machinery, but, in August,
1803, astonished the members of the French Institute by moving, though
with much circumspection.

Fulton, however, was disappointed, and if we may judge from the scanty
records of his life, he never offered this invention to Napoleon.[321]
He felt the need of better machinery, and as this could only be
procured in England, he gave the order to a Birmingham firm, which
engined his first successful boat, the "Clermont," launched on the
Hudson in 1807. But for the war, perhaps, Fulton would have continued
to live in Paris and made his third attempt there. He certainly never
offered his imperfect steamship to the First Consul. Probably the fact
that his first boat foundered when at anchor in the Seine would have
procured him a rough reception, if he had offered to equip the whole
of the Boulogne flotilla with an invention which had sunk its first
receptacle and propelled the second boat at a snail's pace.

Besides, he had already met with one repulse from Napoleon. He had
offered, first to the Directory and later to the First Consul, a boat
which he claimed would "deliver France and the world from British
oppression."

This was a sailing vessel, which could sink under water and then
discharge under a hostile ship a "carcass" of gunpowder or
_torpedo_--another invention of his fertile brain. The Directory at
once repulsed him. Bonaparte instructed Monge, Laplace, and Volney to
report on this submarine or "plunging" boat, which had a partial
success. It succeeded in blowing up a small vessel in the harbour at
Brest in July, 1801; but the Commission seems to have reported
unfavourably on its utility for offensive purposes. In truth, as
Fulton had not then applied motive power to this invention, the name
"plunging boat" conveyed an exaggerated notion of its functions, which
were more suited to a life of ascetic contemplation than of
destructive activity.

It appears that the memoir-writers named above have confused the two
distinct inventions of Fulton just referred to. In the latter half of
1803 he repaired to England, and later on to the United States, and
after the year 1803 he seems to have had neither the will nor the
opportunity to serve Napoleon. In England he offered his torpedo
patent to the English Admiralty, expressing his hatred of the French
Emperor as a "wild beast who ought to be hunted down." Little was done
with the torpedo in England, except to blow up a vessel off Walmer as