1787. A still larger boat followed in 1788, and another in 1790. The

latter demonstrated “with their increased speed and facility the value of Fitch’s invention,” and the last was run during the summer as a passenger boat between Philadelphia and Burlington at a speed of about eight miles an hour. She appears, from an illustration in Appleton’s “Cyclopædia of American Biography,” to have had three large paddles at the stern held in place by a projecting frame, a cross-beam at the extreme end of the frame supporting the rudder, which was placed a little distance behind the paddles. Consequent upon the Virginia patent which gave him the exclusive right of navigating “the Ohio River and its tributaries” he now designed a boat called the _Perseverance_, for freight and passengers on the Mississippi. But as, owing to a storm, she could not be got ready in time, the default clause in the patent became operative. Fitch’s associates now left him and his own resources were at an end, and after one or two other misfortunes he went to France in 1793. Needless to say, that country was in no mood then to entertain the idea of building steamboats. Finding no one ready to listen to his schemes, Fitch departed for London, having deposited his plans and specifications with the American Consul at Lorient. [Illustration: JOHN FITCH’S OARED PADDLE BOAT, 1786.] A rather curious thing then happened. “During this absence his (Fitch’s) drawings and papers were loaned by the Consul to Robert Fulton, then in Paris, in whose possession they were for several months.”[14] Until now, it must be remembered, Fulton had scarcely been heard of in connection with steamboats. [14] Appleton’s “Cyclopædia.” Meantime the ill-starred Fitch, unable to gain a hearing in England either, worked his passage back to America as a common sailor. In 1796, still determined to convince the public of the need for steamboats, he obtained a ship’s yawl, and fitted her with an engine and screw-propeller. With these he experimented in New York and, as usual, no one took any interest in the boat except the proprietor. In 1798 he made and tried upon a small stream near Bardstown a steamboat model measuring three feet in length, but a few weeks later he committed suicide by taking poison. His “Journal” contains the following passage: “The day will come when some more powerful man will get fame and riches from _my_ invention, but nobody will believe that poor John Fitch can do anything worthy of attention.” About twenty years later Fitch’s merits as an inventor were recognised by a Committee of the New York Legislature, which reported that “the steamboats built by Livingston and Fulton were in substance the invention patented to John Fitch in 1791, and Fitch during the term of his patent had the exclusive right to use the same in the United States.” Other inventors were at work. Fulton was in France thinking over the Fitch drawings which had been left there in 1793, trying a submarine boat on the Seine, and in 1801 making a variety of experiments under the auspices of the French Government. In America, one Samuel Morey, in 1790, built a strange boat with a paddle-wheel in the prow, constructed a steam-engine for her, and presently was voyaging on the Connecticut River at the break-neck speed of four miles an hour. A few years later he had another boat ready which could do five miles an hour, this boat having a wheel at the stern, and by request he took Chancellor R. Livingston and others for a trip in New York waters. The Chancellor, who had made a trip in Morey’s first boat at Orford, perceived two things, first, that the speed ought to be increased, and, second, that there was money in steamboats. He promised Morey 100,000 dollars, it is believed, if he could run a boat at eight miles an hour, and offered him 7000 dollars for a patent for the North River as far as Amboy for what had already been accomplished. The latter offer was not accepted. Morey in 1795 took out a patent for a steam-engine, in which the power was to be applied by crank motion, to propel boats of any size. Two years later he built a steamer which he placed on the Delaware, and propelled it by means of two paddle-wheels, one on either side. These wheels gave better results than any method which had yet been tried. When, a little later, Livingston went to France and became associated with Fulton as the financier of his enterprises, it is probable that the knowledge the former had gained of Morey’s work and Roosevelt’s experiments, and the latter of Fitch’s designs, proved extremely useful to both of them. Nicholas J. Roosevelt had attracted some attention by building a small wooden boat across which was an axle projecting over the sides, and carrying paddles, the contrivance being made to revolve by a light cord wound round the middle of the machine and attached to hickory and whalebone springs. In 1798 he recommended to Livingston a vertical wheel, and the Chancellor replied, “Vertical wheels are out of the question.” As late as 1802 Fulton favoured chains and floats, and it was not until after Livingston had communicated Roosevelt’s plan to him that they applied vertical wheels on Roosevelt’s system to their boat on the Seine. About this time also Livingston was engaged with John Stevens, his brother-in-law, and Nicholas J. Roosevelt on the construction of a steamboat to be used on the Hudson, the New York State Legislature having granted the necessary monopoly. The State required that the boat should attain a speed of three miles an hour, but this was not achieved. Livingston was appointed Minister to France in 1801, and was thus cut off from his two partners and brought into communication with Fulton. Another version is that the boat made three miles an hour, and that the State stipulated for four miles an hour. Robert Fulton, asserted to be an Irishman by descent, was born in Pennsylvania in 1765. When a boy he had witnessed the experiments made on the Delaware by John Fitch, but the problems of steam navigation were only a few of those which occupied his versatile genius. He came to England in 1786, and in 1794 invented a marble-sawing machine, a flax-spinning machine, a machine for ropemaking and a mechanical dredger. In 1795 he published a treatise on canal navigation in which he suggested a number of improvements in lock construction. In 1797 he went to France and was for some time occupied in designing and experimenting with submarine boats. He suggested to the French Government that his submarine would be useful in destroying the British Fleet. The Directory would have nothing to do