(fulmen, thunder), in the Romish Church, a denunciation of censure or threats, as by papal authority.

ULTA, a large village of Hindustan, province of Bengal, on the east bank of the Hooghly, 20 miles S.S.W. in a straight line from Calcutta, but much more by the windings of the river. It has safe anchorage for ships, where they are protected from the swell of the sea, and where the anchors hold fast, the bottom being stiff clay. Lat. 22.18., Long. 88.10.

FULTON, ROBERT, a distinguished American engineer and mechanician, among the first who successfully applied steam to the propulsion of vessels, was born in 1765 at Little Britain in Pennsylvania. At a very early age he gave decided indications of mechanical genius. While still a mere youth he began life in Philadelphia as a portrait and landscape painter; and in his twenty-second year, with a view to improving himself in art, he visited England, where he remained for several years under the roof of his countryman West. He states that in 1793 he had conceived the design of propelling vessels by steam, but his numerous engagements prevented him from carrying it into effect at that time. His time was completely engrossed in devising a plane of double incline that should supersede the locks on canals, for which he obtained a patent from the British government in 1794. In the same year he obtained patents for flax-spinning and rope-twisting machines, and various other mechanical inventions, bearing chiefly upon the construction of canals, on which latter subject he published a treatise. In 1797 he removed to Paris, and remained for seven years in the house of Joel Barlow, the American minister at the court of Napoleon I., prosecuting his scientific studies. During that period he projected the first panorama ever exhibited in Paris, and made important experiments on submarine explosives. It was also at this time that he first succeeded, after repeated trials, in propelling a boat through the water by the aid of steam. In 1806 he returned to America, and repeated the experiment on a larger scale and with more decided success. In 1809 he took out his first patent, and seemed to be on the high way to wealth and prosperity, when his rights were disputed, and he became involved in legal proceedings, which embittered the remainder of his existence, and prevented him from reaping the rich harvest to which his industry and genius fairly entitled him. Fulton died Feb. 24, 1815. A minute account of his life and inventions is given in his biography by Cadwallader D. Colden. See Steam Navigation.