Part 16

The City of New York and the City of Paris are also provided with double bottoms, so that, should the outer skin be torn, the inner one would still exclude the sea; and the efficacy of oil in calming the troubled waters has been so well established that apparatus for its distribution is placed in the bows. The number of officers and seamen has been augmented, so that the staff of navigating officers now comprises the captain, the chief officer, two second officers, two third officers, and two fourth officers. Great improvements have also been made in the mariner’s compass and in the patent log and sounding machine. The latter can be used when the ship is going at a high rate of speed, and it records not only the depth of water but the character of the bottom, which is nearly always a clue to the position of the ship when other signs fail. Had these instruments been less perfect, we could not have made our way, with so little delay, past Fastnet and up the Channel to Holyhead, when the fog descended as we were making land.

Still another improvement is in the material of which the propellers are cast. In the new ships it is manganese bronze, which has nearly double the strength of steel and is practically unbreakable.

Sixteen or seventeen years ago the principal lines began to adopt the system of “steam lanes” originally suggested by Professor M. F. Maury, as long ago as 1855—that is, to prescribe definite courses for their steamers, based on calculations as to probable areas of fog and ice. In following these fixed courses the steamers pass each other at an hour and a point on the ocean which can be foretold almost to a certainty, and should one of them meet with an accident, there is every probability that succor will reach her through one of her companion ships.

So keen is the rivalry between the various lines, and so much does their success depend on a reputation for safety, that self-interest, in the absence of a higher motive, is sufficient to stimulate them to leave nothing undone, in the construction and manning of their vessels, which may in any way be the means of averting disaster. In furtherance of their efforts, the British and American governments unite in giving them the most perfect system of lights, buoys, and fog-signals in the world. When twenty or more miles at sea, the captain may discern the rays of the first light, and as he nears port and enters the Channel, there are nearly as many beacons as lamp-posts in a city street.

No testimony to the efficiency of the transatlantic service is more convincing than the record of 1890. The steamers were exposed, as they must be every year, to dangers from collision, from ice, from hurricanes, from drifting derelicts, on their way up and down the crowded Channel and through the shifting sands at the estuary of the Mersey; they were constantly embarrassed by fogs. Nearly two thousand trips were made from New York alone to various European ports: about two hundred thousand cabin passengers were carried to and fro, in addition to nearly three hundred and seventy-two thousand immigrants who were landed at Castle Garden. This enormous traffic was conducted without accident, and no more comforting assurance can be given than this of safety on the Atlantic.

THE OCEAN STEAMSHIP AS A FREIGHT CARRIER.

BY JOHN H. GOULD.

REVENUE OF THE SHIP’S CARGO—AMOUNT OF FREIGHT CARRIED BY EXPRESS STEAMSHIPS—GROSS TONNAGE OF IMPORTANT LINES RUNNING FROM NEW YORK—THE MERCHANT MARINE OF THE UNITED STATES—THE “ATLANTIC LIMITED”—THE SEA POST-OFFICE—IN THE SPECIE ROOM—ENORMOUS REFRIGERATORS—THE NEW CLASS OF “FREIGHTERS”—LARGE CARGOES AND SMALL COAL CONSUMPTION—THE OCEAN “TRAMP”—ADVANTAGES OF THE “WHALEBACK”—VESSELS FOR CARRYING GRAIN—FLOATING ELEVATORS—THE FRUIT STEAMSHIP—TANK STEAMSHIPS FOR CARRYING OIL—PECULIARITIES OF THEIR CONSTRUCTION—THE MOLASSES SHIP—SCENES ON THE PIERS WHEN STEAMSHIPS ARE LOADING—STEAM HOISTING APPARATUS—HOW THE FREIGHT IS STOWED—COALING—THE LOADING OF CATTLE SHIPS—“COWBOYS OF THE SEA”—OCEAN TRAFFIC THE INDEX OF A NATION’S PROSPERITY.

