Northern Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1857-08-19 00:00:00

VERPOOL REGULAR

GLASGOW, GREENOCK, AND 1,1
TRADERS,
Taking* Gjods to BOWLING and rENFREW.
0NYX.......... 250 tons OPAL .... ......220 tnns.
SAPPHIRE.... —230 „ TOPAZ ..217 •,,
//` • MERSEY...... ..220 „ GA RNET ..... • •200 ~
DIAMOND • 220 tons.
DAIS OF SAILING—TUESDAY, THURSDAY, and SATURDAY.
Wharf West Side Ca fling Dock.
App'y to M'Arthar Brothers, Oswald-stieet, Glasgow; Archibald
M'Kenzie, West Quay, Greenock; or to

Al 'ART II U R and lIOGARTH,
Columbia-Bn'ldin3s, Brunswick- Street, Liverpool.

41\. STEAM COMMUNICATION BETWEEN
,j; , LIVERPOOL AND GLASGOW.
ps.bhlipTHLitaT.
. The first class powerfulesa in
teatain
-V PRINCESS ROYAL
Unless prevented by any unforeseen recurrence, the undernoted
or otter steamer Is intended to sail (with or without pilots) b.
twe,n Liverpool and Glasgow, with goods ond passengers, as undeer:
PROM CLARENCE DOCK, LIVERPOOL.
August
PRINCESS ....Tuesday .... 15.... at *l2 o'clock, noon
PRINCESS .... Saturday.... 22.... at 12 o'clock. neon
PRINCESS ....Thursday .. 27..... at 3 o'clock, afternoon
PRINCESS • •.. Tuesday .. Au vl, at 8 o'clock, evettlig
From Cll, ence Pierhcad on days marked thus *
N.B.—Goods for shipment on drys marked *must be alongside
the vessel Three Hours, and on other days One Hour, before time /
sailing.
Fares:—Cabin,including Steward's Fee, 15s ; Steerage, 6..
Servants in Cahln,Full Fare.

JOHN MACM I LAN. 1. India-buildings. Water-street.

isle of atm.

ISLE OF MAN.

r.*
LIVERPOOL AND DOUGLAS.
' DAILY (SUNDAYS EXCEPTED).
The Isle of Man Company's large and powerful Royal Mail Steam-
ship
11,,AWAS,LD, MONA'S QUEEN, or other of their first.class
Steamers, is appointed to leave PRINCE'S PI ERII EAD, LIVERPOOL,
eaye ryr
after Mo rni nTwcaot Ecelceivocke n o
in
1 otchke; extraaafltseorannoon i a
n Steamer
eeavme
re r
every Monday, t o
y
Saturday, at or after Four o'c'enk in the afternoon, with Pas-
sengers only; and troin Douglas for Liverpool. every Morning at Nine
o'clock (Greenwich time), except Monday, at Six o'clock in the Morn.
in g, and Six o'clock in the Evening Saturday, at Eight o'clock
in the Morning, and Six o'clock in the Evening; with Her Majesty'l
Mails bn d Passengers.
Cargo conveyed from Liverpool, by the sing Orry steamer, ever]
Monday, Wednesday, and Friday; and from Douglas every Tuesday
Thursday. and Saturday; leaving each port shout the time of higi
wear, p m.
FARES.--'aloon Cabin and Fees, 65.; Fore Cabin, 3s. Half Far
under 14 Years. Servants Full Fare.
EETCAN TICKETS, available for 14 days.—Saloon Cabin and Fees, 8s
Fore Cabin, 4s.—Return Tickets from Douglas are issued at the NU
only, and cannot be obtained cm board the Steamers.

AGENTS.
LIVERPOOL THOS. ORFORD, 32 (late 24), James-street.
Blanchester John Walker, 77i, Market-street.
Dlnglas Edward Bloore.

BOYS' CLOTHING MADE WITH GREAT TAB
At I.KWIS & COMPANY'S. Rapeta:4b street..;

L THE NEW SYSTEM OF NAVIGATION.

