The Daily Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1860-11-17 00:00:00

THE PRINCE'S RETURN. VOYAGE.

To cross the mighty Atlantic in the months of
October and November, is proverbially an un-
pleasant, protracted, and perilous undertaking.
The voyager at such a season may lay his account
for being buffeted about towards every point of
the compass, as if old .lEOLUS then delighted most
to celebrate his carnival, by letting loose upon

the ocean every pent up fury under his
dominion. The rudest storms, and the heaviest
seas, relieved only by the gloomiest fogs, or
the most listless calms, constitute the general
character of winter voyages across the trackless
paths of the great deep that separates our
North American Colonies from the mother
country. Long days and anxious nights spent in
straggling to make way amid the roar of the
tempest, the dashing of turbulent billows; or the
terrors of murky.fogs impervious to light; and
impenetrable by the strongest vision, are toe often
ill-requited_ by
.resistless head winds; and a lee-
way which scorn every effort either to advance or
hold his own, even by the most gallant and daring
mariner. To the impatient and sorely-tried
traveller, any variety of meteorological phenomena
seems to be ever at hand, save that which would
forward his voyage. Any wind seems to blow
plentifully, except in the desired direction.
Occasionally, there may come a favouring gale,
but then; in all prohabllity, it blovt's With such
terrific vengeance that the tempest-driven sailor
prays for its entire cessation, rather than its con-
tinuance. As the gale begins to favour his course,
the hopeful seaman spreads his canvas to catch
its forward influence. By and by it increases,
and reef after reef is taken in. The ship rolls
heavily, creaking and groaning in every timber,
while the wind hoarsely howls through the
straining shrouds. Sea. after sea washes over
the decks; and everything net firmly strapped is
dashed adrift, Belo* the closed hatches all
miserable and dreary to the eye, While the ear
is troubled with the angry-like noises of the
struggling vessel, and the anxious tread of the
men working on deck. The squall roars like
thunder, and , the weather-beaten barque scuds
along with terrible speed. The close reefed sails
have been split—rent into tatters, and carried
away in shreds. Still the vessel tears on through
the heavy sea, making tremendous lurches, and
rolling as if at every moment she were about to
founder. While the ship thus wildly gambols amid
the strife of elements; each of which seems engaged
in a furious contest for the victory oilier her; the
emotions of the passengers and crew are kept at the
highest strain. Every approaching billow seems to
threaten to swallow up all who behold it. Ever
and anon the wind knocks the ship as if with a
steam hammer, and all on board start as it the
ship had struck upon a rock and were about to
descend to the deep unfathomed caves of the
ocean. Another great wave rushes along the
deck, and fear fills the mind with the thought
that all is over. Blank consternation seizes
upon all, and strikes dumb the youngest and
the oldest, -butt ere the cry of despair is
uttered the vessel rights again and holds on her
way. All, is yet safe, and hope sustains 'the
heart, and strengthens it to encounter the next
adventure. • All these troubles and fears are
forgotten when the gale abates and the weather
clears. The anxieties of the .voyage are easily
overlooked when at last land is sighted, and by
and by the anchor, is cast in the desired haven.

Such is, indeed, a brief epitome of the voyage of
nearly twenty-seven days, after which His Royal
Highness the Prince of Wales and suite completed
their long tour in the New World, and landed
again in Old England. This episode seems to
have been all that was required to perfect and
intensify the interest which the English people
have taken in the Prince's visit to America. For
a moment there was a serious feeling of anxiety for
his safety at sea. The news of the very preparations
made to look out for the missing squadron, when
its voyage became protracted beyond a fair and
reasonable period, raised doubts which might
otherwise have slumbered. The barest glimpse
of the idea that anything should have befallen the
"Hero" and the Prince, called forth an amount of
sympathy and emotion which the ration, per-
haps, was previously unconscious of entertaining
towards so young a scion of our Royal house, and
his safe arrival has been hailed with corres-
pondingly warm acclaims from all classes of the
community.

