The Sun.
London, England, 1857-05-09 00:00:00

c .7ii` -V S PA. PER

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STEAM SIiTTP(..tg2INVINC- de,
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(From the
According to the fable, Chanticleisqdl—the-naaish..
such a life of it by calling them ou fhb beSO
dawn that they put their heads tigether arid
silenced him for good. The next morning they
slept long enough, but their mistress, rising late
and finding, them all abed, gave them nearly as
much as they had given poor Chanticleer. We
have only to suppose her Majesty's domestics re-
ducing the Press to silence, and we may forum tl a
inevitable result. Instead of being kept to their
duty they begin to enjoy repose. A sweet lethargy
creeps on their senses, and their 'eyelids yield to
forgetfulness. A Military appointment has to be
made. A friendly tongue, in persuasive accent'',
:recommends a man whi give no trouble. The
Minister, under a soft illusion Via-, 6ne soldier s
as good as another, so as he be a gentleman, yields
to his charmer, and sends a respectable regiment d
officer oft the errand of. a Clive or a Napier. A
war, fertde in disastrous experiences, is just over,
and complacency reigns in our arsenals and dock-
yards. On a new emergency ships are wanted ;
routine resumes it; easy sway, and as last. as ship
after ship leaves our ports, 'freighted with4hole
regiments, the old story of " accidents" is renewer'. -
Scarce a day passes which does not bring tidings
of ships leaking, putting back, or putting in,
with many feet of water, requiring repaita
to hull, or machinery, or rigging, and
losing days of precious time. They have not
started in a hurry ; for, after all our supposed
experience, and imprbvernent, and preparations,
we buckle on our armour for this new enterprise
(mita as slowly as if we had never proved it 13-fore.
Well, suppose the conspiracy succe,sful, and our
tongues tied. Suppose no journal courageous
enough to insert even letters, taking the Ministe-
rial view that they are the complaints of poor
whinning, ignorant creaiures, what would be the
infallible result ? The fable warns us. Failures of
all sorts would be slurred over. Should truth reach
the War Department or the Admiralty, a friendly
pen would never be wanting to anticipate " exag-
get ation," and blunt the edge, of ill news. Disaster
after disaster' neglect after neglect, would occur
and be forgotten, till the nation, opening its eyes
some day to the general bankruptcy of achieve-
ment, would reason roughly, but truly enough,
that something must be wrong, and that the only
way was to get rid of the present nien and try ethers
—new Generals and Admiral,, new Ministers, a
new system, a new Parliament, a new con-tittrtion
—any novelty in preference to a tenour of ill suc-
cess.

