India, April 26 -- In 1719, Britain passed the Artificers Act. Skilled workers who accepted employment abroad faced forfeiture of property. If they persisted, loss of citizenship. Britain had spent half a century building the mechanical genius of the Industrial Revolution and had no intention of exporting it. The law ran for over a hundred years. It did not entirely work. Samuel Slater, a mill supervisor from Derbyshire, memorised the exact specifications of Arkwright's water frame, emigrated to Rhode Island in 1789 dressed as a farm labourer, and built the first water-powered cotton mill in the United States. The British called him a traitor. The Americans named him the Father of the Industrial Revolution. Horace had a phrase for this. M...