EVENINGS AT HOME AT THE NAUTICAL CLUB:-Rodmond's Soliloquy-The Season and its Fuel—Address of the ChairmanPrince Albert's Memorial-Banca Strait Survey-The Batavian and Atlantic Submarine Cables-The American Question: Passages of our Steamers with Troops; the Guards at Sea; Landing at Bic; Testimonials; True American Courtesy to British Wants; the New Brunswick Route; the Halifax and Quebec Railway; American Opinion of British Cousins-The National Life-boat Institution.

Frozen up-snowed up-then loosed again, to baulk the skaters, by the "sweet influence "-no, not of "the Pleiades" of holy writ, but by that of our own health-giving south-western sea breezes; and all this within the third week of January. Yes, released, not from the "bands of Orion," but from the cold, penetrating claws of Jackey Frost in the N.E. wind, here we are again breathing a health-giving air. Fortunate island! Happy Cockneys! complain not of your twilight noons or murky fogs of winter, ye are blessed above many other mortals of Christendom; so rejoice, and be content even with that changeable but invigorating, healthy climate that has been awarded to you. Talk of the riches of the earth, are they not at your door when you want them? What are all the gold fields to your own coal fields?—those rich parterres of black diamonds which strengthen the right hand of your country and cheer the multitude when dark wintry blasts, with all the chilling host of fog, sleet, snow, frost, and ice predominate and load the atmosphere. Yes, rejoice, O Cockney town, even in your smoky breezes, while you can renovate the system of the outer and inner man with warmth and good cheer.

No bad idea that of yours, friend Rodmond, that terminated your soliloquy, observed Albert, as he thus broke in on him, and cut short his meditations.

What, Albert! Yes, I have been cogitating, ruminating, and come to the same conclusion as many have done before me,-that many people don't know when they are well off. But what a sad business has been that colliery accident at Hartley-215 poor souls buried alive, doomed to a lingering death from starvation, foul air, and all the miseries of a mine some 600 feet beneath the surface!

Badly managed, Rodmond. There should have been more than one shaft for communication. This being blocked up by an accident, the

rest was inevitable.

Yes. Perhaps this will be looked to in future. It's our way you know. But, Albert, the coals for which the lives of those unfortunate countrymen of ours have been sacrificed (as they might have been, and often are, in a wreck at sea), those coals always light up a train of reflections in my mind as to their origin,-whence they came-how old they are and a hundred other questions I could ask about them.

Look at that puffing bit of coal, blowing out the gas as hard as it can. Was all the coal of our globe the work of a day? So says Scripture, "the evening and the morning were the third day," you know.

Floundering, Rodmond, floundering on the mode of reading Scripture, only to be cast high and dry on the difficulties of the carboniferous period! Are you one of those who think you have a right to read Scripture as you please? If so, short will be your insight to it. If a man should borrow another's brains and think he has unravelled a passage, who is there that has brought to bear on Holy Writ all the knowledge which all the world possesses? Depend, Sir, that even a little knowledge is a dangerous thing in reading the Scriptures,-they require all the knowledge in the world to read and understand them. They are open, it is true, to all, but how few there be that can unravel all the dark passages they contain. Why, Sir, those days the works of which are recorded as taking place from "evening to morning," a period of night and darkness, if you will please to observe are considered now to be neither more nor less than periods of time,who shall say how long, for we are told that with the Almighty Creator a thousand years are but as a night and it is past!

But to answer your question rationally, Rodmond, I should say that coal came from Sunderland. How it got there, and in what condition, is another matter. From what distance of time it was lodged there, by what means-whether by a great convulsion of Nature, by which the remains of tropical quadrupeds are now found in polar regions, or by the gradual system of perpetual change, I shall leave for another discussion. But you will find that science is as essential to read Scripture as it is other subjects. I have read somewhere-There is no doubt that the Bible frequently makes allusion to the laws of Nature. But these allusions are often so wrapped in the folds of the peculiar and graceful drapery with which its language is occasionally clothed, that the meaning, though apparent through its thin covering, yet lies, in some sense, concealed until it can be read with lights and revelations of science: then only is the real meaning and beauty of it As our knowledge of nature and her laws has increased, so has our understanding of many passages in the Bible been improved. The Psalmist, for instance, called the earth "the round world," and yet for ages it was the most outrageous heresy for Christian men to say the world was round. But navigation soon proved the Bible to be right, and saved Christian men of science from the stake.

seen.

