The following text may have been generated by Optical Character Recognition, with varying degrees of accuracy. Reader beware!

10 MARINE REVIEW. An Engineers' Yarn. It was in the Steamship Kangaroo I sailed for a foreign clime, on a date which shall be known to you as "once upona time." Now each of the mates and skipper had, strange as it may seem, been polishing up their figures, and had gone and passed in steam; while I and the other engineers, all hot with emulation, got passed in navigation. Now the skipper and I in a general way, got on very well together, for we'd shipmates been for five long years in every sort of weather; but he wasa curious sort of a cuss and possessed a powerful notion, that he knew enough of mechanics to discover perpetual motion; while as for engineering, why to guess by the yarns he told, he'd been driving a triple expansion before he was ten years old. As _ for me I was somewhat nettled at this exaggeration, so to be as big a liar as he, I bragged of navigation--how many a night on the wave-swept bridge, when the howling tempests blew, I had conned and steered on her nor'east course the ship and her gal- lant crew. Sowe nagged and nagged and lied and bragged, till --T'll tell you what," says he, "we'll never settle anything by argument, d'ye see; you take the bridge and keep her course,and take your crowd as well, and I and the mates we'll go below-- we'll make those engines yell." 'Agreed, agreed! A grand idea! 'The best I've heard of yet; I'll keep this packet on her course, and steer her straight, you bet. So skipper and I went down below, when I showed him a thing or two--the donkey checks and the extra feed, as we passed them in review; the swabbing tins, and all the rest, but he got in quite a huff--"Get you on deck," says he, '"'F'll manage her right enough." Soup I went to the flying bridge where the second was in full charge, enjoying himself in the sunlight, for the day was fine and large. Says I, "now steer N. E. by E. across the foaming tide, and look out sharp-for the Bunkum rocks ahead on the starboard side." Then I went down for an hour or so, as I thought I deserved a spell, and slept like a top, and arose refreshed at the clang of the quarter-bell. The sea was smooth, but asort of a mist was hang- ing about overhead, and of all the dangers of the deep, a fog is the one I dread. As I passed the doors of the engine room, the sounds I then did hear, would have paralized Paladin and filled his heart with fear; for the rods and valves were shrieking like fiends at the whipping post, while the stink of the heated bear- ings would have poisoned Hanilet's ghost. Amidst the up-roar down below, it made my heart go thump, when the skipper yelled to his wretched mate that the bilge-pump wouldn't pump. However, away I went to the bridge, as the mist was closing round, till it got so thick that presently I deemed it wise to sound; which I did, and got ten fathoms, and presently nine or so, as it's thick and the water's shailow, why I guess I'd better slow. So I put the telegraph over, but the din which arose when I got the pointer fair on the signal, would have rent the very sky. The fog closed in, and just ahead, I thought I head a bell, so I sent a man to the whisle cord at intervals to yell. I was fretting about the engines, and knew I could safely swear that things weren't going right below, although I wasn't there. I was meditating stopping, for my wits were all abroad, when-- no need to ring the telegraph--she stopped of her own accord ! So down I rushed to the engine room, full of foreboding fears, where the sights and smells which met me would have moved a man to tears. 'The bilges were full of water, the boilers were nearly dry, the low pressed rod was biack as ink, and ditto was the high; the bearings they were blazing hot, the pins, oh! Julius Ceasar! They'd been trying to drive the en gines, but had never thought to grease her! So I chased the lot away on deck, and yelled like one insane, and got the pins and bearings cooled and boilers filled again; the bilge-pumps next I got to work, to chuck it out full bore, and soon the fog cleared off and we were going full speed once more. So you may safely bet your boots from now till crack of doom, no mate nor skipper passed in steam takes charge of my engine room. While as for navigation, it's all very well in its way, but as different from practical seamanship as night is apart from day. No navigating job for me, I'll frankly, freely own, I'll keep my engines up to the mark, but--I'll leave the bridge alone.