The Governor and Council of Safety showed an enterprising willingness to experiment in naval warfare, when in February, 1776, they permitted David Bushnell to explain to them his machine for blowing up ships, and voted him £60 to complete his invention.[451] Bushnell’s “American Turtle,” as his contrivance was called, anticipated modern inventions in submarine warfare. It consisted of a tortoise-shaped diving boat which could be propelled under water. It contained a supply of air sufficient to last the operator a half-hour, and was guided by means of a compass made visible by phosphorus. Upon reaching the doomed vessel a screw was driven into it by the operator. A magazine of powder was attached by a string to the screw. The casting of the magazine from the diving-boat set going a certain clock-work which gave the operator time to get beyond the reach of danger before it ignited the powder. In 1777 a trial of the “Turtle” against the British ship “Eagle,” 84, in New York Harbor was unsuccessful. The operator succeeded in getting under the “Eagle,” but was unable to drive the screw into her bottom. Connecticut did not establish state privateering. In May, 1776, the General Assembly authorized the Governor to fill out the blank privateering commissions which the President of Congress should send from time to time, and to deliver them to such persons as should execute the bond prescribed by Congress.[452] A list of Connecticut privateers in which some vessels are counted two or more times has been made out. The totals of this list give 202 vessels, 1,609 guns, and 7,754 men.[453] In order to enlist her quota of troops for the Continental army, Connecticut in May, 1780, placed an embargo upon privateers.[454] In May, 1776, the General Assembly, in pursuance of the recommendations of the Continental Congress relative to the establishment of admiralty courts by each state, vested the county courts of Connecticut with the power to “try, judge, and determine, by jury or otherwise, as in other cases, concerning all captures that have or shall be taken and brought into said respective counties.” The courts were to follow the rules of the civil law, the law of nations, and the resolutions of Congress. Appeals were allowed to the Continental Congress agreeable to its directions and resolves. Connecticut was more liberal in granting appeals to Congress than Massachusetts, which state, it will be recalled, permitted such appeals only in cases of captures made by the vessels of the Continental navy.[455]