While we would willingly indulge in unmingled
congratulations on the safe completion of the
voyage, it is impossible to read an account of it as
given by the Times' correspondent from on board
H.M.S. Ariadne, which accompanied the Hero,
without coming to the conclusion that in various
respects there was some gross mismanagement
of the royal squadron. Apart from the incon-
venience and anxiety thus unnecessarily pro-
duced, We think the honour of the service has
been to some extent compromised by the ineffi-
ciency of the arrangements. Why did the Hero,
one of our crack line-of-battle ships, make a very
bad passage ? The Ariadne, it is said, could
have been in England in twelve days—less than
half the time taken by the Hero; but whether
the Hero went fast or slow (and the latter
was the rule) her consort was bound to
keep her company, and it necessitated almost
as much work on the part of her crew in shorten-
ing sail to keep behind the flag-ship as it would
to have acdomplished one of the fastest passages
ever made by any frigate in the service. Few
winter passages across the North Atlantic, we are
told, have lasted so long in which the ships have
fallen in With so few storms and heavy seas cal-
culated to retard their progress. The Ariadne
kept constantly ranging up alongside and ahead
of the Hero. The maindeck forward ever
and anon echoed with an impromptu song
among the sailors, with the chorus " Wait for
the Hero, wait for the Hero, wait for the Hero,
she's a long 'way behind!' There were "chaffing"
signals also going on between the vessels. The
Hero had only stowed six or seven days' fuel;
which was a most inadequate supply. The
Ariadne repeatedly took the Hero in tow, and as
repeatedly did the towing gear give way. After
the strongest towing hawsers had been snapped,
the expedient was attempted of fastening one to
the shackle of the Ariadne's stream cable—a huge
piece of irony says the same correspondent,
equal, according to the calculation of the dock-
yard authorities, to nearly three times the
strength of the towing hawsers; yet before
the towing had lasted half an hour, the
shackle broke, and left the Hero adrift. The
fracture of this wretched piece of ironwork
showed a worse kind of metal than one would
..
expect to find in the coarsest pig-iron ; yet on the
strength of this shackle the Ariadne, with all on
board, might have had to depend for safety in a
trying emergency. It is justly argued that it
could never have been tested, as it broke at lees
Ithan half the strain to which it was professedly
proved. Every attempt to secure a thoroughly
efficient towing hawser completely failed ! The
fresh provisions were all exhausted on board
the frigate, and there was nothing for anyone
ship's salt stores ! During
but the saltest of
the night between the 13th and 14th the breeze
had almost died away, and yet the Hero still
kept the double reef in her topsails to a light
wind that scarcely moved her five miles an hour. (
A yacht, says the correspondent quoted, would
have gladly spread all her canvass to the wind
which was keeping this crack line-of-battle ship
under double reefed topsails. If it had been in-
tended to make a long passage, we could under-
stand such a want of proper effort to make way,
but we must remember that at leaving Portland
it was hoped and believed that fourteen days
would suffice—instead of which the actual period
nearly doubled that calculation. If we find so
long a list of grievances connected with the outfit-
ting and. conduct of a royal squadron, carrying the
person of the heir to the crown of England, what
revelations might we not expect from a faithful
correspondent on board an ordinary squadron.
We trust the Lords of the Admiralty will see to

CONSIDERABLE attentioii has been drawn to the recent
prdcedure of the Bank of Engl&nd by its repeated
adViincei.Of the rate Of. dis Count; which is now fixecl sa
high as sit per Ceti; th.e pke4ritdrain upon the bullion:
of the Bank, it is perfectly evident; is caused bY circuni7
stances which need cause no alarm as to onis monetar)t
position. ' The advance of the rate of discount is easi.ly
accounted for on the ordinary principle of demand and
supply. The 'efflux of gold from the Bank is
merely temporary, and in no way weakens our
position. Indeed the result of the present emergency
is Certain, under anything like ordinarily proper ma-.
nagement, to result in a profit to this country. France
alone suffers the loss. The greatest interest has been
felt in autieip4tioU of the Weekly return of the Bank; iri
copsequence of the Vai'ioiis tci the extent of
the drain:

The return from the Bank of England, for thd week
ending Wednesday, the 14th Nov., gives the following
results, compared with the previous week :