REFLECTIONS ON MARITIME PURSUITS. 129 



Take a cylindrical vessel, say a cask ; we find, that as a floating 

 body, it has no stability whatever, but will turn round in the 

 water on its longitudinal axis with the least possible force ap- 

 plied : now, if we put some buoyant timber into the cask, and 

 secure it, we shall then find that the timber, by its weighty will 

 afford the cask a certain degree of stability. But, if water be 

 admitted, the timber within, instead of exerting a force on the 

 lower part of the cask, equal to its weight in the atmosphere, will 

 now exert a force in an opposite direction, equal to its buoyancy 

 in water; the cask will now turn upside down, the timber with- 

 in occupying the surface of the water. 



We know that a solid, specifically lighter than a fluid, will 

 swim, and if the solid be heavier (bulk for bulk) than the fluid, 

 it will sink. But when a solid is of the same specific gravity as 

 a fluid it will neither sink nor swim in it. Now, in loading tim- 

 ber ships, care should be taken to stow the most dense materials 

 in the bottom, and the lighter materials aloft; seamen seldom 

 attend to this circumstance, and they frequently mistake weight 

 for density. Ihe density may be seen at once by the depth to 

 which timber sinks in the water. Ballast is sometimes kept in 

 timber ships which may be of a sandy or soluble nature, and 

 would soon be washed about and pumped out of a leaky ship. 

 It but two frequently happens, that the chain viables and other 

 heavy stores of timber ships, are hauled up and stowed upon 

 deck, and the space previously occupied by such stores is filled 

 With timber of one sixteenth the density of a chain cable ! 



I remember to have seen a timber ship brought into Plymouth 

 Sound that afforded an example of this kind. She became full 

 of water, and upset near the Eddystone ; every thing was 

 washed overboard, her deck timber broke adrift, and her top- 

 masts, &c. were carried away upon the floating raft; the ship 

 righted, but the chain cables dragged along the bottom, one end 

 being fast to the anchors, the other end clenched round the mast. 

 When the wreck arrived in the Sound, and the cables were 

 hauled in, the iron was quite bright by rubbing along the bottom 

 of the sea. 



Thus, by crazy old ships beir^ sent to convey timber from 

 Canada to Europe, and by the injudicious manner in which 

 the disposition of the cargo is made m the hold, are our seamen 

 annually consigned to all the horrors of a lingering death and a 

 watery grave. 



SJ^'BAD, 



VOL. VII.— 1836. R 



