19 



Chapter 



THE COMING OF STEAM AND STEEL 



W. 



HEN the nineteenth century began, steam-propelled 

 boats were already in existence. When it ended sailing vessels were 

 still in use on many of the oceans, but during the century there took 

 place a shift from an age of sail to an age of steam and other mechan- 

 ical methods of propulsion. The progress from one kind of vessel to 

 another was not orderly. It was, in fact, full of curious, illogical and 

 unanticipated changes. The evolution from the full-rigged sailing 

 ship to the purely power-driven steamer produced coundess varia- 

 tions and combinations of the two alternative methods of crossing an 

 ocean. Some were ingenious and effective, some fantastic or mon- 

 strous. In the interests of clarity and order we may note that the use 

 of steam power to drive ships did go through certain stages of devel- 

 opment. In the beginning the steam engine was thought of as being a 

 device that could propel a small vessel on quiet waters such as lakes, 

 rivers and canals; then as a tug, a vessel that could assist a sailing 

 ship in getting in and out of harbors; then, more by necessity than by 

 intention, some of the steam vessels made short, singular voyages on 

 seas and even the open ocean. In many of these acdvides the ship driven 

 by steam also employed sail. When steam finally went to sea it did so 

 simply as an aid to the sailing vessel, and the period of this service 

 lasted for the better part of the century. This point is worth special 

 notice for it is not today clearly understood. 

 Toward the middle of the century there were vessels crossing the 



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