He tried his boat on the River Avon, at Evesham, but it did not succeed, and the engine was taken on shore again.

A local poet commemorated his failure in the following lines, which were remembered long after his steamboat experiment had been forgotten:-- "Jonathan Hull, With his paper skull, Tried hard to make a machine That should go against wind and tide; But he, like an ass, Couldn't bring it to pass, So at last was ashamed to be seen." Nothing of importance was done in the direction of a steam-engine able to drive paddles, until the invention by James Watt, in 1769, of his double-acting engine--the first step by which steam was rendered capable of being successfully used to impel a vessel.

But Watt was indifferent to taking up the subject of steam navigation, as well as of steam locomotion.

He refused many invitations to make steam-engines for the propulsion of ships, preferring to confine himself to his "regular established trade and manufacture," that of making condensing steam-engines, which had become of great importance towards the close of his life.
Two records exist of paddle-wheel steamboats having been early tried in France--one by the Comte d'Auxiron and M.Perrier in 1774, the other by the Comte de Jouffroy in 1783--but the notices of their experiments are very vague, and rest on somewhat doubtful authority.
The idea, however, had been born, and was not allowed to die.

When Mr.
Miller of Dalswinton had revived the notion of propelling vessels by means of paddle-wheels, worked, as Savery had before worked them, by means of a capstan placed in the centre of the vessel, and when he complained to Symington of the fatigue caused to the men by working the capstan, and Symington had suggested the use of steam, Mr.Miller was impressed by the idea, and proceeded to order a steam-engine for the purpose of trying the experiment.