^-^^ 
 
University of California Berkeley 
 
 Gift of 
 GEORGE K. OPPENHEIM 
 
 W 
 
^ 
 
 JJapevs of the dmnock philosophical cSodetg. Jlo. 8. 
 
 WATT ANNIVERSARY" LECTURE 
 
 1 4th JANUARY, 1887, 
 IN HONOUR OF THE BIRTHDAY OF JAMES WATT. 
 
 MR. ROBERT DUNCAN 
 
 EVOLUTION IN NAVAL ARCHITECTURE DURING THE 
 REIGN OF QUEEN VICTORIA." 
 
 G R E E N O C K : 
 
 ORR, POLLOCK & CO., PRINTERS AND PUBLISHERS, 14 CHARLES STREET. 
 
 1887. 
 
Evolution in IRavml Hrcbitecture burins tbe 1Rei0n 
 of <aueen IDictoria." 
 
of the (feumock $hiI00ophioil ^odetg. Jfcr. 8. 
 
 1 1 
 
 WATT ANNIVERSARY" LECTURE 
 
 1 4th JANUARY, 1887, 
 IN HONOUR OF THE BIRTHDAY OF JAMES WATT. 
 
 MR. ROBERT DUNCAN 
 
 EVOLUTION IN NAVAL ARCHITECTURE DURING THE 
 REIGN OF QUEEN VICTORIA." 
 
 GREENOCK : 
 
 ORR, POLLOCK & CO., PRINTERS AND PUBLISHERS, 14 CHARLES STREET, 
 
 1887. 
 
WATT ANNIVERSARY" LECTURE. 
 
 MR. ROBERT DUNCAN, PORT-GLASGOW, 
 
 ON 
 
 " Evolution in Naval Architecture during the Reign 
 of Queen Victoria." 
 
 |HE Annual Lecture under the auspices of the Greenock 
 Philosophical Society, in honour of the birth of James 
 Watt (January 19), was delivered on Friday evening, 
 i4th January, 1887, by Mr. ROBERT DUNCAN, Ship- 
 builder, Port-Glasgow, in the Museum Lecture Hall, his subject 
 being, " Evolution in Naval Architecture during the Reign of Queen 
 Victoria." The importance of the subject drew together an audience 
 which filled the large hall in every part. Mr. JOHN RODGER, Banker, 
 occupied the Chair. 
 
 The CHAIRMAN, in introducing the lecturer, said Ladies and 
 gentlemen, to-night we begin the second half of our twenty-sixth 
 session. As the full syllabus is in your hands, I do not intend to 
 take up your time with the details. It has been framed to meet the 
 varied tastes of the members, and I trust will be as successful 
 as the first half. Our constitution provides that "an extra- 
 ordinary meeting of the Society shall be held every year, in January, 
 in honour of the anniversary of the birth of James Watt." 
 We do this, in the words of the inscription on the statue in the library, 
 " Not to extend a fame already identified with the miracles of steam, 
 but to testify the pride and reverence with which he is remembered 
 in the place of his nativity." And in accordance with this, and 
 through the kindness of our esteemed friend and neighbour, 
 Mr. Duncan of Port-Glasgow, we have been enabled to arrange 
 for the usual Watt lecture. On previous Watt anniversaries we 
 
6 EVOLUTION IN NAVAL ARCHITECTURE. 
 
 have enjoyed the services of Professor Joule, Sir William Thomson, 
 Professor Fleming Jenkin, Mr. Scott Russell, and others ; but on no 
 occasion, I think, have we had a Watt lecturer who was both a native 
 of Greenock and a member of the Society. Mr. Duncan is certain 
 to handle in an able manner the subject he has undertaken. 
 
 Mr. DUNCAN, who was warmly received, said When your com- 
 mittee did me the honour to ask me to deliver the "Watt Anniversary" 
 lecture to your Society, I felt that in accepting the invitation, the 
 responsibility, for me, was of no ordinary kind. Among my earliest 
 recollections is the laying of the foundation-stone of the James Watt 
 Monument with which this hall is connected ; and when a few years 
 after, in the early part of the reign of Queen Victoria, I received a 
 considerable part of my education within the same building, literally 
 at the feet of James Watt, I felt that his venerable face and 
 pensive head were ever present with me ; and his power and 
 influence in after years on the world in which I have lived, have been 
 such as to deepen all my early impressions into something more than 
 veneration for his far-reaching mind, and wonderful, inventive, 
 genius. It is quite possible that the same feelings may have 
 influenced the lives of more than one of my old school -fellows. 
 I know that for one of them I have built a steamer called the 
 " James Watt," and that he has never lost an opportunity of putting 
 that venerated name in the van of Greenock progress. As a 
 Scotchman, James Watt is something more to us all than to the rest 
 of the British Empire. As a townsman he is something more to me 
 and to most here, I hope than to other " brither Scots." If seven 
 cities contended for the honour of Homer's birthplace, why should 
 the natives of Greenock not glory through all time in the immortal 
 name of James Watt ? for his birthplace can never be disputed. 
 James Watt was undoubtedly the prince of engineers and 
 inventors, but he was fortunate in his time. The world was 
 ready for him, and sprang to meet him ; hence the greatness of his 
 work and fame, and its influence on the fortunes of his country and 
 the world during the last century. How great that work has been, 
 we of this time can fairly appreciate. James Watt was essentially the 
 epoch-maker of this modern world. 
 
 The heroes of civilisation were not "the great names at which 
 the world grew pale." They were not the warriors, the priests, nor the 
 politicians, who for long centuries bound the souls as well as the bodies 
 of the people in chains. The true benefactors of the race have been 
 the men of letters, of arts, and industries ; the poet, the historian, the 
 
EVOLUTION IN NAVAL ARCHITECTURE. 7 
 
 man of science, and the mechanic. Among the greatest names of the 
 ancient world, apart from Scripture, were Aristotle in philosophy, Euclid 
 in mathematics, and Archimedes in mechanics; but these men left no 
 successors, and the struggle for existence went fiercely on for the next 
 two thousand years. To my mind there have been only four epoch- 
 making men in all past time, and those four are comparatively modern 
 they were Laurenz Coster the printer, Copernicus the astronomer, 
 Columbus the discoverer, and James Watt the engineer. Coster 
 revolutionised the world of letters, and put books and learning 
 within the reach of all. Copernicus revolutionised the knowledge of 
 the heavens, and made a way for Kepler, Galileo, Sir Isaac Newton, 
 and modern science. Columbus revolutionised the knowledge of the 
 earth, and opened the way for the bold adventurers who have made 
 the modern world. And James Watt revolutionised the world of 
 mechanics and gave to man, and to his countrymen above all men, 
 the empire of the earth, of the land, and of the sea, with a greatness 
 and a power of which the most daring imagination of all past ages 
 never dreamed. 
 
 EVOLUTION IN PROPULSION. 
 
