CHAPTER IV.

Having furnished a general outline of the rise and progress of propulsion by steam on the rivers, coasts, and lakes of the United States of America, and traced its advance in Great Britain to the period when the superiority of the screw over the paddle-wheel, and of iron over wood, had come to be generally acknowledged, I shall now ask my readers to accompany me while I endeavour to describe the great contest between these two countries for the carrying trade of the Atlantic. It is a grand story to tell, one far more worthy of record than the wars for maritime supremacy between Rome and Carthage, or than, perhaps, some wars of more recent times which, without any apparently useful object, have stained land and sea with the blood alike of the victor and the vanquished, rendering desolate many a once happy home.

The war I have now to relate was a far nobler conflict, consisting as it did in the struggle between the genius, scientific skill, and industry of the people of two great nations, commenced, too, and, continued throughout without bloodshed and with a fair field, neither country having, in the direct trade, any special legislative advantages.

Though the Americans still retain the whole of their river, lake, and coasting trade, including even the distant voyage between New York and California, for the immediate benefit of their own shipping, the vessels of both nations conduct on equal terms the intercourse between the mother-countries, and have done so for more than half a century. But when, towards the close of the War of Independence, the struggle for supremacy commenced, the shipping of both England and America were, in all branches of their maritime commerce, under the leading-strings of their respective legislators. England would not then allow American vessels to trade with most of her vast possessions and, while thus nursing her shipowners, prevented the mass of her people from deriving the advantages invariably flowing from a natural and wholesome competition. Nor did she, indeed, confer any real benefit on this favoured class: on the contrary, she taught them to lean on Protection, instead of depending on their own skill and industry. The consequences were apparent in even the earlier results of this struggle. Having ample fields for employment exclusively their own, English shipowners did not enter with their wonted energy, into the direct carrying trade between their own country and America, which was so rapidly developed after the Americans had become independent; they remained satisfied with those branches of commerce expressly secured to them by law, just as the boy too frequently does who, receiving a small patrimony by his parents, cares not to exert himself to increase it and, consequently, leaves others not so highly favoured, to surpass him in the race of competition for wealth and independence. Thus the shipowners of Great Britain did not care to continue their vessels in the trade with America in a competition, on equal terms, with those of that country, especially when they found they would have to produce a superior class of vessel and to use extra exertions, to make this trade pay as well as did their protected branches of oversea commerce without the additional trouble of “improvements.” It was otherwise with the shipowners of the United States, for there was then no other branch of oversea trade where the laws of nations allowed them to compete on equal terms with foreign vessels.

Although possessing the advantage of vast forests of timber for the construction of their ships, the American shipbuilders were obliged to import their iron[164] from Great Britain, their hemp from Russia, and many other articles necessary for the equipment of their vessels from other and distant countries; they did not, therefore, especially as skilled labour was higher at home than in Europe, engage in the vigorous though peaceful struggle, I am about to describe, with any special advantages, but, being equal in energy and industry, they had the incalculable advantage of being obliged to depend on themselves. They, consequently, set to work to construct that description of merchant-vessel likely to yield the most remunerative returns, adopting the best mechanical contrivances within their reach, so as to reduce navigation to the smallest cost consistent with safety and efficiency; and the world soon saw the results of their labours in their celebrated “Baltimore clippers” and the still more celebrated “American liners,” which for a considerable period almost monopolised the carrying trade between Great Britain and the States.

Yet, strange to say, though the superiority of the merchant-vessels of the United States soon became only too apparent, scarcely any improvements were adopted by Great Britain, or indeed, by any other nation, until wiser statesmen than had hitherto guided the councils of this country swept away the whole paraphernalia of her Navigation Laws, and left her shipowners to rely entirely on their own resources.

I have already shown that this superiority consisted mainly in the fact that American ships could sail faster and carry more cargo, in proportion to their registered tonnage, than those of their competitors; but their improvements did not rest here. In considering the current expenses of a merchantman, manual labour is one of the most important items, and, herein, our competitors, by means of improved blocks and various other mechanical appliances, so materially reduced the number of hands that twenty seamen in an American sailing-ship could do as much work, and probably with more ease to themselves, than thirty in a British vessel of similar size. With such ships we failed successfully to compete; and although we have since far surpassed them in ocean steam navigation, the Americans were the first to despatch a steamer, for trading purposes, across the Atlantic.

