compass, or to an ignorance of the effects upon it of the magnetism of the
ship's iron. There is a melancholy example in the loss of H.M.S. _Apollo_,
of thirty-six guns, in 1803, with forty sail of merchant ships, out of a
convoy of sixty-nine vessels, bound for the West Indies. The _Apollo_ was
leading the way, with her train of outward-bound sugar ships following in
her wake, little suspecting the catastrophe which was to follow. At the
very moment her defective compasses drove her ashore, she imagined she was
some forty miles off the coast at Portugal, and so close was the merchant
fleet upon her, that upwards of half of them took the ground and were
dashed to pieces. More recently we have had the instances of the
_Reliance_ and _Conqueror_, wrecked near Ambleteuse, on the French coast,
in sight of the cliffs of Albion, after voyaging from India. The former is
known to have had an immense iron tank on board, the influence of which
upon her compasses must have been very great. The _Birkenhead_, wrecked
near the Cape of Good Hope, and the ship _Tayleur_, in the Irish Channel
are additional instances of the destruction to which the trembling finger
of the magnetic needle points the way, where ignorance or wilfulness have
placed impediments to its truthful action.
Of the numerous errors that may be classed under the general term of
compass defaults, we may mention defective compasses arising from
imperfect workmanship, or from an ignorance of the principles of
mechanical and magnetical science, compasses perfectly adjusted but placed
injudiciously either with reference to the magnetism of the ship, or in
immediate proximity to concealed and unsuspected portions of iron.
Ignorance of the degree of compass error arising from the ship's
magnetism, and of its varying amount in changes of geographic position,
and a consequent belief, that in all places and under all circumstances
the needle is true to the north, are frequent causes of shipwreck.
With regard to the defective mechanical construction of compasses, it must
be admitted that great improvements have taken place of late years, and
the chief credit, we believe, is due to the British Admiralty. Nearly
twenty years ago they instituted a Committee of Inquiry, and the silent
working of the measures then advocated, and the adoption of the
improvements suggested first under the direction of the late Captain
Johnston, and more recently under that of Mr. Frederick Evans, R.N., have
infused into the manufacturers, and a large portion of the mercantile
marine and shipowners, a degree of caution, skill, and attention to
details, which has brought forth good fruit. A large portion of the
superior compasses of the United States navy are manufactured in this
country, entirely on the Admiralty pattern, and several foreign
governments have recently obtained the same instruments as models. It
must not however be supposed that defective compasses have ceased to
exist. Our coasting vessels and many of our noble sailing ships are
miserably equipped, and there are many captains who still look on the
compass as a cheap and common article, fit to be classed with hooks and
thimbles and other articles of the boatswain's storeroom.
There can be no doubt that great errors in navigation are induced by
inattention to placing the compasses. It is common to see the binnacle
within two feet, and even less, of the massive iron-work of the rudder
wheel, which again is in immediate contiguity with an iron sternpost. The
local deviation is consequently great, magnet adjustment is had recourse
to, and a temporary alleviation of the evil follows, which is only
magnified on the ship approaching some distant port. Numerous examples are
on record of iron being introduced by some addition to the equipment of
the ship, which has perhaps been lost in consequence within a few hours
after quitting port.
Among the causes which thus operate, we may name the fancy rails leading
to state-cabins and saloons. These, beneath a highly-polished covering of
brass, often conceal many hundredweights of iron. Cabin stoves and
funnels, immediately under and alongside the compass, are frequently
unsuspected. A noble transport, during the late war, carrying troops and
stores, pursued her course by day with unswerving fidelity, but at night
the compass was as wild as the waves themselves. After diligent search it
was found that the brazier, in preparing the binnacle lamps, had
introduced a concealed iron-wire hoop to strengthen their frame-work. The
stowage of iron in cargo does not receive the attention it deserves, and
we consider it should be imperative for every vessel which carries it to
be swung for the local deviation before quitting port, and a certificate
duly lodged before clearing the Customs. When the _Agamemnon_ adjusted
compasses preparatory to sailing upon the last unsuccessful expedition to
lay the Atlantic cable, it was discovered that the presence of the
enormous coil in her hold caused a deviation of no less than seventeen
degrees! Had she been a merchant ship, no similar verification would have
been made, and the sign-post which showed the path upon the trackless
waters would only have pointed to mislead.