TO THE warren OF THE NOILTHCZN 'VMS.
Sir,-1 -.hat hoped that my letter, in the
NORTHERN TIMES of Friday, Bth lust., would end, for
the present, my encroachments on that space
which you so liberally devote to communications
on subjects of interest to the mercantile marine
but a letter appears in the Shipping Gazette
of Monday 10th lust., and has been widely cir-
:orbited in other periodicals, which requires
-comment from me.
My attempt to reform the system of nautical
education of the country I find to 'be a work of
- increasing labour; but it is particularly encourag-
ing to think that of the somewhat presumptive
statements I have made, as to improvement in
navigation, net one person hewing reputation for
experience or mathematical attainment has disputed
the propriety of my work ; while of the few who
anonymously uisturhed me. all, without exception,
have, atthe same time, confessed their inability to
form a correct opinion, for want of-sufficient know-
ledge of the eubje3t on which they wrote! It is
no less remarkable that those whose position
justified interference, grappled -quietly with the
Spherograph, and in determined and often severe
struggles, -in which " Greek met Greek;" dealt their
heavy blows rather from evident desire to try the
stability of my defences than to slay me on the spot;
thus exhausting their strength., without impairine,
my vigour, and at last yielding their weapons with
a courtesy evinced only by thdse who are too
chivalrous to blush at an honourable defeat.
It hes, however, pleased a Mr. M--, of Dublin,
late of Liverpool, (I withhold is full name, for his
own sake,) to pounce upon the published opinions
of one of these higlaminded of, my temporary
opponents, and to see in the early remarks of-Mr,
John Taylor, of Liverpool, (a gentleman of mathe-
matical repute among his townsmen;) a pretax-, for
direct disparagement of my Spherograph. But my
letter iu your columns of the 8:h instant wil! have
already informed your readers, and probably'Mr
M-- , that Mr. Taylor's remarks (on seeing which
I made a friendly call on that respected veteran in
science,) had no reference whatever to me or my
work. Indeed, a subsequent examination by Mt.
Taylor, of the Spherograph and its •capabilities,
-showed him sufficient reason to modify, if not to
abandor, his general opinion as to the possibility of
'attaining sufficient accuracy in mathematical pro-
jection for prescribed purposes, and even permitted
him to allow me the benefit of his strong reeom
mendation. Mr. M--, or Mr. " Any one,"•while
he simply attempts to defend the public from
fancied imposition, should, while so doing,
receive every consideration, but when he descends
to .gratuitous depreciation and personalities, and
afterwards repudiates friendly request of private
explanation, and refuses to correct his statements,
merely seeking shelter behind a claim to the right
of expressing his opinion on what he properly calls
a " -subject of great national importance,"
and denying privately what he refuses to,
acknowledge in public, viz., " any -inten-
tion whatever of saying anything in disparage-
ment of the Spherograph,". while he allows
the seeds of injury to root arid vegetate in the public;
mind to my injury, I say it is his own fault if I, in
self defence, ant compelled to call him again before
the public. Why, sir, he ignores all the high com-
mendations he had previously, in the hearing of
so meny persons, bestowed on the identical in-
strument, which. (while it suited his purpose to
frequent my office through several months) he had
the frequent opportunity of seeing tested by the
principal navigators of the port of Liverpool. When
Mr. M-- suddenly repudiates all this, and pre-
sumes on a knowledge of spherics, which I do not
scruple to believe has been mainly obtained
by means of my own illustrations of the Sphero-
graph, it is time to ask, to what unfortunate
circumstance I may attribute the favour of his
hostility. And Mr. M—'s reply, either in public
or private, will save me the unpleasant task of
.eg conjecture. I should be sorry to act
with discourtesy towards any one, but meeting my
opponent on his own around of " public" impor-
tance, I contend that he who tries to influence•a
great public question, should be correct at least in
his statement. The " public" is a high triblinal,