with his plans, but when Napoleon became First Consul a Commission was appointed to investigate and report upon them. Beyond agitating the British Government for some time, however, while he experimented with torpedoes designed to destroy their fleet, and trying unsuccessfully to sell his invention to the French Government, nothing was accomplished. He came over to England in 1804 prepared to sell his invention to the British Government. From one point of view Fulton appears as the inventor of a horrible engine of destruction, ready to dispose of it to any country which would buy at a remunerative price. But there is another aspect of Fulton, and this is exhibited by his enthusiastic biographer Cadwallader D. Colden. According to this gentleman, Fulton took no interest “in the then existing contest” between England and France. England and France were to him possible torpedo buyers and their fleets possible torpedo victims. But his ideals included universal free trade and the liberty of the seas, and he looked upon the annihilation of naval armaments as a step in the right direction, as it would destroy what he called the war system of Europe. If this could be effected nations would engage in education, science, and a rivalry of peaceful arts. Fulton has been called a prophet and a statesman; but the doctrine that warfare will be ended by elaborating a more deadly means of destruction than has hitherto been known, coupled with the implied assertion that each invention is the last word in destruction, suggests at once conspicuous limitations in prophecy and statecraft. He never thought of torpedo destroyers. In 1793 Fulton corresponded with Lord Stanhope on the subject of steam navigation. Lord Stanhope was fully aware that invention was knocking at the door, for in a letter to Wilberforce he says: “This country is vulnerable in so many ways, the picture is horrid.... I know, and in a few weeks I shall prove, that ships of any size may be navigated so as to go without wind and even directly against both wind and waves.... The most important consequence which I draw from this stupendous fact is this. It will shortly render all the navies of the world (I mean military navies) no better than lumber. For what can ships do that are dependent on wind and weather against fleets that are wholly independent of either? Therefore the boasted superiority of the British Navy is no more. We must have a new one. The French and other nations will for the same reasons have the same.” He was himself an experimenter, and had been endeavouring to propel a boat by means of an appliance resembling a mechanical duck’s foot. The plans which Fulton submitted to him show a boat with an immense bow or spring fastened to a stumpy mast amidships, operating on a large paddle for which the rail at the extreme end of a raking stern acted as a fulcrum; a second plan shows the boat with a three-paddle revolving wheel at the side. When Livingston went to France in 1801, an enthusiast for steam navigation, and, what was more important, an enthusiast of considerable means, Fulton, whom he there met and financed, was stimulated to fresh exertions. By 1803 a boat to their joint account was built, 70 feet long and 8 feet beam. With this it was proposed to experiment on the Seine. But the machinery, which is said to have been made by Périer, who opposed the Marquis de Jouffroy, was too heavy for the hull. The night before the trial trip was to be made was stormy: the boat broke in half and sank. Notwithstanding this blow to their hopes the partners proceeded with their attempts. The machinery was recovered and found to be practically uninjured, and the hull was rebuilt more strongly. The trial trip took place in August 1803, when the boat made four and a half miles an hour. This was a very moderate speed and was disappointing to all concerned. Nevertheless a voyage by a steam-ship had been made, and it is strange that very little notice was taken of the event in France. Livingston wrote home to America and described it enthusiastically, and he and Fulton determined to build a boat for American waters as soon as Fulton should return thither. Shortly after this experiment Fulton visited Symington, who, as will be seen in the next chapter, had succeeded, with the assistance of Lord Dundas, in starting a little steamer, the _Charlotte Dundas_, on the Clyde as early as 1802. While this boat was being used on the Forth and Clyde Canal, Fulton introduced himself to Symington, whom he accompanied on a trip in the boat, the voyage being made solely on Fulton’s account.[15] The American took copious notes in a memorandum book and, to quote from Symington’s narrative, “after putting several pointed questions respecting the general construction and effect of the machine, which I answered in a most explicit manner, he jotted down particularly everything then described, with his own remarks upon the boat while moving with him on board along the canal; but he seems to have been altogether forgetful of this, as notwithstanding his fair promises, I never heard anything more of him until reading in a newspaper an account of his death.” [15] Knight’s “Cyclopædia.” [Illustration: JOHN STEVENS’ “PHŒNIX,” 1807.] Meantime Stevens, left to himself, had, in 1804, built a vessel propelled by twin screws which navigated the Hudson River. This vessel was remarkable in many ways. The boiler was tubular, and the screw was almost identical with the short four-threaded helix which many years afterwards was generally adopted. It is interesting to note that the screw propeller was tried so early, for it is generally believed that it was not used at all until many years after the introduction of paddles. The engine and boiler of Stevens’ boat are preserved at the Stevens Institute at Hoboken. After his death his son tried the engine and boiler in a boat, which, in the presence of a committee of the American Institute of New York, attained a speed of about nine miles an hour. Although the screw proved its suitability for propulsion, its superiority was not acknowledged, and for many years afterwards marine engineers confined their attention to the improvement of paddle-wheels and the engines for driving them. In 1807, with the assistance of his son Robert, Stevens built the paddle-wheel steamer _Phœnix_, which plied for six years on the Delaware. Dr. James Renwick of Columbia said that “the Stevenses were but a few days later” than Fulton “in moving a boat with the required velocity,” and that “being shut out of the waters of New York by the monopoly of Livingston and Fulton, Stevens conceived the bold design of conveying his boat, the _Phœnix_, to the Delaware by sea, and this boat, which was so near reaping the honour of first success, was the first to navigate the ocean by the power of steam.” The piston-rod of the _Phœnix_ was guided by slides instead of the parallel motion of the Watt engine, and the cylinder rested on the condenser. A point in which the superiority of the _Phœnix_ over the _Clermont_ was shown, was that the paddle-wheel of the _Phœnix_ had a guard beam, which the _Clermont_ lacked. The _Phœnix_ was taken to Philadelphia by sea by Robert Livingston Stevens, son of Robert Stevens. He was accompanied on this voyage by Moses Rogers, to whom the title of “Pioneer Steam Navigator” has been given by American historians, partly on account of this voyage and partly because he was on board the auxiliary sailing ship _Savannah_ on her memorable voyage to Europe.