In 1791, when the steam-boat was in its infancy—indeed, when it was hardly known—Mr. Fitch[165] of Windsor, Connecticut, boldly predicted that sailing-vessels would soon be superseded in the carrying trade between Great Britain and America by steamers, though it was not till 1819, that the American steam-ship Savannah, of 300 tons, arrived at Liverpool from Savannah, Georgia, in thirty-one days, partly steaming and partly sailing;[166] but as her horse-power was too small, while she was otherwise unsuited for ocean navigation, she did not prove commercially remunerative. The questionable success of the Savannah, combined with the fact that about this time, and for some years afterwards, men of science[167] were demonstrating, at least to their own satisfaction, that the navigation of the Atlantic by steam power alone, was the dream of a visionary, prevented, for ten years, the renewal of this bold experiment, the American sailing-vessels continuing to retain the bulk of this carrying trade.

The next step in Transatlantic steam navigation was the dispatch, in 1829, of an English-built vessel, the Curaçoa, of 350 tons and 100 horse-power, which made several successful voyages between Holland and the Dutch West Indies. On the 18th of August 1833, a steam-ship named the Royal William[168] sailed from Quebec and arrived at Gravesend on the 11th of September, having been detained three days at Nova Scotia on her way to England. But it was not until 1838 that the practicability of profitably employing vessels propelled by steam on an Atlantic voyage was fully tested. In that year, an advertisement appeared announcing that the “steam-ship Sirius, Lieutenant Roberts, R.N., Commander, would leave London for New York on Wednesday, the 28th of March, calling at Cork Harbour, and would start from thence on the 2nd of April, returning from New York on the 1st of May.” Thus a company of merchants was found sanguine enough to test the practicability of regular steam navigation with the United States, by advertising, not merely the days of sailing from England, but, also, those of arrival and departure from America. Circumstances, however, delayed the departure of the Sirius until the morning of the 4th of April, when she started, at ten o’clock, with ninety-four passengers. Although not built for Transatlantic navigation, having been previously employed by the St. George Steam Navigation Company in their trade between London and Cork, the Sirius was much superior in size to either of the three vessels which had previously made the voyage, being about 700 tons register with engines of 320 horse-power, constructed by Thomas Wingate, of Glasgow.[169]

But the Sirius was soon surpassed by the Great Western, which three days afterwards (the 7th of April, 1838) followed her with goods and passengers for New York. As the Great Western, the marvel of the period, was the first steam-ship specially constructed for the now vast trade between Great Britain and the United States, it may interest my readers to know that she was built of wood by Mr. Patterson, of Bristol, according to his own design, and that her dimensions were 212 feet in length between the perpendiculars, 35 feet 4 inches breadth of beam, and 23 feet 2 inches depth of hold; registering 1340 tons, builders’ measurement.[170] Her engines (on the side lever principle) were 440 horse-power, constructed by Messrs. Maudslay, Sons, and Field, of London, having cylinders 73½ inches in diameter and 7 feet stroke, making twelve to fifteen revolutions per minute.[171] She was commanded by Captain Hosken.

In the interval between the sailing of the Sirius and the Great Western and their arrival at New York, much doubt prevailed as to the probability of their accomplishing the voyage in safety, and this uncertainty was increased by the arrival at ports in Great Britain, of vessels from America, without having encountered either of them; it was forgotten for the moment, that, in the immensity of the ocean, vessels may easily miss each other although traversing the same zones. They were however at length spoken with by the Westminster, an American sailing packet, the Sirius on the 21st April, within six hours’ sail of her destination, and the Great Western on the 22nd. The former reached New York on that day after a passage of seventeen days; the latter completed the passage in two days’ less time, having arrived (without any accident in either case), on the 23rd of that month.