 The invention of the steam engine is the foundation of all the 
 changes that have taken place in the naval architecture of this 
 country. Spasmodic attempts had been made in the last quarter 
 of the last century after the adaptability of Watt's engine to mining 
 and manufacturing purposes had been fully established to apply it 
 to the propulsion of small vessels with paddle-wheels, but no com- 
 mercial venture in this direction was made in this country till 1812, 
 when Henry Bell's " Comet " began a regular passenger service 
 between Glasgow, Greenock, and Helensburgh. The example thus 
 set was speedily followed, and in a few years steamers with paddle- 
 wheels were plying regularly with passengers and cargo and even as 
 tugs on all the rivers in Britain, and to Ireland and the Continent. 
 Marine engineering was fairly begun, and the necessary adaptation 
 of engines and boilers with greater strength and power for seagoing 
 purposes, stimulated invention in the kind and quality of the tools 
 and general appliances for manufacturing such machinery, as well as 
 in the machinery itself. 
 
 In the marine boiler shop of that period we have the 
 origin of the iron ship. The boilermaker began to think that 
 if the shell of a boiler would keep water in, it would keep it out. 
 Iron boats of small size had been built before for canal purposes, but 
 
8 EVOLUTION IN NAVAL ARCHITECTURE. 
 
 the time was now ripe for a radical change in the vessel itself to adapt 
 it specially to the change in the mode of propulsion. 
 
 Up till the year of Her Majesty's accession no systematic 
 attempt had been made at ocean steam navigation. Like 
 the galleys of old, the paddles still crawled along the shore, 
 never being able to go far from their supplies of coal ; and 
 being generally full-rigged ships, using their sails on all occa- 
 sions, an Atlantic voyage seemed beyond the reach of steam 
 alone. Many learned men had declared it a commercial impossibility. 
 Many things are practically and scientifically possible that, under the 
 existing conditions from which they are considered, may at the same 
 time seem commercially impossible. Ocean steam navigation in 1837 
 seemed a very doubtful business, and with comparatively good reason. 
 The steam engine of that day was, from our present point of view, 
 a rather crude affair, especially in the boiler department, where the 
 waste of fuel was enormous. It was considered a great achievement, 
 by John Bourne in his " Treatise on the Steam Engine," published 
 in 1846, that the consumpt of fuel for sea-going purposes had been 
 reduced from nine Ibs. of coal per indicated horse power per hour to 
 six Ibs. In the presence of such vast waste of coal, ocean steam 
 navigation might well appear impossible, except in very large vessels, 
 the success of which at that time might naturally seem more than 
 doubtful. Hence the enormous size of the " Great Eastern" at a later 
 date built to carry sufficient coal for an Australian voyage a specu- 
 lation in naval architecture in which the designer and constructor 
 were not much influenced by commercial or prudential considerations. 
 
 THREE RADICAL CHANGES IN TWENTY-SEVEN YEARS. 
 
 In 1837 also, you will remember that the screw-propeller had no 
 existence except in an experimental form, and we are thus brought 
 face to face with three radical changes in shipbuilding and the modes 
 of propulsion within twenty-seven years from the starting of the Comet 
 two of the most important of which were in the first three years of 
 Her Majesty's reign. In 1812 steam shipbuilding began. In 1837 
 the first iron vessel made its appearance in Lloyd's Register, and in 
 1840 the screw-propeller made its first experimental trial in the 
 Archimedes round the coasts of Britain. Before 1812 sails were the 
 only modes of propulsion on the sea, and oars on narrower waters. 
 Very quickly the steam engine worked its way to the front, and 
 speedily drove the sailing packets out of their trade. By 1837 river, 
 coast, and channel steam trades may be considered as fairly 
 
EVOLUTION IN NAVAL ARCHITECTURE. 9 
 
 established ; and conjointly with the railway system, which began in 
 1829, they were of great service in opening up and developing the 
 internal commerce of this country. But more was wanted. Increased 
 facilities and power of production internally, demanded increased 
 facilities and expansion abroad. Rapidity and regularity of com- 
 munication are the first conditions of commercial expansion. Mail 
 services by steam had been established with the Continent, the 
 Mediterranean, and even with India in a way, with very satisfactory 
 results; and in 1838 the first Atlantic steam communication began. 
 The Sirius and the Great Western made the voyage to and from New 
 York at the same time in the middle of that year, in fourteen and 
 seventeen days respectively, under steam all the way. The difficulty 
 of ocean steam navigation was solved; and the further expansion 
 which has since been accomplished was only a question of time and 
 adequate means. What those adequate means were we have now to 
 consider. 
 
 EVOLUTION IN MATERIAL FOR CONSTRUCTION. 
 
 Before the steam engine came into existence, the commercial 
 intercourse between the nations was comparatively trifling. People 
 had to be in the main content to have their wants supplied by the 
 soil on which they lived ; all else were luxuries scarce and dear. 
 Money to purchase any but the actual necessaries of life was far from 
 plentiful, and the mineral resources of this country, upon which the 
 great prosperity of the last century has been built, had reached their 
 limit of development, as there was no power in existence fit to keep 
 the mines free of water to admit of deeper sinking. Without the 
 steam engine we should by this time have had neither coal nor iron, 
 and been commercially arrested in the middle of the eighteenth 
 century, depending upon wooden ships and sails for such carrying 
 trade as we had by sea. Practically, the shipping and commerce of 
 the country had come to a stand. A change was wanted which 
 should not merely be a development, but a revolution. It came 
 with James Watt, and the result we all know. 
 
 Up till the accession of Queen Victoria the change was compara- 
 tively slow but sure. The wooden ship and the wooden steamer grew 
 and multiplied; their development received a fresh start from the new 
 conditions, and they went on again as far as wood with iron, brass, 
 and copper fastenings could safely go. But that combination also 
 has its limits, in dimensions, in strength, in cost, and in durability. 
 It reached its limit of greatest development nearly forty years ago in 
 
10 EVOLUTION IN NAVAL ARCHITECTURE. 
 
 the large Atlantic steamers of the Cunard line, built here by Mr. 
 Steele, and the opposition Collins line in America. Beyond 
 the sizes of those vessels iron and steel only could safely go ; 
 and iron was growing so fast that the fate of the wooden ship, and 
 especially of the wooden steamer, was a foregone conclusion. Hence- 
 forth progress and development in wooden vessels was arrested, and 
 a process of degradation set in, which we also know. There are few 
 wooden vessels of large size now belonging to this country, and 
 scarcely any built in it but the very smallest coasters. The sea-going 
 wooden shipbuilding of the United States and Canada is also to a 
 large extent extinct, and the foreign commerce of those countries is 
 mostly carried in iron vessels built and owned in Britain. 
 
