River and coast trade of Great Britain—The Iona, paddle steamer—First screw collier Q. E. D.—The King Coal collier—Her dimensions and crew, note—Improvement in care of seamen—Leith and London traders—Dublin and Holyhead Mail-Packets—Their great speed and regularity—Dimensions, power, capacity, and cost—Dover and Calais Mail-Packets—The Victoria—Her speed—Proposed tunnel and other modes of crossing the Straits of Dover—Mr. Fowler’s plan—The Castalia—The Bessemer—Her swinging saloon—The cigar-ship built at Baltimore, 1858—Similar ship built on the Thames, 1864—Perkins’s economical steam-engine and proposed fast boat—The Engine of the Comet—Modifications in the construction of Marine Engines—Ratio of speed to power—The Compound Engine more economical than the simple—Great skill required for building perfect ships, and, especial importance to England of having the best ships—But her ships not yet perfect, though great progress has been made during the last half century.
River and coast trade of Great Britain.
Although Great Britain supplies from its rivers and coasts three-fourths of the ocean-going steamers of the world, its own coasting and inland navigation affords but a very limited field for the employment of vessels of any kind compared with the shores and rivers of America, India, and China.
Before the introduction of steamers, a few row-boats, sailing wherries, and barges were sufficient to conduct the whole of the river traffic. This new expedient, however, though soon met in another form by the competition of railways, has vastly developed even this comparatively limited trade. Steam-boats now, whether on business or pleasure, are to be found in great numbers on every navigable stream, and are still on the increase; indeed, the improved facilities for intercourse on land, so far from retarding that increase, gives fresh life to the swarms of passenger-boats, yachts, steam-launches and steam-barges, which ply wherever they can find the means of flotation, and, especially, on the Thames and Clyde.
The Iona paddle steamer.
Offering, as it does, greater inducements than any other river in the United Kingdom, there are now to be found on the Clyde many elegant and commodious steam-boats. Although generally inferior in size, equipment, and speed to those of the Hudson or Long Island Sound, one of them, the Iona, a paddle-wheel boat, employed in the passenger traffic between Glasgow and the Western Highlands, is almost unrivalled.[442] This beautiful vessel affords deck and cabin accommodation for no less than 1200 passengers, and her long range of saloon houses, with plate-glass windows extending right fore and aft, gives her a graceful and imposing appearance. Fleets of similar vessels, though of inferior dimensions, now ply between Glasgow and the numerous watering places which line the shores of the estuary of the Clyde, presenting a striking contrast to the times of Henry Bell’s Comet.
First screw collier, Q. E. D.
The King Coal collier.
Equally marked has been the improvement in the vessels now employed in the coal and coasting trades of Great Britain. From the sailing-vessels of the north-east coast, of which an illustration has been furnished,[443] we advanced to the screw, and, in 1844, built of iron the first screw-collier, the Q. E. D., for the conveyance of coal from Newcastle to London. She was heavily barque-rigged, and, in style and form, somewhat resembled the fast Baltimore clippers, the intention of her owners being to depend chiefly for speed upon her sails, and to use her engine as an auxiliary power. Her mizen mast, a hollow tube of iron, was made to serve the purpose of a funnel, and the whole of her standing rigging consisted of wire rope. She had a double bottom, divided into separate chambers, so that any injury to the one would not affect the other, each being covered with a false floor and hermetically closed. Into these vacant spaces between the bottom and the floors, water could be admitted by means of cocks, for the purpose of ballast, and, at the same time, easily pumped out again by an engine when not required. The Q. E. D. therefore, in herself, contained many inventions then little known, the more important of which, as the wire rope and water ballast, are now in general use. But the auxiliary engine and full sailing rig did not answer in the coal trade better than it had done for distant voyages, the sails in this, as in all cases, having become auxiliary to the engine as a propelling power. Steamers of light rig and comparatively full power, now carry on the largest proportion of this trade, although there is still room for a considerable number of the old sailing-colliers. An illustration of one of the finest steam-colliers will be found on [the following page], and I am enabled through the courtesy of her owners to furnish not merely a drawing, but the particulars of this vessel, which bears the appropriate name of King Coal.[444]