The safe arrival of these ships at New York was hailed with immense acclamation, thousands of persons having gathered early in the morning to bid them welcome, and, as this, too, is a matter of historical interest, I shall trouble my readers with the substance of the accounts of their arrival as they appeared, at the time, in the public journals.[172]

The Sirius sailed on her homeward voyage on the afternoon of the 1st of May, her advertised time, and the Great Western on the 7th of that month. The former reached England on the 18th of May, the latter on the 22nd, being respectively, sixteen and fourteen days on the passage. The whole distance run from Bristol to New York, by the Great Western, was 3125 knots,[173] her average speed being 208 miles each day, or 8·2 per hour, consuming 655 tons of coal. Her return passage was accomplished at an average of 213 knots each day, or close upon 9 knots an hour, with a consumption of 392 tons of coal (the difference of consumption arising no doubt in a great measure from the prevalence on her homeward passage of westerly winds); her average daily consumption on this occasion varied from 27 tons, with expansive gear in action, to 32 tons without it.[174]

As the Sirius was not intended for the American trade she made only the one voyage across the Atlantic and, on her return to Liverpool, was dispatched to London to open up steam communication between that city and St. Petersburg, where she was for some years successfully employed.

But another steam-vessel was soon engaged to take the place of the Sirius. On the 6th of July, 1838, a paragraph in the public journals[175] announced the interesting fact that the enterprising merchants of Liverpool, who now hold the great bulk of the Anglo-American trade in their hands, had dispatched their first steam-ship, the Royal William, though the second of that name, to New York.[176]

Although the practicability of steam navigation across the troubled waters of the Atlantic had now been triumphantly established, other steam-ships having followed the Royal William in rapid succession, many years elapsed before the magnificent sailing-vessels which American energy and skill had created, were driven from the trade.

In October 1838, Sir John Tobin, a well-known merchant of Liverpool, seeing the importance of the intercourse now rapidly increasing between the old and new worlds, dispatched on his own account, a steamer to New York. She was built at Liverpool, after which place she was named, and made the passage outwards in sixteen and a half days. It was now clearly shown that the service could be performed, not merely with profit to those who engaged in it, but with a regularity and speed which the finest description of sailing-vessels could not be expected to accomplish. If any doubts still existed on these important points the second voyage of the Great Western set them at rest, she having on this occasion accomplished the outward passage in fourteen days sixteen hours, and the homeward passage in twelve days fourteen hours, bringing with her the advices of the fastest American sailing-ships which had sailed from New York long before her; and thus proving the necessity of having the mails in future conveyed by steamers.

But this idea so far from being new was coexistent with the introduction of steam itself for the purposes of navigation; nor indeed was it the idea of any one person interested in the trade between Great Britain and the United States of America, though one man set himself more zealously to carry it into practical and continuous operation than any one else.

So far back as 1830, Mr. Samuel Cunard of Halifax, N.S., contemplated the establishment of a mail service between the two continents, his original plan, which he followed up, being to run steamers from Liverpool to Halifax (that harbour presenting unusual facilities for the reception of steam-vessels) and thence to Boston in the United States.

About that time the Government of Bombay which had just launched the Hugh Lindsay, and the East India Company were considering the introduction of larger steam-vessels for their naval service, and, as Mr. Cunard was personally known to Mr. Melvill, then secretary to that Company, he placed himself in communication with that gentleman, making known to him his views, and requesting to be favoured with an introduction to any shipbuilder in this country or other persons likely to join him in carrying out his project. Mr. Melvill furnished him with a letter to Mr. Robert Napier, the well-known engineer and shipbuilder of Glasgow, and through him Mr. Cunard was led to discuss this important undertaking with Mr. George Burns of that city, and his friend and correspondent Mr. David MacIver of Liverpool.[177] Both those gentlemen entertained with favour the proposals of Mr. Cunard, and, subsequently, agreed to co-operate with him in finding the requisite capital and ships, should he be enabled to secure the contract for the conveyance of the Transatlantic mails.

The regularity of the passages of the Great Western satisfied the British Government as to the superiority of steam over sailing-packets, and, in October 1838, the Admiralty issued advertisements for tenders for the conveyance of the North American mails by steamers. Much to the annoyance of the Great Western Company, who did not contemplate any serious opposition to their offer, the tender from Mr. Cunard, as the lowest and, in many other respects the most favourable in its conditions for the public, was accepted, the contract being entered into in the name of Samuel Cunard, George Burns, and David MacIver; and from this sprung the vast private maritime undertaking now popularly known as the Cunard Company.

