302 ON TWO EVENTS IN THE HISTORY OF STEAM NAVIGATION. 



plished by William Symington in 1801, as is proved by 

 authentic documents, which have been published by Mr. 

 Woodcroft in his ^ Origin and Progress of Steam Naviga- 

 tion.' Symington, instructed by the failure of the ratchet- 

 work engine which he had made for Miller's boat, fitted up 

 the ' Charlotte Dundas,' in 1801, with a double-acting hori- 

 zontal cranked engine, and thus made her what Mr. Wood- 

 croft has justly called " the first practical steam-boat/' 

 Her speed, when running alone, and not towing other 

 boats, was six miles an hour. 



4. The use of this vessel was abandoned, not from any 

 fault in her construction or working, but because the Di- 

 rectors of the Forth and Clyde Canal feared that she 

 would damage its banks. Yet the man in all Britain who 

 possessed at that time the greatest practical experience of 

 the working of canals (the Duke of Bridgewater), was not 

 deterred by any such apprehension from ordering, in 1802, 

 eight similar vessels from Symington to be used on his canal. 



5. The death of the Duke of Bridgewater early in the 

 following year prevented the execution of that order. 

 But Symington had evidently done all that lay in his 

 power, and all that was necessary, to convert the steam- 

 boat from an awkward piece of experimental apparatus to 

 a practically useful machine ; and the honour paid to his 

 memory ought not to be lessened because the career of 

 his invention was cut short by a misfortune. 



6. There is nothing in this to detract from the honour 

 which is justly paid to Fulton as having been the first 

 to practise steam navigation on a great scale as a com- 

 mercially profitable art. 



7. Another event, passed over in the paper to which I 

 have referred, is the first introduction of commercial steam 

 navigation into Europe, which was efiected on the River 

 Clyde, in 18 12, by Henry Bell, as is proved by documents 

 cited in Mr. Woodcroft's work already referred to. 