-- Marine Engineer, London. Affairs in Admiralty. Judge Wallace of the United States circuit court of appeals, -- second circuit, heard a case a short time ago in which a barge, while being towed through a channel with a hawser 100 feet long, sheered from the course of the tug and struck on submerg- ed rocks,causing her to sink. The pilot of the tug was unfamiliar with the obstructions of the channel and allowed the tow to go too far to westward of the safe course. The court held that the loss of the barge was properly found to be duegto the negligence of the tug. Circuit Judge Wallace of New York upheld the district court of the southern district, same state, in a collision case of some importance recently. The tug Titan, moving slowly with two car floats alongside, entered the East river near the New York shore. he steamer Francis was coming down the river at a speed of 12 knots. 'The boats being about end on, the Titan ported her wheel and was about to signal to pass port te port, in accordance with the thirteenth rule of navigation, when the Francis signalled her to pass to starboard, and shaped her own course to port. 'The Titan immediately assented, put her wheel hard a-starboard and stopped ; but owing to her previous action she continued to swing to starboard. The Francis proceeded on her course to port until within 200 or 300 feet, when she re- peated the signal and altered her course still more to port, but could not do so sufficiently, and collided with the tow of the Titan. She court held that in departing from the statutory rule the Francis took the responsibility of passing safely to starboard and, as the Titan did all she could to comply with the signals, she was not in fault. A New Boiler Tube Cleaner. An engraving accompanying an advertisement in another part of this paper shows a boiler tube cleaner of special merit. It is known as the Baldwin vacuum boiler tube cleaner and it is being placed on the market by the Oliver P. Clay Company of ~ Cleveland, sole agents for the United States. By its use a vac- uum is formed in the tube to which it is applied and the hot gases rush through the tube with sufficient velocity to perfecrly clean it for its entire length, discharging the soot through the stack into the air, thereby doing away with the disagreeable work of cleaning out the back connection. Robert S. Hay of the Globe Iron Works Company, Cleveland, says it is the best tube cleaner that company ever used. He says it will be the thing to use on marine boilers as it is peculiarly adapted to that purpose. Trade Notes. | : The ship chandlery business of Rand & Roemer, Manito- woc, Wis., is now conducted by Paul Olson, formerly with that company. Five men are at work in the new sail loft on sails for the Paige, Genoa and Southwest, and as agent Mr. Olson has sold stearing gears tor the Edward Buckley and two of Hart's boats. The Lunkenheimer Brass Manufacturing Company of Cin- cinnati is preparing for the World's Fair a most elaborate display of their specialties in valves, sight feed lubricators, oil and grease cups, etc. A complete line of brass and iron goods, besides some novelties in steam whistles and sight feed lubricators will also be exhibited by this company. L. P. & J. A. Smith of Cleveland have contracted with Charles Ward of Charleston, W. Va., fora Ward boiler 53 square feet of grate for one of their dredges. Ward boilers are also be- ing built for the light-house tender Grace Darling, 40 square feet grate, and for the revenue marine steamer Hudson, 74 square feet grate, besides some thirty launch boilers anda new style generator having 45 square feet of grate and 2,225 square feet of heating surface for naval use. : Official Numbers and Tonnage. The bureau of navigation, E. C. O'Brien, commissioner, assigned official numbers to the following lake vessels during the week ending April 16: Steam--Uganda, Erie, Pa., 2,053.57 tons gross, 1,708.61 net, No. 25,289; Frank C. Barnes, Grand Haven, Mich., 46.34, tons gross, 29.29 net, No. 120,894. Sail--Leader, Port Huron, Mich., 31.85 tons gross, 35.25 net, No. 141,195. , The captain shouted to the man at the wheel, "Another p'int a-port, quartermaster!" "How shocking,' exclaimed a lady passenger to her friend. "I must get the captain to sign the pledge, for this is the third pint of port he has called for within the last ten minutes. How these captains do drink!"--London Fairplay.