62 PROTO-BATHYSPHERES 



a "twisting rod," and squeezed the water out of the cor- 

 rect number of goat-skins, when the vessel would obe- 

 diently rise at once through the water (Fi^. 17). 



Robert Fulton, the inventor of the steamboat, also 

 seems to have devised a submarine which, if his biographers 

 are to be believed, was astonishingly successful when tried 

 in the sea near Brest in 1801. 



"A noted English smuggler, one Johnson," so Whymper 

 tells us, "was next in the field, and he constructed a large 

 vessel, one hundred feet long, which could descend below 

 the surface of the sea. Her spars and rigging could be 

 lowered and made fast to the deck. It was built with a 

 very special object, being none other than to rescue 

 Napoleon from the island of St. Helena! His idea was to 

 make the land at nightfall, sink below the surface, and 

 approach sufficiently near to enable him to land one of the 

 conspirators, who should arrange with the illustrious cap- 

 tive the best mode of evading the vigilance of the guards. 

 ^Johnson was promised a fabulous sum if success should 

 crown his efforts; and he was to receive four thousand 

 pounds directly his vessel was ready for sea. Too late!' 

 The report of Napoleon's death was received on the day 

 that the rescue-ship was coppered." 



In the New York Daily Times for as late a date as 

 August 24, 1854, we find an amusingly naive editorial. 

 In speaking of recently developed underwater suits of 

 leather and rubber and carrying with them a box of con- 

 densed air, the writer says: "The condensed air they are 