[16] [16] See p. 122. In 1806 Fulton returned to America, having ordered an engine to be made by Messrs. Boulton and Watt at Birmingham. He did not tell them what he proposed to do with it, but it was the engine for the first steamboat constructed by him for American voyages--the famous _Clermont_. After this engine was delivered in New York it remained in the Customs while Brownne, a shipbuilder, constructed the hull. In 1807 the boat made her first trip on the Hudson. The original dimensions of the _Clermont_ have been variously stated, the discrepancies being probably due to the alterations to which the vessel was subjected, and also to methods of measurement. From a letter which Fulton wrote it appears that the boat was 150 feet long and 13 feet wide, drawing 2 feet of water.[17] This was no doubt the over-all figure, as other data give slightly less lengths which would be on the water-line, or the inside measurements between stem and stern, both of which raked. [17] Reprinted in the _Nautical Gazette_, New York, August 22, 1907. Messrs. Millard and Kirby, of New York, who made most exhaustive researches into the history of the _Clermont_ with a view to the reproduction of that historical vessel at the centenary celebration at New York in September 1909, state that when Fulton worked out his displacement and wetted surface and resistance, his results corresponded with a boat of the dimensions just given, and no other figures could have given those results. On November 20, 1807, Fulton wrote to Livingston that the boat was so weak that she must have additional knees and timbers, new side timbers, deck beams and deck, new windows, and cabins altered; that she, perhaps, must be sheathed, her boiler taken out and a new one put in, her axles forged and ironwork strengthened. With all this work the saving of the hull would be of little consequence, particularly as many of her knees, bolts, timbers and planks could be used in the construction of a new boat. His opinion, therefore, was that a new hull should be built with knees and floor timbers of oak, bottom planks of two-inch oak and side planks of two-inch oak for 3 feet high. “She is to be 16 feet wide, 150 feet long; this will make her near twice as stiff as at present and enable us to carry a much greater quantity of sail. The 4 feet additional width will require 1146 lb. additional purchase at the engine, moving 2 feet a second or 15 double strokes a minute; this will be gained by raising the steam 5 lb. to the inch, as 24 inches the diameter of the cylinder gives 570 round inches at 3 lb. to the inch--1710 lb. purchase gained. To accomplish this work a good boiler and a commodious boat running our present speed, of a voyage in 30 hours, I think better and more productive to us than to gain one mile on the present boat.” The first _Clermont_ had a depth of hold of 7 feet. She had masts and sails but no wheel enclosures, no bulwarks, no berths in the cabin, and no covering over the boilers; this work being done, according to Fulton’s letter of August 29, 1807, after his return from the first trip. When she was altered on account of instability, in the winter 1807-8, she was widened to 16 feet on the bottom and 18 feet at the deck, which made her much stiffer. It was then that her poop was built up and various other improvements made. Her fly-wheels were outside the hull, placed forward of the paddles, and revolved the same way, and it is related that on a subsequent voyage one of the paddle-wheels becoming disabled, paddles were affixed to the fly-wheel and the voyage resumed. The _American Citizen_ of August 17, 1807, announced that: “Mr. Fulton’s ingenious Steamboat, invented with a View to the Navigation of The Mississippi from New Orleans upwards, Sails to-day from the North River near The State Prison to Albany, the Velosity of the Steamboat is calculated at four miles an hour; it is said that it will make a progress of two against The Current of The Mississippi, and if so it will certainly be a very valuable acquisition to the Commerce of the Western States.” An immense crowd assembled to witness the fiasco which was expected to mark the first experimental voyage of “Fulton’s Folly,” and jeered Fulton and his steamer unmercifully. But when the vessel moved into midstream under the power of her own engines, the crowd cheered as energetically as only a crowd can when it has been agreeably surprised and the appeal of facts to its chivalry is irresistible. “Dense volumes of smoke began to pour forth from the smokestack. The boiler began to hiss. At one o’clock the hawser was drawn in, the throttle opened, and to the accompaniment of the stertorous exhaust, the uncovered sidewheels began to quiver, then slowly to revolve. A hush fell on the spectators. Fulton’s own hand at the helm turned the bow. The _Clermont_ moved out into the stream, the steam connections hissing at the joints, the crude machinery thumping and groaning, the wheels splashing, and the smokestack belching like a volcano.... One honest countryman, after beholding the unaccountable object from the shore, ran home and told his wife he had ‘seen the devil on his way to Albany in a sawmill.’”