and is, moreover, impatient of endeavours to
mislead it.
Whether the success of my humble attempt to
relieve the United States frigate Niagara of her
compass difficulties, as mentioned by your cartes-
pendent at the time, excited passions peenliar to,
and excusable in, " patentees," I leave to your
readers to determine; certain it is that Mr. M—
has published to the world the following open
attack upon me. Referring to the Niagara, he
says (in- the &tipping Gazette of the 10th inst., 1
and elsewhere)—" Mr. Sexby had the benefit of
sights laid down at great expense by the Liver- 1
pool Corporation, to enable all vessels lying in the, ,
river to, ascertain the errors of the compass
and, consequently, to find in a feiv se-
conds, the true bearing of the ship's head.
With these aids, -Mr. Saxby's Spherograph appears
to have answered admirably. But without these
sights, or-any-other object not accurately laid down
on a chart., the -magical Spherograph could only
serve to involvethe navigator in the most unfathome
able depths of the science of errors." And he
adds, " Having;no terrestrial sight to commence
the working of an abstruse problem in spherics,
Mr. Saxby would be compelled to take some celes
tial body for his .guide, and then we should have
him attempting to -work out with accuracy a
spherical problem on a plane. This, most mathe-
maticians know to .be• utterly impossible; as Mr.
John Taylor has dust told the world, that it may
answer fin a rough .way, but that is not such an
answer as is required in navigation. In this opinion
Mr. Taylor will be supported by every man who
knows anything of spherics." -I quote thi.s, for com-
parison, with his note in reply to my remonstrance,
-wherein this same Mr. M-- denies any intent to
disparage. I aria compelled to dispute Mr. M--'s
competency to decide on any question of navigation,
spherics, or of the compass. His strange acquaint-
ance with a science unknown to mathematicians, vise
the science of errors, has, fear, unfitted him for
clear perception, where accuracy is all essential
am afraid that in meddling with spheric pre-
-seetion, he feels him-self to be in the same category
es the little boy, who, in trying to use a saw. found
it too much for hint, on account of the teeth. My
opponent may have donned a lion's skin, and have
found it convenient to further his .umnietakeble
views by assuming an aspect of importance, but
the dangling claws, and shaggy-mane, as dis-
played before me, are worse than ridiculous—
( neenie me, dc., 4-c )
Nosy, every person aequainted with the Mersey
well know that no one on board the ;United
States' ;;,frigate Niagara. whic.h lay off the ,New
Ferry, eould possibly have availed himself of the
Corporation marks on the dock walls for compass
correction, and, therefore. Mr. statement
is, to use the mildest word, a •`• mistake," Ought
any one, therefore, to be excused for founding a
Charge against an invention which is likely to,
prove usefut, on a mere ignorant assumption ? I
ehatlenge Mr. M-- to disprove that the -Sphere-
graph cap-able of all ao-lurocy that navigation
MI Possibly require—nay, that -its correctness
is saperabundant, and fully equals, in most
instances, the accuracy at present obtained by
calculation. Even Aa the case refereed ta, it will
be rerreembered, by those of the public who
witnessed the testing -on board the Niagara (where
one of the most aceamplished navigators in the
U. S. navy, lieutenaut /Sermon, had computed the
truo compass error from an altituadneanedr
poetzsititi
ineuetl;
taken just previously), that my answer
coincided witk the ealculated ,Wautel as b
o _tained by
the sailing master, the said Lieutenant Kennon.
My work was simply this. Lieutenant Kennon
gave me Cle apparent time at ship—with this and
he known latitude and declination, Isar five or
six seconds, and triaupt calculation, by the
Bpherograph the sun's true bearing,; on comparing
this with the sun's compass bearing, of course the
difference was the gross error of the compass
itself in one sum. I ought to mention that the
bearing was taken by the aid of a Meath card
(Friend's " pe/Drusn, and I trust the Board of
Trade will soon see the advantage of considering
this instrument superior to the azimuth compass
Allen for sea use, as it avoids osoilistiogaiu4..43,llo