Interesting as the ocean fleet is from the point of view of the passenger who crosses the seas on business or pleasure bent, the part that steamships play in the commerce of the world is even more worthy of consideration. There is a vast region between decks and down in the lower hold of which the ordinary traveller knows little. And yet the ship’s cargo brings to the owners a large portion of their revenue, and makes possible the magnificent steamships of to-day.

There are $500,000,000 invested in ocean-going steamships sailing from the port of New York alone! The figures are appalling, yet they are a conservative estimate of the wealth intrusted to the mercies of the ocean. There are twenty-nine regular lines of steamships running between New York and European ports. Of these, eight lines run express steamships, and twenty-three lines carry passengers and freight. The other six lines transport freight only, and there are still other lines running to the West Indies, Central and South America, and our own Atlantic coast and Gulf ports.

Seven steamship companies—the White Star, Inman, Cunard, North German Lloyd, Hamburg-American, Guion, and the French line—have the record-breakers.

The Teutonic and the Majestic of the White Star line, and the new French liner La Touraine, are said to have cost $2,000,000 each. The City of Paris and the City of New York, of the Inman line, and the new Hamburg-American steamship First Bismarck are supposed to have cost considerably over $1,500,000 each.

The White Star line steamships Majestic and Teutonic each carry, in addition to their 1,500 passengers, some 2,500 tons of freight. This line has in all ten steamships—six devoted to passengers and freight, and four to freight exclusively.

The Inman line steamships City of Paris and City of New York carry 1,200 passengers each, and still have room for 2,700 tons of freight.

The Cunarders Etruria and Umbria have each accommodations for about 1,600 passengers, and also take about 800 tons of freight.

The North German Lloyd line has twelve express steamships in the service, with an average passenger capacity of 1,150 for all classes. The freight capacity varies from 2,000 to 2,500 tons: the line has three sailing days each week. There are nine other steamships of the line sailing between this port, Baltimore, and Europe, making the total number of their vessels twenty-one. In October, 1891, the line inaugurated a Mediterranean service. At all times there are eight of the express steamships belonging to this line at sea, and two are in port at New York and two in the European port.

The Hamburg-American Packet Company has four express steamships, forming a weekly service from New York, and which is almost entirely devoted to the passenger business. These vessels each accommodate about 1,250 passengers of all classes. They have a small freight capacity—from about 600 to 700 tons of light cargo being the limit. No perishable goods are taken.

The Guion line steamships Alaska and Arizona have passenger accommodations for 1,300 and 1,100, respectively, and their freight capacity is about 2,000 tons.

The Compagnie Générale Transatlantique, or, as it is more frequently called, the French line, has six express steamships, with a freight capacity of 2,500 tons each, as well as accommodations for about 1,000 passengers.

The Wilson line, with its thirty steamships, is one of the greatest freight carriers in the world. There are four distinct lines from New York, one running to Hull, one to Antwerp, one to Newcastle, and one to London. The latter is known as the Wilson-Hill line. The Atlantic fleet, flying the Wilson flag, has 114,000 gross tonnage. Some of the steamships of this line have passenger accommodations, but the company confines itself almost exclusively to the carrying of freight.

The number and gross tonnage of steamships of the different lines are shown in the following table, the tonnage being from “Lloyd’s Register:”

