At ten years of age the young Pierre-August was sent by his father to a professional school at Alfort, where he learned the rudiments of Latin, but three years later his father brought him home intent on his becoming a watchmaker.
In the years that followed there was a period of stress and storm during which father and son wrestled for mastery. Always when the latter worked he showed a dexterity of touch, an ingenuity of invention which astonished the father; but, on the other hand, his escapades away from home were the despair of the stern watchmaker. The young Caron, full of wit, of song, skillful in tricks and gay of humor, attracted a following of youths whose tendencies were toward a loose life and low morals.
For five long years the struggle continued between the father and his brilliantly gifted son. Promises of amendment on the one hand and paternal pardon on the other had led to nothing. Finally, since remonstrance proved in vain, the elder Caron resorted to sterner measures: he turned his son into the street and closed his doors against him. He left open to the boy, nevertheless, one way of return. Friends of the family in secret communication received the lad, who soon showed a sincere desire to be restored to the good graces of his father. The Père Caron, at first inexorable, at length relented so far as to write the following letter, which is still in existence:
“I have read and re-read your letter. M. Cottin has shown me the one which you have written to him. They seem to me wise and reasonable. The sentiments which you therein express would be entirely to my taste if it were in my power to believe them durable, for I suppose that they possess a degree of sincerity with which I should be satisfied. But your great misfortune consists in having entirely lost my confidence; nevertheless, the friendship and esteem which I entertain for the three respectable friends whom you have employed, the gratitude which I owe them for their kindness to you, force from me my consent in spite of myself, although I believe there are four chances to one against your fulfilling your promises. From this, you will judge the irreparable stain upon your reputation if you again force me to drive you away.
“Understand then thoroughly the conditions upon which you will be allowed to return; … I require full and entire submission to my will and a marked respect in words, actions, and expression of countenance; do not forget that unless you employ as much art to please me as you have shown in gaining my friends, you hold nothing, absolutely nothing, and you have only worked to your harm. It is not simply that I wish to be obeyed and respected, but you shall anticipate in everything that which you imagine will please me.
“In regard to your mother, who has twenty times in the past fortnight implored me to take you back, I will put off to a private conversation on your return what I have to say to make you thoroughly understand all the affection and solicitude which you owe to her. Here then are the conditions of your return:
“First—you shall neither make nor sell, nor cause to be made or sold, directly or indirectly, anything which is not for my account; and you shall succumb no more to the temptation of appropriating to yourself anything, even the smallest matter, above that which I give you. You shall receive no watch to be repaired under any pretext whatever, or for any friend, no matter whom, without notifying me; you shall never touch anything without my express permission—you shall not even sell an old watch key without accounting for it to me.
“Second—you shall rise at six o’clock in the summer and at seven in the winter and you shall work till suppertime without repugnance at whatever I give you to do; I do not propose that you shall employ the faculties which God has given you, except to become celebrated in your profession. Remember that it is shameful and dishonorable to be the last and that if you do not become the first in your profession, you are unworthy of any consideration; the love of so beautiful a calling should penetrate your heart, and be the unique occupation of your mind.
“Third—you shall take your suppers always at home, and shall not go out evenings; the suppers and evenings abroad are too dangerous for you, but I consent that you dine Sundays and holidays with your friends, on condition that I know always to whom you are going and that you are absolutely never later than nine o’clock. And furthermore I exhort you never to ask permission contrary to this article and I advise you not to take it to yourself.
“Fourth—you shall abandon totally your maudite musique, and above all the company of idle people. I will not suffer any of them. The one and the other have brought you to what you are. Nevertheless, in consideration of your weakness, I permit the violin and the flute, but on the express condition that you never use them except after supper on working days, and never during the day; and you also never shall disturb the repose of the neighbors, or my own.
“Fifth—I shall avoid as far as possible sending you on errands, but in cases where I shall be obliged to do so, remember that above everything else I shall accept no poor excuses for your being late. You know in advance how much this article is revolting to me.
“Sixth—I will give you your board and eighteen livres a month which will serve for your expenses and little by little enable you to pay your debts. It would be too dangerous for your character and very improper in me to count with you the price of your work and require you to pay me board. If you devote yourself as you should, with the greatest zeal to the improvement of my business, and if by your talents you procure me more, I will give you a fourth part of the profits of all that comes to me through you. You know my way of thinking; you have experienced that I never allow myself to be surpassed in generosity; merit therefore that I do more for you than I promise; but remember that I give nothing for words, that I accept only actions.
“If my conditions suit you—if you feel strong enough to execute them in good faith, accept them and sign your acceptance at the bottom of this letter which you shall return to me; in that case assure M. Paignon of my sincere esteem and of my gratitude; say to him that I shall have the honor of seeing him and of asking him to dinner to-morrow, so dispose yourself to return with me to take the place which I was very far from believing you would occupy so soon, and perhaps never.”
Beneath is written:
“Monsieur, very honored, dear father;—I sign all your conditions in the firm desire to execute them with the help of the Lord; but how sadly all this recalls to me a time when such laws and such ceremonies were unnecessary to engage me to do my duty! It is right that I suffer the humiliation that I have justly merited, and if all this, joined to my good conduct, may procure for me and merit entirely the return of your good graces and of your friendship, I shall be only too happy. In faith of which, I sign all that is contained in this letter.
A. Caron, fils”
During the three years which followed the young man’s return to his father’s house he made such rapid progress in the art of watchmaking that we find him in 1753 making his first appearance in public in the defense of an escapement for watches of which he claimed to be the inventor.
In the December number of Le Mercure of that year, the following letter was published, which needs no commentary to show how thoroughly his father’s conditions had been understood by the youthful genius and with what serious purpose he had set to work.
“I have read, Monsieur,” he says, “with the greatest astonishment, in your September number, that M. Lepaute, watchmaker to the Luxembourg, there announces as his invention, a new escapement for watches and clocks which he says he has the honor of presenting to the King and to the Academy.
“It is of too much importance to me in the interests of truth and of my reputation to permit him to claim this invention by remaining silent on the subject of a breach of faith.
“It is true that on the 23rd of July last, in the joy of my discovery I had the weakness to confide this escapement to M. Lepaute, allowing him to make use of it in a clock which M. de Julienne had ordered of him, and whose interior he assured me would be examined by no one, because of the arrangement for winding of his own invention, and he alone had the key to the clock.
“But how could I imagine that M. Lepaute would ever undertake to appropriate to himself this escapement which it will be seen I confided to him under the seal of secrecy?
“I