[18] A passenger, recording the voyage, says a miller boarded the _Clermont_ at Haverstraw and said he “did not know about a mill going up stream and came to inquire about it.” [18] New York _Evening Sun_, July 1909. The boat itself was wedge-shaped at bow and stern, which were cut sharp to an angle of 60 degrees. She was almost wall-sided. She was flat-bottomed and keelless, leeway being prevented by two steering boards. Her tiller was at the back end of the after cabin so that it was difficult for the steersman to see ahead. The paddle-wheels, 15 feet in diameter, being uncovered, splashed tremendously, and drenched the passengers. A paddle-wheel had to be disconnected when it was desired to turn the vessel round. The _Clermont_ reached Chancellor Livingston’s residence at Clermont, 110 miles from New York, in 24 hours, against the wind, the average speed being 4·6 miles an hour. The running time for the whole journey to Albany of 150 miles was 32 hours, or nearly five miles an hour; the return trip was made in 32 hours, running time, the sails not being used on either occasion. An eye-witness as she passed up the river thus describes her: “It was in the early autumn of the year 1807 that a knot of villagers was gathered on a high bluff, just opposite Poughkeepsie, on the west bank of the Hudson, attracted by the appearance of a strange-looking craft, which was slowly making its way up the river. Some imagined it to be a sea monster, whilst others did not hesitate to express their belief that it was a sign of the approaching judgment. What seemed strange in the vessel was the substitution of a lofty and strange black smoke-pipe rising from the deck, instead of the gracefully tapered masts that commonly stood on the vessels navigating the stream, and, in place of the spars and rigging, the curious play of the working beam and piston, and the slow turning and splashing of the huge and naked paddle-wheels, met their astonished gaze. The dense clouds of smoke, as they rose wave upon wave, added still more to the wonder of the rustics. This strange-looking craft was the _Clermont_ on her trial trip to Albany; and, of the little knot of villagers above mentioned, the writer, then a boy in his eighth year, with his parents, formed a part, and I well remember the scene, one so well fitted to impress a lasting picture upon the mind of a child accustomed to watch the vessels that passed up and down the river. On her return trip, the curiosity she excited was scarcely less intense--the whole country talked of nothing but the sea monster, belching forth fire and smoke. “The fishermen became terrified and rowed homeward, and they saw nothing but destruction devastating their fishing grounds; whilst the wreaths of black vapours, and rushing noise of the paddle-wheels, foaming with the stirred-up waters, produced great excitement amongst the boatmen, until it was more intelligent than before; for the character of that curious boat, and the nature of the enterprise she was pioneering had been ascertained.” According to Colden, those who saw the _Clermont_ at night described her as “a monster moving on the water, defying the winds and the tide, and breathing flames and smoke.” She had, he proceeds to say, “the most terrific appearance from other vessels which were navigating the river when she was making her passage. The first steamboats, as others yet do, used dry pine-wood for fuel, which sends forth a column of ignited vapour, many feet above the flue, and whenever the fire is stirred a galaxy of sparks fly off, which in the night have an airy, brilliant, and beautiful appearance. This uncommon light first attracted the attention of crews of other vessels. Notwithstanding the wind and tide were adverse to its approach, they saw with astonishment that it was rapidly coming towards them; and when it came so near that the noise of the machinery and the paddles were heard, the crews in some instances shrunk beneath their decks from the terrific sight; and others left their vessels to go on shore; while others again prostrated themselves, and besought Providence to protect them from the approach of the horrible monster which was marching on the tides, and lighting its path by the fires which it vomited.” After the improvements had been made in the _Clermont_ she entered in the spring of 1809 upon the regular work for which she was intended--the day service between New York and Albany. The guards and paddle-boxes, which were mere temporary structures, were made substantial and permanent, and the cabins were rearranged and refitted in the most beautiful manner. The _Clermont_, said Professor Renwick, “thus converted into a floating palace, gay with ornamental painting, gilding, and polished woods, commenced her course of passages for the second year in the month of April.”[19] [19] The “Master, Mate, and Pilot.” When rebuilt she was christened the _North River_ and maintained the service alone until October, when a second Fulton boat, the _Car of Neptune_, was launched. She was a larger boat, and ran continuously until 1817, and the other vessels which were added to the little fleet also proved successful. The complete list of Fulton’s steamboats would include also the _Rariton_ (1809), _New Orleans_ (1811), _Paragon_, _Firefly_, a Jersey ferryboat, and _Camden_ (1812), _Washington_ and a York ferryboat (1813), _Richmond_, a Nassau ferryboat, _Fulton_, _Vesuvius_, and _Demologos_, a warship (1814), _Aetna_, _Buffalo_, and _Mute_ (1815), _Olive Branch_, _Empress of Russia_, and _Chancellor Livingston_ (1816). Fulton and Livingston’s enterprise was a financial success almost from the first, and naturally others thought to share in it; as they could not join the pioneers they determined to rival them. One of the chief of these was a Captain Elihu S. Bunker, who maintained a line of sailing sloops between Hudson City and New York. The steamers were taking the wind out of his sails in more senses than one, and not liking the prospect of being becalmed, financially, he determined to go in for steam. A syndicate of capitalists of Albany backed him. The fact that Livingston and Fulton had been already granted an absolute monopoly for navigating the waters of the State of New York by steam deterred them not a whit. They ordered two boats, to be about the size of the _Clermont_, and called them the _Hope_ and _Perseverance_. They were each 149 feet in length, 25 feet beam inside the paddles, and had a depth of 7 feet 7 inches. [Illustration: ROBERT FULTON’S “CLERMONT,” 1807.] Legal proceedings quickly followed, Livingston and Fulton having their work cut out to defend their monopoly. How like these boats were to the Fulton boats is evident from the affidavit of Charles Brownne, the builder of the _Clermont_. He says that he has “examined the steamboats _Hope_ and _Perseverance_ and they are not built like any vessels which navigate by wind or oars on any of our waters, or any foreign waters that he knows of. That said steamboats being more than Six the length of their breadth[20] of beam and flat at bottom are not calculated to navigate with sails