The Sun.
London, England, 1870-06-30 00:00:00

FLOATING TELEGRAPH STATION.

When the first Atlantic telegraph failed, considerable
study was devoted by scientific men to the discovery of
means by which relief might be %fforded to the
stretch of line which was to extend from the coast
of Ireland to Newfoundland. Among others who
directed their attention to the subject was Cap-
tain John Moody, late managing director of the Goole
Steam Shipping Company, who has been for many years
engaged in superintending the building of steam and sail-
ing vessels. The result of Captain Moody's application is
the production of a flat-bottomed boat or launch, now
lying in the Thames, off Grays. This was inspected on
Tuesday by a party of scientific and nautical men. The
vessel is intended to be moored by four anchors at any
point where she can be useful either as a telegraph
station, as a place of refuge, or as a light-ship. She is built
of iron, something after the Minotaur fashion, and is pro-
vided with four water-tight chambers, which project in
star-fashion from the centre. This naval structure draws
but twelve inches of water, and her inventor claims for her
not only perfect seaworthiness, but a power of righting
herself superior even to that of air-chambered lifeboats
of the National Institution. The vessel is, in effect, an
inhabitable buoy, and when securely moored would
serve the purposes of a light-ship. Captain
Moody would have one stationed some distance
west of Valentia Island, off the coast of Kerry ;
another off Brest, and others east of the American
coast, to receive Atlantic cables, and to be the
means of transmitting early intelligence of and from ships
at sea. The present experimental vessel has a breadth
from ray to ray of 65 feet, and a circular hold of 12 feet
in depth. It would be quite practicable for a crew suffi-
cient to manage a light-ship to find comfortable quarters
on board, provided that the vessel is found to be perfectly
trustworthy when stationed at anchor in a heavy sea. On
this point Mr. Fox, Lloyd's agent at Southend, has re-
ported that the vessel rode out a storm there in May,
without shipping a pint of water, at a time eighteen large
steamers were unable to proceed on their voyage on ac-
count of the gale. On Tuesday the ship was rigged fore
and aft, and in the short trip she made with a mere breath
of wind, on the reaches of the Thames off Grays, she
was found to act, not only as well as could be expected in
the case of a vessel which is intended to be stationary, but
to be possessed in no small degree of the sailing qualities
of a sea-going craft.

THE ALBERT ASSURANCE SOCIETY.—An application
was made to Mr. Bloxam, Chief Clerk in Vice Chancellor
James Chambers on the part of the liquidators of the
Albert Assurance Company in the matter of a policy
effected on the life of the Earl of Fife. The policy in ques-
tion was effected on the occasion of his lordship's marriage
and was vested in the hands of trustees. The latter were
now desirus of reasuring under the new construction sub-
ject to the leave of the court. The liquidators considered
that it would be of advantage to the society to carry out
the proposal, and the Chief Clerk concurring an order was
made accordingly.
THE BISHOP OF LINCOLN ON THE VATICAN
COUNCIL. —The Guardian publishes a letter addressed by
the Bishop of Lincoln to the Bishop of Ely as President
of the Anglo-Continental Society. A question has, he
says, arisen whether it is desirable the Church of. England
should remain a passive spectator of what is going
on at Rome, or should avail itself of this oppor-
tunity of publicly declaring its own sentiments.
The Bishop of Lincoln inclines to the latter course.
The Fathers of the Reformation set us an example how
to act in the present crisis. The Church of England did
not remain a passive spectator of the Council of Trent.
Bishop Jewell put forth his celebrated "Apologia," which
was translated into most European languages, and the
Thirty-nine Articles themselves were, in fact, produced
by the Council of Trent. The Bishop thinks that the
English Church ought now to follow this precedent, and
fulfil her mission on the Continent by shewing how a
Christian Church may be at once scriptural and Catholic.
He commends the question to the Synod of Canterbury.