_Towards the Pacific--Liverpool to Quebec._
Leaving Liverpool at noon of the 2nd September, 1886, warping out of
the dock into the river--a long process--we arrived, in the fine screw
steamer "Sardinian," of the Allan line, off Moville, at five on the
following morning; and we got out of the inlet at five in the
afternoon, after receiving mails and passengers. It may be asked, why a
delay of twelve hours at Moville? The answer is--the Bar at Liverpool.
The genius and pre-vision of the dock and harbour people at Liverpool
keep the entrance to that port in a disgraceful condition, year after
year--year after year. And the trade of Lancashire, Yorkshire,
Cheshire, and Derbyshire, is compelled to depend upon a sand-bar, over
which, at low tide, there is eight feet of water only. Such a big ship
as "The Sardinian" can cross the bar in two short periods, or twice in
the twenty-four hours, over a range, probably, of three or four hours.
On my return home I wrote the following letter about this bar to "The
Times":--
"THE BAR AT LIVERPOOL.
"SIR,--You inserted some time ago in 'The Times' a letter from
Professor Ramsay detailing the troubles arising to travellers from the
other side of the Atlantic, owing to shallow water outside the entrance
to Liverpool, and you enforced the necessity of some improvement, in a
very able article. Professor Ramsay was at that time returning from the
meeting of the British Association, held in the Dominion of Canada.
"Still, while time goes on, and the question becomes more and more
urgent, the bar, with its eight feet of water at low tide, remains as
it was, save that some navigators contend that it grows worse.
"Yesterday 340 passengers, of whom I was one, by the noble Cunard ship
'The Etruria,' experienced the difficulty in all its varieties of
trouble.
"After rushing through very heavy seas and against violent winds for
three or four days, we cast anchor a good way outside the bar at 5
o'clock yesterday (Sunday) morning. The weather was too rough for the
fine tug-boat, 'The Skirmisher,' to come so far out. So, after swinging
about till 10 o'clock, we moved slowly on, crossed the bar about half-
past 11, and were off the northernmost dock later on. Here the usual
process of hauling the ship round by the aid of the tug took place, and
then the further process of putting the baggage on board the tug, in
advance of taking the passengers. I was fortunate in being taken off
the ship in a special tug-boat by some friends, got to the landing-
stage, where the baggage is examined by the Customs, and, a carriage
waiting for me, was at the Central Station at Liverpool at one o'clock.
But, with all these comfortable arrangements, I had lost at least seven
hours, and had missed all morning trains. The other passengers, I fear,
did not get through for two or three hours later, and those for London
would be lucky if they just caught the 4 o'clock train.
"It would not, I am told, be prudent to take a ship of the size and
draught of 'The Etruria' over the bar till two hours before high water
on a flowing, and one hour after on an ebbing, tide. Thus, for such a
ship--and the tendency is to build larger and larger vessels--the
margin, even in moderate weather, is probably three hours out of the
twenty-four, or, in other words, exclusion from the port for twenty-one
hours out of the twenty-four, more or less.
"Lancashire will soon have to say whether its manufactures and commerce
are to be tied to the bar at Liverpool; and, in the new competition of
ports, a port open at any time of tide must ultimately draw the trade
and traffic.
"Before the Committee of the House of Commons, on Harbour
Accommodation, on which Committee I had the honour to sit, it was
proved that every country in Europe, having a sea-board, was making and
improving deep-water harbours,--except England.
"Take the case of Antwerp, which is already attracting traffic to and
from the great British possessions themselves by reason of its great
facilities.
"Liverpool is a place where the dogma of absolute perfection is
accepted as a religion. But some of us may be pardoned if, in both
local and national interests, we must be dissenters.
"That the bar may be made better instead of growing worse is obvious.
But the great cure is by cutting through the peninsula of Birkenhead
and obtaining a second entrance to the Mersey, always accessible, and
obviously alternative. This was the advice of Telford seventy years
ago, and 'The Times' has called public attention to a practical way of
working out the Telford idea, planned by Mr. Baggallay, C.E., and laid
before the Liverpool authorities--in vain.
"I may add that if our ship had called at Holyhead, the London
passengers might have left Holyhead on Saturday evening instead of
Liverpool on Sunday afternoon, a difference of a day.
"I beg to remain very faithfully yours,
"EDWARD W. WATKIN.
"Northenden, _Oct_. 18, 1886."