 In 1837 there were only 230 merchant vessels over 500 
 tons belonging to Great Britain, and only one iron vessel over 
 fifty tons register. That one iron vessel was the beginning of the 
 evolution in naval architecture the parent of the new species 
 destined to revolutionise the naval and merchant shipping of the 
 world. I daresay this early specimen did not look much like its 
 great destiny. It had probably more the look of the missing link 
 than of the more perfect type of later days. I remember as a little 
 boy looking with great surprise, not unmixed with contempt, at the 
 first specimen of the genus " iron vessel " I had ever seen. It was 
 sent from Glasgow to Greenock to get wooden beams and decks put 
 on it by my father. The iron shipbuilder of the Clyde of that remote 
 period could make the iron shell as like as possible to a long open 
 boiler or tank ; but putting a deck on it, with its necessary hatches 
 and fittings, was a mystery he did not understand. It did not occur 
 to him, nor to anybody else for a good many years after that, that an 
 iron deck would do as well as a wooden one in many respects 
 better. It was the same thing with iron and steel masts and yards, 
 and with wire rope. Nothing but timber would do, even for the 
 masts of an iron ship, and hemp alone was suitable for rigging. Now 
 all that is changed, and nothing but steel decks, steel spars, and steel 
 rigging will serve our modern notions. It is wonderful how absurdly 
 dense and conservative we are in many things which appear so 
 obviously simple and proper after they have become established. 
 The missing links in iron shipbuilding were comparatively few ; the 
 true type soon evolved itself from the conditions of the transition 
 period. It was no sooner apparent that iron was suitable for ship- 
 building than the services of the naval architect were at the disposal 
 of the boilermaker ; the former to supply the design and mode of 
 
EVOLUTION IN NAVAL ARCHITECTURE. II 
 
 construction, the latter to do the mechanical work, for which the 
 wooden shipwright had neither the necessary tools nor training. 
 
 EVOLUTION IN WORK. 
 
 Here again we have an evolution in work, and a new class of 
 artizans springing up to take the place of the shipwrights, who looked 
 in some danger of being deprived of their living, as the spinners and 
 weavers of an earlier time were rendered destitute by the introduction 
 of the power-loom and the spinning jenny. Fortunately for the ship- 
 wrights many of them could and did adapt themselves to the new 
 conditions of trade, as their employers had to do ; and the expansion 
 of that trade became so great and rapid that all readily found employ- 
 ment more regular and better paid than ever they had before. 
 
 EVOLUTION IN DESIGN AND PROPORTIONS. 
 
 The new departure did not much affect the design and proportions 
 of ships for some considerable time. Science, outside of the naval 
 dockyards, had scarcely any existence ; and the technical literature of 
 the shipbuilder dealt exclusively with timber ; hence all the previously 
 acquired and recorded knowledge of ship construction was valueless 
 as applied to a totally different material, the qualities and quantities 
 of which sufficient for the work ships had to do were quite 
 unknown to all the recognised authorities on ships. The boilermaker 
 triumphed in the mechanical department, and the speculative naval 
 architect, as his assistant, found himself, for the first time, free from 
 the leading-strings of authority, at liberty to make any design and 
 arrangement of material he pleased sufficient for the vessel's intended 
 trade. But in this freedom of design he was restrained by the con- 
 servatism of old associations with wooden ships, and the dimensions 
 and proportions which had ruled the wooden trade long ruled the 
 iron also. On account of the elasticity of timber, even in the large 
 masses and combinations necessary in shipbuilding, wooden sailing 
 vessels were rarely built of a greater length than three to four times 
 their breadth, or about six times their depth. With woedea steamers 
 this became extended to about seven times the breadth and ten times 
 the depth ; but with these extreme proportions in both classes the iron 
 binding had to be of the most formidable character, otherwise they 
 soon got out of shape and lost caste accordingly. 
 
 The naval architect in iron took some time to discover that propor- 
 tions which were dangerously weak in wood, were perfectly safe in iron, 
 and it was from the iron river steamer that the lesson was most quickly 
 
12 EVOLUTION IN NAVAL ARCHITECTURE. 
 
 and effectively learned, and applied on a larger scale. Development 
 in length, in proportion to breadth and depth, reached its limit about 
 thirty years ago, when a length over ten times the breadth was 
 attained, with the result that iron too was discovered to have a limit 
 of strength, with manageable weight, on the arrangement of scant- 
 lings then common in iron ships, beyond which it was not profitable 
 in the owners' interest to go. 
 
 This ten-breadths limit became almost a rule for nearly twenty 
 years; but within the last ten years the researches of the late Mr. 
 Froude, in his experiments on the models of ships of war, to 
 determine the effect of proportions and form on resistance and 
 speed, have had the effect of causing a reaction in favour of greater 
 breadth, even for the highest speed types, and this reaction has 
 affected the lower types to such a degree that the length of an 
 ordinary cargo steamer, in proportion to breadth, is now very little over 
 the proportion common to the largest iron sailing ships of this time. 
 
 INFLUENCES AFFECTING FORM. 
 
 Along with this retrogression in length or rather in proportions 
 the forms of iron ships also became retrogressive, reverting to 
 ancestral types. Various influences have been at work to this end. 
 As in the natural world changing conditions have developing or 
 degrading effects, in the commercial world similar effects follow 
 similar causes. 
 
 The earliest influence on the change of form was the change 
 of Tonnage Law in 1835, which was immediately followed by 
 a style of ship as remarkable as it was peculiar. The square boxes of 
 the older time gave place to long raking sharp bows and sterns, broad 
 decks and narrow bottoms, which, coupled with the fiddle-shaped 
 waists of the paddle-steamers of the period, made the strangest 
 possible contrast with the prevailing types of a few years before. 
 This could hardly be called progress, and it was not development. 
 It was distinctly evolution of entirely new forms, with the changed 
 conditions of the law regulating the measurement of ships. 
 
 With 1854 came another change of the tonnage law entirely for the 
 better, and the forms of our ships immediately took shape accordingly. 
 The extremes of the previous types gradually disappeared, and naval 
 architecture, once more free in all directions, prepared to assert itself 
 in improved forms adapted to all the varied requirements of trade. 
 This freedom was short-lived as regards construction. In the follow- 
 ing year, 1855, Lloyd's Register Committee issued their first rules for 
 