only. And that the first boats of such make of the said steamboats which he ever saw or heard of was built by him from drawings and directions given to him by Robert Fulton and constructed to be navigated by steam and wind, and which boats are now known by the name of _North River_ and _Car of Neptune_ Steamboats: This deponent also saith that the water wheels; the guards round the water wheels, the covering to the water wheels; the steps from the wheel guards to enter the row-boats, space on the guards for wood for the engine, bins or lockers in the wheel guards and necessaries on the fore part of the wheel guards, are exact copies from the Boats built by him for Livingston and Fulton, and such water wheels, wheel guards and conveniences he has never known or heard of to any other kind of boat or vessel. This deponent further saith that in the said Steamboat _Hope_ the manner of arranging the rudder with a perpendicular iron bar on its after part, and leading from its wheel ropes, along the sides of the boat to a steering wheel before the Chimney of the Boiler and to a Station above the place of the engineer and fireman, is an exact copy from the boats of Livingston and Fulton. This deponent objected to this mode of steering at the time the said Fulton proposed it, believing it to be impracticable, and he does not know of a like mode of steering to any other kind of vessel. This deponent also says that the mode of placing the main mast far forward, and the mizzen mast so far aft, as to leave a convenient space between the two, which shall not be incommoded by ropes, booms, or yards, and afford room for spreading an awning for the comfort and convenience of passengers is the same exactly in the said _Hope_ Steamboat as in the boats built by him for Livingston and Fulton. That this mode of placing masts so far apart, to the best of his knowledge, is not known in any other kind of vessel, and would not answer for a vessel intended to work with wind only, without the aid of steam, but in union with steam has been proved by three years’ experience on the _North River_ Steamboat to succeed perfectly well. This deponent further says that the form and make of the said _Hope_ and _Perseverance_ steamboats, their wheels, wheel guards, manner of steering, mode of placing the masts and rigging, mode of arranging the awning, arrangements of the Cabins and kitchen, suspending their row-boats from the sides instead of from the stern, as is usual, are in his opinion in all these combinations and arrangement, exact copies from the _Car of Neptune_ Steamboat, _and more like her than she is like the_ North River _Steamboat_ which was first built, and further this deponent saith not.”[21] [20] _Sic_: probably means “their length was rather more than six times their beam.” [21] “Steamboats on the Hudson,” in the “Master, Mate, and Pilot,” October 1909. The _Hope_ and _Perseverance_ ran throughout the season of 1811 with passengers and freight, between New York and Albany, and met with as much of the public patronage as did the other boats. The courts, however, decided that Captain Bunker and his supporters were acting illegally, and gave the drastic order that their steamers should be confiscated and handed over to Livingston and Fulton, who did not run them but had them broken up. Writing in 1838, in regard to his early experiments, to the Secretary of the Treasury at Washington, Captain Bunker described an incident which unfortunately for American steamship records does not stand alone. The Captain was undoubtedly fortunate that matters were no worse. “In 1811,” he says, “I had command of the steamboat _Hope_ plying between New York and Albany. The engine and boilers were made and put in by Robert McQueen. On the second trip from New York, while Mr. McQueen’s foreman had still charge of the works on board (they not having been delivered as completed), this man had a gang of his own men from the shop, and, while proving the machinery, had a man that he was instructing to become engineer of the boat. While on the passage, off Esopus meadows, something appeared to be wrong in the fire-room (which was in charge of a miserable drunken fireman) and the engine moving very slowly. I found on examination, that there was not a drop of water in either of the boilers, and that both of them were red-hot, as well as the flues, and must have been so for at least half an hour. The heat was great enough to melt down five solder-joints of steam-pipe, which was made of copper. I immediately started the forcing pump myself, not thinking that there could be any danger in the operation; the effect of which was a crackling in the boiler as the water met the hot iron, the sound of which was like that often heard in a blacksmith’s shop when water is thrown upon a piece of hot iron. I cannot, therefore, believe for a single moment that explosions are produced, to such a degree as I have before recited, by throwing cold water into a red-hot boiler. In the way above described, I cooled down both of the boilers, during which time neither of them jumped out of its place; nor do I see how it could be possible for such an effect to be produced, having always been of opinion that there could be no other cause for a boiler to burst than the pressure of steam inside, and not gas produced by letting cold water or lukewarm water into it; for I deem it impossible for a red-hot boiler to contain heat enough to explode with any quantity of water that might be suddenly thrown into it. Besides, it must be remembered that the supply-pipes are connected with the bottom of all steam-boilers, or are very near to the bottom; therefore, instead of producing explosion, the forcing of cold or lukewarm water into hot water must have the tendency to cool it. For instance, I have known engineers to keep off their feed as long as they possibly dared, when running with another boat, knowing that as soon as they began to feed, the steam would fall, especially if they could not get a full supply of steam for the engine.”