625 



SHIPBUILDING. 



SHIPS AND SHIPPING. 



In the figure below we have placed the two ends together (at a 

 reduced scale), to show the whole load-water lines of the ship ; and it 

 is remarkable that, hi vessels built on the wave principle, the amount 

 of proportionate beam (within ordinary and reasonable limits) is said 

 to very little affect the question of speed. 



Kg. 0. 



stern 



Saw 



Another feature in Mr. Scott Russell's ingenious theory deserves 

 mention. If we divide a ship vertically fore and aft into parallel 

 portions of equal thickness, or, which may be more intelligible to the 

 general reader, if we construct the model of such ship with boards of 

 coloured wood of equal thickness throughout, the lines along the 

 bottom of the ship, formed by the line of junction of such boards, and 

 which are called buttock-lines, are made purposely cycloidal at the 

 stern (the difference in the colour of the woods shows the lines more 

 strongly) : such a form of construction is said to facilitate the delivery 

 of water as it passes along the hull. 



Sir William Syraonds, late surveyor of the navy, greatly altered the 

 form of ships in her majesty's service, although he had much opposi- 

 tion to contend with. We are certainly indebted to him for more 

 height between decks, faster sailing qualities, greater stability, but 

 tln'i-i- an' still those who do not wholly admit his theory as fully 

 applicable to heavily armed ships. He gave greater beam, at the 

 expense of hold stowage, Sic. the details of his construction may be 

 seen in an interesting work bearing his name, published a few years 

 since. As a comparison with the prevailing mode of constructing the 

 midship form of section, the following figure will suffice. 



Fig. 10. 



If oa I* the beam of a ship of war as usually constructed, he 



would increase the beam to o 6, and adopt a very rising floor ; while 



a m < would be the shape of the old form, 4 n c would be that of Sir 



W. Symonds ; but this extent of beam has its limits, for although the 



displacement is taken from the bottom and placed at the load-water 



lino, where it exerts a power of buoyancy, in the ratio of the square of 



'iince from the fore and aft midship line of the ship, it is said to 



the rolling of a (drip, under certain circumstances, less easy. But 



is no question that shipbuilding received an impetus from Sir 



W. .Syinondu, at a time when in England the whole science was in a 



state of torpor. 



Most elaborate investigations as to the mathematical principles 

 involved in the rolling motion of a ship have been recently made by 

 Dr. Woolley. Rolling is manifestly of two kinds, deep rolling and 

 uneasy rolling ; the vessel's motion in the latter case in principally 

 affected by the raising of the centre of gravity and the suddenness of the 

 check to oscillation caused by the rapid immersion of the lee-side of 

 the ship, and is often sufficient to endanger masts, and is attendant 

 upon the adoption of very rising floors, for the nearer the midship 

 section approaches a semicircle, the deeper but easier will be the 

 rolling, but this brings us into another extreme, namely, the possibility 

 of danger from capsizing. Dr. Woolley has shown that the mathema- 

 tical expression for periods of rolling, or as it is called, the theory of 

 rotation, affords no correct indication of the actual condition of a 

 vessel at such times of oscillation. 



He gives the following formula : 



fie 

 Time of rotation 



where k is the radius of gyration about a longitudinal axis per- 

 pendicular to the plane of rotation through the centre of gravity, and 

 o M is. the height of the metacentre above the centre of gravity. From 

 which he deduces the following inferences, namely, the smaller the 

 amount of o p, or the less the stability of the ship, the longer is the 

 time of oscillation, and consequently the greater the easiness of the 

 motion ; while such tote, however, may, as already observed, be beyond 

 a certain'point a source of evident danger. Uneasy rolling may, more- 

 over, be partially corrected by removing weights nearer to the side ol 

 the ship, thus increasing the axis of rotation, or as some call it the 

 radius of gyration. The questions of rolling and stability are of great 

 moment to the shipbuilder, as what are called sea-going qualities pre- 

 eminently hinge on these. The well-known expression for comparison 

 i if stabilities u as follows, namely : 



= \bK summation of thv functions of the cubes, of the 



ordiuates, dx being the differential of the length of the elementary 

 >rism, and D being the displacement. So that in fact the comparative 

 liabilities of ships may be said to be the comparative heights of their 



metacentres above the centres of gravity. 