_Transatlantic Lines._

+------+-------- |Number| | of | Total Lines. |Steam-| Gross |ships.|Tonnage. --------------------------------------------+------+-------- Wilson | 30 | 114,000 North German Lloyd | | (12 direct and 9 calling at Baltimore) | 21 | 111,585 Hamburg-American (including Baltic line) | 19 | 82,589 Anchor (including Mediterranean service) | 15 | 63,083 Netherlands | | (9 direct and 4 calling at Baltimore) | 13 | 43,314 National | 12 | 54,062 Sumner | 12 | 42,800 White Star | 10 | 58,162 Florio | 9 | 22,500 Red Star | 7 | 33,959 Fabre | 7 | 23,600 Mediterranean & New York S. S. Co. | 7 | 15,000 Inman | 6 | 41,276 Cunard | 6 | 40,253 French | 6 | 46,927 Allan | 6 | 23,738 Liverpool, Brazil & River Plate | | (Atlantic service) | 6 | 12,000 Guion | 5 | 22,651 Bristol City | 5 | 24,000 Beaver, during winter months | 5 | 17,500 Arrow | 5 | 13,000 Thingvalla | 4 | 11,985 Union (Sloman’s) | 4 | 11,750 Marseilles | 4 | 12,000 Great Western S. S. Co. | 4 | 10,000 Bordeaux | 3 | 6,000 White Cross | 2 | 5,169 Linha de Vapores Portuguezes | 2 | 3,777 Insular Navigation Co. | 1 | 2,893 --------------------------------------------+------+--------

This list gives only the regular lines engaged in the freight and passenger business, besides which there are the tank steamships, the tramp steamships, and a large number of vessels which call for orders from other ports, as well as steamships which are chartered for special freights.

_Central and South American, West Indian, and other Lines from New York._

+------+-------- |Number| | of | Total Lines. |Steam-| Gross |ships.|Tonnage. ------------------------------------+------+-------- Atlas | 12 | 22,000 Booth’s | 10 | 14,000 Red Cross | 10 | 16,225 New York & Cuba S. S. Co. | 9 | 25,300 Red “D” | 6 | 11,020 Quebec S. S. Co. | 6 | 9,094 Royal Dutch West Indian Mail | 6 | 10,156 United States & Brazil S. S. Co. | 5 | 16,400 Compañia Trasatlantica | 5 | 10,866 Earn | 5 | 12,500 Union (Sloman’s) | 4 | 8,000 Clyde (West Indian) | 4 | 6,600 Waydell’s | 4 | 4,500 Trinidad | 4 | 4,000 Atlantic & Pacific S. S. Co. | 4 | 9,904 Pacific Mail | 3 | 8,800 Wessell’s | 3 | 4,500 Liverpool, Brazil & River Plate[18] | 3 | 7,500 Honduras & Central American | 2 | 3,000 Anchor (West Indian Service) | 2 | 2,077 Maryland | 2 | 6,000 New York & Porto Rico S. S. Co. | 2 | 2,000 ------------------------------------+------+--------

Besides the regular lines there is a big fleet of tramp steamships. During the fiscal year ending June 30, 1891, 136 of these steamships, with 102,856 net registered tonnage, entered at the port of New York. This did not include the tramps who found their way here from West Indian and South American ports, or our own domestic ports, or those who may have drifted in from provincial ports. Many foreign tramps find their way to this port in ballast, seeking cargo, or for orders.

Aside from all these lines to foreign ports, there are our coastwise steamships, operated by a dozen or more lines, prominent among them being the Old Dominion, the Savannah, the Clyde, the Mallory, the Cromwell, the Morgan, the New York Steamship Company, and the Red Cross lines.

The ocean steamship lines require an auxiliary fleet of harbor vessels as tenders to them. Of these, the most numerous are the tow-boats, or tugs, as they are popularly called. There are 375 tow-boats registered at New York, but fully 400 float on the waters in the vicinity of the city. About 50 tow-boats have a gross tonnage of over 100 tons. Among the largest are the Amboy, of 272 tons, and the Luckenback, an ocean tug, of 255 tons. Still larger than these are the Vanderbilt and Oswego, the side-wheelers which pull the long strings of canal-boats up and down the Hudson. The tow-boats are fitted with powerful engines, and the facility with which one little tug will pull a ship many times her size, or a dozen canal-boats, is a marvel to the visitor from inland districts. The most powerful of these tugs have engines of 900 indicated horse-power, and of the type known as the fore-and-aft, or tandem. Two of these harbor tugs, the Amboy and the Raritan, both belonging to the Pennsylvania Railroad Company, have been operated with twin screws for twenty years at least.

