The Sun.
London, England, 1852-09-15 00:00:00

TO THE EDITOR OF THE TIMES.

Sir,—l look forward with anxiety lest the seeming im-
portance of financial, legal, and other useful reforms,
which touch the pocket and press on public notice, shall
wholly engage the time and attention of Parliament to
the neglect of really more important interests—the
security of our country from the evils of even local in-
vasion.
It is not by speeches in the Lords or Commons, though
published in the Times (stultified as th©y are by contra-
diction and misrepresentation), that a just estimate can
be formed of the defective nature of our protective de-
fences; no, nor by any readable article which could be
promulgated by your favour—but by directing public at-
tention in the right course to obtain information and ex-
cite reflection on the stealthy, silent changes that have
taken and are taking place in the maritime circumstances
of our country.
Let the public ascertain whether, in addition to the
loss of employment for 12,000 seamen, expelled from the
banks of Newfoundland by the effect of pecuniary bonne
ties given by rival nations, a still greater number of able
mariners have not been driven from our South Sea
whale fishery by the like device; whether the coal trade
on our shores is not now in progress of being superseded
by steam-conveyance; whether, from want of employ-
ment in these and oter ways, tens of thousands of sea-
men have not quitted their native country, to serve in
foreign vessels on distant shores ; and whether, in a
case of emergency, we shall not (as regards our sailing
ships of war) be at a loss to find seamen, while the ma-
ritime resources of rivel nations have been increased by
our supineness.

If these truths are confirmed (as assuredly they will
be on inquiry), is it not essential that the most strict
attention shall be paid to all that concerns the steam
department as the best substitute for our former naval
force? I could not composedly rest my head on the pil-
low in death (now, in the coar-.e of nature, not distant),
were I to abstain from endeavouring, through the widest
channel open to me, to obtain investigation into the
abuses perpetrated in the steam department of the navy.
In my last communication I proved (from the Naval
Blue Book of Jaly, 1849), that "engines of great power
compared to the biz') of the boilers" (6,385) were
adopted (without previous trial) at a cost in ships and
machinery of millions sterling, and I asserted that thews,
had failed to that extent in practice. I may now elf,
that the reverse of this experiment has been put in pro-
gress, and that small engines are now being fitted to
large boilers' although no official trial hes been made
or permitted to be made (but peremptorily refused),
since the chief engineer admitted in evidence that
" we do not know to this day which i 3 the best boiler"
(6,090).

I shall here assign the reason for these peremptory
refusals on this important question—namely, that as the
whole steam department is fitted with boilers patronised
by the chief engineer, which are now found to have one-
third of their tubular surfaces wholly non-efficient, even
when the other two-thirds are pushed to extremity, such
exposure would be a fatal blow to farther arbitrary
adaptations. _

s "Nothing can disengage the naval service from the
((rags by which its improvement is retarded but the re-
vival of the Naval Commission of Inquiry quashed by a
vote of the unreformed !louse of Commons, on the Ist
of March, 1805."
Brenton, in his " Life of Earl St. Vincent," says,
" Every man on entering public life should make the Re-
ports of the Naval Commissioners his study." It would
be an unalloyed good if his advice to statesmen could be
successfully recommended for public adoption, and so
originate petitions for the investigation of professional
concealments respecting which the Legislature area,,.
attention
t ion
t o
un-
acquainted as with the internal organization of the Chi-
nese marine.
now, have
steam
aeveengiven,aroused
ships-of-war
had not the moat positiveorders
absolutely
roheirbi, t ibnyg equipment
pm ereen t
" engines of groat
emergency,power"
Dire
the erroneous disasters
ewunder the most pressing
their
to be noted in the log-book and officially
f ut
lhle working
steam,
unless
o ,
reported by letter to the Admiralty'. This order, as
I mentioned in my observations on the dreadful occur-
rence in the Amazon, ought to have been promulgated,
conspicuou.ly affixed, and strictly enforced, on board of
all packets under the inspection of the steam department
(5,825). A precaution the more indispensable, since the
prudent management* of our North American Packet'