236 Original Articles. | April, 
to afford us a retrospective glance over the early history of the globe 
and its animated freight, to have retained also, fresh and living before 
our eyes, the illustrations of aboriginal barbarism in the persons of 
men accompanied by their primitive apphances, so that we may not 
excuse ourselves, through ignorance of the past, from seeking to afford 
a worthy example, and to mould the minds of future generations. 
These are indeed interesting subjects for the consideration of 
ethnologists and anthropologists ; but unfortunately (or perhaps we 
should say fortunately for our readers) we are unable to proceed 
with such inquiries, for we are reminded that we have undertaken, 
in the space of a few brief pages, to furnish a retrospect of the 
past history of Steam Navigation, and to indicate, in as many lines, 
what we believe to be its future prospects. Nor have we, in the 
performance of this task, to overcome the last-named difficulty alone ; 
that is, of condensing into a few pages the history of what we shall 
term a scientific art, upon which many volumes, some of them of no 
mean proportions, have been written. There is still another fence 
between our readers and ourselves, and that is one in which we shall 
seek only to break a gap for the purpose of opening a commu- 
nication with those who are likely to be interested in our brief story. 
Should the heads of this narrative have the effect, as we trust they 
may, of whetting their appetites, and of causing them to long for 
deeper draughts from the sources whence we have drawn, then indeed 
they must widen the passage for themselves, and effect an entrance 
into our field ; for it would be impossible for us to drag all our tech- 
nicalities through the narrow aperture which enables the practical man 
of science to hold converse with the popular readér, or the tyro in 
knowledge. 
Steam Navigation has, during the brief period of its existence (for 
its history extends but over half a century), attained a degree of per- 
fection which may not be excelled for generations to come. It has 
linked, more closely the tropics and the poles, the old world and the 
new; and, with the exception, perhaps, of the Electric Telegraph, 
there is no modern invention that has effected more in the cause of 
civilization than the engine for marine locomotion. Even in its 
relation to Electric Telegraphy, everyone must admit that it has 
been the immediate precursor, if not the instigator, of that power ; 
for what was left to man after he had succeeded in holding communi- 
cation with his fellows thousands of miles away, in the course of a few 
days, converting him who was a stranger in distant climes into an 
immediate neighbour—what remained for him, we say, but to contrive 
the means of bringing this one still nearer, for the purpose of convers- 
ing with him as though they abode under the same roof? Was it not 
over the well-trodden path of the Millers, the Fultons, the Watts, and 
the Stephensons, that Wheatstone conceived the idea of winging his 
flight ? 
Indeed, with the discovery of steam navigation there commenced 
quite a new era in the history of our race. Many physical and mecha- 
nical difficulties had to be overcome before sufficient progress was 
made in the art to make it the means of extending the commerce of 
