In this mezzotint print, James Watt sits in a small dark room, and he holds dividers on a table to the left of the composition. However, Watt has just turned in his chair to look over his shoulder at a pan of water issuing clouds of steam and working a piston set above it from the released pressure. An archway is behind the scene. The print is based on a famous painting by James Eckford Lauder at the Scottish National Gallery.