[22] [22] The “Master, Mate, and Pilot,” Vol. II. No. 5. So far as the Hudson was concerned the decision of the courts crushed Captain Bunker, and frightened off any other possible trespassers on the monopoly. But Bunker had determined to become a steamship owner, and being crowded out of the Hudson he started a line of steamers as near New York City as he could, the Long Island Sound Line. The first of his vessels he named after his late opponent Fulton. She was built in 1813 and plied for the whole of her first season in 1814 on the Hudson River, as, the United States being then at war with England, it was feared that she would be captured if she ventured up the Sound. [Illustration: THE “PARAGON.” BUILT 1811.] At the time the Fulton boats had to meet Bunker’s opposition, the third Fulton steamboat, the _Paragon_, made its first appearance on the river. She was both faster and larger than her predecessors. She was fitted with two masts, one stepped very far forward, and the other very far aft. The foremast carried an immense square foresail with a little square topsail above it, and there was also a large triangular sail carried on the stay from the end of the bowsprit to the cap of the lower mast. The aftermast carried an ordinary trysail or mizzen. The vessel had a large rudder and was steered from amidships, according to a contemporary print. The following year another Fulton steamer, the _Firefly_, came on the scene. She was a small vessel, only 81 feet in length, and though designed for the lower river service, was used elsewhere as occasion demanded. Fulton by this time was himself planning the placing of steamers on other rivers, and in 1814 the _Richmond_ was launched from his designs for the James River in Virginia. The British-American War at this time rendered it unsafe to send her south, and as the _North River_, late _Clermont_, was about worn out by now, the _Richmond_ took her place. Fulton seems to have been associated to some extent with Bunker, for the latter’s boat, _Fulton_, was designed by Fulton himself. She was a sloop-rigged vessel with a single mast stepped well forward, and made considerable use of sails. She was 134 feet in length and 26 feet beam, and had a large square engine-house that extended rather above the sides of her paddle-boxes. Hitherto all the American steamers had been of the wall-sided, flat-bottomed type inaugurated by the _Clermont_. The _Fulton_ was the first steamer to be constructed with a round bottom like a sailing ship. Fulton was also interested in steamboats on the Mississippi and other western waters. He and Nicholas Roosevelt were associated in 1809 in this project, and in 1811 the steamer _New Orleans_ was built. It was the pioneer boat of the service, and descended the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers from Pittsburg to New Orleans in fourteen days. In 1817 the _Chancellor Livingston_ appeared on the Hudson and in her general equipment marked a decided improvement in every respect upon anything that had gone before. She was the finest vessel without exception that Fulton and Livingston ever possessed. Her designer was Henry Eckford, one of the leading naval architects in America. She was, moreover, the biggest steamboat which had been built in the world, as she was of over 500 tons burden. The building of this boat was supervised at first by Fulton himself, but he died before it was completed. The _Chancellor Livingston_ was three-masted, and fore-and-aft rigged throughout, and carried in addition a large square sail on the foremast. She had three funnels which were placed forward of the paddle-boxes and between the fore and main masts. Her engines were of the steeple type. She was square-sterned, and not only carried a deck-house, but the roof of the deck-house was extended to form a square deck or gallery, and above this again were a smaller deck-house and a large awning, so that passengers on either deck were amply protected from the weather. The gallery, at the stern, was the same shape as the stern itself. It was supported by stanchions, and carried as far forward as the paddle-boxes. Early pictures of this vessel represent her as having portholes along the sides of the hull abaft the paddles, from which it would appear that in the body of the ship itself there was also passenger accommodation. She was therefore the first vessel to have three decks devoted to passengers. The first trip of this boat was made towards the end of March 1817, between New York and Newburgh, the 65 miles being covered in less than nine hours, in only three of which was the tide running with the ship. Coming back she did the distance in eight hours fifteen minutes, for the most part against wind and tide. Her cost complete was 110,000 dollars. This boat was not allowed to lie idle, and a statement was published in December 1821 that the _Chancellor Livingston_ made during the season of that year “170 trips from New York to Albany. Allowing the distance to be 150 miles the aggregate will exceed 25,000 miles, which would more than have carried her round the globe. We presume the _Richmond_ has performed the same number of trips, and when it is considered that these boats are generally filled with passengers, some idea may be formed of the extent of travel on the North River.” Already excursions were very popular. The _Chancellor Livingston_ took excursionists once a week during July and August as far as Sandy Hook. The same year, 1821, the steamer _Franklin_ took passengers to the fishing banks twice weekly, and the _Olive Branch_ of the Philadelphia Line gave its patrons what its owners called “a sail around Staten Island and turtle feast,” and it was added that “a fine green turtle will be cooked, and a band of music provided,” all for one dollar seventy-five cents. Captain Bunker, who had the _Enterprise_ built in 1818 at Hartford, Connecticut, brought her into the New York service in 1821, for an excursion starting at half-past four in the morning from the East River for Sands Point. This is one of the earliest records of a steamer built elsewhere coming to New York waters to enter upon the local trade. Henry Eckford also planned the steamer _Robert Fulton_, which in 1822 made the first successful steam voyage from New York to New Orleans, and thence to Havana, in which trade she was afterwards engaged regularly. The _Robert Fulton_ then passed into the possession of the Brazilian naval authorities, who turned her into a sailing ship and she became the fastest warsloop in the Brazilian navy. The _Firefly_ was the first steamer to get round Point Judith, on the Rhode Island shore, and reach Newport from New York. This was May 26, 1817, and the voyage lasted twenty-eight hours. The sailing packets on the route, as usual, resented her incursion, and when the wind was favourable they usually outsailed her. The competition grew so great between the steamer and the sailers that the latter made the typical American sporting proposal not to charge passengers for the voyage between New York and Newport if they did not reach port before the steamer. Although the size of the American river steamers had been steadily