The uses to which Savery proposed to apply his engine were various. One was to pump water into a reservoir, from which, by falling on a water-wheel, it might produce a continuous rotary motion. Another was to raise water into cisterns for the supply of gentlemen’s houses, and for use in fountains and as an extinguisher in case of fire. A third was to raise water for the supply of towns, and a fourth to drain fens and marsh lands. But the most important, in the inventor’s estimation, was its employment in clearing drowned mines and coal-pits of water. He showed how water might be raised from deep mines by using several engines, placed at different depths, one over the other. Thus by three lifts, each of 80 feet, water might be raised from a mine about 240 feet--then considered a very great depth. From Savery’s own account, it is evident that several of his engines were erected in Cornwall; and it is said that the first was tried at Huel Vor, or “The Great Work in Breage,” a few miles from Helstone, then considered the richest tin mine in the county. The engine was found to be an improvement on the methods formerly employed for draining the mine, and sent the miners to considerably greater depths. But the great pressure of steam required to force up a high column of water was such as to strain to the utmost the imperfect boilers and receivers of those early days; and the frequent explosions which attended its use eventually led to its discontinuance in favour of the superior engine of Newcomen, which was shortly after invented.