It is remarkable how much misapprehension on the nature of magnetic action
exists even among men of high intelligence. A competent witness, in a
recent law-trial, in a case of wreck, arising chiefly from a want of
knowledge of the laws of magnetism in the navigation of the ship, stated
that seamen in general believed, that if a cargo of iron was covered over,
its effects were cut off from the compass. A leading counsel in the case
sympathized with the general ignorance, because he confessed that he
shared it. The adjustment of compasses by magnets is a most delicate
operation, and has received much attention from some of our leading men in
science. An able committee, under the auspices of the Board of Trade, are
now engaged, in the midst of an iron navy, in the port of Liverpool, in
elucidating the whole of the subject. We feel bound, however, to record
our opinion against the indiscriminate employment of all the nostrums
prescribed by the compass-doctors or quacks at many of our seaports. Let
the shipowner consult such reports of the Liverpool Committee as have been
already published, or follow the Admiralty plan of having at least one
good compass in a position free from all magnetic influences. In some of
the large ocean steamers a standard compass is fitted high up in the mizen
mast, and we hear that it is proposed to build a special stage on board
the _Great Eastern_, in order to keep the compass from being affected by
the immense body of iron in her fabric.
A perusal of the evidence given in those inquiries which take place
relative to the loss of ships, under the Mercantile Marine Act, would lead
to the supposition that defective charts were even a greater cause of
wrecks than compass defaults; but this is not the case. The fact is,
incorrect charts afford an excuse for a master who may have lost his ship,
which is but too readily accepted by the members of courts of inquiry and
of courts martial. The defence set up for the wreck of the _Great Britain_
steamer, in Dundrum Bay, on the east coast of Ireland, was, that St.
John's Light, placed two or three years previously, was not inserted in
the most recent charts of the Irish Channel procurable at Liverpool, and
that consequently it was mistaken for the light at the Calf of Man. But
these two lights are at least thirty miles apart, and it is monstrous to
suppose that a steamer should be so much out of her reckoning within a few
hours of leaving port. Again, in the more recent case of the wreck of the
_Madrid_ steamer, off Point Hombre, at the entrance of Vigo Bay, several
masters were examined, who stated that they had invariably passed equally
close to the same headland, in reliance on the correctness of the chart.
"Under these circumstances," said the Court, "the loss of the _Madrid_
cannot be attributed to the wrongful act or default of the captain." His
certificate was therefore returned; and, at the same time, he was informed
that, as a general rule, "150 yards is not a sufficiently wide berth to
allow in passing headlands." We should think not; and furthermore we
imagine that, if the omission of every insignificant rock close to shore,
in government charts, is to be taken as an excuse for shaving a dangerous
headland, we may expect to hear of many repetitions of the disaster. The
_Orion_, wrecked on the west coast of Scotland, and the much-abused
_Transit_, in the Banca Strait, owed their fate to the unseaman-like love
of hugging the shore.
It must be admitted, however, that the charts in common use on board
merchant ships are very faulty, both with respect to the position and
character of lights, buoys, and beacons, and to the variation of the
compass, which is not unfrequently half a point wrong,--an error which may
be fatal in shaping a course up Channel or in a narrow sea. From this
great evil the seaman has, at present, no protection. The remedy lies in
the hands of the legislature, who have only to compel all chart-sellers to
warrant their charts corrected up to the latest date, at least with
respect to lights and buoys. There are but three or four publishers of
private charts, as far as we are aware, in the United Kingdom; their stock
of plates cannot be very large, and, once examined and set right, the
corrections and additions could be easily inserted. Either the Board of
Trade or the Admiralty should be entrusted with this duty. The latter are
obliged to correct their own charts, and we understand it is the practice
of the hydrographer to cause every new light, or change of light, or buoy,
or beacon, to be inserted in the plate within twenty-four hours of the
time of the intelligence reaching the Admiralty. A large number of notices
to mariners--upwards, we believe, of a thousand a-week--are printed and
published, both by the Trinity House and the Admiralty, and distributed
among those connected with shipping; and every chart-seller should be
bound under a penalty to give proof to the Board of Trade or to the
Admiralty that he had inserted the corrections in his copper-plate within
forty-eight hours of the appearance of the notice.
It is a startling fact that the materials for constructing charts, even of
parts of the waters which wash the shores of Europe, are not yet in
existence. Of the coast of Europe generally we are tolerably well
informed, although there are many portions that require closer
examination; but on the African and Asiatic portions of the Mediterranean,
the early seat of civilization and the best known sea in the world, there
is still much to be done. When M. de Lesseps brought forward his romantic
proposal for a Suez Canal, no survey existed of the coast of Egypt from
Alexandria to El Arish. Of Syria we know nothing accurately; Cyprus,
Rhodes, and the western half of Crete, are still almost blanks. But it is
in the eastern seas and in the Asiatic Archipelago that we are most at
fault. The Persian Gulf, portions of the coast of India, Ceylon, Burmah,
Malacca, Cochin China, the Yellow Sea, Corea, Japan, the southern and
eastern parts of Borneo, Celebes, &c., are hardly so correctly mapped as
the mountains in the moon. The north and east coasts of New Guinea, again,
are unsurveyed. As long as the Spice Islands, and the unknown lands washed
by the Indian seas, were given up to pirates, and to the imagination of
poets, this want was not felt; but now that our clippers swarm in these
seas, and that Australia herself is beginning to trade there extensively,
we shall assuredly hear of fearful shipwrecks from want of surveys. Then,
indeed, it will be truly said, that imperfect charts are the cause of
shipwrecks, unless, when India passes under the Imperial Government,
vigorous steps are taken to remedy this grievous defect.