The original conditions of the contract were that, for the sum of 55,000l. per annum, Messrs. Cunard, Burns, and MacIver should supply three suitable steam-ships and perform two voyages a month from Liverpool to the United States, leaving England at certain periods; but, afterwards, it was thought desirable to have fixed days in America as well as in England for departure. By a subsequent arrangement, four boats were required by the Admiralty to be provided by Mr. Cunard instead of three, subject to certain other conditions, for which the subsidy was increased to somewhere about 81,000l.[178] per annum.

For the performance of this contract Mr. Cunard and his co-partners placed on the line four steam-ships[179] in every way adapted for the service so far as the knowledge of the period extended, and from the commencement of the company until the present day the Cunard Company have without exception supplied vessels greatly exceeding the stipulated power required by their postal contracts. The whole of the first four vessels were constructed of wood on the Clyde by its leading shipbuilders, and the engines were supplied by Mr. Robert Napier, long celebrated in his profession. They were nearly alike in size and power, and, that my readers may compare them with the steam-vessels of to-day a drawing of the Britannia (which commenced the service by sailing from Liverpool on 4th July, 1840) is furnished (page 182); the particulars of her construction, in all essential details, are likewise herewith supplied.[180]

These vessels commenced the mail service in 1840 between Liverpool, Halifax, and Boston, performing it with great regularity out and home at an average speed of about 8½ knots an hour, and giving complete satisfaction to the public on both sides of the Atlantic; indeed, when the Britannia, on her first voyage, was frozen up in the harbour of Boston, the inhabitants of that city, at their own expense, cut her through the ice into clear water for a distance of seven miles. (See illustration, page 182.)

In 1844, Mr. Cunard brought into the service (partly in pursuance of his contract) the Cambria and Hibernia, each of 500 horse-power, and of 1422 tons, with an average speed of 9¼ knots.

In 1848, the America, Niagara, Europe, and Canada followed, so as to meet the increasing wants of the trade and the ever increasing demands of the public for greater speed and improved accommodation. Each of these vessels was about 1820 tons and of 680 horse-power, with an average speed of 10¼ knots an hour.

The success of the Cunard Company, created, as might have been anticipated, much jealousy among the shareholders of the Great Western Steam-ship Company, who complained of a monopoly having been granted to their injury and to that of other owners of steam-ships engaged in the trade, or who were desirous of entering it. Although no unfairness was alleged against Mr. Cunard and his partners, and no valid charges could be raised against the manner in which the mail services were performed, the Great Western Company had sufficient influence to obtain a parliamentary inquiry. They asked it, first, on the broad grounds (which have since been frequently raised, and now with much more show of reason than then), that the public was taxed for a service from which one company alone derived the advantage, and which could be equally well done and, at less expense, if mails were sent by all steamers engaged in the trade, each receiving a certain amount of percentage on the letters they carried; and, secondly, because their company had been the first in the trade and had incurred great expense and risk in developing steam communication between Great Britain and the United States of America. But, after full inquiry, the committee reported that the arrangements concluded with Messrs. Cunard, Burns, and MacIver, were on terms more advantageous than any others which could then be made, and that the service had been most efficiently performed.[181]

Indeed, it was clearly shown that even the first boats the Cunard Company ran between England and America were superior in power and speed to any others similarly employed,[182] and this superiority they long maintained. In the calculations made of the relative power of the steam-vessels thus employed, an average westerly passage across the Atlantic was taken, and an endeavour made to place these vessels in the order of speed. The Oriental and Great Western were pronounced about equal, as also the President, and the Great Liverpool before the alterations were made in her. It should however be remarked that, though the proportion of power and tonnage was the same in the case of the Oriental and British Queen, it was not questioned that, on every point, especially when the vessels were deeply laden, the Oriental had the advantage. It may also be mentioned that the Liverpool was, after her alterations, 393 tons larger than formerly; and, though her proportion of power was consequently diminished, her speed and weatherly qualities were materially increased,[183] showing that more depended on the form and construction of the vessel than on having a large engine power.

