Oddly enough, while Bell was experimenting on the Clyde, Mr. Dawson was doing the same in Ireland. He even claims that he built a fifty-ton steamer in 1811, and which, by a coincidence simply, as it would seem, he had also named the _Comet_. He put the first steamer for public accommodation on the Thames in 1818, to run between London and Gravesend. Mr. Lawrence, of Bristol, introduced a steam-boat on the Severn shortly after Bell put the _Comet_ on the Clyde, and brought her to London, but so great was the opposition from the watermen that he took her back to Bristol. She was afterwards taken to Spain, and long plied between Seville and St. Lucar. These were the precursors of those grand steam-ship lines which now run to every part of the habitable world. Bell’s steamer was made, in the second year of its career, a pleasure-boat to many parts of the coasts of England, Scotland, and Ireland, and may therefore count as one of the first ocean-going as well as river steamers. [Illustration: FOUR GREAT ENGINEERS.] CHAPTER VI. THE HISTORY OF SHIPS AND SHIPPING INTERESTS (_continued_). The Clyde and its Ship-building Interests—From Henry Bell to Modern Ship-builders—The First Royal Naval Steamer—The First Regular Sea-going Steamer—The Revolution in Ship-building—The Iron Age—“Will Iron Float?”—The Invention of the Screw-propeller—Ericsson, Smith, and Woodcroft—American ’Cuteness—Captain Stockton and his Boat—The First Steamer to Cross the Atlantic—Voyages of the _Sirius_ and _Great Western_—The International Struggle—The Collins and Cunard Lines—Fate of the _Arctic_—The _Pacific_ never heard of more—Why the Cunard Company has been Successful—Splendid Discipline on Board their Vessels—The Fleets that Leave the Mersey.