Page:Devon & Cornwall Notes & Queries.djvu/47

 26 Devon Notes and Queries. in the naval warfare of the future, is a progressive one. There are, in the Gentleman's Magazine of 1747 and 1749, descriptions and illustrations of two different kinds; one of elliptical tub shape ; the other of ordinary boat form, to be propelled by oars. Each was s^id to be capable of being sunk in, and raised out of the water, at pleasure; but the great practical difficulty in both was the air supply. These accounts of a ** diving ship ** led to two communi- cations in the latter volume, recording the claims of two Devonians to the invention, and as matters of local interest they are worthy of being noticed here. The first appeared in a letter from " Samuel . Ley, of Lamorran,'* stating that twenty years before, such a vessel had been invented by *' Nathaniel Symons, of the parish of Harberton, near Totness, Devon, a common house-carpenter." Of this he gave the following details : — ** He made his boat in two parts, and join'd them in the middle very tight, with leather, that no water could get in ; he made a false door in the side, which, when he was in, shut very tight ; and the' his going in admitted a small quantity of water, it was no inconvenience ; after this outer-door was shut, he opened the inner one to get into his boat. There was more than four- score weight of lead to the bottom of his boat (but this I presume must be according to the dimensions of the boat). Tho* the boat would swim when extended to its full dimen- sions yet he had a screw to each side of his boat, which, when within it, he could manage himself, and which, by means of the leather that joined the parts of the boat, contracted them to that degree that the boat would sink. He went into the middle of the river Dart, entered his boat by himself, in sight of hundreds of spectators, sunk his boat himself, and tarry*d three quarters of an hour at the bottom; and then, by extending it with his screws he rais'd it to the surface again without any assistance. He said that tho* at last the air began to be thick he could bear it very well. This same person invented the famous diving engine for taking up of wrecks, tho* his cousin L. . . e, and some others, deprived him both of the honour and profit." (312) The second was that of " John Lethbridge, of Newton Abbot,*' who, regarding the allusion to L ... e as intended I