We are supposed to be a sort of wreckers, reap-
ing our harvest from disaster and waiting upon ill-
fortune. We are charged even with setting down to
the credit of departments that average of casualty
certain to all people and a condition of human life.
But is it so'? Do Cunard's steamers regularly
return to port half wa erlogged, or alternately
run for protection or refit into some friendly
port af.er a few days' sailing ? Is the Bay of
Bay so much worse than the rest of the Atlantic,
and how do packet-ships and merchantmen meet
what we are told is the usual result of a week's
rough weather on new rigging ? Thousands of ships
cross the Atlantic every year, often in the very
roughest weather, yet nature has provided no Co-
runna or Vigo between Cape Clear and Boston.
The piston of the huge engine of a Cunard or a
Collins steamer Dever ceases its motion from the
moment it rises at the moorings in the Mersey to
the moment when the steam is blown off at New
York. Yet it is a venial affair that the Transit,
with 600 or 700 men on board, should drift upon
her own anchor and put back to Portsmouth in a
sinking state. Then, she does not roll, and the
people who write letters to say that she does aro
land-lubbers, suffering the usual depression of
spirits after a short sea voyage. It appears, in-
deed, on Sir Charles Wood's own figures, that the
Transit, while 100 ft longer than the Satellite, with
which it is compared, is only 14 inches broader in
the beam. She is, then, at least likely to roll ;
and, though the commander, master, and carpen-
ter, in the reports, declared that she rolls "easy,"
we are not surprised at the qualification, that
though easy, she rolls " deep ;" deep enough, no
doubt, for the soldiers ou board. But every one
knows ttiat the effect of deep rolling on a ship origi-
nally constructed for lightness would be to open
the seams and disclose any weakness of timbers.
Sir Charles Wood states what we are ready to
believe,—that the masts and sails of this vessel are
lighter than those intended by its builders. But, as
the poop has,heen increased, and the fire part of
the vessel ieSsaseed over, to afford greater accommo-
dation to the ship's company, the result must be a
balance of conflicting alterations ; and, if we have
no formula for ascertaining which way the difference
lies, we are not so very unreasonable in taking the
evidence of the sick soldiers that in bad weather the
ship rolls like a tub, lets in water at every seam,
and does not leave a hammock dry. Sir Charles
\,\rood only offers conflicting considerations, whereas
their testimony is decided and clear, and even mili-
tary officers know whether a hammock is wet or
dry as well as Sir Charles Wood.
The case of the sister ship, the Urgent, which so
sadly belies its name, we are content to leave to
the letter of the gentleman quoted by Sir Charles,
who anticipate, " exaggerated accounts." It is be-
yond our depth to dive into the mystery of
" leaden joints" and " washers," "blowing-off
pipes" and "Kingston valves ;" nor can we see why
these or anything else need be " blown out" or
"blown off" by any slieht cause, or why the pipe
should have been divided by which the wat r from
the boilers was driven into the sea. A pipe with this
important office ought not to be at the mercy of ac-
cident ; nos ought a large ship with 800 men on
board, and sally boats for 300, to be at the mercy of
any small substance, such as a bit of wood or coal,
that might choose to insinuate itself " through the
Kingstons," and temporarily prevent their closing
after blowing off. We don't hear of these things
on board the Transatlantic packet steamers, for the
simple reason that if one of them were found with
the water nearly up to the engine fires, and no ac-
count to be given but a speculation on the possi-
bility of a bit of wood or coal having pas.ed, as they
say, the wrong way down the throat, the suspicious
and selfish public would immediately make a note
of the ship liable to these mysterious casualties,
and quietly abstain from taking their passage by it.
The sequel shows, too, that the public would have
been perfectly right. The commanding officer of
the Urgent sends these ingenious specu ations from
Corunna, and wishes his chefs to inf r that the
trivial nature of the accident suggested no fear as
to the future. The ship was, however, obliged in
a few dat s to put into Madeira, on leaving which
she again broke her engine gear. After one more
attempt at steaming she broke it a third tine, and
finally had to finish her voyage to Barba foes under
sail, and with a leak at her stern which it required
the continual work of 30 men to keep down.
Which, then, was justified by the result—the Cap-
tain's ingenious explanations, or the "exaugeratsd
accounts" they were intended to anticipate ?
Sir Charles Wood very civilly repeats one of
his usual expressions about " the imagination of
the writers in the newspapers," which he appears
to think the inexhaustible source out of which
all the casualties of his department arise. Yet
when we have ventured to disregard the gay, airy
tone, in which Sir Charles discusses these matters,
and the " amusement " which he professes to de-
rive from these " attacks," we cannot
does h help e
refs Whin
—what does lie really deny ? Wh
ielunstioonn !i)
t the
faonicmy
for
lea.ksae,eglf,r.saeihnt tfitz,llputtsianiglining:
thatgia theten
Urgent,? l) oe
ecxailro. it an ;
atn-
y,
in s breaking, b re a
down,in g down,
and so at, last arriving at Bar-
other hand, was not the com-
lmbeaaadk:ideni:e7. pumping,
On
the other
g officer'srstory of the little b t of wood or
coal pure imagination ? Was it a baseless fabric
of fancy in the soldiers on board the Transit that
they were all wet to the skin' and that not a ham-
mock was dry? Sir Charle, with great pomp, an-
nounces a contradiction, and then tells a story
which is no contradiction at all, or at the most some
ingenious theory of a nature to elude every possi-
ble test. We beg to say, once for all, that we are
prepared for acci4ents ; we are ready to excuse
them ; and we expect an average quantity—some-
times an excess. But we do not call it an "acci-
dent" that when peace was only proclaimed a year
ago, and all our ships from that date have been
coming into harbour with all their defects fully
known, after the lapse of eight or nine months, any
explanation, any excuse, any apology should be
found necessary for the ships employed in convey-
ing her Majesty's troops to a new scene of war.

NEW FORM OF ACTION FOR BREACII Or
psexISL—
ASSAULT BY A LADY.—Toe Northern Daily Erprcss
states that, at Darlington, on Monday, Mils 4—, a lady
residing in Harewood-grove, was charged with assaulting
Mr. B—, a solicitor, her next door neighbour. Mr. B.
stated that on meeting him the other day, in the street.
she "spat in his face and over his dress, and mid. him
a liar and a coward, that she followed him for some di- -
tance, assailing him all
the while. Miss A did not
deny the charge, but said in justification, " He cane to
my house for ten years, and made me an offer, and has
said to Mr. R—, the
.grocer, that it was only for a pas-
time." Mr. B— having denied this statement, Miss A—
said "I never told a lie in my life, and you are a liar and
a coward." She also charged Mr. B. with having thrust
a «disgusting and blackguard letter" under her door.
This also Mr. B— denied. Miss A— then said, "I know
I took the law into my own hands, and I don't care for
its being known to all the people that I spat at that liar
and coward, and I wanted to get a stick to thrash him
with, and, failing in that, I took the course ',did." She
was fined 31. and costs. We have suppressed the names
in the foregoing statement, but the Express gives them
infull.