150 THE SEA. 



attempts were made at first, owing- to some derangements connected with the locks of the 

 exploding apparatus. At length, however, the explosion took place, and was a thorough 

 success. He has left a full account of it in his own work.* Nothing: was left of the bri<r : 



O O " 



all that was seen in her place was a high column of water, smoke, and fragments. It 

 showed, as Fulton always believed, that the torpedo should, if possible, be exploded under 

 the vessel to be blown up. In his cool but yet enthusiastic way he says : " Should a 

 ship of the line containing five hundred men contend with ten good row-boats, each 

 with a torpedo and ten men', she would risk total annihilation, while the boats, under 

 the cover of the night and quick movements, would risk only a few men out of one 

 hundred." 



Fulton, after this, lectured frequently before the members of Congress, and so favourably 

 impressed them that a sum of 5,000 dollars was voted in aid of his experiments. One of 

 the plans he proposed was to couple by a line two torpedoes, then letting them drift on 

 the bow of the vessel to be destroyed, the line would catch on the cable or bows, and the 

 torpedoes would drift towards the vessel on either side. He also proposed " block ships " 

 of 50 or 100 tons, with cannon-proof sides and musket-proof decks (i.e., virtually ironclads), 

 to be propelled by machinery, which was to be worked l>y the crew. "On each quarter 

 and bow she was to be armed with a torpedo fastened to a long spar, the interior end of 

 which was to be supported and braced by ropes from the yards. . . . By means of 

 these spars the torpedoes were to be thrust under the bottom of the vessel to be destroyed." 

 Half the many plans proposed for torpedo warfare may be traced back to Robert Fulton 

 at the end of the last and beginning of the present century. Among his inventions 

 was a "cable-cutting machine," a description of which would occupy an undue amount 

 of space in a popular work. Suffice it to say that by its means he succeeded in cutting, 

 several feet below the surface of the water, the cable a 14-inch one of a vessel lying at 

 anchor. 



One of the most important experiments made at this time was his attempt, under sanction 

 of Government, to blow up the sloop-of-war Argus, and the case demonstrates very clearly 

 the ingenuity of the defence, and the means taken to foil the assailing torpedo. We have 

 heard quite recently of propositions to defend a vessel by means of a kind of <( crinoline," 

 as it has been termed, a strong network, &c., surrounding the whole or a part of the vessel at 

 some distance from it, which should prevent the torpedo from exploding near the hull. Such 

 was actually the means devised by Commodore Rodgers, of the United States Navy, in the 

 year 1809, and which proved entirely successful in foiling Fulton's torpedo. Golden says : 

 "She had a strong netting suspended from her spritsail-yard, which was anchored at the 

 bottom ; she was surrounded by spars lashed together, which floated on the surface of the 

 water, so as to place her completely in a pen; she had grappling-irons and heavy pieces 

 of the same metal suspended from her yards and rigging, ready to be plunged in any 

 boat that came beneath them; she had great swords, or scythes, fastened to the ends of 

 long spars, moving like sweeps, which unquestionably would have mowed off as many 

 heads as came within their reach." 



By these devices the torpedo-boat was unable to get near the Argus, while the netting, 



* "Torpedo War, and Submarine Explosions " (New York, 1810). A scarce and valuable brochure . 



