tion, we may note that it was not until the
beginning of the seventeenth century that the first submarine boat
was actually built and navigated. A Hollander, Cornelius Drebel, or
Van Drebel, born in 1572, in the town of Alkmaar, had come to
London during the reign of James I., who became his patron and
friend. Drebel seems to have been a serious student of science and
in many ways far ahead of his times. Moreover, he had the talent of
getting next to royalty. In 1620 he first conceived the idea of
building a submarine. Fairly detailed descriptions of his boats--he
built three from 1620-1624--and of their actual use, have been
handed down to us by men whose accuracy and truthfulness cannot be
doubted. The Honorable Robert Boyle, a scientist of unquestioned
seriousness, tells in his _New Experiments, Physico-Mechanical
touching the Spring of the Air and its Effects_ about Drebel's work
in the quaint language of his time:

But yet on occasion of this opinion of Paracelsus, perhaps it
will not be impertinent if, before I proceed, I acquaint your
Lordship with a conceit of that deservedly famous mechanician and
Chymist, Cornelius Drebel, who, among other strange things that
he perform'd, is affirm'd, by more than a few credible persons,
to have contrived for the late learned King James, a vessel to go
under water; of which, trial was made in the Thames, with admired
success, the vessel carrying twelve rowers, besides passengers;
one which is yet alive, and related it to an excellent
Mathematician that informed me of it. Now that for which I
mention this story is, that having had the curiosity and
opportunity to make particular inquiries among the relations of
Drebel, and especially of an ingenious physician that married his
daughter, concerning the grounds upon which he conceived it
feasible to make men unaccustomed to continue so long under water
without suffocation, or (as the lately mentioned person that went
in the vessel affirms) without inconvenience; I was answered,
that Drebel conceived, that it is not the whole body of the air,
but a certain quintessence (as Chymists speak) or spirituous part
of it, that makes it fit for respiration; which being spent, the
remaining grosser body, or carcase, if I may so call it, of the
air, is unable to cherish the vital flame residing in the heart;
so that, for aught