Less than twenty-five per cent. of the freight trade of the country is carried on by ships flying the Stars and Stripes. During the calendar year of 1890, 33,359 vessels engaged in foreign trade entered at the ports of the United States. Their total tonnage was 18,510,374. American vessels, to the number of 11,033, carried 4,334,774 tons of the total amount, and foreign ships handled 14,175,600 tons. The merchant marine of the United States has a total tonnage of 4,424,497. The coastwise fleet has an aggregate tonnage of 3,409,435; the foreign trade, 928,062; and vessels registering 87,000 tons are engaged in the cod and whale fisheries. The vessels belonging to the port of New York in 1890 were 1,976 sailing vessels, of 409,468 tons; 1,032 steam vessels, of 374,673 tons; 230 canal boats, of 23,709 tons; and 671 barges, of 143,540 tons.

The volume of the ocean freight is enormous. Some idea of it can be gathered from the statistics of imports and exports issued by the United States Government. Of cotton alone, the vast quantity of 2,907,308,000 pounds was shipped from American ports during the fiscal year ending June 30, 1891. This is the largest quantity of cotton sent out of the country in any one year. The value of the cotton exported was $290,708,898, which is nearly half the value of the sum total of the four leading agricultural products. This amounted to $588,251,912. Next to cotton, the most important agricultural products exported were breadstuffs, including grain, which were valued at $127,668,092. Provisions, including meats and dairy products, amounted to $31,696,234. It is worth noting that the total value of the exports of these five leading products was $15,263,951 in excess of the same products in the previous year. The total value of exports and imports of merchandise, during the fiscal year ending June 30, 1891, was $1,729,330,896, an increase of $82,191,803 over the previous year, and of $241,797,869 since 1889. The foreign commerce of the United States for the year 1890 was the largest in the history of the country. The movement of the vast quantities of agricultural products and manufactured goods kept the ocean fleet busy. Forty per cent. of the total export trade of the United States goes from the port of New York. During 1890 the export business from the five principal ports was as follows: New York, $370,322,430; New Orleans, $107,300,637; Baltimore, $73,967,796; Boston, $70,364,955; and Philadelphia, $37,241,645. The total from all ports was $881,076,017. The imports in 1890 amounted to a total of $823,286,735, out of which New York received $527,497,196, considerably over one-half. It might be noted in passing, that of the total amount of customs duties collected by the Government in 1890, 67.17 per cent. came from New York.

Time is a great factor in ocean freight transportation, as well as in the passenger business. In the old days when the clipper ship was considered a perfect type of ocean travel, twenty days was a quick passage between New York and Liverpool, and when the Red Jacket made her famous trip in 13 days, 1 hour, and 25 minutes, the feat created as much excitement as the breaking of a record by an ocean greyhound does in these days of marine triumphs. The trip was made in 1854, and was an eastward one, the sailer logging 3,017 miles from Sandy Hook to Liverpool. In the following year the clipper ship Mary Whitredge ran from Baltimore to Liverpool in 13 days and 7 hours; she travelled 3,400 miles. Another remarkable trip was made by the Dreadnaught in 1860. She sighted the Irish coast in 9 days and 17 hours after leaving New York; but it took her three days longer to reach Liverpool. An instance showing the sailing quality of the old clipper ships occurred in 1864. The Adelaide, of the Williams & Guion line, while on her way down New York Bay, was passed by the steamship Sidon, of the Cunard line; but the Adelaide arrived in the Mersey before the Sidon, having made the passage in 12 days and 8 hours.

The clipper ship was the ocean greyhound of the Fifties. Her lines were those of a racer, her towering masts and broad expanse of canvas gave her the benefit of every breeze. She carried only the better class of freight in addition to her passengers, and it was not until some time after steamships had become an established fact that the passengers abandoned the clippers to the freight traffic.

