The long and complicated story of Fulton's sudden interest in
torpedoes and submarine boats, his dealings with the Directory
and Napoleon and with the British Admiralty does not belong here.
His experiments and his negotiations with the two Governments
occupied the greater part of his time for the years between 1797
and 1806. His expressed purpose was to make an engine of war so
terrible that war would automatically be abolished. The world,
however, was not ready for diving boats and torpedoes, nor yet
for the end of war, and his efforts had no tangible results.*

* The submarine was the invention of David Bushnell, a
Connecticut Yankee, whose "American Turtle" blew up at least one
British vessel in the War of Independence and created much
consternation among the King's ships in American waters.


During all the years after 1793, at least, and perhaps earlier,
the idea of the steamboat had seldom been out of his mind, but
lack of funds and the greater urgency, as he thought, of the
submarine prevented him from working seriously upon it. In 1801,
however, Robert R. Livingston came to France as American
Minister. Livingston had already made some unsuccessful
experiments with the steamboat in the United States, and, in
1798, had received the monopoly of steam navigation on the waters
of New York for twenty years, provided that he produced a vessel
within twelve months able to steam four miles an hour. This grant
had, of course, been forfeited, but might be renewed, Livingston
thought.

Fulton and Livingston met, probably at Barlow's house, and, in