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

6 MARINE REVIEW. ct Plans for Whale-Back Barges on the Pacific. Capt. Alex. McDougall and Capt. Thomas Wilson were to- gether in Cleveland, Wednesday, after their visit to San Fran- cisco and the Puget sound district. As might be expected, the talk of the barge company beginning immediately the construc- tion of a ship building plant on the coast, together with the stories of other gigantic projects, is all wind. A ship building plant may be erected in the vicinity of Puget sound three or four years hence by the barge company but all that has been agreed upon as yet is the experiment of sending two of the steamers around Cape Horn to engage in the coal trade between the sound and San Francisco. This will be done as soon as possi- ble, the boats going to the Atlantic by way of the St. Lawrence, and Capt. McDougall visited the New York office of the company to make such a recommendation before coming to Cleveland. ‘‘There is not a rolling mill on the coast,’’ said Capt. Wilson, ‘‘and it is nonsense to think of starting a shipyard there until the development is much greater than at present. The freight on iron across the country would be $15 or $20 a ton and, while $30,000 or $40,000 in iron would not figure largely in the con- struction of a war vessel at San Francisco, for which the govern- ment would pay a couple of million, it will readily be seen that this matter of freight does not admit of a thought of building cheap merchant vessels. Then, too, there is little demand as yet for additional tonnage and the method of doing business is very crude. ‘The coal trade between the sound and San Fran- cisco is the main line of business and every charter gives the shipper twenty-five days for loading and unloading. This is only a sample of the way in which the tradeis carried on. There are no storage houses or docks and the shipper makes a ware- house of the vessel. A great deal of coal is imported. English vessels come to San Francisco with coal from Australia and other places when there is a chance of getting grain for export and if they do not get the grain they go to Vancouver island for more coal and the distance is no greater than to the sound. With proper handling facilities the sound coal would be made to compete more successfully with this importing business but the development will demand time.’’ If the shipyard is eventually established it will be located at Ana cortes, a little island town which has two good harbors. The citizens are said to have offered $200,000 in cash and $300, - ooo in lands. At Portland,Ore., the merits of the whalebacks were explained to the chamber of commerce by Capt. McDougall. He reviewed all thac has been claimed for the barges on the Jakes and said there was no more material in one of them than there was in the part of a tramp steamer above the water line, and a 3,000 ton steamer of this kind, with her machinery and equipment com- plete, weighs one-quarter less than the machinery in the ordinary 3,000 ton steamship. Lake Ship Yards Will Build War Ships. At the next sitting of the naval committee the navy depart- ment will present an answer to Representative Adam’s inquiry in the house, as to why F. W. Wheeler & Co., West Bay City ship builders, were not awarded the contract for a practice ship, that company being the lowest bidders. The answer will consist of the statement made at the time, that the treaty or agreement in 1818 with Great Britain, stipulated that the great lakes should not be occupied by more than three war vessels of 100 tons, armed with one 18-pound cannon. ‘The maintenance of the U.S. S. Michigan on Lake Erie is a violation of the treaty, which it is also claimed, was terminated by notice being given by the United States during the late war. Accompanying this answer and in- formation is a request from the secretary that congress should take action on revoking or modifying this treaty, if it was decided to prevent the awarding of contracts to lake ship-builders. The REVIEW asked recently why contracts for engines could not be given lake builders, but it seems that prospects are bright for the building of a few cruisers entire in lake yards within a year or two, ‘The keel of cruiser No. 6 was laid a few days later, Preparing for the Annual Meeting of Lake Carriers. A circular from Secretary Keep to the members of the Lake Carriers’ Association gives March 4 as the date of the annual meeting to be held in the commitee rooms of the merchants’ ex- change, Buffalo. The following subjects will come up for con- sideration; rst, compulsory arbitration by members of the asso- ciation of disputes relating to vessels; 2nd, a code of instructions to masters of vessels represented in the association for the safer navigation of rivers, harbors and narrow channels; 3rd, uniform- ity in the method of steering steam vessels on the lakes. Mem- bers who.cannot attend, are requested to communicate any sug- gestions they may desire to make with reference to the subjects mentioned, or the general work of the association, to the secre- tary before March 1. Lake Michigan Vessel Owners’ Association, The owners of Lake Michigan lumber carriers are endeavoring to perfect an organization through which they hope to maintain remunerative freight rates next season. They have the sympathy of vessel owners engaged in other lines of lake trade but it must be admitted that their undertaking isa difficult one. At the last meeting of the organization, which is called the Lake Michigan Vessel Owners’ Association, it was decided that the board of directors should not consider the rate of freight as binding unless 80 per cent. of the boats engaged in Lake Michigan trade sign the by-laws. The organization will confer with the Seaman’s ~ Union with a view ot agreeing on a scale of wages. Although the matter of freight rates may not be successfully carried out it would seem that such an association could accomplish a great deal of good in many ways for the general carrying trade of Lake Michigan. The Rafts will be Regulated. Advices from Washington regarding the report of the com- merce committee of the house on Congressman Burton’s bill to regulate raft towing in the connecting waters of the lakes are highly satisfactory to the vessel interests. First reports regarding the amended bill said it would admit of rafts in the St. Mary’s river 6co by 700 feet. This is untrue, however, as the following text of the bill willshow: “That from and after the passage of this act it shall be unlawful to float down or through tHe St. Mary’s river lumber or timber rafts larger in size than 65 by 700 feet, or to float down or through St. Clair and Detroit rivers rafts larger in width than roo feet, and in all of said rivers forming the - connecting waters of the great lakes such rafts shall be handled by such a number of tugs as may be necessary to have such rafts at all times and throughout all their parts under the control and management of said tugs, and the parties in charge of the same. And in the St. Clairand Detroit rivers said rafts and the vessels towing the same shall at all times be kept clear and out- side of all dredged or artificial channels in said rivers.” The delegation of lake men that appeared before the committee some - time ago to urge the passage of this bill, advocated a penal clause, - but the committee considered this to be unnecessary, believing that the laws now in force afford sufficient means of redress in cases of damage owing to the carelessness of raftsmen. Althongh the vessel interests would prefer a bill limiting the length of rafts in the Detroit and St. Clair rivers as well as the - Sault river this bill is“generally considered a step in the right direction. . The report of Mr. Stockbridge, which accompanies the bill to the house, reviews the arguments of the delegation of lake _ masters and vessel owners who went to Washington in support of the bill and presents along list of casualties resulting from the towing of rafts during three months and a half of 1890. a very strong document and will no doubt assist in pass ode ae i The keel of the first iron ship ever built in Maine last week, that of cruiser No. 5, at the Bath Iron rr