Narrative of the surveying voyages of his majesty's ships Adventure and Beagle (vol.2): between the years 1826 and 1836 : describing their examination of the southern shores of South America, and the Beagles's circumnavigation of the globe

1883. COMPARISONS — QUALITIES. 291 structed good ships since 1810 — Sir Robert Seppings, Profes- sor Inman, Mr. Roberts, and Mr. Fincham, were very much restricted as to dimensions allowed with respect to guns to be carried ; and that, therefore, no one can pretend to say what degree of excellence the ships might have attained, had their architects been unshackled ; but taking things as they are — not as they might have been — to Symonds and Hayes (if not chiefly to the former) belongs the merit of having improved our navy materially. We are so apt to forget, during the heat of controversy, that even an approach to perfection is unattain- able, and the utmost any one can hope for is to have fewer faults than his rivals — that we should not hastily condemn, in any case, only because we can detect deficiencies or errors. Many persons have remarked, that notwithstanding all the competition, all the trials of sailing, and all the reported improvements, which have taken place since the peace, our fastest ships have not excelled some of those built by France, England, or other countries, during the war. My own know- ledge of those ships is only derived from the descriptions of persons who sailed in or chased them : but the conclusion I am led to draw from their accounts is that, with few exceptions,* those ships were very shghtly built, often of unseasoned timber, and that their rapid rate of sailing only lasted so long as their frames would yield to the fluid, and were not water-sodden. Recently launched, light, and elastic, confined by few beams, knees, or riders, held together by trunnions more than by metal, and intended only to sail swiftly — for a short existence — those greyhound vessels were as different in their construc- tion from the solid, heavy, durable ships of this day, as a light, active youth is from a well-set man trained to labour. A man-of-war requires strength, solidity, capacity ; great * The Malta (Guillaume Tell), Norge, and a few others, were splendid exceptions, but even in the construction of those ships far less iron and copper were used than is now customary in vessels of their class. By- substituting so much metal in place of wood, for knees, braces, and bolts, solidity, strength, and capacity are acquired in modern ships at the ex- pense, in most instances, of elasticity, and swift sailing. u2