The daily dispatch. [volume] (Richmond [Va.]) 1850-1884, 1853-10-12
American Ship Building.

There Is no single department VI h"
enterprise in which the energy and ambition
.fthe American people have been more sig
naIIy displayed than in their efforts to OBTAIN
control of the seas and WELD the scep're oi
commercial greatness. Our countrymen IN
berited from their island ancestors strong
taste and aptitude for maritime pursuits and
from the first settlement of the continent 'hey
took to the water rs naturally as young ducks'
Their passion and capacity to achieve sue
cess ON the broad arena Of the great deep
was first displayed in the whale fishery, which
they commenced as early as 1920, and having
in about fifty years hunted the whale from
their own shores, these Nimrods of the wave
followed their gigantic prey with indomitable
determination into the most distant recesses
of the Northern and Southern oceans. Never
had any nation pursued this perilous yet pro
ftabIe branch of commerce with such extra
ordinary ardour. The achievements of the
Norwegians, the Biscayans, the Dutch and
the English, were completely thrown into the
shade by the daring and success of these in
FAINT colonists. II was the energy and PROV
ess displayed by the colonial mariners in this
pursuit which elected from Mr. Burke, in his
eloquent speech on American affairs, in l774,
the famous tribute to ga people who are still
in the gristle and not hardened into man
hood
There is no leaf in the volume of American
history which contains more brilliant and
soul-stirring record than that on which is en-
blazoned the progressive and triumphant
march of American commercial enterprise,
from the moment spoken of by MIR. Burke
when our people were in the "gristle, until
this hour when they are near being harden
ed into manhood" One of the most striking
features in that progress, is the great and
wonderful Improvement which has been made
in the art of ship building. Our ocean steam
ers are acknowledged, by eminent British ma
val authority, to excel the best specimens of
British architecture, and American clipper
ships, in speed, strength and capacity, are the
wonder of the world.
This article has been suggested by an &C
count. which we have heretofore published'
of the mammoth clipper, the Great Republic,
and which is said to be the longest, largest,
and sharpest ship ever built in the e. States.
Think of a vessel 325feetin length, 52in width,
80 in depth, registered tonnage 1000, with
storage capacity for between 5000 and 5000
tons, with complete decks, with masts, of
which the main mast is feet in diameter, and
131 feet long, and which viii spread 10000
yards of canvass in single suit of sails! Our
country may make poor show beneath the
glass roof of Worlds Fair, but when the
theatre is the broad expanse of world OF
waters, where else shall we see such speci-
mems of commercial enterprise and mechani-
calskill, as our majestic clippers, the monarchs
of the wave, to whom even britannia has re-
signed her sceptre, and who reap golden tri-
butes from every cline!
The excellence ofsuch ship as the Great
Republic, and ofthe otherlarge clippers, isnot
so much their size as their splendid model and
wonderful combination ofspeed strength and
capacity for freight. In point ofdimensions,
even the ancients, in some Of their ships,
might cope with the moderns. The cedar
ship of Sesostris; the extraordinary vessel
which Archimedes constructed, at the order
of Hero, and which seems to have been
sort of floating hotel and church combined;
the shipin which Constantine removed the
largest of the obelisks of Heliopolis to Rome,
those must have been enormous productions;
but they were clumsy, unmanageable masses,
which were regarded, even in those times, as
of no practical advantage. 1t was reserv-
ed for the ingenuity and skill of our country
men to construct vessels not only of immense
size and capacity, but which are managed
with the greatest ease and which fly over
the wa.ers with the grace. buoyancy and
speed of bird. What honors would the an
clients have heaped upon such achievements
of artas these when they esteemed the inven-
tors of their own rude vessels worthy to take
rank among the Gods, and even the ships to
be translated to the heavens, where their
light among the consultations still cheers the
mariner in his wanderings over the deep.