increasing, there had not been a great acceleration in the matter of speed. Even at the time of Fulton’s death few, if any, American river steamers exceeded an average of seven miles an hour for the trip. Robert Livingston Stevens, son of John Stevens, built about that time (1813) the _Philadelphia_, which attained an average speed of eight miles. Speed was a question to which he devoted considerable attention, for he realised its importance, and nearly every vessel he turned out was an improvement upon its predecessor. The inventions and improvements which he introduced inaugurated a new era of steamboat construction. Of the fate which overtook some of these early vessels, it may be noted that the _Clermont_ died of premature old age, the _Car of Neptune_ was broken up, the _Paragon_ went to the bottom, and the _Hope_, the _Perseverance_, the _Firefly_, and the _Richmond_ were broken up. [Illustration: THE “PHILADELPHIA.” BUILT 1826.] According to evidence given before a Select Committee of the House of Commons in 1817 by Mr. Seth Hunt of Louisiana, there were then ten steam vessels running between New York and Albany, two between New York and Connecticut ports, four or five between New York and New Jersey ports, besides ferryboats on the Hudson and East Rivers. There were also steamers on the Delaware, between Philadelphia and Trenton, Newcastle, and Wilmington; also steamers from Baltimore to Norfolk, Virginia, which crossed the estuary of the Chesapeake. Steamers had been to New London and New Hartford. The _Powhatan_ steamer of New York was three days exposed to a gale in the open sea, after which it arrived at Norfolk, Virginia, and thence steamed up the James River to Richmond. At that time, according to this witness, there were on the Mississippi two steamers, the _Etna_ and _Vesuvius_, which were each of 450 tons, carried 280 tons of merchandise, 100 passengers, and 700 bales of cotton. Towards the middle of the last century numbers of steamboats were placed on the coastal and river services from New York. The Fulton ferryboats _Union_ and _William Cutting_ were both built in 1827; and in the following year the _De Witt Clinton_ was built in Albany for the passenger service between New York and Albany; she was 571 tons gross, more than any of her contemporaries. A notable vessel, then the fastest steamboat ever built, was the _Lexington_, which began to run in 1835 between Providence and New York. As the railway companies were formed about the same time, the competition between the steamboat companies and the railways was lively and fares were reduced with American thoroughness. The _Narragansett_ arrived at Providence in October 1836. She was fitted with a 300-horse-power horizontal engine, which was too heavy for her, for on her trial trip she rolled over with the directors of the company and their guests on board. Fortunately no lives were lost. In 1838, the _John W. Richmond_ appeared as the rival of the _Lexington_ and there were many exciting races between the two, but two years later the _Richmond_ was sold for employment elsewhere. The _Lexington_ was burnt in 1840, and the _Richmond_ met with a similar fate three years later. The Fall River Line was established in 1847 and has maintained the service to the present day. All these steamers were built of wood, and as they increased in size they developed a marked tendency to “sag,” that is, drop in the middle, or to “hog,” that is, drop at the ends. This tendency was overcome by an ingenious system of stump-masts and strutts, and iron ties, invented by Colonel Stevens. There are various methods of applying these stiffeners, and the peculiar framework of wooden arches and stump-masts which appears on so many American river steamers is due to the necessity of employing one or other of these systems for strengthening purposes. In some of the later vessels (as in the _De Witt Clinton_) these ties are put into the framework of the superstructure. In construction, the development of American steamers on inland waters since Fulton’s time has proceeded on entirely different lines from those which marked the progress of river navigation in Great Britain. American river steamers were designed not only to cope with the traffic in narrower and shallower places, but to carry whatever was necessary in deeper waters, and at the same time get through the more difficult places somehow. The great distances to be travelled on the American rivers rendered necessary the provision of vessels carrying large quantities of cargo and extensive accommodation for passengers, whilst the bars occurring at intervals in the beds of the rivers made it compulsory that the vessels should be of light draught. The construction of English river steamers, on the other hand, has been conditioned by the comparative narrowness of the English rivers and the lowness of the many bridges which span them. [Illustration: THE “DE WITT CLINTON.” BUILT 1828.] The Fall River Line boats were the pioneers of the modern type of Hudson River steamers, the first of them being the famous _Bay State_, plying between New York and Fall River. She was 315 feet long and 40 feet beam and of 1500 tons burden. Her engines were of 1500 horse-power. The _Bay State_, being intended for Long Island Sound work, was much more strongly built than those boats which were confined to the Hudson River Line. This vessel was both the largest and fastest craft of her day. She ran the distance from Fall River to New York in nine hours fifteen minutes, including a stop at Newport. In 1864 she was dismantled, and her hull was converted into a barge, her machinery being placed in a new steamer named _Old Colony_. Vessels followed each other in rapid succession, but although rival companies sprang up with considerable frequency, few of them lasted very long and their boats, if good enough, were sometimes acquired by the Fall River Company. One of the most dangerous competitors was the Merchants’ Shipping Company, which controlled fifteen steamers, and for which William H. Webb, the famous American shipbuilder, constructed those two historic boats, the _Bristol_ and the _Providence_. The line lost two or three of its steamers in rapid succession, and had to suspend payment. The _Bristol_ and _Providence_ had each two hundred and twenty-three state-rooms. They were lighted by gas throughout, and were afterwards steam-heated. Each boat carried a band of music, and for the first time on an American merchant vessel the officers and crew were in uniform. In 1883 the first iron steamboat in Long Island Sound, the _Pilgrim_, was