Some Liverpool cotton broker wrote to me to say that I had forgotten
that there were two tides in the twenty-four hours. Nothing of the
kind. There was one word miswritten, and, therefore, misprinted, which
I have corrected: but the broad fact remains, and why my compatriots in
the broad Lancashire district do not see the danger, I cannot
comprehend, unless it be that some of them are up in the "Ship Canal"
balloon, and others, the best of them, are indifferent.
Steaming along, after leaving Moville, we passed Tory Island, the scene
of many wrecks, and of disasters around. It has a lighthouse, but no
telegraphic communication with the shore at all.
I wrote a letter about that to the Editor of the "Standard." Here it
is:--
"TORY ISLAND.
"SIR,--Newspapers are not to be had here, but as this good ship is only
a week out from Liverpool, and five days from out of sight of land to
sight of land, I may fairly assume that Parliament is still discussing
Irish questions.
"Thus I ask your indulgence to make reference to a question which is
decidedly Irish, but is also Imperial, in the sense that it affects the
lives of large numbers of persons, especially of the emigrant class,
and is interesting to all the navigation and commerce of necessity
passing the north-west extremity of Ireland.
"If your readers will refer to the map they will see, outside the
north-west corner of the mainland of Ireland, Tory Island. It was on
Tory Island that 'The Wasp' and her gallant captain were lost, without
hope of rescue, for want of cable communication; and Tory Island itself
has excited the interest of the philanthropist on many occasions. On
Tory Island there is a lighthouse, with a fixed light, which can be
seen sixteen miles. Not long ago, as I learn, a deputation from the
Board of Irish Lighthouses went all the way to England to beg the Board
of Trade, at Whitehall, to sanction the expenditure of eight hundred
pounds, with a view to double the power of the light on Tory Island.
Perhaps the Board of Trade, after some interval of time, may see their
way to do what any man of business would decide upon in five minutes as
obvious and essential. But that is not the point I wish to lay before
you. My point is, that while the lighthouse on Tory Island is good for
warning ships, and may, as above, be made more effective, no use is
made of it in the way of transmitting ship intelligence.
"I ask, therefore, to be allowed to advocate the connection of Tory
Island, by telegraph cable, with the mainland of Ireland and its
telegraph system. The cost of doing this one way would, as I estimate,
be two thousand five hundred pounds; the cost of doing it another way
would be about six thousand pounds.
"The first way would be by a cable from the lighthouse on Tory Island,
leaving either Portdoon Bay, on the east end of Tory Island, or leaving
Camusmore Bay on the south of it, and landing either on the sandy beach
at Drumnafinny Point, or at Tramore Bay, where there is a similarly
favourable beach. The distance in the former case is six and a half, in
the latter seven and a half miles, the distance being slightly affected
by the starting point selected. Adopting this route at a cost of two
thousand five hundred pounds, which would include about twenty miles of
cheap land telegraphs, available for postal and other local purposes,
would be the shortest and cheapest mode.
"The second way would be to lay a cable from Tory Island to Malin Head,
where the Allan Steamship Company have a signal station. The distance
is twenty-nine miles; the cost, as I estimate, about six thousand
pounds. I should, however, prefer the former and cheaper plan, as I
think it would serve a larger number of purposes and interests.
"From Portdoon Bay, on Tory Island, to Tramore Bay the sea-bottom is
composed of sand and shells, very good for cable-laying; and there is a
depth of water of from seventeen to nineteen fathoms.
"Tory Island is the turning point--I might say pivot point--for all
steam and sailing vessels coming from the South and across the Western
Ocean, and using the North of Ireland route for Liverpool, Londonderry,
Belfast, Glasgow, and a host of other ports and places. It can be
approached with safety at a distance of half-a-mile, near the
lighthouse, as the water is deep close to, there being twenty fathoms
at a distance of one-third of a mile from the Island.
"The steamers of all the Canadian lines pass this point--the Allan, the
Beaver, the Anchor, the Dominion--while all the steam lines beginning
and ending at Glasgow, Greenock, and other Scotch ports do the same.
Again, all sailing vessels, carrying a great commerce for Liverpool and
ports up to Greenock and Glasgow, and round the north of Scotland to
Newcastle and the East Coast ports, would be largely served by this
proposal. Repeating that this is a question of saving life and of
aiding navigation at an infinitesimal cost, I will now proceed to show
the various benefits involved.