EVOLUTION IN NAVAL ARCHITECTURE. 13 
 
 the construction of iron ships, and shipbuilders were again in lead- 
 ing-strings as far as the scantlings and distribution of material went. 
 With great wisdom Lloyd's adopted the new tonnage law, as the basis 
 for scantlings, leaving the shipbuilder and shipowner free to choose 
 any dimensions and form of ship most agreeable to their taste or 
 requirements. In 1862 the Liverpool Underwriters' Registry became 
 a classification society, with register book and rules for scantlings for iron 
 vessels only. This Registry took dimensions solely, as their basis for 
 scantlings with a distribution of material, less in weight, and con- 
 siderably different from Lloyd's. An early effect of this change of 
 base for construction, probably not intended nor foreseen by the 
 framers of the Liverpool rules, was a gradual reversion to the box 
 shape for new vessels classed exclusively in that Registry. Nearly all 
 the tonnage of the kingdom at that time was built under the oldest 
 tonnage law, abolished in 1835, but still existing as a measure of price 
 with builders, hence called " builders' tonnage." This law, taking no 
 account of the depth or form, left the owner free to get the largest 
 carrying capacity possible for his money. The consequence was that 
 the ships built under that law were usually the deepest and squarest 
 possible for their length and breadth. In a few years thereafter 
 about 1866 the old law was entirely superseded by the new as a 
 measure of purchase and sale, but its effect remained in the rules of 
 the Liverpool Registry. They had classification to sell, and they sold 
 by dimensions, leaving the tonnage to the builder and owner ; they 
 required considerably less material in construction, which was to the 
 further advantage of the owner in a cheaper ship and larger carrying 
 ability, and the consequence was a steady increase in the demand for 
 Liverpool class, much to the disadvantage of Lloyd's. This induced 
 the committee of Lloyd's Registry, about 1870, to make an entire 
 revision of their rules for the construction of iron vessels ; but instead 
 of reducing the material, and rearranging its distribution, on their 
 former tonnage basis, they adopted a system based on dimensions 
 and proportions chiefly, only influenced slightly by the form of the mid- 
 ship section, and thereby accelerated the reaction on the forms of ships 
 which had already begun. So long as the two systems were in some 
 antagonism, the older prestige of Lloyd's maintained the greater 
 number of new ships in some reasonable symmetry ; but as soon as 
 the principles which governed the scantlings of both Registries became 
 almost the same, and in the main erroneous, the reaction from long fine 
 forms became intensified, and the box shapes of the old tonnage law 
 again became the fashion. The amalgamation of the Liverpool Registry 
 
14 EVOLUTION IN NAVAL ARCHITECTURE. 
 
 with Lloyd's in 1885 has concentrated the construction and classifica- 
 tion of British shipping in that society, and, were it not for the 
 conservative tendencies of all monopolies, I would be disposed to 
 hope that a more scientific base for construction would receive their 
 early consideration. 
 
 It is hardly too much to say that Lloyd's present arrangement 
 of scantlings by dimensions and numerals, ignoring the form, 
 is not satisfactory ; the inducement remains to build vessels of 
 the squarest shapes to the extreme limits of the " numeral " require- 
 ments, as the weight of ship per ton of capacity is thereby minimised. 
 In my experience it is not difficult, within the range of any or all of 
 the numerals, to reduce the load displacement which ought to be 
 the measure of the vessel's strength for her work one-fourth to one- 
 half, within the ranges of form as expressed in co-efficients of tonnage, 
 still common in merchant steamers, especially where high speed is 
 required, without receiving from the Rules any consideration in reduced 
 scantlings for the diminished weight and strains the material of the 
 hull has to bear. This can hardly be considered satisfactory from a 
 practical and commercial point of view, and it certainly is not from the 
 scientific standpoint of our present knowledge of the strength of iron 
 and steel ships. The tenacity and safe working load of iron and steel 
 for all structures on land are now perfectly well known, and the 
 quantity of those materials required for any structure can be judiciously 
 apportioned by all competent engineers to the strains and pressures 
 the work has to bear. In boiler work, factors of safety in proportion 
 to pressures, have long been recognised standards for the proportions 
 of the parts of boilers, according to their size and shape. In ships 
 alone the proportions of material required in construction are deter- 
 mined by combinations of figures in connection with dimensions, which 
 have no relation to the form of the vessel or the loaded strains the 
 material of the hull has to bear. Those strains are now as well known 
 for ships as they are for boilers. Fair factors of safety have been deter- 
 mined with scientific precision by several competent authorities, and 
 can be calculated without difficulty. There does not appear to be 
 any reason why co-efficients of strength should not be imported into 
 construction rules, as they have been into rules for loading. Much 
 valuable knowledge and experience has been evolved from the 
 practical working, and the literature, of the naval architecture of the 
 last sixteen years, since Lloyd's existing rules were framed, and it is 
 not expecting too much from the eminent scientific skill of Lloyd's 
 principal administrative officers, to hope that we shall soon see an 
 
EVOLUTION IN NAVAL ARCHITECTURE. 15 
 
 amendment of the rules for the construction of iron and steel vessels, 
 worthy of their high position and reputation. 
 
 EVOLUTION IN SIZE. 
 
 In 1837, as I have already said, the vessels of the merchant navy 
 were all small, very few being over 500 tons, and none except the 
 ships of the East India Company which were more men-of-war 
 than merchantmen were over 1,000 tons register. It is difficult 
 to get at the dimensions of those early ships. Lloyd's Register Book 
 did not record dimensions till 1863; but we have an idea from the 
 usual proportions of wooden vessels under the old law, that a 
 sailing vessel of 500 tons in 1837 would be very little over 100 feet 
 long. The steamers of the same period were all of the same style. 
 The Enterprise, the first steamer to make the voyage to India by the 
 Cape of Good Hope in 1825 was only 122 feet long, and sailed as much 
 as possible not a very smart process, dragging paddle-floats conse- 
 quently she took 113 days on the passage to Calcutta. The Royal 
 William, which was the first Atlantic steamer from Liverpool in 
 1838, was 175 feet long. The Britannia, the first of the Cunard 
 Line in 1840, was only 207 feet long, and in other respects not 
 unlike a 1,200 ton sailing ship of the present day. The largest of 
 the wooden steamers built between that time and 1850 when they 
 were entirely superseded by iron vessels did not exceed 300 feet, 
 and there development in timber ceased. With the building of the 
 Great Britain at Bristol between 1839 and 1845 she took all that 
 time to build a large stride was made in the dimensions of iron ships 
 too large it was believed at the time. She was barely 300 feet long, 
 and was considered so enormous that no less than six masts would 
 serve her. She is still in existence, but in dimensions has long since 
 been left behind. Besides being the largest ocean steamer of her 
 time, she was designed the first of the ocean screw propellers. The 
 iron ship and the screw were steadily working their way. The length 
 increased by degrees, but it was not till 1870 that it reached 400 feet 
 in the largest Atlantic steamers. 
 
 In 1872, as President of the Institution of Engineers and Ship- 
 builders in Scotland, I ventured the prediction that as the previous 
 generation had doubled the length of ships, I saw no reason to doubt 
 that the next generation might double that again ; and reckoning by 
 draught of water, and assuming twenty-five feet as the deepest safe 
 draught at both working ends of the Atlantic voyage, I indicated 
 the longest purely cargo steamer for profitable work at twenty times 
 
1 6 EVOLUTION IN NAVAL ARCHITECTURE. 
 
 the draught, or say 500 feet. For mixed passenger and cargo traffic 
 I assumed twenty-five times the draught, or a length of over 600 feet ; 
 and for purely passenger steamers I took thirty times the draught, or 
 750 feet long, and gave it as my opinion that it was " not problematical 
 we might yet see steamers of 00 feet in length, the ferry boats of two 
 oceans, making their regular passages in a week." This you will 
 admit was a pretty long stride for the time, but already more than 
 half of my prediction has been accomplished. Purely cargo steamers 
 are now over 400 feet long. The mixed class considerably over 
 500 feet ; and when the purely passenger expresses come to be built, 
 it must be with a power and speed that shall throw all previous 
 passages of the mongrel breed entirely into the shade. 
 
