178 CONGRESSIONAL PROCEEDINGS. 



that we have an institution which has received many high 

 enconiums for excellence, yet it is certain that original inves- 

 tigations of physical truth are not the objects contemplated 

 or mainly pursued in that establishment. Consequently, its 

 existence in full activity and usefulness does not diminish 

 the necessity of a national institution for the purposes now 

 proposed. 



3. To the naval service of the country the subject offers 

 a great variety of important considerations. The whole 

 business of navigation, whether for commercial or for war- 

 like purposes, ought to be founded on the most accurate 

 scientific principles ; and every motive which should impel 

 the mechanic or engineer to guide his practice by the lights 

 of science is equally or more urgent on the mariner. In 

 the prosecution of his adventurous enterprise, the latter 

 must encounter every element of nature. Taking, as we 

 now do, steam navigation into the account, Ave find him 

 engaged at the same moment in a conflict between fire, air, 

 earth, water, light, heat, electricity, galvanism, magnetism, 

 chemical action, and the gravitating forces of the earth, the 

 ocean, and the atmosphere. 



To enable him to contend successfully against these 

 various forces, he must, in addition to the principles of the 

 art of navigation, with no mean modicum of astronomy, 

 bring to his aid an extensive range of physical sciences. 

 Not that a staunch, well-equipped vessel must necessarily re- 

 quire in him who directs her course all these qualifications : 

 the above remarks are intended to apply to nautical science 

 and practice as a whole, embracing whatever belongs to 

 the naval profession. This requires investigations to be 

 made into the good qualities and the defects of different 

 species of timber, the influence of the season of cutting on 

 the durability of its various kinds, and the most effective 

 and economical methods of preventing decay. 



Among other materials for naval use requiring attention 

 are those of cordage, in all their varieties, from the rigid 

 hempen ropes of our own manufactories, to the rude coir 

 cable of the east, buoyant and elastic, floating clear of a 

 rocky bottom, where the heavier hempen line would be 

 chafed and destroyed ; and from the delicate production of 

 Manilla to the stouter staple of the Sisal hemp of Yucatan. 



Far from being distinctly known, and their several quali- 

 ties clearly discriminated, these different materials have 

 hitherto been scarcely distinguished by their proper names, 

 even among our mariners and merchants. And the names; 

 characters, and habitudes of the plants which produce the 



