The Sun.
London, England, 1845-09-03 00:00:00

CORVETTES.

Three complete
Two in progress

IsRIGI.

Twenty-three afloat
Ten in pro,ress 15,245

PACKETS.

Nine afloat

BRIGANTINE&

Three afloat ...
One in progress

19,500
812

We have nearly a hundred ships, involving an expenditure
of 1,336,250/. This enormous sum applies, it will be remem-
bered, to vessels many of which are only half finished, and has
no reference to steamers, on which an enormous amount of
money has also been squandered, without the production of a
single vessel that really answers the purpose for which she was
intended. Now it is surely competent to any Member of Par-
liament or public journalist to assert that this immense amount
of the public treasure ought not to have been placed at the dis-
posal of any individual, let his reputation for talent have been
what it might, without the most ansple proof of his competency
to direct its application. To confine ourselves to Sir William
Symonds's four crack ships, the Vernon, the Queen, the Pique,
and the Albion—it is a fact, placed beyond the possibility
of contradiction, that not one of them has realised the
calculations of her constructor ; and that he has scarcely
ever produced a ship which has answered his own
expectations of her displacement. Among the more
flagrant examples of this sort of incapacity may be mentioned
the Spartan, the Gorgon, the Victoria and Albert, and the
Retribution. Several, like the Gulnare, the Blazer, and the
Tartarus, floated so deep in the water that it was nece sary to
take out the engines which had been provided for them, and
supply their place with others better calculated to conceal the
miserable blunders of their constructor. Nor was an ex-
change of engines the only expedient to which it became ne-
cessary to resort before these vessels could be commissioned.
The Gorgon was bult with a view to carry guns on her lower
deck, but the notion was of necessity abandoned and her ports
caulked down, or the first gale would have sunk her ; and yet
with this fact before their eyes, the Surveyor's patrons permitted
him to lay down another vessel on similar lines. The Cyclops, the
Victoria and Albert, and numerous others of his ships, have only
been rendered serviceable by continual and costly alterations
after they were launched; to say nothing of even more expen-
sive deviations from the original plans furnished by him when
they were on the stocks. Yet in the teeth of these formidable
proofs of incompetency, blunders which no degree of tinkering
or coaxing can ever repair, and which net even the unscrupu-
lous favouritism of Lord Mint') could conceal—notwithstanding
the shield he extended over their author—no qualm o; doubt
of any kind as to the propriety of enabling their perpetrator
to go on squandering the public money in the accumulation of
fresh failures, appears, for one moment, to have entered the
heads of his patrons. Nay, so blind was their partisanship,
that, in all the pretended trials of Sir W. Symonds's ships with
those of other constructors, they took care to have them con-
ducted on a principle that offered as slight a chance as possible to
his rivals; arid if any vessel, like the Barham, offered prac-
tical proofs of superiority which it was impossible to suppress
or distort, they permitted him to break her up, or sell her out
of the service. We believe we are within the mark when we
affirm that ships have been thus disposed of whose very copper
and iron, to say nothing of timber, comparatively undamaged,
have produced nearly the sum for which they have been sold.
On the other hand, the Vernon and Pique, new ships, have
absolutely cost a great deal more than they are worth in alera-
tinny and repairs, and are now (of the condition of the Vernon
at least we can speak confidently) only fit, like the Rover, to
be broken up. Tnis by the way; for we propose, on a future
occasion, to lay before our readers some details of the condi-
tion and value of the various ships either broken up or re-
commended to be broken up by the present Surveyor of the
Navy, and the inadequacy of the price obtained for them.
Mais, revenir d nos moutons. It is a fact which cannot be
gainsaid, and which has been repeatedly admitted in the
House of Commons and elsewhere, by men every way corn-
petent to form a correct judgment on the subject, that during
the last twelve years the seienoe of naval architecture has not
only not advanced, but has absolutely retrogaded; and that this
result is owing to the adoption, nay mere, the protection of
the crude theories of unscientific pretenders, who, if required
so to do, would be found unequal to the solution, mathema-
tically, of one of the simplest problems of their art. During
the existence of the school of naval architecture, fostered and
encouraged by the good Lord Melville, there was, we will
venture to affirm, no one of its alumni who could not have
calculated with the nicest precision the displacement of a vessel
of given dimensions. In our own day, however, and some
twelve years after the impolitic dissolution of this valuable in
stitution, on the ground, we presume, that an elementary
knowledge of ship-building is not requisite to qualify a
surveyor of the navy for his duties—out of upwards of a
Hundred ships constructed by Sir William Symonds we are
perfectly sate in asserting that there are not half a dozen
which fulfil, in this simple element of the science, the
intention of their constructor. The obstinate repudiation
by Sir William Symonds of that aid by which alone a
naval constructor can achieve a contemplated result
with any degree of precision, reminds us forcibly of the
reply of the well-known painter, Fuseli, when recommended
by a friend to study "nature," "‘ Hang Nature (said he) she
puts me out 1" Sir William seems to eschew the stud/ of the
scientific department of his art on the same principle—it
" puts him out 1" Yet, ignorant as he is of the science of
ship-building, so much so, indeed, as to be unable to solve its
simplest problem, he has been permitted to make his " hit or
miss" experiments for upwards of twelve years, on more than a
hundred ships, and that, too, at a cost of nearly a million
and
a half sterling 1 Surely, whatever may have been the motives
of former Boards of Admiralty in screening for so long a period
his incapacity, and affording him the means of increasing the
number of his failures, it is incumbent on their successors, who
have shown so feealous and anxioua a desire to promote the in-
terests of the public service, to adopt some mode of releasing
themselves from the vast responsibility they are hourly incur-
ing on his account. Lord Ingestre, aho has a sound practical
as well as theoretical k,oss ledge of the subject, proposes the
establishment of a board of construction as the only feasible
means of arriving at any really satisfactory result. Let the
surveyor be a member of this board if it be thought desirable ;
but let him, for the future, be restrained from the repetition of
blunders which the merest tyro in the science, acting upon
known and recognised principles, would be enabled to avoid.

THE EXPERIMENTAL FLEET.
Yesterday we published a summary of the trials between
the stops of the experimental fleet, in the accuracy of which
results we have the greatest confidence. All accounts agree
that the trials took pace in light winds, and for the most part
in smooth water, the very weather in which the surve)or's
ships have been always stated to have the advantage. Other
details of the trial tailings induce a result rather different than
our yesterday's summary. We, therefore, give them as they
have reached us.
By these accounts, there were five trials between the whole
fleet " with the wind," and six trials " on a wind," besides
other trials one ship with another, and orie class with anothi r.
In the trials " with the wind" on July 19 :Ind 22, and
August 6, 17, and 18, five in number, the Queen is first,
having beaten the others three times out of five, but at the most
not above a mile and a halt. The Albion is second, having
beat the Queen once, and the Rodney four times out of five.
The Rodney is third, having beat the Queen once, and the
Albion once. The Canopus is fourth, beating the Queen
once, the Albi,n one.., and the Rodney twice. The St. Vin-
cent is fifth, beating all the ships once, on which occasion the
Queen was fourth, more than a mile astern, and the Albion a
mile and a half astern ; the Rodney was second on that occa-
sion, and the Canopus third, only about 32 fathoms from the
St. Vincent ; the Superb was sixth, the Vanguard seventh,
and Trafalgar last--thus

WITII THE WIND.

July July Aug. Aug.
19 22 6 17

Aug.
18

Queen
Trafalgar
St. Vincent'
Albion
Rodney '
Canopus '
Var guard
Superb

1 1
hit las
4 3
2 2
3 4
5
7 6
•6 k 6