"First of all it would save five hours, as compared with present plans,
in signalling information of the passing to and fro of steamships. As
respect all Canadian and many other steamers it would also expedite the
mails, by enabling the steam tenders at Loch Foyle to come out and meet
the ships outside at Innishowen Head; and this gain of time would often
save a tide across the bar at Liverpool, and sometimes a day to the
passengers going on by trains. As respects the Scotch steamers going
north of Tory Island, it would enable the owners to learn the
whereabouts of their vessels fourteen hours sooner than at present. In
the case of sailing ships the advantages are far greater. Captain
Smith, of this ship, a commander of deserved eminence, informs me that
he has known sailing ships to be tacking about at the entrance of the
Channel, between the Mull of Cantyre and the north coast of Ireland,
for eighteen days in adverse and dangerous winds, unable to communicate
with their owners, who, if informed by telegraph, could at once send
tugs to their relief. Again, when eastern winds prevail, in the spring
of the year, tugs being sent, owners would get their ships into port
many days, or even weeks, sooner than at present.
"But it needs no arguing that to all windbound and to disabled ships
the means of thus calling for assistance would be invaluable.
"For the above reason I hope the slight cost involved will not be
grudged, especially by our patriots, who have taken the Irish and
Scotch emigrants under their special protection. I respectfully invite
them and every one else to aid in protecting life and property in this
obvious way.
"I am, Sir, your obedient Servant,
"E. W. WATKIN.
"S.S. Sardinian, off Belle Isle,
"_September_ 9, 1886."
Our voyage on to Quebec had the usual changes of weather: hot sun, cold
winds, snow, hail, icebergs, and gales of wind, and, when nearing Belle
Isle, dense fog, inducing our able, but prudent, captain to stop his
engines till daylight, when was sighted a wall of ice across our track
at no great distance. Captain Smith prefers to take the north side of
Belle Isle. There is a lighthouse on the Island, not, I thought, in a
very good situation for passing on the north side. But I found that
there was no cable communication between Belle Isle and Anticosti.
Thus, in case of disaster, the only warning to Quebec would be the non-
arrival of the ship, and the delay might make help too late. I ventured
to call the attention of a leading member of the Canadian Government to
this want of means of sending intelligence of passing ships and ships
in distress. In winter this strait is closed by ice, and the
lighthouses are closed too. Inside the fine inlet of "Amour Bay," a
natural dock, safe and extensive, we saw the masts of a French man-of-
war. The French always protect their fishermen; we at home usually let
them take care of themselves. This French ship had been in these
English waters some time; and on a recent passage there was gun-firing,
and the movement of men, to celebrate, as the captain learned, the
taking of the Bastille. On the opposite coast is a little cove, in
which a British ship got ashore, and was stripped by the local pirates
of everything. Captain Smith took off the crew and reported the piracy;
but nothing seems to have been done. A British war-ship is never seen
in these distant and desolate northern regions. It may well be that the
sparse population think all the coasts still belong to France, in
addition to the Isles of St. Pierre and Miquelon. This is how our navy
is managed. Can it be true that the Marquis of Lorne recommended that
an ironclad should be sent to Montreal for a season, as an emblem of
British power and sway--and was refused?
After some trouble with fog and wind, preceded by a most remarkable
Aurora Borealis, and some delay at night at Rimouska, we reached
Quebec, and got alongside at Point Levi, on the afternoon of Saturday,
the 11th September; and I had great pleasure in meeting my old friend
Mr. Hickson, who came down to meet Mrs. Hickson and his son and
daughter, fellow-passengers of mine. I also at once recognized Dr.
Rowand, the able medical officer of the Port of Quebec, who I had not
set eyes on for twenty-four years. I stayed the night at Russell's
Hotel; and next day renewed my acquaintance with the city, finding the
"Platform" wonderfully enlarged and improved, the work of Lord
Dufferin, a new and magnificent Courthouse being built, and, above all,
an immense structure of blue-grey stone, intended for the future
Parliament House of the Province of Quebec. The facility of borrowing
money in England on mere provincial, or town, security, appears to be a
Godsend to architects and builders, and to aid and exalt local ambition
for fine, permanent structures. Well, the buildings remain. To find the
grand old fortifications of Quebec in charge of a handful of Canadian
troops, seemed strange. Such fortresses belong to the Empire; and the
Queen's redcoats should hold them all round the world. I was told--I
hope it is not true--that the extensive works above Point Levi,
opposite Quebec, constructed by British military labour, are
practically abandoned to decay and weeds.