The rudder serves to govern the ship's motion ; for, on being turned 



so that its plane is in a position oblique to the plane of the masts and 

 ceel, the reaction of the water against it as the ship advances, being 



resolved in a direction perpendicular to the last-mentioned plane, 

 jeeomes a force which causes the ship to turn upon a line passing 

 trough its centre of gravity. Thus by giving the rudder more or less 

 nclination to the said plane, the ship may be made to move in any 



required direction, or may be made to avoid an object by which its 



safety might be endangered. 



Certain highly interesting facts have been very lately under discus- 

 lion by the Institution of Naval Architects, aided by the opinions of 



naval officers of the greatest experience : these will be properly noticed 



under STEAM-VESSEL. 



SHIPS AND SHIPPING. The law applicable to English merchant 



ships consists of so much of the common law as relates to personalty, 

 ;he English maritime law to be found in statutes and decisions of her 



majesty's courts, and the general law maritime recognised less or more 

 jy all civilised nations, but peculiar to no one nation in particular. 



The subject may be conveniently considered under the following 

 leads : 



1. The ownership of merchant vessels. 



2. Their navigation. 



3. The persons who navigate them. 



4. The carriage of goods and passengers. 



1. Ojcnenhip. Acquisition of Ship Property. Ships, or shares in 

 them, are, in view of the law of England, personal property, wliich 

 upon the death of the owner passes to his personal representative, and 

 on marriage of a female owner to her husband. Ship property is legally 

 acquired by construction, by purchase, or by capture from an enemy. 

 Very often, perhaps most frequently, the keel of a new ship is not laid 

 down in the builder's yard before a contract has been concluded for 

 her construction between the builder and his customer. Usually, 

 however, all property in the uncompleted vessel continues meanwhile 

 to be vested in the builder, notwithstanding such contract, even 

 although payments be made in advance, and appear to be regulated 

 in accordance with the progress of the work. It is not till she is 

 completed and ready for delivery, and either delivered or approved of, 

 that the rights of ownership vest in the, purchaser. Before that time, 

 any instrument executed on his part, with the intention to transfer a 

 title to the ship or any share of her, would be a mere nullity. It is, 

 however, allowed by the law of England to stipulate for a transfer of 

 the property in the uncompleted ship at any stage of her progress, in 

 return for payment of the price in advance by certain agreed instal- 

 ments ; and this is sometimes done. 



Purchase of ships already built presupposes in the buyer much skill 

 and no small degree of caution to be perfectly safe. The policy of law 

 in this country respecting bargains is to throw the buyer entirely on 

 his own resources in making the contract, by cutting off all hope of 

 subsequent help out of difficulties into which he never could have 

 fallen if he had used his reason at the time of the purchase. Moreover 

 the difficulties in the way of a purchaser's retrieving himself in case of 

 a bad bargain are increased by the recent statutes respecting the 

 transfer and registration of merchant ships (17 & 18 Viet. c. 104 ; 18 & 

 19 Viet. c. 91). A compulsory form of bill of sale is prescribed by the 

 statute, any deviation from which, by the introduction of other par- 

 ticulars, may deprive the buyer of the right of requiring the registration 

 of his title. Warranties, therefore, and representations in the nature 

 of warranties, cannot now be introduced into the only document of 

 contract that can be enforced in a court of law or equity. For any 

 contract, however formal and solemn, other than the authorised bill of 

 sale, although duly executed by both parties, and money paid upon it, 

 gives the buyer no legal or equitable title to the ship, no right to sue 

 in a court of equity for specific performance, or even any right to sue 

 for damages in a court of law on nor>performance. This appears to be 

 thought indispensable to any system of effective registration of titles to 

 ship-property. 



Regiitration. All British ships are now required to be registered, 

 excepting only ships of fifteen tons burden and under, employed on 

 British rivers or coasts, and vessels of thirty tons, not having a whole 

 or fixed deck, and employed in fishing off the coasts of British North 

 America. A British ship is no longer necessarily a British-built ship, 

 or a British-manned ship, but simply a British-owned ship. The persons 

 who are capable in law of being owners of a British ship are (1), 

 natural born British subjects ; (2), persons made denizens by letters of 

 denization, or naturalised by or pursuant to any act or ordinance of 

 the Imperial Legislature, or by or pursuant to any act or ordinance of 

 the proper legislative authority in any British possession, provided that 

 while tney are such owners they are resident within her majesty's 

 dominions, or members of a British factory, or partners in a house 

 actually carrying on business in the United Kingdom or within the 

 British dominions, and have taken the oath of allegiance subsequently 

 to denization or naturalisation ; and (3), bodies corporate established 

 under, subject to the laws of, and having their principal place of 

 business in, the United Kingdom or some British possession. For the 