The President, built by Messrs. Curling and Young for the British and American Steam Navigation Company, was launched on the 7th December, 1839, with great éclat, but her career at sea was very brief, and her end most melancholy. It may be summed up in the few words that, when due from New York, in April 1841, she did not make her appearance; tremendous weather having been experienced in the Atlantic, with unusual quantities of ice in very low latitudes, the most intense anxiety arose both in the mercantile world and among the relatives of the passengers as to the cause of her detention. The arrival of other ships from the same port increased the public anxiety. For a considerable period the appearance of every large vessel was hailed as the missing steamer, and a thousand rumours prevailed as to her wreck in various parts of the world. The hopes long entertained that her engines had broken down and that she had sailed for the West Indies or elsewhere to refit, proved fallacious, while the agony of the parties interested in her was kept alive by the most conflicting speculations as to the cause and certainty of a catastrophe. The President was never again heard of, nor was any trace of her wreck ever discovered. This calamitous event, however it affected the interests of the company of Bristol merchants to whom she belonged, did not check the ardour of the people of England for steam navigation across the Atlantic.

The Great Western Steamship Company having, so far back as 1838, resolved to build a second ship much larger than their first, aimed at realizing in her the greatest improvements the art of naval construction could then command. Nor were they disappointed in their expectations, the Great Britain when launched being not merely much the largest, but also the finest vessel up to that period built for ocean steam navigation.[184]

In proportion to all other vessels hitherto constructed of iron, the dimensions of the Great Britain were altogether colossal and, at the time, she excited quite as much public interest as that vast leviathan, the Great Eastern, did at a later period. She was built at Bristol, and her lines were furnished by Mr. Patterson of that place, who had planned and constructed the Great Western. Nor was the public interest in her at all lessened when it became known that, though originally intended for a paddle-wheel steamer, her builder had boldly resolved to adopt the screw, then comparatively little known as a means of propulsion.

As there were still many unbelievers in the suitability of iron, for the construction of sea-going vessels, and still more who had no faith whatever in the value of the screw, this second step in advance on the part of the directors of the Great Western Steamship Company led to much discussion among scientific men, and created many evil forebodings as to the ultimate fate of the Great Britain, all of which she, however, falsified. On her passage from Bristol to the Thames, though she encountered very severe weather, she braved the storm in a manner (see following illustration,) which ought to have silenced for ever the opponents of iron as a suitable material for the construction of vessels of every description, as well as those men of science who still, and for many years afterwards, maintained that the screw, under all circumstances, was an inferior motive power to that of the paddle-wheel.

So great, indeed, was the interest felt in this vessel that, on her arrival in the Thames, Her Majesty and Prince Albert with great numbers of the nobility, and thousands of other persons, paid her a visit. Nor was her fame confined to England, forming as she did the subject of discussion among the learned and scientific societies of Europe, which was taken up with unusual fervour in the United States of America when it became known that she was to be employed as one of the Transatlantic steamers destined to eclipse the still celebrated American sailing clippers.[185]

Though the Americans continued with undaunted courage their lines of sailing packets, every year, increasing their dimension, and improving by every possible means their speed and seagoing qualities, they saw the most valuable portions of their trade (first-class passengers and fine goods) passing into the hands of British steamers. Resolving if possible to maintain their position, they, with that genius, and ready adaptation of means to an end peculiarly their own, fitted a steam-engine into one of their sailing-vessels, and were therefore the first to apply the auxiliary screw to ocean navigation, as they had been the first to cross the Atlantic with steam. They knew that when the wind was strong and favourable, their celebrated ships could, with their sails alone, surpass in speed any ocean steamers then afloat, and they thought that if they could introduce, at a moderate cost and with comparatively small current expenses, a steam-engine to propel their sailing-packets when the wind failed, or when entering port or passing through narrow channels, they would be enabled to hold their ground against their now formidable rivals. Consequently, they sent forth, in the autumn of 1845, their auxiliary steam-packet ship Massachusetts,[186] of which the following is an illustration.

