Le Roy
took him to Buffon's, where he saw some interesting experiments on
inflammable air; the Abbe Morellet exerted himself to get the model of
his bridge, which had been stopped at the custom-house, safely to
Paris. Through their influence it was submitted to a committee of the
Academie des Sciences; their report was, in substance, that the iron
bridge of M. Paine was _ingenieusement imagine_,--that it merited an
attempt to execute it, and furnished a new example of the application
of a metal which had not yet been sufficiently used on a large scale.
Two other gentlemen from America, who were interested in science and in
mechanics, were in Paris at that time. Rumsey was there with his model
of a steamboat; and Thomas Jefferson, whose curiosity extended to all
things visible or audible, was busily collecting ground-plans and
elevations, and preparing to add at least two ugly buildings to a State
"over which," as he himself wrote, "the Genius of Architecture had
showered his malediction."
Unfortunately for inventors, the times were not favorable for the
construction of boats or of bridges.
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