nary navigation of the river, and from defects in her machinery; the greatest of which was, having her water-wheel shafts of cast iron, which was insufficient to sustain the great power applied to them. The wheels also were hung without any support for the outward end of the shaft, which is now supplied by what are called the wheel-guards.

At the session of 1808, a law was passed to prolong the time of the exclusive right to thirty years; it also declared combinations to destroy the boat, or wilful attempts to injure her, public offences, punishable by fine and imprisonment.

Notwithstanding her misfortunes, the boat continued to run as a packet, always loaded with passengers, for the remainder of the summer. In the course of the ensuing winter she was enlarged, and in the spring of 1808, she again commenced running as a packet-boat, and continued it through the season. Several other boats were soon built for the Hudson river, and also for steamboat companies formed in different parts of the United States.

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

It having been found that the laws, granting to Livingston and Fulton exclusive privileges, were insufficient to secure their enjoyment, the legislature of New York, in 1811, passed a supplementary act, giving certain summary remedies against those who should contravene the protecting laws. The act, however, excepts two boats which were then navigating the Hudson, and one which ran on Lake Champlain in opposition to Livingston and Fulton: without these exceptions, the law, as to these boats, would have been ex post facto. In respect to these, therefore, the parties were left to the same remedies as before passing the last act. The opposition boats on the Hudson, were at first to have been propelled by a pendulum, which some thought would give a greater power than steam; but on launching their vessel, they found the machinery was not so easily moved as when she was on the stocks. Having found by experiment that a pendulum would not supply the place of steam, and knowing no other way of applying steam than that they saw practised in the Fulton boats, they adopted all their machinery, with some small alterations, with no other view than to give a pretence for claiming to be the inventors of improvements on steamboats.

Messrs. Livingston and Fulton attempted to vindicate their rights, and to stop these boats, by an application to the Circuit Court of the United States for an injunction; but the judge decided that he

had not jurisdiction of the case. They then made application to the Court of Chancery of the state, but the Chancellor, after hear. ing an argument for several days, refused to grant an injunction. An appeal to the Court of Errors, composed of the Senate of the state, and the five judges of the Supreme Court, unanimously reversed the decision of the Chancellor, and ordered a perpetual injunction; so that the boats could no more be moved with steam, than they could by a pendulum. The merits of the members of this Pendulum Company were contrasted with those of Fulton, by Mr. Emmet, the counsel for the appellants. He described them as "men who never wasted health and life in midnight vigils, and painful study, who never dreamt of science in the broken slumbers of an exhausted mind, and who bestowed on the construction of a steamboat just as much mathematical calculation and philosphical research, as in the purchase of a sack of wheat, or a barrel of ashes."

About the year 1812, two steam ferry-boats were built under the directions of Mr. Fulton for crossing the Hudson river, and one of the same description for the East river. These boats were what are 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 crossed and re-crossed without losing any time by turning about. He contrived, with great ingenuity, floating docks for the reception of these boats, and a means by which they are brought to them without a shock.

From the time the first boat was put in motion till the death of Mr. Fulton, the art of navigating by steam was fast advancing to that perfection of which he believed it capable: for some time the boat performed each successive trip with increased speed, and every year improvements were made. The last boat built by him was invariably the best, the most convenient, and the swiftest.

The following anecdote shows the quickness of apprehension, as well as the practical knowledge of Mr. Fulton. It will be remembered by some of our readers, how long, and how successfully, Redheffer had deluded the Pennsylvanians by his perpetual motion. One of these machines was put into operation in New York in 1813. Mr. Fulton was a perfect unbeliever in Redheffer's discovery, and although hundreds were daily paying their dollar to see the wonder, he could not be prevailed upon to follow the crowd. After a few days, however, he was induced by some of his friends to visit the machine. It was in an isolated house in the suburbs of the city. In a very short time after Mr. Fulton had entered the room in which it was exhibited, he exclaimed, "Why, this is a

crank motion." His ear enabled him to distinguish that the machine was moved by a crank, which always gives an unequal power, and therefore an unequal velocity in the course of each revolution; and a nice and practical ear may perceive that the sound is not uniform. If the machine had been kept in motion by what was its ostensible moving power, it must have had an equable rotary motion, and the sound would have been always the same.

After some little conversation with the show-man, Mr. Fulton did not hesitate to declare that the machine was an imposition, and to tell the gentleman that he was an impostor. Notwithstand. ing the anger and bluster which these charges excited, he assured the company that the thing was a cheat, and that if they would support him in the attempt, he would detect it at the risk of paying any penalty if he failed. Having obtained the assent of all who were present, he began by knocking away some very thin pieces of lath, which appeared to be no part of the machinery, but to go from the frame of the machine to the wall of the room, merely to keep the corner posts of the machine steady. It was found that a catgut string was led through one of these laths and the frame of the machine, to the head of the upright shaft of a principal wheel; that the catgut was conducted through the wall, and along the floors of the second story to a back cock-loft, at a distance of a number of yards from the room which contained the machine, and there was found the moving power. This was a poor old wretch with an immense beard, and all the appearance of having suffered a long imprisonment; who, when they broke in upon him, was unconscious of what had happened below, and who, while he was seated on a stool, gnawing a crust, was with one hand turning a crank. The proprietor of the perpetual mo. tion soon disappeared. The mob demolished his machine, the destruction of which immediately put a stop to that which had been, for so long a time, and to so much profit, exhibited in Philadelphia. The merits of this exposure will appear more striking, when we consider that many men of ingenuity, learning, and science, had seen the machine: some had written on the subject; not a few of these were his zealous advocates, and others, though they were afraid to admit that he had made a discovery which violated what were believed to be the established laws of nature, appeared also afraid to deny what the incessant motion of his wheels and weights seemed to prove.

Mr. Fulton had enlarged views of the advantages of internal improvements, both as regards commerce, and the stability of the union, by a free intercourse between the states. As early as 1807, he pointed out the practicability of opening a communication