The Sun.
London, England, 1866-07-09 00:00:00

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Royal family during the stay of her Majesty at
Osborne.

The new War Department screw steam storeship
Earl de Grey and Ripon, built and engined by the
Thames Iron Works, Shipbuilding, Engineering,
and Dry Docks Company at Black wall, went down
the rivor on Friday to test the ship and machinery
for the manufacturers' satisfaction, and will make
her official trip to-morrow from Woolwich arsenal.
She is intended to replace the Balaclava, lost on the
Irish coast in conveying the Wyvern's heavy cupola
guns to Birkenhead. Mr. 11. T. Moore, who has
commanded the sister ship, Lord Paninure, during
the entire period of her service, about seven years,
with acknowledged success, has been transferred to
the command of the new ship by the War Depart-
ment, on an augmentation of pay and emolumont.
Rear-Admiral Hastings R. Yelverton, arrived at
Portland on Friday morning last shortly before
noon, attended by his secretary, Mr. J. W. Burke.
He proceeded on board her Majesty's ironclad ship
Caledonia, Capt. Foley, which, having arrived the
previous day from Devonport, was anchored inside
the breakwater. Admiral Yelverton, it is under-
stood, will take command of the Channel squadron,
which is expected to assemble at Portland during
the ensuing week.
The armour-plated screw steamship Lord Clyde,
24, Captain Roderick Dew, C. 8., left Plymouth
Sound on Friday afternoon for the Cape of Good
Hope. She tows the tender African to Madeira.
The armour-plated screw steamship Prince Con-
sort, 31, Captain Edward A. Inglefield, left Ply-
mouth on Friday for the Mediterranean.
The screw steam gunboat Dapper, 60 horse power,
Lieut. W. Moriarty (tender to the Britannia), from
Dartmouth, arrived at Plymouth on Saturday.
The iron armour-plated screw steamship Achilles,
26, Capt. E. A. Vansittart, left Plymouth Sound on
Saturday for Hamoaze, where she will be repaired
and refitted. The alteration in the position of her
masts is to be made with a view to the improvement
in her power of staying. She is now alongside the
sheer hulk, and to-morrow will probably be placed
in the Prince's Dock, Devonport, which will be
vacated to-day by the 12-gun sloop Liberty.
At her Majesty's dockyard at Portsmouth there
is room for reform. The amount of visible work in
the building or repair of ships, it must be admitted,
is very small, when considered in relation to the
number of hands employed and the cost of supervi-
sion. This is accounted for by a want of organisa-
tion of labour, the change in the work of ship-
wrights from wood to iron, and the great curse of
the Admiralty dockyard system—continual altera-
tions, to the hindrance of work that should be turned
out of hand at once. Of ships building in Ports-
mouth dockyard there is at present but one small
vessel, the Danae, 1,080 tons, designed by Mr. E. J.
Reed, which promises to be a very handsome and
fast craft. The remaining building shipways in the
yard are all converted into stores for timber in logs
and planking. Of ships under repair in dock, the
Himalaya, in No. 11, is the only one that can be
said to be making any progress, if we except a useless
wooden gunboat in No. 5. The Himalaya is having
a complete overhaul to hull and machinery. She
will be undoeked about the end of next week, but
will then take a couple of months to complete
before she can be pronounced ready for commis-
sion. The Orestes and Harrier, corvette and
sloop, unarmoured, in No. 5 and 6 docks, are wooden
vessels, whose repairs will approach nearly the total
of their original cost, and are altogether out of date
for purposes of war, as they could be destroyed by
the dozen by such iron-armoured gunvessels as the
Medusa and Triton, recently built on the Thames
for the Peruvian Government—sea-going gun-
vessels with a 101 knot speed, and carrying four
150-pounder Whitworth rifles on 8f t. draught of
water. In No. 3 dock is the Scorpion turret-ship,
opened up completely, and with about six men at
work upon her laying down one of her new iron deck
plates. In No. 2 dock is the Volcano floating steam
factory, another useless vessel, whose capabilities
