She was a popular vessel, and her captain was deservedly held in high respect.

Meantime numerous charges and slanders were circulated, to the prejudice of Mr. Fulton, denying that he was entitled to any credit for any invention, any discovery, any improvement, or any new application of any principle in steam navigation; he was accused of being a plagiarist and an impostor. These he bore in silence.

On February 11th, 1809, Mr. Fulton took out his first patent for his inventions in navigation by steam, and on February 9, 1811, he obtained a second patent for some improvements in his boats and machinery.

In 1811 he made known his plan for "River Ferry Steamboats." The difficulties which then were connected with the ferries to and from the city of New York as well as elsewhere, and the delays, dangers, labor, and expense attending the modes then of conducting them, will no doubt be remembered. Passengers were usually transported in open boats or barges, and vehicles, horses, animals, and other freight in open lighters. It often required most of the day, and at great hazard and difficulty, to get a carriage and horses

The immediate consequence of the exposition of Mr. Fulton's plan was the formation of a company to establish a steamboat ferry from the west end of Cortlandt street, at the river, to Paulus Hook (now Jersey City). In that year and in 1812 two steamboats (the "York" and "Jersey "), under Mr. Fulton's direction, were built as ferry-boats for crossing the Hudson river, and soon after one of the same description for the East river.

These boats were called twin boats, each of them being two complete hulls united by a deck or bridge. They were sharp at both ends, and moved equally well with either end foremost, so that they could cross and recross without turning about. He contrived floating docks for the reception of those boats and a means by which the boats were brought to them without a shock. To attain that end he subjected himself to much labor, expense, and difficulty. In the end a vast deal of the contrivance was found to be unnecessary, for a practiced pilot can and does with ease so guide and graduate the momentum of the vessel as to bring her in gently and without any shock at all.

This was one of the many evidences of the extreme caution of

of Mr. Fulton in his arrangements in steam navigation. For a long time the river steamers, in stopping to land and receive passengers, usually employed a row-boat or barge, under the belief that it was dangerous for a steamer to run to the dock. Now, experience has proved that the safest and easiest way is for the steamer to go to the dock, and not to use the row-boat or barge, the pilots being able, without danger or difficulty, to bring her gently to the landing-place.

In reference to the ferry-boats Mr. Fulton, in a publication respecting them, says:

"In a new combination of this kind it is not to be expected that everything should work to the best advantage in a first experiment or that every requisite should be foreseen. The boat which I am now constructing will have some important improvements, particularly in the power of the engine to overcome strong ebb tides, from which, again, other improvements will be made, as in all new inventions. The present boat crosses the river, which is a mile and a half broad, in fifteen minutes; the average time. twenty minutes. She has had in her at one time eight four-wheel carriages, twenty-nine horses, and one hundred passengers, and could have taken three hundred more."

Mr. Colden, the biographer of Mr. Fulton, well observes: steam navigation could have been applied to no other purpos than to move these floating bridges over such streams as the cross, where other bridges are impracticable, he who introduced it well deserves to be ranked among the greatest benefactors mankind"

In the trial trip of the "Nassau," the first steam ferry-boat and from Brooklyn, Mr. Stoudinger, an engineer of great ability 11 the employ of Mr. Fulton, by an accident got entangled in the machinery and was killed. The event caused a sad cloud for some time over the spirits of Mr. Fulton, for he respected and esteemed the lost engineer very much.

In 1812, on the Delaware, the Jersey ferry-boat "Camden," navigated by steam, and to run from Camden to and from Philadelphia, was built. She ran on that ferry for a long time.

During the time which elapsed between the period of his return to the United States and the time of his death he was incessantly employed in his projects, experiments, and studies in relation to submarine and inland navigation and torpedo war.

In his system or plan of torpedo war he so engaged the attention of the United States government that in 1806 it authorized an expenditure of money under his direction in the prosecution of experiments on that subject, which experiments were accordingly prosecuted; and on July 20, 1807, one of them was successful. By the explosion of a torpedo on that day in the harbor of New York a brig was blown up-in truth, annihilated.

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About 1810 he published his works on Torpedo War or Submarine Explosions," adopting as his motto: "The liberty of the seas will be the happiness of the earth."

In that year an act was passed by Congress appropriating $5,000 to be expended at his discretion, under the directions of the Secretary of the Navy, for trying practically the uses of torpedoes.

In September Mr. Fulton exhibited to a number of gentlemen appointed by the government to represent it the models of his engines and apparatus, and submitted to them his explanations of his plans and as to the way he proposed to use them; and also his invention "The Cable Cutter." The experiment was made on the brig "Argus" at the Navy Yard, in the harbor of New York, in that month and in the succeeding month of October, on which occasion every appliance for her protection was employed by the navy officers and agents of the government.

Among them there was a diversity of opinion as to the result, although Mr. Fulton retained full confidence in the successful practicability of his torpedo inventions.

Thereafter he ceased to give much attention to this class of inventions until the war of 1812. Then he conceived the idea of forming submarine batteries and instituted experiments to try the effect of discharging cannon, loaded with ball, under water. The demonstration was to his mind satisfactory, and, moreover, the experiment gave rise to his conception of A Steam Man-of

war.

In March, 1814, Congress, on the application of the officers of the government and actuated by the earnest solicitation of many influential citizens of the city of New York, passed an act authorizing the President of the United States to cause to be built, equipped, and employed, one or more floating batteries for the defense of the waters of the United States. The building of the vessel was committed to the Coast and Harbor Defense Associa