 On that same occasion I said that as steam pressures had been 
 more than quadrupled in the preceding generation with the most 
 beneficial results, it was not beyond the bounds of possibility that 
 we might double and treble these again, with corresponding economy 
 in coal consumption. In 1837 the highest pressure of steam afloat 
 was ten pounds, and till the general adoption of the compound 
 engine, about 1870, pressures had not advanced beyond thirty 
 pounds. In that year they went up with a bound to sixty pounds, 
 and at that time this looked very near a limit with the cylindrical 
 tubular boiler, as steel, such as we have now in general use in ships 
 and boilers, was unknown, and iron at much higher pressures than 
 were then in use was unmanageable in size and unreliable in quality. 
 Not half a generation has elapsed since 1872, and already my 
 anticipation has been fully accomplished with the aid of the new 
 material. At the present time there is scarcely a marine engine 
 making of less than 150 pounds pressure, with triple expansion; and 
 quadruple expansion engines and boilers have been built to carry 
 1 80 pounds pressure in regular work. 
 
 When we venture to prophesy we must have a large amount of faith 
 leavening our knowledge. I had at that time, and I have still, 
 sufficient faith in our engineers to believe that their ingenuity and 
 efforts towards the extreme limit of economy in coal consumption are 
 not exhausted. When we are looking forward to still shorter passages 
 between Europe and America, it is quite unnecessary to trouble our- 
 selves with doubts as to what may be accomplished within the bounds 
 of possibility. We know very little of the possible. We know what 
 has been done within the last fifty years, and how extremely impos- 
 sible it would all have seemed to our grandfathers. About 
 fifty years ago one steamer a fortnight began the Atlantic trade, 
 
EVOLUTION IN NAVAL ARCHITECTURE. 17 
 
 burning four times the quantity of coal required by a modern 
 triple expansion engine of the same power. Those vessels had no 
 room for anything in their holds but coal, and carried only the 
 lightest goods besides at rates that would make a modern shipowner's 
 teeth water. But step by step the ships and engines grew in size and 
 multiplied in number. Competition reduced passage rates and 
 freights. Cargo took the place of coal, and the screw and the com- 
 pound engine superseded the paddle, and now, instead of one 
 steamer a fortnight, we have daily, almost hourly, sailings between 
 Europe and America, and the time on passage has been reduced 
 from fourteen days to seven. The size of the steamer has increased 
 from 175 feet and 700 tons in the Royal William to 550 feet and 
 8,000 tons in the City of Rome ; while the Servia, Etruria, and others 
 of the Atlantic " greyhounds " are not far behind. Year by year we 
 are more and more separating the passenger from the cargo traffic 
 in all departments of commerce on land and sea, and inevitably in a 
 few years the passenger traffic on the Atlantic must be carried in 
 steamers built for that trade alone, and of very much greater 
 speed than anything yet accomplished. Speeds have been 
 accomplished in torpedo boats under very forced conditions, which 
 until accomplished were believed impossible. It accords with all 
 our past experience that what has been the miraculous speed of one 
 generation has become the ordinary pace of the next ; and it is quite 
 within the bounds of possibility that Her Majesty's reign may yet see 
 steamers of 800 feet long, the "Flying Scotchmen" of the sea, 
 making their Atlantic passages at twenty-five to thirty miles an hour. 
 It must not be supposed that I originally proposed and 
 now repeat such large dimensions from admiration of mere 
 magnitude ; neither do I advocate leaps in the dark beyond all past 
 experience or present necessities. The demands of commerce ought 
 to be met as they arise by means commensurate, and especially in 
 shipping not greatly in excess, otherwise commercial failure is 
 inevitable, as in the case of the Great Eastern. The time will come, 
 in my opinion, when vessels of greater size than she is will be not 
 uncommon ; but they will be the result of steady development, not 
 of "the vaulting ambition that o'erleaps itself." When, therefore, 
 fifteen years ago, with the warning of the Great Eastern before my 
 eyes, I ventured to predict that the next generation would see even 
 larger vessels in regular employment on the Atlantic and Pacific 
 Oceans, I did so in the full belief that such vessels would be evolved 
 from the commercial requirements of their time, and with all the 
 
1 8 EVOLUTION IN NAVAL ARCHITECTURE. 
 
 developments of the intermediate period necessary to insure their 
 commercial success. It may be asked why I still adhere to my 
 extreme lengths in the face of the reaction in favour of shorter 
 lengths with which we have recently been made familiar, even for the 
 highest ocean speeds. My answer is that our present highest speeds 
 are not the highest possible on the sea, and that they are being 
 achieved under uneconomical conditions. As a commercial element, 
 " pure speed" of the highest order I have indicated must be conducted 
 on the most economical principles, or it will fail of commercial 
 success. In all my experience there is a minimum length in relation 
 to which[ speed|must be maintained, otherwise the economical relation- 
 ship will be vitiated and power wasted. The rule for that minimum 
 length is Mr. Scott Russell's, " that the length of every steamer should 
 not be less in feet than the square of the speed in knots for which she 
 is designed." More length is an advantage, less is a mistake. You 
 will easily see by a very simple calculation that the length of all the 
 highest-speed commercial vessels yet built is well over this economical 
 limit for the highest speeds that have been accomplished. For 
 example, if a speed of 10 knots is wanted, the square of 10 is 100, 
 which is the shortest suitable length in feet for 10 knots speed. 
 
 If 12 knots be wanted, the length should be 144 feet. 
 If 1 5 225 feet. 
 
 Ifi8 324 feet. 
 
 If 20 400 feet. 
 
