Star.
London, England, 1827-09-11 00:00:00

TRIP TO SHEERNESS.

Though " a Trip to Sheerness" possesses none of dull
fashionable trim which renden a " Trip to Bath" or" Brighton"'
so palatable among the listless coteries of high life, yet those who
glory in their country's naval greatness, or love to ruminate oiler
the changes to which its habitable surface has been sod is now sub.
jected, will find, in a trip to Sheerness, all that their most 'angular
wishes could desire. A steam-boat, commodiously fitted up, well
supplied with every comfort, and in which civility appears as as
established rule of office, sails thrice a week from the Tower Wakes
and on board of which I was sculled in a wherry for the small
matter of three pence. The weighing of the anchoe was but the
effort of a few minutes, and through the dwelt wedged and chaotic
mass of vessels of all sizes, and of all nations, we cautiously threaded
our way, checking the velocity of our movement every now and
then, by letting off a jet of steam, when any obstacle to our course
presented itself direct a-bead, even stopping the boat skint-cher,
wheeling her right or left, or backing her astern, as circumstance.
required, and making her yield, in fact, as obidiently to the word
of command of the individual who guided her as if she bad been a
being endowed with life and reason.—When we had fairly dived
Into the depths of this species of marine labyrinth, a sense of loneli-
ness came before me, as if I was shut out from all intercourse with
the smiling works of nature by which I was so lately surrounded,
and I hailed every glimpse of the little unoccupied spaces of water
that presented themselves as we proceeded, with ehat sort of pro-
phetic rapture which a farmer, after a long term of drizzling wee.
thee, hails the little patches of blue opening sky through the black
curtain that bad enshrouded them, as portending a speedy change of
the dismal and unpropitious times that bad preceded. The ships,
oo advancing further (Inwards, were generally seen to lie in conti-
guous rows, according to the country whence they come. After
fairly emerging out of the maze of masts, the country on each side
Is seen rising into moderately elevated hills, having their green 11l
perficiesvariegated with trim pruned hedges and groupes of
germed here and there with a picturesque cottage, or mansion of the
wealtby,reping out from among the forest clumps that embowered
them. W&ks of vast extent have lately been completed at Sheerness,
and such others, too, are now in progress, as will render it the
most complete and extensive naval depot in the world. Here are
three new docks for building or repairing ships of the first-rate
class, and two others for vends of entailer dimensions, into one of
the former of which the Prince Regent, a three-decker, and the
largest ship in the world, was lately taken to be examined, with
all her masts and yards, guns and stores fitted, and without the
dock being in the slightest degree injured thereby—a thing hitherto
unprecedented in naval history, and which could have been effected
in no other place on the globe. There Is also a fine building slip
here, and three basins, each capable of containing eight ships of the
line ; as also two for smaller rates—one of the former having its
entrance fitted with a cassoon to detain the water in it, during ebb
tide, for keeping the vessels afloat ; all the others admitting the
tide to flow freely out and in, leaving thus the greater portion of
the ships within them, resting, during low water, upon the soft mud
of their bottom. The old houses of the garrison are now also in
the course of being pulled down,-to construct works for the puttee-
' tion of the whole; and when these are completed Sheerness will be
lin a manner a place of new creation. The Isle of Sheppey, in
which this depot and the fishing village of Queenborough lie, is
about thirteen miles long by ten broad, and contains 11,000 inha-
bitants. Towards the sea it presents a range of rather high clayey
cliffs, declining towards the Kentish side into low, marshy flats,
defended from the overflowing of the tides by dykes in the Dutch
style, Its soil is a rich alluvial, resting on blue clay, and produces
luxuriant crops of wheat, oats, beans, peas, &c. besides caraway
and coriander seeds, considerable quantities of the two latter being
yearly raised here, though less now than in former times. Barley
is found to be unsuited to its soil, and there is not a rock or a sur-
face spring In the Wand, the whole of the fresh water, which is
exceedingly pure, being furnished by wells sunk far below the
level of the sea ; those belonging to the inhabitants having the wa-
ter drawn up from them by means of horses, and the one belong-
ing to Government by a steam-engine. A pipe from the latter,
' which formerly supplied the residents of Blue Town, having been
cut off by the erection of the new wall, was the principal cause of
the great destructiveness of the late fire, as otherwise water would
have been furnished in sufficient quantity for the supply of the en-
gines to put it quickly under. The well in the dock-yard is said
to be the second in point of depth in Europe, and with such diffi-
culty is the valuable element above alluded to procured through.
out the island, that many individuals earn a comfortable livelihood
by collecting the brackish water in the ditches about, mad retailing
it through the town for washing and other common purposes. The
Isle of Sheppey le fast washing away on the seaward side, and if
steps are not hereafter taken to remedy this, possibly in a century or
