Liv’n Acknowledges the Boat to Answer & Refuses to use Vertical
Wheels.
Clermont, _28 Octr., 1798_.
Dear Sir,
After sending mine of yesterday I received your favor of the 21st, in
which you enter more particularly into the experiments you have made,
but not so fully as I would wish, as you will find by the queries I
have troubled you with. If you are right as to the motion through the
water, the Spanish Minister could not err much in his calculation, for
it appears to me that the tide in your river is not short of 2 miles &
I have found in my models that the velocity of the boat with the tide
is greater in proportion than the mere difference between that and
still water.
This is one of the experiments I wished you to ascertain accurately by
running one hour with the tide & determining the distance and running
back the same distance against the tide. Be it as it will, we now know
what we can do with a sufficient power, and tho’ _paddles should even
do more they are too inconvenient and too liable to accidents to be
used_—AS FOR VERTICAL WHEELS THEY ARE OUT OF THE QUESTION.
What I principally write now for is to ask you whether it would not be
better instantly to fit the boat for passengers by putting a deck over
so much as you make cabbin of. This should be the whole, only leaving
room for wood near the engine. This deck should be of inch pine boards
& rounded so as to carry off the water and made as tight as possible.
It should be raised about ten Inches so as to admit of glasses that
shove past each other all round The inside only wants to be papered
with any cheap common paper and to have two rows of benches the one
behind the other. The rear bench so low as to admit the knees under
the front one. A narrow table of one board should run through the
middle. The back cabbin should be fitted for the ship’s company and
have windows and shutters in case of bad weather. Some arrangement
should also be made for boiling in pot and kettle. All this should be
going on while you are fitting the machinery. It will I believe be
best to get two or three quick hands from New York to do it as your
shipwright is both slow and extravagant. We have yet one month to use
and a pretty important one, because the roads will soon be bad, and
tho’ we should only go 3 miles an hour we shall still be able to pick
up something besides our expenses and acquire some experience of what
further is necessary. I have provided a Captain at £5 a month who
understands the river. You say you have a steward and fire engine
hand. Tho’ I think Smallman should make the first voyage.
I am, Dr. Sir,
R. R. LIVINGSTON.
Mr. N. J. Roosevelt.
The headings of the foregoing letters are copied from their respective
indorsations which would seem to have been made by different hands and
as though in the preparation of a case.