Closely connected with the question of imperfect charts, is the state of
the lights, buoys, and beacons around the coast--those fixed and floating
sentinels set around the island to guide and direct the weather-beaten
mariner. A few years ago we should have had to bewail our shortcomings in
the number of these aids to navigation, and have had to point to them as
prominent causes of shipwreck. The report of the Select Committee of the
House of Commons on Lighthouses, in 1845, shows the want that then
existed, not only on the coasts of Scotland and Ireland, but even at the
entrance of the River Thames. Much, however, has recently been done. It
appears, from the address of the Prince Consort, at the annual Trinity
House dinner, that 77 lighthouses, 32 floating light-vessels, and 420
buoys and beacons, under charge of the corporation, are now distributed
around the coasts of England alone. Great praise is due to the elder
brethren of the Trinity House for their care in lighting the Prince's
Channel, and especially for their admirable works now in course of
construction under Mr. James Walker, C.E.; among which we may instance the
new lighthouses at the Needles, at Whitby, and at St. Ives, the
light-tower on the Bishop Rock, off Scilly, and on the Smalls off
Pembroke. In Scotland, also, several new lights have been established; and
some of the buoys have been coloured on a systematic plan--red buoys being
placed on the starboard hand, and black buoys on the port hand, on
entering a harbour from seaward, according to the mode adopted in France,
Belgium, and Holland. This system, however, presents difficulties where
there are several channels, as at the mouth of the Thames; but there are
many places in which it might be applied with advantage. At present, we
believe, the river Tees is buoyed on exactly the reverse plan; and in some
of the large ports of the kingdom a local scheme is adopted, which
completely closes the navigation to all but the local pilots, for whose
special advantage this secret system appears to be maintained. The
adversaries of a simple and uniform method of buoying the coast do,
indeed, urge that it would put the key of our harbours into the hands of
our enemies; but this argument is so puerile that it is hardly worth
notice. If we cannot maintain the integrity of our waters by force, we
certainly shall never maintain it by cunning.
The want of lights on the shores of Ireland has long been a cause of
complaint. Till within a few years, on a coast which is the land-fall of
nearly all vessels that cross the Atlantic from Canada, Nova Scotia,
Boston, and New York, there were spaces of sixty, seventy, and eighty
miles without a light! Yet during all this time light dues were levied on
the Americans, and other nations, who were thus treated to a sample of
Irish reciprocity. On the coasts of the United States there were ample
lights and no light dues, while on the coast of Ireland the lights were
few and the dues heavy. We trust that the royal commission which, on the
motion of Lord Clarence Paget, has lately made its report respecting the
state of the lights and buoys of the country, will give a stimulus to the
improvement which has already begun, and either get rid of these light
dues or recommend a more equitable method of levying them. One penny a ton
on the actual tonnage of the country, paid once a year, would be
sufficient to maintain all the lights in the kingdom, and would be more
simple than the present complicated system of paying every fresh voyage,
which bears so unjustly on the coasting trade. The time, we believe, is
close at hand when the lights themselves will be revolutionized. It is of
the last importance to the mariner that the brightest and best light that
science can furnish shall be held out upon the sunken rock, or perpetually
maintained upon the dangerous headland. Yet it cannot be denied that we
have nothing better than oil lamps for the purpose; and though the most
profound science and the most delicate art have been employed to make the
most of this feeble power, the fact remains, that we have not advanced
beyond the oil-wick of the last century in our attempts to provide a light
which will throw its beams far and wide over the sea, and pierce through
the fogs and drifting snow-storms of the dark winter nights. It is not
less strange that we are behind the French, and even the Spaniards, with
respect to the mechanism necessary to concentrate the little light we
have. In the two former countries the vast majority of the lighthouses are
upon the dioptric principle, the whole light of the lamps being
concentrated in occasional flashes, by means of a powerful system of
lenses, forming a complete cage of glass. England, on the contrary,
employs in most of her lighthouses the old metal reflectors; and, as Lord
Clarence Paget justly observes, the voyager leaving Folkstone will clearly
appreciate the difference between the two systems, by comparing the
dioptric light flashing from the far distant Cape Griz Nez with the feeble
spark of the English reflector light close to him at Dungeness. It has
been the great aim of the constructors of these powerful lenses to throw
all the light of the lamps into parallel rays, so that only a thin disc of
light is cast upon the sea; but, as Mr. Findlay truly remarked in his
paper read at the Society of Arts, we have at last over-refined, and a
fearful shipwreck has already been the result. The _Dunbar_, after making
a prosperous voyage to our antipodes, was wrecked at the Sydney headland,
within sight of her port. This dangerous cliff was surmounted by a
reflector light which sent a thin disc of rays, under which the ship
passed in a fog. Had a few divergent rays been allowed to light the danger
at her feet, she would have escaped her fate.