 Those of us who have built vessels intended for such speeds are well 
 aware of the difficulty experienced in approaching these results even 
 with vessels considerably in excess of the limits, and we are well 
 aware also that nothing approaching 20 knots is now afloat on the 
 Atlantic passage even with much larger dimensions. It is quite true 
 that in torpedo boats and torpedo catchers speeds of 20 to 25 knots 
 have been obtained with very much smaller vessels, but these have not 
 been commercial results. They have been achieved as specialties, 
 regardless of all other considerations, at an expenditure of money and 
 power, for limited periods of time, which would be simply ruinous if 
 tried commercially in regular work. In business matters we must 
 keep within the factors of safety and profit, as determined by past 
 experience, if we would escape destruction. When, therefore, we 
 speak of speeds that have not been hitherto attempted on the ocean, 
 we must be prepared to accept all the conditions necessary to 
 commercial success ; and one of the chief of these conditions is that 
 the length must be proportional to the speed. We have seen that for 
 
EVOLUTION IN NAVAL ARCHITECTURE. 19 
 
 a speed of 20 knots we must have a length of 400 feet at least, which 
 is not an excessive length in our experience, but when we go over 20 
 knots the length increases with startling rapidity by the square of the 
 speed. Hence for a speed of 22^ knots we must have a length of 
 500 feet, and even that we have surpassed; it therefore only requires 
 a slight change in the conditions of the ship herself to adapt existing 
 dimensions for these higher speeds. It is when we come to higher 
 speeds still that we get beyond our present limits and into the region 
 of the extravagant ; but, however extravagant the figures we have to 
 face may appear, they must be met if the speeds required are to be 
 realised. We have, therefore, for a speed of 25 knots, to have a 
 minimum length of 625 feet ; for 27^ knots we must have 756 
 feet, and for 30 knots 900 feet, and all those lengths with forms 
 especially adapted for the speeds required. Hence the revolution 
 that must take place in the Atlantic passenger trade if we are to get 
 higher speeds than those now being accomplished by the largest 
 vessels afloat. Cargo must be abandoned, and the vessels built 
 expressly for mails and passengers alone. For the enormous power 
 required they must have twin-screws, and with twin-screws the 
 draught even of the largest need not exceed the present draught of 
 the largest Atlantic liners. If it be said that the draught is too little 
 for such extreme lengths, I again refer to experience as our safest 
 guide. The fastest of our river steamers have a length over fifty 
 times their draught of water, and the best of our Channel steamers 
 have lengths from twenty to thirty times their draught. The fastest 
 Channel steamer I have had to do with is a twin-screw steamer with 
 a length exceeding thirty times her draught ; and I venture to say 
 that, irrespective of the breadth, where the draught of any high-speed 
 steamer is greater than in this proportion to length, the result cannot 
 be perfectly satisfactory. Hence, finally, the necessity for the 
 great lengths I advocate in proportion to draught of water and 
 speed, and I do not hesitate to again repeat that shorter lengths for 
 the highest speeds involve waste of power, unsatisfactory results, and 
 commercial failure. 
 
 EVOLUTION IN THE NAVY. 
 
 If we look now for a few minutes at the Navy we shall find an 
 evolution as wonderful taking place in that department of British 
 naval architecture. In 1837 the wooden ships of the Navy were not 
 any longer than the merchantmen of that date, although of very much 
 greater breadth and depth or rather height according to the number 
 
20 EVOLUTION IN NAVAL ARCHITECTURE. 
 
 of gun decks they had above water. The Queen, three-decker, no 
 guns, was only 204 feet long, and the French i20-gun ships of the 
 same date were just 210 feet The famous 74's were only 180 feet 
 long, and the frigates 130 to 160 feet. They were veritable tubs, 
 despite their sounding names and still more wonderful deeds ; and 
 with their primitive artillery, and the conditions of their equally 
 primitive existence, they are now, as fighting ships, as extinct as 
 the mammoth. 
 
 With the Crimean War in 1854 we entered on a new era in armour 
 clad gunboats, which in 1860 developed into the wooden "ironclad" the 
 Gloire in France of 252 feet long, and the Warrior and Black Prince 
 in this country of 380 feet long, which are still among the half 
 dozen longest vessels of the British Navy. The armour of these 
 vessels did not exceed 4^ inches thick, and at that time there was 
 neither shot nor shell in existence that could pierce such armour. 
 
 That is just twenty -six years ago, and we have had no 
 naval war since to test our strength ; yet such has been 
 the rivalry among the Powers of Europe, and especially between 
 ourselves and our dear friends the French, that the whole 
 system of our navy has undergone an entire revolution in ships and 
 artillery, an evolution so extraordinary so far as the ship is concerned 
 that it cannot in any sense be called development, and could 
 only be paralleled in nature on the hypothesis that the monstrous 
 reptiles of the dragon age of the world were evolved from the birds of 
 the preceding epoch. Unfortunately, for the hypothesis in this 
 instance, the birds in nature came after the reptiles ; it may be, 
 therefore, not unlikely, that when the present fighting saurians are 
 played out, future generations may have an evolution in aerial 
 navigation more extraordinary than anything we have seen, or can 
 conceive of, on the sea ; meanwhile the noble old ships of Nelson's 
 day with their clouds of canvas have all disappeared, and in their 
 place we have a hideous, scaly monster, with only its back above water, 
 vomiting fire and smoke, sweeping along with irresistible, unseen 
 force, and armed with powers of destruction of which Nelson and 
 the heroes of his age had no conception. 
 
 The "Warrior" was a full-rigged ship, with four nine-ton and 
 twenty-eight six-ton muzzle-loading guns behind armour four-and-a-half 
 inches thick, and a speed of thirteen to fourteen knots. At present 
 we have two ironclads, or rather steelclads, building, of 345 feet long, 
 73 feet broad, about 12,000 tons displacement, and 12,000 horse- 
 power, with an expected speed of i6j^ knots, carrying four 68-ton 
 
EVOLUTION IN NAVAL ARCHITECTURE. 21 
 
 breech-loading guns, in two turrets, behind 20 inches of armour. We 
 have other four of 10,000 tons displacement and 12,000 horse-power, 
 to have a speed of 17 knots, with similar armament and armour, and 
 three formidable monsters of the same size and speed, each carrying 
 two no-ton guns in two turrets; besides several, smaller guns for 
 minor service. In addition to these we have built and building 
 seven "belted cruisers," as they are called, of 300' x 56' and 5,000 tons 
 displacement, with 8,500 horse-power, for a speed of 18 knots. 
 These vessels have a lo-inch armour belt round their waterline, and 
 carry two 1 8-ton and ten six-inch breech-loading guns. 
 
 The enormous weight and power of recoil of such great guns ren- 
 ders great breadth of ships necessary for stability, and the enormous 
 armour considered necessary to offer some resistance to the power of 
 such guns renders it imperative that the vessels should be the shortest 
 possible for the speed, to reduce the surface requiring protection. As 
 it is, they have only partial protection, a belt of the thickest armour 
 along the waterline to keep the shot or shell from piercing under 
 water, and on the turrets to protect the guns ; the rest of the armour 
 where there is any more thinning off much too weak for the power 
 of the largest guns. As a rule the overwater hull at the ends is 
 very vulernable, and it seems an open question how long such 
 vessels would be able to keep afloat in action against similar 
 antagonists. 
 
