The Sun.
London, England, 1861-03-07 00:00:00

THE NAVY.

The trial of the new screw steam sloop Rogan°
at the Lower Hope has been reported at Woolwich
as highly satisfactory, the engines supplied by
Messrs. Scott and Co., of Greenock, performing 96
revolutions per minute, her draught of water being
10 feet 4 inches forward and 12 feet 8 inches aft,
working up to 630-horse power, being nominally
150 only. The speed of the vessel was 101 knots
per hour.

Her Majesty's paddle steamer Vivid yesterday
returned to Woolwich from her second trip to the
Nore on trial of Mr. D. K. Clark's:patent apparatus
for the prevention of smoke issuing from the chim-
ney. Mr. Clark's invention consists in introducing
a supply of air into the furnace above the fuel by
means of jets of steam. The operation of the jets
during the trials is stated to have been attended
with a falling off of indicated power to the extent
of 62 horse-power, being about 10 per cent. of the
power worked up to by the Vivid, and a consequent
reduction of speed from 13.17 to 12.05 knots, by a
loss of nearly a quarter of a knot per hour. The
consumption of fuel was scarcely affected, being in
each case about the same. The plan of mitigating
the nuisance of smoke, though somewhat favourable,
is stated to be still imperfect. The effect of the
apparatus, it appears, occasions a noise in the en-
gine-room to some objectionable extent, but which
it was suggested might probably be in a great mea-
sure remedied by the inventor.
The screw steam gunboat Procris is ordered to be
commissioned at Plymouth by Lieut. the Hon. J.
Carnegie. She is to have a crew of 30 men.
A further official trial of the system of instan-
taneously disconnecting boats from their falls, on
being lowered from a ship's davits on any sudden
emergency, took place on board the steam tender
Lucifer at Portsmouth, on Tuesday, in the presence
of ,;Rear-Admiral Superintendent Hon. George
Grey ; Captains Moorman and Coote of her Ma-
jesty's ships Cossack and Victory; and several
other naval officers. The trials took place outside
the harbour, and the boat was lowered three times
with the most perfect success, as far as the inven-
tor of the system pretends to go—the instantaneous
freeing of the falls from the boat at the moment
required by the person in charge of her. To obtain
this result the boat is fitted with an iron shaft run-
ning along the boat's kelson and connected with an
eccentric under the sternsheets ; the latter, worked
by a small hand lever, throws the shafting forward
or aft as may be required. On this shafting, in a
line with the boat's falls, are stout claws or teeth,
immediately in front of each of which are stout
metal rollers. From the after part of each roller
run three-inch square casings, level witb the boat's
thwarts. The lower block of each full has its hook
prolonged into a stout bar, sufficient to reach the
shafting in the bottom of the boat, and terminating
in a semicircular link moving upon a stout iron pin.
To hoist the boat up to the davits from alongside
the bars attaehed to each block are passed down the
casings until the semicircular links touch the bot-
tom, when the lever, thrown forward by the hand
of the man in charge of the boat, the clawe of the
shafting catch the links and jamming each under
its roller, it is locked by the eccentric in that posi-
tion. A pin inserted abaft adds to its security. It
will therefore be seen that to lower the boat, the
falls having been cleared in the usual manner, and
the crew having taken their seats, the lowering
from the ship commences in the common way. The
officer in charge of the boat, with his hand on the
lever, has the power of freeing the boat from its
falls at any moment he sees a fit opportunity, and
releasing both ends of the boat at the same instant.
In this certainty consists the merits of the inven-
tion claimed by the inventor, who does not prefer
any claim to give the boat headway prior to Blear-
ing the ship, as in Clifford's plan. The invention is
of a somewhat analogous character to the late Capt.
Bynaston's, whose disengaging hooks were also of
a very similar character to those adopted for a like
purpose, in 1833, by Lieut. Waghorn, the projector
of the overland route, and which were fitted to
the Levant, merchant steamer, and tested in
Falmouth Harbour in the following year, in the
presence of Capt. King, superintendent of packets,
with the most perfect success. The system of low-
ering tried on Tuesday, however, professed to be,
and certainly appears so, a more certain and instan-
taneous method than either Kynaston's or Wag-
horn's. Webb, the inventor, is a carpenter's mate
on board her Majesty's ship Illustrious, not the St.
Vincent, as formerly stated.
The first delivery was received yesterday at
Woolwich of the new Admiralty night signals, in-
vented by Mr. W. H. Ward, and manufactured by
Messrs. Ridsdale. The inventor has succeeded in
embodying in these signals (the system of which is
now adopted by the British and American navies),
the whole of the improvements which have been
suggested from time to time by the authorities of
Woolwich dockyard Lin their investigations during
the last 18 months, as well as by the Lords of
the Admiralty themselves at the , various in-
spections of the invention during the pro-
gressive stages of improvement. The system now
presents an entirely new feature, the dimensions,
weight, and efficacy of the apparatus having been
totally changed. The whole of the sets delivered
yesterday having been inspected by the authorities
were readily epproved and stored for transport,
being intended for the Ist division of the Channel
fleet, in command of Rear-Admiral Smart.
The weather was exceedingly tempestuous at
Portsmouth yesterday, with the wind from W. to
W.S.W. At 7 p.m. the strength of the gale con-
tinued unabated, and a heavy squall, accompanied
with rain, passed over. A large number of vessels
had taken shelter inside the Wight, and there was
every appearance of a wild and boisterous night.

The undernamed have been nominated to naval
cadetships :—W. W. Pughe, H. R. G. Hughes, C.
Gardner, J. Alaitland, A. Pigott, and F. Chalmer.
The following appointments were made yester-
day at the Admiralty—John Brown, chief engineer
to the Terrqr ; Wm. Owen, first-class assistant-en-
gineer, to the Indus, for temporary charge of the
machinery of the Phcebe ; Henry Cooper, promoted
to the rank of acting first-class assistant-engineer
in the Skipjack. and A. Stretton, acting third-class
assistant-engineer, to the Fisgard, for service in
the Monkey.