From a description given of her in the Mechanics’ Magazine of January 1846, she appears to have been 161 feet in length on deck, 31 feet 9 inches in breadth of beam, and 20 feet depth of hold from maindeck. She was 751 tons, O.M., and had a full poop extending to the mainmast, in which there was accommodation for thirty-five first-class passengers.

Her enterprising owners (Mr. Forbes and others),[187] did not contemplate competition so far as regards speed with the steamers then employed on the Atlantic service, but by using the screw as an auxiliary they hoped to accomplish the voyage with so much greater rapidity than an ordinary sailing-ship as to recompense them for the cost of the machinery and the cargo space which it occupied. By insuring greater regularity they also hoped to command a moderate share of the passenger traffic, and of that description of goods which from their nature would not allow so high a rate of freight to be paid as the owners of steam-ships required to cover the greatly enhanced cost of navigation. The passages of the Massachusetts, as compared[188] with those of sailing-ships which left Liverpool before and after her, showed a considerable saving in time.

Her motive power consisted of a condensing engine, constructed by Messrs. Hogg and Delamater of New York, designed by Captain Ericsson and fitted with his screw, the blades of which turned up out of the water when the vessel was under sail alone. The engine had two cylinders working nearly at right angles, each 3 feet stroke and 26 inches diameter. There were two boilers, named “waggon-boilers,” each 14 feet long, 7 feet wide, and 9 feet high, with a furnace to each boiler. For the purpose of raising steam quickly there was a blowing-engine and blower, the power of her engine being equal to 170 horses, sufficient to drive the ship about 9 statute miles an hour in smooth water and during calms, with a consumption of 9 tons of anthracite coal per day. The whole of the machinery, with the boilers, coal bunkers, &c., which were fitted in the after portion of the lower hold, occupied a space of one-tenth the cubic contents of the ship. Her propeller was made of composition metal, and could be raised out of the water when the steam-power was not required. Its shaft passed through the ship, close to the stern post on the port side and rested in a socket which was bolted to the stern post, and further supported by a massive brace above. Her entire cost was 16,000l. complete in all respects with machinery.

But even the Massachusetts[189] did not meet the wishes of the American people. They saw their most valuable maritime commerce slowly but surely passing away from them, and though not yet prepared to run steamers to compete on the direct Atlantic line with British enterprise, they determined to secure at least a portion of the first-class passenger and fine goods trade with Europe. Consequently, they established a line of steam-ships of their own to run between New York and Bremen, calling at Southampton, and in June 1847 started their first ship, the Washington, for Southampton on the same day that the Britannia, belonging to the Cunard Company, sailed from New York for Liverpool. This was the first race between American and British steamers, and though the Britannia did not require “to run by the deep mines, and put in more coal” to beat the Washington as the New York Herald anticipated, the other prophecy of the editor of that enterprising journal has been now remarkably fulfilled.[190]

The Britannia won the race by two full days. The Washington,[191] of which the following is an illustration (though the Spithead correspondent of the London Times does not give a very glowing account of her appearance as she passed before him on the waters of the Solent[192]), was welcomed on her arrival at the port of Bremen with great rejoicings; the burgomaster proceeding on board in state to invite the captain to a banquet in the Town Hall, specially prepared for him by the Senate.

Hitherto the American Government had been opposed in principle to all subsidies, but the vast results which accrued to the material interests of the United States from the extensive employment of steam navigation, effected concurrently a great change in the policy of the Federal Legislature and soon rendered it necessary to subsidize vessels of their own for the conveyance of their mails to Great Britain. If, before the period of the introduction of steam, Congress had exhibited an undue parsimony in providing funds in any form for their national navy, it is certain that a more liberal policy now prevailed.

Ocean steam navigation was now adopted by the Americans for the joint purpose of extending and advancing the commercial and other interests of the country, and more especially to provide a marine force which might be easily made available for the protection “of American rights;” and the attainment of this two-fold object was the motive which, in the opinion of Congress, justified the application of public funds in aid of private enterprise. Nor was the argument, once so popular in England, overlooked that the money so advanced would ultimately be reimbursed by saving the expense of a standing fleet to the extent of the number of the vessels subsidized in the conveyance of the mails, while encouraging commerce and the arts during the time of peace.

