technicalities. He accordingly made a direct appeal to them in a Memorial to Congress. We may as well here give the further history of this claim. It met with the usual delays and obstructions that private claims, having nothing but their intrinsic merits to support them, are compelled to encounter. It called forth the usual amount of legislative pettifogging. Session after session passed away, and still it hung between the two Houses of Congress, until the very time which had elapsed since it was first presented began to be brought up as an argument against it. At length, when Congress established the Court of Claims, a prospect opened of bringing it to a fair hearing and a final decision. It was submitted to that tribunal six years ago. The Court decided in its favor,--the three judges (Gilchrist, Scarborough, and Blackford) being unanimous in their judgment. A bill directing its payment was reported to the Senate,--and there it is still. Although favorably reported upon by two committees at different sessions, and once passed by the Senate, without a vote recorded against it, it has never yet got through both Houses of Congress. For furnishing this Government with the magnificent war-steamer which was pronounced by Captain Stockton "the cheapest, fastest, and most certain ship of war in the world," Ericsson has never been paid a dollar. It remains to be seen whether the present Congress will permit this stain upon the national good faith to continue. If it does, its "votes of thanks" are little better than a mockery. The efficiency and utility of the propeller having been established beyond a doubt, it went at once into extensive use. But the inventor was again disappointed in his just expectation of reaping an adequate pecuniary benefit from his exertions. Upon the strength of some attempts at screw-propulsion,--made and abandoned by various experimenters,--which had never resulted, and probably never would have resulted, in any practical application, rival machines, which conflicted with Ericsson's patent, soon made their appearance. A long litigation followed, during which all attempts to collect patent-fees were necessarily suspended; and the result was, that the invention was virtually abandoned to the public. But no one can take from Ericsson the honor of having first introduced the screw-propeller into actual use, and demonstrated its value,--an honor which is now freely accorded to him by the highest scientific authorities at home and abroad.