ffers in the days of Noah. The steam-engine ordered from Boulton
and Watt was received in the latter part of 1806; and in the following
spring the boat was launched from the ship-yard of Charles Brown, on the
East River. Fulton named her the "Clermont," after the country-seat of
his friend and partner, Chancellor Livingston. She was one hundred and
sixty tons burthen, one hundred and thirty feet long, eighteen feet
wide, and seven feet deep. Her engine was made with a single cylinder,
two feet in diameter, and of four feet stroke; and her boiler was twenty
feet long, seven feet deep, and eight feet broad. The diameter of the
paddle-wheels was fifteen feet, the boards four feet long, and dipping
two feet in the water. The boat was completed about the last of August,
and she was moved by her machinery from the East River into the Hudson,
and over to the Jersey shore. This trial, brief as it was, satisfied
Fulton of its success, and he announced that in a few days the steamer
would sail from New York for Albany. A few friends, including several
scientific men and mechanics, were invited to take passage in the boat,
to witness her performance; and they accepted the invitation with a
general conviction that they were to do but little more than witness
another failure.

Monday, September 10, 1807, came at length, and a vast crowd assembled
along the shore of the North River to witness the starting. As the hour
for sailing drew near, the crowd increased, and jokes were passed on all
sides at the expense of the inventor, who paid little attention to them,
however, but busied himself in making a final and close inspection of
the machinery. Says Fulton, "The morning I left New York, there were
not, perhaps, thirty persons in the city who believed that the boat
would ever move one mile per hour, or be of the least utility; and while
we were putting off from the wharf, which was crowded with spectators, I
heard a number of sarcastic remarks."

One o'clock, the hour for sailing, came, and expectation was at its
highest. The friends of the inventor were in a state of feverish anxiety
lest the enterprise should come to grief, and the scoffers on the wharf
were all ready to give vent to their shouts of derision. Precisely as
the hour struck, the moorings were thrown off, and the "Clermont" moved
slowly out into the stream. Volumes of smoke and sparks from her
furnaces, which were fed with pine wood, rushed forth from her chimney,
and