have been long outgrown by the wants of the navy,
but which is, nevertheless, like many other matters
in the yard and port, " continued." The old ship
basin has its water space occupied by an old paddle
steamer which, for almost time out of memory, has
been " converting" into a coal depot, and the
Prince of Wales three-decked screw steam ship,
which, as being an acknowledged useless vessel, is
being carefully caulked all over, inside and outside.
The steam basin water space is occupied by the
Minotaur iron frigate, whose outfit it is not
expected will ever be completed until she has
been placed in commission and taken altogether
from. Portsmouth and to sea ; the Warrior iron
frigate, whose refit began a long time back,
when paid out of commission by Captain Hon.
A. A. Cochrane, and is believed to have made a
little progress in the first stage ; the Mersey wooden
unarmoured frigate, which began fitting.out months
and months ago, and is still fitting out, although
understood to be ready for the pennant of commis-
sion, the Rinaldo and Dart, an unarmoured corvette
and sloop, on board which a show of bustle is made
by the riggers and shipwrights in giving them the
finishing touches for the first-class reserve ; the
Ariadne unarmoured wooden frigate, waiting her
chance for repairs, &C. ; and the armoured screw fri-
gate Royal Alfred, which is making the most satis-
factory progress of any, from the fact of her having
her captain appointed to her on the books of the
Victory for the special purpose of superintending her
outfit. The Royal Alfred, however, can afford to
wait, or rather linger over her outfit, for were she
ready for sea to-morrow her ten 12-ton rifled guns
with their carriages and slides are not ready for her
Of the ships now in commission and occupying the at-
tention of the dockyard authorities at Portsmouth the
Hector iron frigate is completing her refit for sea,
reported for the Mediterranean ; the Bellerophon iron
frigate is alongside the sheer 'jetty with topmasts
housed and lower yard on deck in course of refit.
She is, like the Royal Alfred, waiting her gnus and
their:carriages, and therefore can afford to take matters
leisurely, much as the presence of so exceptionally use-
ful an ironclad would be valued with the fleet under
Lord C. Paget in the Mediterranean at the pre-
sent juncture of affairs. The Tamar, screw troop-
ship, also requires docking to examine her bottom,
prior to again proceeding to sea, and this nearly
closes the list of visible work going on in ship build-
ing or ship repairing, refitting, &c., in Portsmouth
dockyard. Of the useless work turned out by the
yard let us take as a specimen the last vessel com-
pleted, and now lying alongside the yard, rigged,
stored, armed, and waiting to have her pennant of
commission hoisted. This is the Cruiser, a modern
unarmed sloop, of 752 tons and 60-horse power, and
engines nominal. This vessel, on being paid out ofe
commission at Portsmouth some considerabhle time
back, was, as is customary, placed along with
ships in a similar condition in one of the
private
in
harbour,
the upper waters of Portsmouth harbouth%
of time she was again brought
hioorwounolly repaired.
surveyed, and ordered to
dbenott
repair a vessel of
Ine course
Portsmouth dockyard
and, of Course, the
752 tons, and so the
yard, the ship duly repaied.
Without
following
bill of costs duly honoured.
after sta • ges of outfit at
jocboNuv_lraesdc, consigned to a
the Cruiser through herll
bes
uffielent to say that
Portsmouth yard, it will
this 60-horse powered wooden
sloop, fully , rigged
as a .$l4, carries five guns—four of the useless
steel-tubed 64-pounders and one 100-pounder ;
that she requires but the apointment to her of
a commander to place her actully in commission,
and when commissioned, if she is intended
for a fighting ship, which it t
mu be presumed she is
by the presence of the five guns on the deck she
will be the greatest burlesque as a man-of-war
afloat in the world. No
the work going on in the
steam factory of Ports-
mouth yard, owing to the fact that here an entirely
different department
is at work, and on principles
the opposite to those originated in other depart-

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