Report of the House of Ccmmoni on Steam- Boats. 113 



employed in perfecting the art of graduation, and in the con- 

 struction of instruments of better promise. As it was the 

 rudeness and inaccuracy of dividing which brought this in- 

 strument into existence, one would think that as the art be- 

 comes cultivated, it will fell into disuse. The art in this country 

 is certainly sufficiently advanced to set repeatmg instruments 

 aside : and, if I am rightly informed, several foreign artists are 

 at this time pursuing the course of its improvement, in which 

 for many years they had been impeded by circumstances which 

 science could not control. It is therefore my opinion, that as 

 the division of instruments becomes generally improved, so 

 will the repeating circle hasten to its dissolution ; and perhaps, 

 on account of the great services, which, in its time, it has ren- 

 dered to astronomy and geodesy, some future age may be m- 

 duced to chaunt its requiem. 



XXI. Report of a Committee of the House of Commons on 

 Steam-Boats ; being the Fifth Report on the Roads from 

 London to Holyhead^ Sj-c. 



[We have much pleasure in giving insertion to this Report, so highly cre- 

 ditable to the Committee from which it has proceeded, botn on account ot 

 the valuable matter embodied in it, and of the sound principles ot non- 

 le-'islation which it contains: and are desirous at the same time to ex- 

 pr"es5 our great satisfaction at the candour and ability with which it is 

 drawn up, and the impartial justice which the Committee have done to 

 the seneral talent and enterprise of the whole country, without any ap- 

 pearance of an intention, which has perhaps formerly been suspected, to 

 eulogize and serve a particular party.— Editors.] 



Your Committee, since they presented to the House their 

 Second Report, have prosecuted the inquiry, then only just 

 be<Tun, into the important subject of steam-boats. 



"The first instance of applying steam to vessels, is that which 

 occurred in 1736, when Mr. HuU obtained letters patent tor 

 the construction of a steam-boat for towmg vessels m and out 

 of port *. The application of paddle wheels, now so generally 

 adopted, appears to have been originally suggested by this 

 patent. Mr. Hull proposed to employ the atmospheric engine 

 of Newcomen, which, by means of a crank communicating with 

 the working beam, imparted a rotary action to the wheels and 

 paddles which were placed at the bow of the vessel. Next m 

 succession were die experiments of the Duke of Bridgewater, 

 to use steam-boats for towing barges on canals ; and then came 

 those of Mr. Miller, of Dalswinton in the county ot Dumtries, 

 in a double vessel with the wheel in the iniddle+. J^ut ^"er 

 Mr. Hull, the Marquis de Joufiroy unquestionably holds the 



• See App. p. 2. of Partington on the Steam-engine. f ^' P" ^7* 



Vol 60. No. 292. Aug. 1822. P Vio»t 



