The Dorset County Express and Agricultural Gazette.
Dorchester, Dorset, England, 1862-04-29 00:00:00

Aunty anb Nabu.

THE CPPOLA VESSEL.—The tender of Messrs.
Satinida, 11rot1ii re, of the Isle of Dogs, for the construe-
nun et Captain Cdr.'s cupola vessel having been found
to be the lowest, it %vas on Monday accepted by the
Admiralty. Messrs. Samuela have bound themselves,
under a penalty of 14,0(0 (which will be rigidly enforced
in thee' nit of any Itches on their part), to launch the
ship on the 10th of February, 1863. The price at which
the contract is taken, vie., 044 155., is regarded as very
low, and the gentlemen who have undertaken it will, if
they succeed in complying with its terms, deserve great
praise for their enterprise and energy. The ship, for
which £180,600 has been tykes in the estimates, is to
be 280 fret long, nearly 2,600 tons, will draw about 20
feet, and will have engines of 500-horse power. She will,
according to present amingeinenta, have six cupolas.
each armed with two 100-pounder Armstrong guns.
IRON-PLATED SHIPS or Ws,—We (Times) are
informed that a great importance in the existing b tate of
our naval affairs has just been taken by the Board of
Admiralty. It is well known that at the psesent
moment our entire fleet ofoinall vessels of war is built
of wood, slid is wholly unprotected by armour plating.
Every corvette, sloop, and gunboat in the service is
therefore, to sudden and complete destruction by
the shell fire of an enemy. In view of these facts, a
complete stop has recently been put to the construction
of further vessels of this kind in the Royal dockyarde.
In Fiance for soms yeare mist, and in America during
the last year, smell iron-plated craft have been designed
and built; but in all cases these have been fit to operate
upon house coasts and harbours only, and have been
wholly incapable of performing general sea service.
Our own Admiralty and their constructors have
naturally been averse to the building of similar vessels,
but at the same time no means of producing sea-going
plated ships of moderate dimensions have been devised,
which is said to afford great security, with a com-
paratively small amount of plating, and which has met
with the full approval of the Board. The new design
has been made by Mr. E. J. Reed, formerly of the
School of Naval Construction' Portsmouth, now
secretary to the Institution of Naval Architects, under
the general supervision of Adtuiral Robinson' the
Controller of the Navy. It is applicable to ships of
various classes, and provides for the use of powerful
plate: battery of Armstrong guns, with a great range
of fire; for the security of the ships from penetration
between wind and water; for steaming power scarcely
inferior to that of the present unprotected vessels; and
for the protection of boiler' s engines, redder-head and
steering apparatus. These advantages are said to be
secured without at all comprising the fitness of the
ship to receive a complete rig and equipment, no that
she may be fit for sea service in any part of the world.
The design, we understand, has been placed unreservedly
at the disposal of the Admiralty, who have issued an
order for its immediate adoption, and have appointed
the inventor, Mr. Reed, to superintend the construction
of the vessels in her Majesty's dockyards. The timber
now in store, mid even that already converted, will be
available for the new vessels, which are to be timber.
built below the water, but incombustible at the upper
part. Although the design was only completed a week
ago, all the preliminary arrangements for carrying it
out have already been made under the immediate care
of the Controller and the Dike of Somerset. The first
vessel is to be commenced forthwith at Deptford dock-
yard, and is to be named the Enterprise.

The explosion was the result of an extensive fall in tl •
roof of this god. The magazine of fire-damp thus
liberated rushed into the workings, exploding, ai •
matter of course, as soon as it came in contact with
the naked lights used by the miners. At the inquest
...the assistant viewer admitted that naked candles were
used regularly, although the mine was a fiery one. It
comes out, too, that on the morning of the explosion
the shin one of the main airways was soweak—in other
words, the ventilation was so defeative—thattbe instru-
inent used for measuring the velocity of the air, whom
placed in the current, remained uninfluenced. The
agent of the colliery gave evidence SO utterly and
unblushingly at variant's with fact that the Coroner I
characterised his conduct as "petfectly disgraceful,"
and declared he could not believe a word he said.
The accident which deprived these six men
of life having thus palapably been the result
of the most culpable neglect on the part of those whose
duty it was to manage the mine, of the most ordinary
precautions against accident, it might have beensunposed
that the jury would have shown their sense of such
conduct by bringing in a verdict of manslaughter.
Nothing of the kind—the verdict was "Accidental
death,' coupled with an opinion that "it was not safe
to work the mine with naked lights near the goat."
Something more than this requires to be done. The
inspector has power to prosecute, we suppose, and this
case ought not to b• permitted topes..