New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1875-12-18
SAIL AND STEAM.

The reports from the missing French steam
ship are evidently incorrect in several partlcu-
lars. 1t was on the morning of the 2lSt OF
November in lat. 400 Sc n, long 24' 81
W., or about $50 miles west OF Havre, that
the Am6rioue was disabled by the breaking of
her shaft, and on the same day the China fell
in with her end took of some of her passen-
GERS Captain Pouzolz then stated that he
should sail as close as possible to the 50th
parallel of latitude (the dispatches said
the 9th, but this was clearly an error),
which would keep him about 80 miles
north of the latitude of Havre and
RIGHT in the track of vessels bound for the
English Channel. The Bremen steamship
K6,n spoke her about the last OF November III
lat. 400 40, long 10, and the British steamer
Terrier passed her on the LIST of December In
lat. 800, long 1So. She had therefore sue
ceeded in keeping upon the prescribed course
and in eleven days had made ABOUT 500
miles. IL she continued the same lesureiy
progress without assistance, and met with no
more accidents, she ought to reach her desti-
nation about the middle of next week.
But on the 18th the surprising intelligence
came from London that the steamer Indus, on
the Sd instant, had sighted steamer supposed
to be the Amerique off Cape st. Vincent at the
southwestern extremity of Portugal, that Is to
say about 900 miles from the spot where the
Terrier left her two days before. This OF
course is impossible. Either there Is mis-
take IN tho date, or the vessel seen was not
the Amerique. We incline to the former sup
nosition. The Indus would not have spent
more than four days in the voyage from Cape
iS
that by the 10th or 11th OF December the
AmGrique may have been driven by a STORM
as far as the locality Indicated. Indeed If she
had kept on her former course she would
probably have been spoken by good many
English vessels, or found and brought home
by one of the three steamers which have been
searching for her.
We see no reason to be alarmed for her
safetv. but there is something in the circum
stances of this tedious voyage not pleasant to
think Of The agent of the line III this city is
reported as saying that the Amerique, having
large hull and spreading but little canvas,
would be almost unmanageable under sail
alone. having about all she could do to keep her
course and make perhaps few milesa day. This
supposes of course reasonably good weather.
What would happen in a tempest he did not
venture to predict Now the disabling OF
machinery at sea is a very common accident
and it is not often that so good piece OF
work can be done under such circum-
stances as was recently accomplished by
the officers of the Ethiopia, who repaired
broken shaft in mid-Ocean and made 1t last
through the rest of the voyage. II seems
monstrOus that great passenger steamers should
be so ineficiently rugged that their sails are
of hardly any use except as auxiliaries, and in
case of the cracking of piece of iron they
must roll helpless on the bosom of the deep
until somebody finds them, and passes them
line. Here we have a beautiful specimen of
naval architecture, furnished with comforts
and luxnries for the passengers, fine furniture
and upholstery, and every conceivable
device for relieving the monotony of
an ocean voyage-except sniiciency of sails.
Ii is certainly not beyond the ability of our
mechanics TO build fast and commodlous steam
ers which can make their way pretty well under
canvas in an emergency; and the frequency of
such accidents as that which has now kept the
AmGrique five weeks at sea ought to arouse
vessel owners and travellers to the danger OF
the prevailing errors in construction.