 It is perfectly clear we cannot go on much longer in this 
 this style. Everything above the deck we might almost say above 
 water has been sacrificed to obtain thickness of armour to protect 
 what remains. And what remains, covered with eighteen inches to 
 two feet solid steel, is as vulnerable after all to the guns and shells 
 they carry as the old wooden walls were to the artillery of their 
 time. If all this has been accomplished in twenty-five years, 
 what may we not expect in the next twenty-five ? It would be 
 needless to say that what has happened was not foreseen. 
 It was both foreseen and predicted by those who knew how 
 invariably history repeats itself, the conditions being similar. The 
 power of attack must inevitably overcome the power of defence, 
 intelligence and skill being equal. As the ironclad knight of the 
 Middle Ages went down before the unprotected and light-armed 
 footman and was extinguished by the gun, so will the armour and 
 the guns of the new men-of-war inevitably kill each other, as they 
 are now doing. We have, I believe, reached the limit of armour and 
 guns afloat, unless we are prepared to go to vastly larger and more 
 
22 EVOLUTION IN NAVAL ARCHITECTURE. 
 
 costly fabrics involving the expenditure and loss of several millions 
 on each ship. Our newest will cost a million each, which will be 
 as every new development in the past has eventually been so 
 many additional millions thrown away so far as defence is concerned. 
 Our most recent development has been in power and speed. We 
 have discovered that the lumbering ironclad of low speed, is no 
 match for the swift cruiser of high speed. Apart from the weight of 
 armour and size of guns, the power of choosing position and distance, 
 or declining action, depends on speed. We are therefore endeavouring 
 to make our new ironclads as fast as the cruisers. But here again 
 the light-heeled cruiser has the advantage with equal power. It 
 becomes a race between an outrigger and a jolly-boat, with similar 
 crews, which is what racing men would call " a moral." In the not 
 very remote future our ironclads will be reserved for harbour defence 
 at home, and in the colonies and coaling stations ; they will be much 
 better than permanent land works for places of this kind ; while the 
 defence of our mercantile marine will depend upon the swift cruiser 
 with long range guns, to match the swift cruisers that will be sent 
 against our merchant ships in time of war by our enemies, whoever 
 they may be. With ironclads and guns they cannot fight us, and 
 will not try. In merchant shipping we have everything to lose, and 
 no other possible enemy has anything to speak of. In the next great 
 war in which we are engaged, the lesson that the Alabama taught the 
 world will not be lost sight of, aud will be applied against ourselves. 
 Are we at present prepared? I rather think not. None of our 
 i8-knot cruisers are yet ready. Our large and fast Atlantic liners 
 would do for speed, but they are unsuitable for the carriage and 
 recoil of the large guns required for the long-range service of the 
 present day. Such guns have to be carried high with a free 
 range, and for this purpose I doubt much the stability and 
 capability of such vessels as protectors of our commerce. We 
 want vessels of at least equal speed, specially designed 
 for such service. Those we have will do so far, but we 
 want more, and larger, and faster. I trust we may get them 
 in time. For transport service our Atlantic "greyhounds" are 
 all right ; speed is the one thing needful there ; and in this depart- 
 ment our Government service is lamentably deficient. Our best, 
 almost our only, transports, specially built for the purpose, are 
 twenty years old, with speed of ten to twelve knots. It would 
 be almost certain death to send a regiment of soldiers to 
 any of our foreign stations in one of these in time of war. 
 
EVOLUTION IN NAVAL ARCHITECTURE. 23 
 
 They could not escape an enemy's cruiser, and they could not 
 fight. Our Admiralty seem to have lost sight of the fact that their 
 transport ships are hopelessly antiquated in point of machinery and 
 speed, and that in the event of war they would be useless unless 
 immediately re-engined for the highest speed of the present day. 
 
 Of the torpedo fleet and its possibilities in time of war, I need not 
 speak. You have had that so recently before you in most attractive form 
 that I can add nothing to it, except, that it is an evolution entirely of the 
 ironclad period. It is the old story of striking the horse beneath to 
 bring the iron-clad knight to the ground. It may be of service in the 
 open sea, but for the torpedo apart from the fleet I have a very great 
 respect, and have to express my confidence in it in the hands of the 
 engineer, as the weapon of all others for harbour and river defence. 
 If we were as alive to its value as our possible enemies are, there 
 would be no chance for a French or Russian cruiser to enter or leave 
 a British port at home or abroad in safety. At the present moment, 
 unfortunately, this might be done with impunity. Let us hope it will 
 not long be so. 
 
 EVOLUTION IN THE SCIENCE AND LITERATURE OF NAVAL 
 ARCHITECTURE. 
 
 For fifty years before the accession of Queen Victoria, the 
 science and literature of naval architecture had made no progress. 
 What was of it was all naval. There was no science and no literature 
 to speak of in merchant shipbuilding. Anything of the kind that did 
 exist in this country was of foreign origin, chiefly French. Our 
 countrymen of last century and the early part of this were quite 
 content to beat the French when they could catch them take 
 their ships, copy their models, and translate and apply their science. 
 To the Admiralty authorities of those days nothing more seemed 
 necessary, and nothing more was done ; and in 1837, so far as British 
 naval architecture was concerned, we were still in the age of Noah 
 indeed rather an age behind him as there were no sailing vessels 
 of any kind belonging to Britain of as admirable proportions for 
 seagoing purposes as Noah's Ark. 
 
 In 1811 the first school of naval architecture in Britain was estab- 
 lished at Portsmouth, for the training of the dockyard apprentices in the 
 science and practice of naval construction, avowedly from the French 
 books and models. This school continued till 1831, when 
 it was abolished, the Government of the day not seeing any 
 good use it could make of the scientific apprentices it had trained ; 
 
24 EVOLUTION IN NAVAL ARCHITECTURE. 
 
 and these as they completed their education were naturally dissatisfied 
 at being turned back to manual labour, without any opportunity being 
 given them to show that they could improve on French fashions. 
 
 In 1848, in another enlightened fit, the Admiralty opened a 
 school of mathematics and naval construction at Portsmouth, under 
 Dr. Wooley, who is still alive ; and again, in a relapse of economical 
 ignorance, closed it in 1853. In the short time it existed, this school 
 produced Sir Edward Reed, Sir Nathaniel Barnaby, and several 
 others who have since made their mark on the naval architecture of 
 Britain. In 1864 these alternate fits of intelligence and stupidity 
 came to an end in the establishment of the Royal School of Naval 
 Architecture at South Kensington, which was transferred in 1873 
 to Greenwich, where, as the Royal Naval College, it has some 
 prospect of continuing, as one of the institutions by which the 
 maritime supremacy of Great Britain will be honourably maintained. 
 
 In the South Kensington school were trained the men who 
 are at present the heads of the Constructive Departments of the 
 Government service. Mr. W. H. White, the chief constructor, is one 
 of the ablest literary authorities on naval architecture in this or any 
 other country. Professor Elgar, the first professor of naval archi- 
 tecture in Glasgow University, is now director of H.M. Dockyards. 
 Professor Phillip Jenkins, his successor at Glasgow, and many others 
 of the same school, but only less distinguished, are now doing good 
 service to their country in these and other important positions in the 
 naval and merchant service. 
 