But organic remains of warm climate animals found, as they are, in the ice of polar regions, undoubtedly tell of some huge cataclysmsome tremendous displacement of the crust of our globe, even anterior to the Noachim deluge, by which the objects of the Almighty Creator were accomplished-and all for what? To render this earth fit for the habitation of man,-ungrateful, presumptuous man;-that atom of creation who, with his finite imagination, presumes to imagine that he ought to comprehend infinity. What should we do without coal, Rodmond? Depend on it that Young was right when he said— NO. 2.-VOL. XXXI,

N

"Not deeply to discern, not much to know,
Mankind was born to wonder and adore."

This discussion might have run on till the hundred queries of Rodmond had been proposed and answered, but was broken off by "Chair, chair," and the worthy Chairman of the Club was summoning his friends to business.

We parted from our last meeting, he observed, in the gloomy atmosphere of adversity. We were deploring, as we always must do, the great national loss which the country has sustained in our noble Prince Consort, the beloved partner of our revered Queen. We had before us the probability of war arising from the affair of the Trent, and not all the consolation we could derive from the establishment of our Naval Reserve was sufficient to do more than give life to our meeting. Another of our "evenings," however, has come, and brought with it the fulfilment of those desires which the whole nation has expressed, even in our sanctuaries, in reference to the last of these exciting subjects. Our American cousins have shown their wisdom in admitting the justness of our demands for the restoration of the Southern Commissioners with the amende honorable; in fact, they have seen that the law of nations proves us to be right this time. Although but young in the roll of those nations, they are yet experienced enough to know that "Discretion is the better part of valour,"-that one war on their hands is at least enough, and the unauthorized act of their officer, Captain Wilkes, in the San Jacinto, is therefore repudiated in toto. The Southern Commissioners, in whose favour we have thus for our own sakes been compelled to interfere, have been delivered over to our Ambassador, and left the States in one of our ships of war, the Rinaldo. This part of the American question is set at rest, but the blocking up of the entrance to Charleston has been protested against by France and ourselves, and there is a state of uneasiness arising from the civil war in the American States which still leaves a gloomy look in the western horizon.

In reference to the former unhappy subject to which he had alluded, the Chairman continued, a national loss like that which England has sustained was not likely to pass by unnoticed, and the many virtues and the blank that is left on occasions where those virtues possessed by Prince Albert were exercised, were not likely to be unrecognised in a couutry the community of which are not in general slow in acknowledging solid worth. A meeting in the metropolis, under the auspices of the Lord Mayor, has been attended as it should, and the resolutions passed would be recorded in their papers, the result of which was that above £17,000 had been already subscribed towards erecting a memorial to commemorate England's admiration of the noble qualities of this excellent Prince. Under such auspices there can be no doubt that something more enduring in effecting a perpetual benefit of the most desirable kind than a mere monument will be accomplished. The hearts of her Majesty's subjects are better receptacles

of good fame, from which its benefits may be read, than any record of stone or brass. The resolutions were:

First-by the Bishop of London,-" That this meeting, deeply deploring the irreparable loss the country has sustained by the lamented death of his late Royal Highness the Prince Consort, whose powerful and well-regulated mind and great abilities have for more than twenty years been unceasingly devoted to improving the condition of the humbler classes, and to the development and extension of science and art, and to the judicious education and training of the royal family, is of opinion that a lasting memorial should be erected commemorative of his many virtues, and expressive of the gratitude of the people."

Second "That a committee be formed, consisting of the following noblemen and gentlemen, to carry into effect the foregoing resolution, with power to add to their number, and that the Right Hon. the Lord Mayor be president of the same, and treasurer of the fund: Lord Stratford de Redcliffe, the Bishop of London, Baron Rothschild,” &c., &c.