For a time the sailing vessels held their own as freight carriers, but the improvements in steamships of recent years have robbed them of the bulk of their trade. They still hold their own for long sea voyages. There is a limit to the use of steam, and it is reached when the distance to be travelled makes the cost of coal and the space it occupies greater than the value of the cargo will warrant. Until some new motive power replaces steam, or steam is produced by the use of petroleum or other concentrated fuel, the clipper ship still has an occupation, and the hearts of all old-time skippers will be gladdened by the sight of her white wings upon the seas.

In 1850 a 1,400-ton sailing vessel was considered a big ship, but some of the new British four-masted steel ships sailing between Europe and America carry from 5,000 to 6,000 tons of cargo.

* * * * *

Great as have been the changes in ocean transportation, still greater changes are pending. The transatlantic business shows the most marked changes. From the old time packetship to the early type of steamship was but the first step. Faster vessels were built, and the space devoted to cargo was encroached upon by enormous engines and boilers, by big coal bunkers, and by large saloons and an increased number of state-rooms. The hulls changed from the bulging sides of the first types to the narrow, racing pattern of to-day. Speed and the arrangements for the comfort of a large list of passengers robbed the vessels of their freight capacity, and now the freight of an ocean greyhound is a secondary consideration. This necessitated the creation of a distinct class, known as the freighter.

The first railway cars having compartments for passengers, baggage, and freight were changed to express trains, where speed and comfort are the first considerations, and freight trains, where carrying capacity is the main object. In just the same manner, and for the same reasons, the ocean traffic is undergoing changes. The day cannot be far distant when the passenger ships will take only passengers, mails, specie, and express packages. The best-informed nautical men to-day declare that the progress of the last five years, remarkable as it has been, is but a circumstance compared with the possibilities of the future.

The ocean greyhound is simply an exponent of the times. What the limited express trains are on land, the racer is upon the sea—the “Atlantic Limited.” Expense is no object. The faster the ship, the greater the rush for passage in her. She is, of course, a floating palace of magnificence, but speed is the main object, and speed is at times as important for certain classes of freight as it is for passengers. The hue and cry that steamship companies are endangering the lives of their passengers by ocean racing is pointed in the wrong direction. It is the public who are to blame, if blame it is to annihilate time and space by the genius of man. The owners of these vessels spend millions to build ships, and then risk both their capital invested, and the reputation of their line for safety, in order to satisfy their patrons. People of the nineteenth century—Americans in particular—are in a hurry, and never stop to consider the enormous expense, the immense consumption of coal, the fearful and terrible strain on the firemen and coal-passers down in the bowels of the great vessel. Everything is done with a rush. Lightning express trains across continents and racers upon the oceans are necessities of the day.

The love of record-breaking is universal. The performance of the Majestic on August 5, 1891, thrilled the people of every nation. Her triumph of crossing the Atlantic in 5 days, 18 hours, and 8 minutes was echoed round the world. Hardly had the echoes died out when her sister-ship—twin in size and type—the Teutonic, came into New York Harbor with a better record still. It was 5 days, 16 hours, and 30 minutes, and the Teutonic was crowned “Queen of the Seas.”

But for how long?

The City of Paris held her record for upward of two years; the Etruria and the Umbria each was the crack racer for a year; but the Majestic only held the coveted place at the head of the Atlantic fleet for just two weeks.

At the rate of increase of speed since 1880, when the Arizona was champion, with a record of 7 days, 8 hours, and 8 minutes, we should have a five-day ship before many years, and perhaps eventually a four-day ship. At a 25-knot gait a steamship would cross from Daunt’s Rock to Sandy Hook in 4 days and 15 hours. The Teutonic averaged 20.349 knots for the entire trip, and on a 24-hour run she averaged over 21 knots.