two hence its name may require to be obliterated from the map.
Whole acres, with houses upon them, have been carried away in a
sinew storm, while clay shallows, sprinkled with sand, which stretch
a lull mile beyond the verge of the cliff over which the sea now
sweeps, demonstrate the original area of the island. From the blue
clay of which these cliffs are composed, may be culled out speci-
mens of all the fishes, trees, and fruits which abounded in Britain
before the birth of Noah ; and the traveller may consequently han-
dle, though he cannot eat fish which swam, and fruit which grew In
the days of the Antediluvians, all now converted into solid stone
by the petrifying qualities of the soil in which they arc imbedded.
Here are lobsters, crabs, and nautiluses presenting almost the same
realty at those we now see crawling and floating about—branches
of trees, too, in as perfect order as when lopped from their parent
stems, and trunks of them, twelve feet in length, and two or
three in diameter, fit, in all appearance, for the operations of the
saw, with great varieties of fruits, resembling more those of tropical
slimes than of cold latitudes like ours—one species having a large
kernel with an adherent stalk, as complete in its parts as when
newly plucked from the tree that produced it. Alum, gypsum,
calcareous sinter, and iron pyrites are found abundantly on the
beaches of the Island, as also the celebrated Sheppey cement stone,
which is, collected and shipped to London, foe the purpose of being
ground down into a powder and mixed up as a cement. Sheppey
is separated from Kean by a sea chaffnel, named the Swale, through
which sntaU vessels readily pass, a ferry-boat forming a medium of
communication between the two; but when the proposed draw-
bridge is completed, a distance of five miles will be saved in the
land route to lAodon. On the line of the Medway, betwent
Sheerness and Chatham, lie 35 sail of the line, 25 frigates, and 15
sloops of war, all in complete order for putting to sea at a few
weeks' notice, which filled my mind with pride and wonder at,
what our dear little Island is capable of achieving should war again'
call forth her Naval energies, although the sallow, onbealday cons.
plezions of the inhabitants of Sheppey, and the multitudinous array
of new-formed graves in the chureh-yard, made use soon sigh for a
more agreeable field to indulge my patriotic thought% upon, and,
consequently, as boon as the return of the steam-packet was
announced, I hurried on board of her, under even more plea-
'tirade feelings than when I first set out on my journey.
While rowing past the Dock-yard towards the steamer, my
ears were unexpectedly stunned by three as hearty and bois-
terous cheera as ever the Doot or Mounsiers were regaled
with on our jolly tars ranging their gallant barks alongside
of them, broadside to broadside ; when casting my eye in
the direction whence these proceeded, I perceived a boat pushing
out from the shore towards the steam boat also, which I subse-
quently found contained, in the person of Dr. Hutchison, Surgeon
of the Dock-yard Establishment at this place, the subject of these
loud and laudatory farewells; a Gentleman who, it appeared, had
endeared himself to all classes in the place by the uniform kindness
of his deportment, and more particularly to the naval mechanics
and labourers, from his gratuitously dispensing his professional ser-
vice among their families during the period of his stay, and who had
thus availed themselves of the opportunity his retirement from
alike, by reason of ill-health, afforded of evincing their respect for
leis person. and thankfulness for bis past kindnesses in the only way
the poor can manifest their feelings of gratitude towards the rich.—,
While my spirits were yet pleasurably excited by this manifestation
of grateful feeling on the part of the labouring community of Sheer-
ness, the thoughts called up by the too numerous opportunities af-
forded to the worthy Doctor of dispensing his professional services,
in the place, made me naturally wonder what in the name of folly
Could have induced the Noble individual lately at the head of the
Admiralty, to construct the finest duck-yard in England, or, per-
haps, in Europe. in the centre of a pestilent marib, where multi-
tudes are carried off yearly by the remittent and intermittent fevers
arising from its noxious miasma ; diseases which are indeed so fa-
tally prevakute that few individuals on the island ate above a
twelvemonth totally free of their attacks, unless great care be taken
of their persons. The narrowness and intricacy of the outward
channel also rendering it a most difficult task often for large ships
to pass and repass to and from seaward, point out Sheerness as a
must ineligible place for a naval station, requiring several changes
of wind to carry vessels readily to sea, whereas, from Portsmouth
or Plymouth they could get quickly out with almost any wind.—
The peat and increasing trade too, carried on by means
of the *fhames, imperatively requires that both its waters
and those cat its tributaries should not be blocked up by idle
war-hulles, but reserved fur the sole use of our commercial
marine to pass to and front without " let or hindrauce" upon.—
the important changes that bass at various times taken place, too,
,n the sand•banks at the mouth of the Thames, render it probable.
that before another century expires, the channels through then, will
be impassable fur first-rate ships of war, demanding thus possibly a
canal to be cut to cat r y them Out against the enemy. W. IL

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