate tow-linen shirts, which was ten a day.