Another great and increasing difficulty arising from the limited
capabilities of the present burners, is the fact that steamers are
beginning to show lights as powerful as those exhibited in lighthouses of
the inferior order and in the light ships. Hence a confusion is growing up
between the fixed and the moving lights, which threatens to produce most
disastrous consequences. As recently as February last, the _Leander_, an
American barque, proceeding down St. George's Channel, saw a light which
she mistook for that on the Tuskar Rock, and, when too late, discovered
that it belonged to the screw steamer _North America_, which was coming
right ahead. A fearful collision was the consequence, and the unfortunate
ship with nearly all her crew was sent to the bottom. It has been found
absolutely necessary to change the light in the Nore light-ship from a
fixed to a revolving one, to distinguish it from the numerous powerful
lights carried by steamers at anchor or when passing along the Thames.
Various attempts have been made to increase the illuminating power of the
burners. In 1832 Lieutenant Drummond proposed the use of the oxy-hydrous
light, and as far as the intensity of light was concerned the new agent
was perfectly successful, the Drummond light at seventy miles' distance
appearing nearer to the spectator than the ordinary reflector light at
twelve miles. But it was found impossible to maintain a steady light by
this system, and it was therefore abandoned. Since then Professor Holmes
has been making experiments with the magnetic electric light. The
apparatus is said to consist of a series of very powerful magnets, around
the poles of which the helices are made to revolve by means of a
steam-engine. A powerful magnetic current is thus produced, which passing
through carbon pencils shows a splendid light. The great difficulty of
this and of other similar propositions to obtain the light by passing the
current through two points, is to so regulate them that they shall always
remain at the same distance apart, for any variation would immediately
affect the intensity of the light. This desideratum has not yet been
accomplished, neither do we think it possible of accomplishment. Professor
Way has, however, we imagine, solved the problem by substituting a running
stream of mercury in place of these points.
A moment's inspection of the grim wreck chart leads us to reflect whether
the care taken to warn mariners of their danger is not in many cases the
immediate cause of their seeking it. If we note, for instance, the
lighthouses fringing St. George's and the English Channel, we are struck
with the extraordinary fact that there we find the greatest congregation
of those dismal dots which indicate loss of life and property, and it
would seem as though ships like moths were attracted and destroyed by the
light. Such, no doubt, is often the case. Ships bound up Channel make for
the nearest light, and from that shape their course until they meet with
the next light. They feel their way, as it were, in the dark night by the
handrail of these guides, and sometimes stumble on the very rocks that
support the beacons themselves--the fog, as in the case of the _Dunbar_,
allowing them to get within and under the danger flash. The disasters
produced by this system of groping about sunken rocks and bluff headlands
has led Mr. Thomas Herbert of the Trinity House to propose the lighting of
the Mid Channel. His system is to moor floating lighthouses, of a form
which secures a steadiness sufficient for the purpose, and he is thus
enabled to place a row of most powerful lights at little comparative
expense up the very centres of the two great channels of English commerce,
and indeed of the commerce of the world. A ship on entering the Channel
would immediately make for the westernmost of this line of "Fairway
lights," instead of looking out for the Lizard, and once having made it,
the course would be free of all possible danger. Eight floating light
towers extending from the westernmost one, forty miles south-west of
Scilly, to Dungeness, would add enormously to the security of this
wreck-strewn sea. The outermost of these lights Mr. Herbert proposes
should be put in telegraphic communication with the shore, by which means
merchants and consignees would be made acquainted with the arrival of
vessels full a day earlier than at present. By this means also Greenwich
time could be laid on to the station, and enable the anxious captain to
verify the correctness of his chronometer up to the latest possible
moment. Such a station might further serve as a depôt for water and fresh
provisions, so much required by vessels detained by contrary winds in the
Chops of the Channel, and to provide which ships are now annually sent out
by the Admiralty. Without expressing any decided opinion upon this scheme,
it seems to us to possess sufficient plausibility to warrant inquiry. If
there should be no insurmountable practical objection,--and we have heard
practical men speak well of it,--there can be little doubt that it would
dissipate in no small degree the dangers of the Channel, without
interfering with the present lights, which would always be useful for the
coasting trade.