Third-moved by Baron Rothschild, M.P.,-" That committees throughout the United Kingdom be formed to raise subscriptions to the proposed memorial, and that her Majesty's subjects be invited to subscribe."

Fourth,—“ That the memorial recommended should be of a monumental and national character; and that its design and mode of execution be approved by her Most Gracious Majesty the Queen."

The Chairman would not occupy the time of the Club in any further allusions to the progress of this good work, which he hoped would be taken up in the spirit which it merited by all those who gloried in the name of Briton, merely observing that they could not do wrong by sending their contributions to the Lord Mayor of London. In this busy time there was an abundance of subjects to occupy the attention of his friends around him, and which he should leave to them. There was one, however, on which he had received a letter from a naval offi-. cer abroad that he should consign to their minutes. They had no doubt read in the last Nautical the useful and elaborate remarks of Captain Spratt, of H.M.S. Medina, on the proper depths for electric cables as at present constructed, which recommended a depth under 300 fathoms being preserved. But as all information on the subject of submarine telegraphy as at present pursued was desirable, he would request the Secretary to read the letter he had in his hand from Mr. Staunton, an experienced Master of the Royal Navy, who had lately completed, with so much credit to himself and importance to his brother seamen, his excellent survey of Banca Strait. In fact, he might add, that so much service had this officer rendered to the navigation of the eastern seas by his survey of this strait-in which he had brought forward a superior channel to that called the Lucipara Channel, formerly used, but now discontinued-that it well deserved the attention of Lloyd's, who, he believed, were always ready to promote whatever conduced to the safety of navigation,

The following interesting letter was then read:

The Batavian Submarine Cable in Banka Strait was originally laid down in November, 1859, by Mr. Gordon, C.E., from the British screw steamer Bahiana, assisted by the Dutch steam-frigate Merapie.

A great mistake was made in the first place laying it along Lucipara Channel, as ships were constantly fouling it with their anchors. The cable only remained five months in working order, and even then a steamer was constantly employed splicing it. The Dutch, at last, finding the cable broken in so many places, decided to relay it along the middle of the strait, and between the banks bounding the southern entrance of Banka.

The cable, however, proved so rotten, that it would not bear the necessary strain of hauling in. In many places the iron wires were rusted through, and the gutta percha, being exposed, was much perforated by the destructive ravages of coralline and other sea animalculæ. In such a condition, were it practicable, the cable would not be worth the expence of raising, and the Dutch have therefore given up the attempt. Extensive buildings were erected at the principal stations, electricians engaged for three years, and, with the original cost and freight of the cable, by this failure the Dutch estimate their loss at £250,000..

I do not know whether the iron wires were galvanized, which of course would tend to preserve them, but I am informed that in some places the Malay seamen covered over the splice with rope made from the Goumite palm (Arenga saccharifera). Where this was done the iron wires under the rope appeared in good condition and free from rust. At Mintok and other Dutch possessions piles of piers and other wooden buildings exposed to the action of salt water are wrapped round with this rope to preserve them from decay and destructive mollusca.

It is stated that the Goumite rope is nearly as effective as copper sheathing in preserving wood submerged. It is made from the bark of the Goumite palm, resembles horse-hair in appearance, is more durable and elastic than coir rope (made from the cocoa-nut bark), is much stronger than hemp, so light that it will float on the surface of water, and when well laid resists wet, and the natives say no insects will penetrate it. The Goumiti palm is very abundant all over the archipelago, and sold at Singapore at one dollar per cwt.

Having all these advantages, I believe that a cable made of Goumite rope round the gutta percha and copper wires would be more durable, elastic, and easier managed than one covered with iron wires, besides being less expensive. But should it be found necessary to cover the shore end with iron wires, I would then place a service of Goumite rope to prevent the wires rusting. From the present state of the Batavian cable I am convinced that no cable covered solely with wire will last two years submerged in a tropical sea.

At present the Dutch have no intention of laying down another cable. Singapore to Batavia is the first stage to connect our colonies