The Express.
London, England, 1860-06-06 00:00:00

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LONDON, WEDNESDAY, JUNE 6.

Pons and enthusiasts have loved to fancy that
they could trace the sympathy of the element' with
the struggles and sufferings of mortals. The
winter we have passed, and the summer, on which
we are entering, almost seem to realise the
imagination. While nations are fiercely contend-
ing, and old dynasties trembling to their fall,
land and sea have been devastated by a succession
of furious storms. Since the night of the
Lliith of October, when the Royal ('hurter was
crushed like en eggshell on the rocks of
Moelfrs Bay, hurricane after hurricane, of
a violence rarely known in these northern
latitudes, has swept over us. May ended with a
tempest, the effects of which are counted up in
the list of three hundred sod fifty vessels lost
during the week. Probably there arc many of
which we do not yet know, for the steamers from
Holland report the whole of the North Sea to be
full of ffoetMg wreck. June opened with another
storm, which with us on shore approached the
character of a tornado. For the present, we can
but rest on faint hopes that it may not have
spread so wide disaster at sea as its immediate
precursor. But already we have reports of heavy
losses on the south coast, and, however its range
may have been limited, those tierce squalls which
overthrew houses and uprooted trees on land must
have wrought fearful havoc on all that craned
their path at sea.

Ageing the violence of nature man's powers
are vainly exerted. No human strength or skill
ivin save a vessel exposed in a dangerous situation
to the full fury of such gales as we have lately
experienced. Nay, it even seems as if our latest
advances in science rendered us in some degree
more helpless than before. Iron ships go to
pieces more rapidly than wooden vessels, and they
yield fewer fragments to which drowning men may
cling. Their effect on the compass, not yet suffi-
ciently studied to be capable of being al.
ways remedied by mechanical adjustments,
no doubt often contributes to bring them
into peril. We are, therefore, the more
hound to seize on every suggestion which
science may offer to furnish us with the means of
avoiding danpri which, bursting on us unprepared,
involve sue!, terrible results. A few hours' notice
of a coming storm would in most cases enable
seamen to be prepared for the worst. To run
within a safe harbour ; if no harbour be near, to
stand out to the open sea, would save a wreck,
and one or other alternative would in most cases
be adopted within that space of time. Shipswithin
harbour could be more securely moored, shipsabout
to sail could defer their leaving shelter, if they had
warning of an approaching gale. This warning is
what science now proposes to give. In the Wreck
IttAurn for 1859 Admiral FITZROY draws attention
to the fact that most of our great storms are of
the nature of what scientific men have lately called
Cyclones. They are, in fact, gigantic whirlwinds,
often of several hundred miles diameter. But at
the Name time that the wind rushes furiously in a
circle, the whole system has a rapid progressive
motion. The centre of the Cyclone in which the
If npl ?oiler was lost passed over the Eddystone
Rock, over Exeter, and over Reigate. It reached
the Eddystone at 3 p.m., Exeter at 4 p.m., Reigate
at half-past 5 p.m. It then passed away in a

north-easterly direction. At a similar rate its cir-
cumference advanced. The Channel fleet en-
ommtered it on the afternoon of the 25th October;
it was on the morning of the 26th October that
its greatest force was felt at Liverpool, and it was
many hours later before it reached the east coast
of Scotland. These were precious hours. How
many a wreck, how many hundreds of lives would
Lave been saved could Holyhead and Liverpool
have known what was passing at Eddystone, and
that what was passing there was every moment
drawng near to them. Why should they not have
known? We have a telegraphic system stretching
from Cornwall to Inverness. In a few minutes
intelligence of the rise and progress of a gale
could be transmitted from the first point at which
it touched the island to all our ports. Successive
intelligence would speedily give assurance of the
fact, and a reasonable certainty of the extent it
would affect, and of the direction and rate of its
advance. The information would first be sent to
London, a comp.:tent officer would forward it
where it might be required. Such arc the outlines
of the plan which Admiral FITZROY has suggested.
It may be that our knowledge of the laws of
storms is not yet sufficiently matured to make this
scheme always successful. The wind blowoth
where it listeth, and an element so mobile is ne-
cessarily 'abject to the slightest local influences.
Some allowance, too, must be made for the in.
!Nonce of mistaken warnings in making seamen
regardless of them for the future. Yet, taking
everything into consideration, we confess we should
anxio.isly &sin: that some such arrangement were
forthwith carried into execution. So simple a
matter as the telegraph if g from every

outport any remarkable fall of the beim- I
raster, sudden change of the tomperatuni, or
other threatening of an approaching storm, with
intelligence of the direction and force of the wind
when it rose, could involve no serious difficulty or
expense. An office in London, with two or three
skilled interpreters of the signs, would, in truth,
be the whole new establishment required. The
local authorities of each resort of our shipping
would doubtless readily make arrangements to
give the speediest publicity to the notices they
might receive. So easy and ready a method of at
least diminishing the dangers to which our ships
and mariners are exposed surely deserves an im-
mediate trial. Within the last year ships and
cargo to the estimated value of 1,760,0001. were
lost upon our coasts. Sixteen hundred souls
perished with the wrecks. If the method proposed
were successful in saving but a few of the gallant
men, of the helpless women and children, who
must otherwise have gone down, it would well re-
ward the effort. Should it save but a small per-
centage of the annual loss of property, should it
diminish ever so little the perils of the sea, it will
amply have repaid its cost

We are informed that the Hon. and Rev.
DOTIOLAM GORDON, a son of the Earl of Amain:err,
is to have the stall in Salisbury Cathedral ren-
dered vacant by the nomination of the Hon. and
Rev. S. WALDIORAVI to the Bishopric of Carlisle.
Mr. doencre's principles are those of the most
developed Tractarianism. Mr. GORDON will be a
welcome ally of his new Bishop, of all the occu-
pants of the Episcopal Bench the one most in-
clined to Romish doctrines ; but the Bishop was
already so well supported by congenial clergymen
that the aid dm given him was not required. The
Chapter, which, by the elimination of Mr. WA L-
owrie va, has been fairly purged of the Evange-
lical element, should now be a " happy family."