Its origin and management.
The Messageries Maritimes, their greatest shipping undertaking, though exceedingly well managed, is after all, a pure creation of the Government—one, too, nursed with the greatest care from its infancy, and maintained throughout by large grants from the public purse, which were materially increased on the accession of the third Napoleon to the Throne of France, who, throughout the whole of his reign, displayed a marked anxiety to promote and encourage maritime undertakings. Previously, indeed, to 1851, the company had been chiefly engaged as carriers by land, and was under contract for the conveyance of the mails throughout a considerable portion of France.
First contract for the conveyance of the oversea French mails, 1851.
In July of that year this company entered upon its first oversea contract with Government for the conveyance of the French Mails to Italy, the Levant, Greece, Egypt, and Syria, and in 1852 spontaneously added to their services the principal ports of Greece and Salonica.[362]
Extension of contracts, 1854-56.
In 1854, the managers of the Messageries Company concluded arrangements with the Minister of War for the transport of all troops and military stores between France and Algeria, besides the conveyance of the mails, and, having very materially increased their fleet owing to the requirements of the Crimean campaign, they were, in 1855, enabled to open between Marseilles, Civita Vecchia, and Naples, a direct weekly line of steamers, independently of the postal service, principally intended to meet the requirements necessary to be maintained between the War Department and the army of occupation at Rome.
Brazil line, 1857.
When the Crimean War happily came to a close, and the military lines of steamers to the Black Sea were no longer necessary, the directors, in 1856, employed their disposable vessels in increasing the frequency of services to Algeria, and in establishing a postal service between Marseilles and the ports of the Danube and along the east coast of the Black Sea, for which they obtained a contract from Government in 1857. In that year they, likewise, entered into arrangements for the conveyance of the French mails between Bordeaux, the Brazils, and La Plata.
Vast extent of its fleet.
The fleet of the Messageries Company had now reached fifty-four ships of 80,875 tons, and 15,240 horse-power, afloat or in course of construction, evidently more than they could profitably employ: they, therefore, applied for and obtained from their Government, in 1861, a contract for the conveyance of the French mails to India and China, requiring for this purpose only an additional steamer. But the increase of trade to the East, brought about in no small degree by the increased facilities and by an anxious desire on the part of the company to meet the wants of the travellers of all nations, very soon enabled the directors to double the services of their steamers to the East. In 1871 their fleet measuring 137,334 tons, of 20,885 horse-power, performed services on the India and China routes of 230,135 French leagues; on the Mediterranean and Black Sea, 153,478; and, on the Brazilian, 50,004: in all, 423,607 leagues annually, independently of various extra services. Since then their Brazilian and La Plata lines have been doubled, and now (1875) the company employs 175,000 tons of steam-ships, besides chartering numerous sailing-vessels.[363]