Mr. Holland was originally a school teacher in Ireland, from which country he was exiled because of his political beliefs. On coming to the United States he became affiliated with the Fenian movement. Previous to his construction of the _Fenian Ram_ Mr. Holland built experimentally a small one-man boat. The money to build the _Fenian Ram_ was subscribed by the "Clan-na-Gael" and other Irish patriotic societies, and an associate of Mr. Holland recently informed me that over $200,000 (£41,000) was subscribed to enable Mr. Holland to carry on his experiments. After the collapse of the Fenian movement the _Fenian Ram_ was towed up to New Haven, Connecticut, and hauled out on the banks of the Mill River, where it has lain ever since, hidden under a pile of lumber. One of the former leaders of the Fenians informed me that the scheme was to build a number of submarines of about the size of the _Ram_. They were to have been carried across the Atlantic in a special ship with water-tight compartments extending below the water line, into which the submarines were to have been floated and a sea door closed. On arrival on the English coast, this special ship, which was apparently a harmless merchantman, was to locate the British war vessels in some one of the harbors, sail in and anchor near them; then the little submarines were to be released from their mother ship and proceed to sink as many of the British ships as they could by firing explosive shells into them below the water line. The novelty of such an attack was relied upon to spread consternation among the British fleet and thus enable the submarines to escape. In 1878 Mr. G. W. Garrett, of Liverpool, took out a patent and constructed a small boat whose equilibrium was to have been maintained by the admission of water into a cylinder and forcing it out by a piston. In 1879, Mr. Garrett brought out a larger vessel, called the _Resurgam_, in which his means of control were forward diving rudders similar to those of the Confederate _Hunley_. The novel feature of this vessel was the installation of a very large steam boiler in which sufficient heat could be stored to enable the vessel to make a submerged run of several miles after the fires were shut down. This vessel was lost during her experimental trials.