298 Mr Harvey on the Science of Ship- building. 



these, and many other particulars, are connected with the great 

 question of notation. And when we have seen the march of 

 whole departments of science retarded for years by the use of 

 barbarous symbols of notation, it is not too much to insist, that 

 in the formulae and equations of condition that may hereafter 

 be created for the use and extension of naval architecture, 

 some little attention should be paid to the lights that the mo- 

 dern analysis has thrown on this great question. The remot- 

 est element of a ship must be connected with some primi- 

 tive element, by a series of unquestionable laws ; laws, dark 

 and mysterious it is true, at present, but which the spirit of a 

 genuine and pure induction will eventually illuminate and 

 make clear. This remote element may, however, be traced to 

 its primitive source by a shorter route, by one process of ratio- 

 cination than by another ; but by no better method than by 

 the pure light of a legitimate notation can this important ob- 

 ject be attained. 



Plymouth, May 26, 1828. 



Art. XVI. — On the Cultivation of the Science of Shipbuild- 

 ing. By George Harvey, Esq. F. R. S. Lond. and Edin. 

 Member of the Royal Geological Society of Cornwall, &c. 

 &c. Communicated by the Author. 



The question has often been asked, to what causes are we to 

 attribute the neglect of the science of shipbuilding, which it 

 is said is generally the case in Great Britain ; and how is 

 it that States, confessedly our inferiors in maritime impor- 

 tance and strength, should nevertheless excel us in the theo- 

 retical construction of their ships ? To these interrogations 

 it may be answered, that our triumphant superiority on the 

 ocean affords a ready and probable solution. Our superiority 

 has induced neglect, while other nations, jealous of our nauti- 

 cal power, have strained every nerve to rival and surpass us, 

 and endeavoured to make up the want of numbers by superior 

 constructions. The French, for example, have endeavoured, 

 and in a multitude of cases have succeeded in producing better 

 sailers ; and the Americans, by enlarging their scale of the dif- 