 It is hardly likely that the Royal School of Naval Archi- 
 tecture at South Kensington, with its after developments at 
 Greenwich, would have had any existence but for the estab- 
 lishment in 1860 of the Institution of Naval Architects in 
 London. This Institution was founded chiefly by the active 
 exertions of Sir Edward Reed, then plain Mr. Reed, editor 
 of the Mechanics' Magazine, one of the Admiralty's scientifically 
 trained apprentices for whose services they had no employment. 
 Mr. Reed naturally became the first secretary of the institution 
 in the foundation of which he had done such good service 
 and continued to hold that position till the force of circumstances in 
 the naval developments of France, compelled the Government to 
 break through the conservatism of official routine, and appoint him 
 over the heads of the older " barnacles " of the service, as the 
 first scientific constructor of the British Navy. It is needless to say 
 that the result justified the appointment. The British Navy became 
 
EVOLUTION IN NAVAL ARCHITECTURE. 2$ 
 
 in his hands second to none in scientific adaptation for its work, 
 and in design and construction ; a reputation which his successors 
 in office have endeavoured steadily to maintain. 
 
 Contemporaneously with the founding of the Institution of 
 Naval Architects in London in 1860, the Scottish Shipbuilders' 
 Association was established in Glasgow, your humble servant 
 taking a considerable part in its formation and the first 
 secretaryship. This association was in 1865 amalgamated with 
 the Institution of Engineers, founded in Glasgow in 1857 by 
 the late Professor Macquorne Rankine and others. These associa- 
 tions still exist, incorporated as the " Institution of Engineers and 
 Shipbuilders in Scotland," their crest being the bust of the immortal 
 engineer whose memory Greenock now delights to honour. 
 
 All these institutions were the outcome of a feeling on the part 
 of those specially interested in their formation, that the scientific 
 and technical knowledge and experience, of the evolution in naval 
 architecture that had taken place during the previous twenty years, 
 was not available in literature. Many men and many minds were at 
 work in the development of the new epoch of iron shipbuilding and 
 ocean steamers, but nowhere was the knowledge and experience thus 
 being evolved recorded for the benefit of all engaged in it. The 
 signal success that has attended these institutions in England and 
 Scotland is a proof that they were much wanted, and struck root at 
 the proper time. Year by year the volumes of " Transactions " that 
 issue from the Councils of both institutions, tell their own tale of a 
 progress in the science and arts with which they deal, as extra- 
 ordinary as it has been honourable and beneficial, alike to those 
 whose business it records, as to the British Empire to which they 
 all belong. 
 
 As the independent outcome of these Institutions and the 
 Royal Naval Schools, and contemporary with them, a popular 
 literature has sprung up in periodicals and books, which has exercised 
 an important educative influence on the public mind, apart from its 
 technical value to the youth of our shipbuilding and engineering 
 industries. The older foreign literature of the last century and the 
 early part of this, with its following in this country, which did duty 
 fairly well so long as timber was the only material for shipbuilding, 
 and wooden ships of war the only vessels on which it was necessary 
 to expend any science in construction this old literature has been 
 superseded with the material, and the conditions of propulsion, and 
 naval warfare, on which they were founded. The science contained 
 
26 EVOLUTION IN NAVAL ARCHITECTURE. 
 
 in it has formed the groundwork of a nobler structure in the 
 evolution of the last thirty years. 
 
 With 1860 began the new era inaugurated by the Institu- 
 tions, after which it is only necessary to name the principal 
 authors to note the importance of the change. In 1865, Sir 
 William Fairbairn and Mr. Scott Russell both gave their ship- 
 building experience to the world, the former in a handy, practical, 
 and useful volume ; the latter, in a veritable Great Eastern of books. 
 In 1866, Professor Rankine, in conjunct with Mr. Isaac Watts, the 
 superseded chief constructor, Mr. Barnes of the Admiralty, and Mr. 
 J. R. Napier, published a volume of very unequal merit. Professor 
 Rankine's work, as it always was, being of the highest order of 
 science, the old chief constructor's portion was obsolete at date of 
 publication. In 1869, Sir Edward Reed published "Our Iron- 
 Ironclad Ships " and " Shipbuilding in Iron and Steel," and from 
 1872 to '75 four volumes of "Naval Science," and again in 1885 a 
 volume on the "Stability of Ships," of all of which it is not too much 
 to say that they are masterpieces of scientific and practical know- 
 ledge as well as literary skill. In 1877, Mr - W- H. White, the present 
 Chief Constructor, published his " Manual of Naval Architecture," 
 a most interesting and popular treatise of great value ; and chief among 
 the less distinguished authors we have three educational treatises on 
 the *' Theory and Practice of Shipbuilding," by Mr. Samuel Thearle 
 the last volume not yet three months old which for clear and 
 vigorous writing and thorough knowledge of the subjects treated are 
 not surpassed in the literature of naval architecture. Such 
 historical works as Mr. W. S. Lindsay's " History of Merchant 
 Shipping" and Lord Brassey's " British Navy" and "Naval Annual" 
 are especially valuable for information not available in technical and 
 scientific literature. 
 
 It would scarcely be possible to over-estimate the value to 
 practical men of the books of the Register Societies, of which 
 Lloyds and Veritas are the chief. Published annually, and con- 
 tinually being improved to keep pace with the times, they contain 
 a mass of information to be found nowhere else, and afford abundant 
 evidence of the careful and constant supervision taken by the great 
 Register societies over the shipbuilding and shipping of the world. 
 From the mere enumeration of the principal literary and scientific 
 influences at work among us now, as compared with the state of 
 matters fifty years ago, it will be evident that if we had much to learn, 
 knowledge kept pace with practice, and the two have worked har- 
 
EVOLUTION IN NAVAL ARCHITECTURE. 27 
 
 moniously together in the wonderful evolutions that have been going 
 on during that time. Firstly, in the modes of propulsion ; secondly, 
 n the material of construction ; and thirdly, in the design, the size, 
 the proportions, and the forms of vessels, for all the varied purposes, 
 which the new conditions of internal commerce and foreign trade, 
 national expansion, colonisation, and war required; and which have 
 been continually met, by the increased numbers, increased size and 
 carrying capacity, increased speed, greater efficiency and greater 
 economy, in shipping, that modern business, war, and pleasure, 
 imperatively demand. If we had much to learn it will have 
 been, I hope, apparent from the sketch I have endeavoured to 
 give you of the .work that has been done during the reign of Queen 
 Victoria, that we have been apt scholars and not unworthy country- 
 men of the great man who showed us all the way. The impulse and 
 stimulus that James Watt gave to our intelligence, ingenuity, and 
 application have never ceased to act and react always for the 
 better on each succeeding generation, for the last hundred years. 
 May our successors be worthy of their great inheritance in his 
 name and influence, and in the names and influences flowing from 
 him, which have made that inheritance the great British Empire 
 of to-day. 
 
Si**-