The Americans also now complained (they had not thought of it before) that the ocean mails along their southern coasts had been placed in the hands of foreign carriers,[194] sustained and protected by the British Government, under the forms of contracts to carry the British mails; while the Cunard line, between Liverpool and Boston viâ Halifax, constituted the only medium of regular steam navigation between the United States and Europe. In this way it was alleged that the commercial interests of the United States were on one side entirely at the mercy of British steamers which plied along the southern coast of the United States, entering their ports at pleasure, and thereby acquiring an intimate knowledge of the soundings and other peculiarities of the American harbours, a process which might prove highly injurious to America in the event of a war with Great Britain: while, on the other, danger was incurred by a foreign line of steamers carrying the ocean mails, under the liberal encouragement of the British Government, and thus threatening to monopolize by steam the mail postage and freight between the two countries.

Under these somewhat hazardous circumstances to the commercial and political interests of the United States, it became necessary to decide whether American commerce should continue to be “thus tributary to British maritime supremacy,” or an American medium of communication should be established through the intervention of the Federal Government in the form of loans in aid of individual enterprise. The Americans now felt that unless they departed from their previous policy, they could not contend successfully against the Cunard line of packets, which received a large subsidy from the English Government.

It was humiliating, they also argued, to their pride as a great maritime people, that foreigners and commercial rivals should wrest from them the virtual monopoly of ocean steam conveyance, especially between the United States and Europe, as well as between the West Indies and South America. But, in reviewing this question, their statesmen and politicians might have perceived without prejudice, that England has acted upon the same liberal policy in furnishing means to establish ocean lines to other parts of the world where American rivalry has no place; therefore, the paragraph about the “Queen of the Ocean levying her imposts upon the industry and intelligence of all the nations that frequent the highway of the world,”[195] is merely a rhetorical flight, with no foundation in fact, apparently introduced into their official reports in order to reconcile the ignorant people of the Western States to the payment of a tax for services performed, by which they would be but indirectly and remotely benefited.

Moreover, it was urged, in favour of the principle of subsidies, that the American sailing packets, though undoubtedly vessels of unrivalled beauty and swiftness, were fast losing the most valuable portion of their trade through the competition of steamers under a foreign flag; but, so far from this being an argument in favour of subsidizing vessels of their own of a similar description, the shipowners of New York and Boston and in all the leading American ports, who held the sailing-ships as a property, naturally complained that the United States’ Government should improperly interfere by a protective system, which would inflict a double injury upon them, and insisted that such matters should be left entirely to individual enterprise, which, in their opinion, becomes paralyzed under the effects of Government patronage bestowed upon some to the exclusion of others. To all these, and similar complaints from other quarters, the Government answered that the system was deemed to be not only calculated to awaken and reward the enterprise of American citizens, but avoid the expense of keeping on hand, in time of peace, a large and useless military marine, which could only be preserved in a condition of efficiency by a vast annual outlay of public money. The Government therefore came, perhaps reluctantly, to the opinion that these ocean facilities should exist through their intervention, more especially as they were beyond the capabilities of private means.

But apart altogether from any of the reasons assigned in favour of subsidizing a line of mail steamers of their own, the national pride of the Americans had been touched by the success of the Cunard and other lines of steam-ships frequenting their ports, or trading, if not along their coasts, at least on seas they considered their own, and they attributed this success (not altogether without reason) to the annual grants for mail services from the British Crown.

Nor is it surprising that their national pride should have been touched. American genius and skill had sent forth steamers to trade on their coasts, lakes, and rivers which were marvels of naval architecture, unsurpassed in speed and in the splendour of their equipment—their sailing packets, as we have seen, were the finest the world had then produced, while their perfection in the art of shipbuilding had even reached so high a point that they constructed steamers to ascend rivers where there was hardly depth of water for an Indian canoe; indeed it was proverbially said, in honour of their skill in the art, that their vessels would traverse valleys if only moistened by the morning dews. No wonder they should have felt annoyed at the progress of British shipping in those branches of maritime commerce they had long considered peculiarly their own.