built. She had a double hull divided into ninety-six water-tight compartments. The _Puritan_ followed her. The _Plymouth_ was launched in 1890, and was burnt in dock ten years later, and in August of the following year the present _Plymouth_ was launched. All these vessels were side-wheelers, the later ones being of steel, and having a speed of twenty miles an hour. One of the finest vessels now afloat is the _Commonwealth_. She is 456 feet in length, 35 feet moulded breadth, 96 feet breadth over the guards, and has a depth of hull of 22 feet. She has sleeping accommodation for 2000 persons. Like all steamers on the Fall River Line, the _Commonwealth_ is built of steel. Seven doorless bulkheads extend to the main deck. The hull is double, and the space between the bottoms is divided into a great many water-tight compartments. She has also collision bulkheads on each side at the guards and a bulkhead athwart ship. Her engine is of the double inclined compound type, with two high-pressure cylinders 96 inches in diameter, all having a common stroke of piston of 9 feet 6 inches. The wheels are of the feathering type with curved steel buckets. Besides the usual auxiliary steam pumps, there is a large pump for use only on the fire-sprinkler system. Her speed is twenty-two miles an hour. During the nineteenth century there was an equally striking development among the steamers of the various lines on the Hudson River. The _Empire of Troy_, to distinguish her from another steamer called the _Empire_ built in the ’forties and belonging to a rival line, was then the largest river steamer in the world, being 307 feet over all and of 936 tons register. She was quickly superseded by the _Hendrick Hudson_ of the Albany Line, which was the first Hudson River steamer to exceed a thousand tons. This in turn was eclipsed by the _Oregon_. The _St. John_, of 2645 tons, built in 1863, was the first to exceed 2000 tons, The _Adirondack_, of 3644 tons, was placed on the river in 1896, and in 1904 the _C. W. Morse_, of 4307 tons, appeared. [Illustration: THE “WILLIAM CUTTING.” BUILT 1827.] The Hudson River boats, after the first or experimental types of vessel, have always been famous for their speed and beauty no less than their comfort. One of the most famous of them all was the _Alida_. Two others, which raced occasionally, were the _Oregon_ and the _C. Vanderbilt_, one notable contest in which they engaged being in 1847, for a stake of 1000 dollars. On the way back the _Oregon_ ran short of fuel, whereupon the owners threw into the furnaces the furniture and everything else that would burn which they could lay hands on. The time of the run was 3 hours 15 minutes, which gave an average speed of 20 miles an hour. After the heroic sacrifice made by the Oregonians, it is satisfactory to learn that the _Oregon_ won by 400 yards. The _Alida_ and the _Hendrick Hudson_ raced from New York to Albany, the former doing the voyage in 7 hours 55 minutes, the latter boat being 15 minutes longer on the voyage. The scheduled time of the present Hudson River Day Line steamers over the same water is 9 hours 30 minutes, from which it would appear that the boats of sixty years ago were as capable of fast travelling as are their palatial successors of the present day. One of these, a second _Hendrick Hudson_, was launched on the Hudson in 1907, a hundred years from the day of the _Clermont’s_ first voyage up the river. [Illustration: THE “MARY POWELL.”] The decade from 1840 to 1850 was the golden age for steamboat proprietors on the Hudson River, as there was then no railroad competition, though there were several competitive steam-ship companies. In 1849 there were no less than twenty steamers on the route between New York and Albany, and the fares were cut as low as 12¹⁄₂ cents for the 145 miles. One of the steamers on the river in the ’forties was the _Norwich_. A few years later she was converted into a tug-boat, and up to the end of 1909 was still in active service. She has been repaired so often, however, that not much of her original hull is left, but her first engine is still in use. A steamer which is still held in affectionate memory by all frequenters of the Hudson River, the celebrated _Mary Powell_, was launched in 1861, and was never eclipsed in speed by any vessel until the modern torpedo-boats were built. She frequently covered 27 miles an hour. This remarkable boat came from the New Jersey yards of Messrs M. A. Allison. Originally she was 260 feet in length, but in 1874 she was increased to 286 feet, and again in 1897 to 300 feet. Her paddle-wheels were 31 feet in diameter, with 26 floats to the wheel, each float being 10¹⁄₂ feet long by 1 foot 9 inches wide and dipping 3¹⁄₂ feet. One vessel, the _Glen Cove_, attained notoriety if not fame by being the first to carry that novel musical instrument known as the calliope. Fortunately for New Yorkers, the innovation was not popular. The machine consisted of a large steam chest, on the top of which were arranged a number of valves according to the number of whistles to be blown. As a powerful calliope could be heard for a distance of some miles, and as the instrument frequently consisted of from eight to twelve whistles, and the selection performed upon it was of the “Shall we gather at the river” variety, it cannot be said that the English have been the only people to take their pleasures sadly. Three boats plying in New York Bay carried these excruciating instruments. The _Glen Cove_ was sold with her calliope to ply on the James River in Virginia, and was sunk by the Confederates during the Civil War. The most aggressive calliope was carried on the _Armenia_. It had thirty-four powerful whistles. [Illustration: THE “HENDRICK HUDSON” (HUDSON RIVER DAY LINE), 1906.] In 1860, the _Daniel Drew_, a long and very narrow boat, reduced the time of the voyage to Albany to seven hours twenty minutes. It is impossible for the heavy steamers of the present day to travel on the up-river stages as fast as the lightly built boats of that time, but in the deeper waters of the lower river they are faster than the lighter vessels. A steamer of the latest type is the _Robert Fulton_, built for the Day Line by the New York Shipbuilding Company of Camden, N.J., and the W. and A. Fletcher Company of Hoboken. Her trials took place exactly 116 days after her keel was laid, and she began to run in 1909. The development of the steam-ships on the lakes was no less remarkable than on the sea-coasts. At the outset the boats were of wood, which was gradually superseded first by iron and then by steel, and with the