From River to Sea 47 



we read that 3,000 persons are often 

 nowadays carried across the Atlantic in 

 a single hull, we can only say with 

 Dominie Sampson, " Prodigious! ' 



The Royal William left Quebec on her 

 first voyage across to London on August 

 5, 1833, and she made a good, if slow, 

 crossing by arriving off Gravesend on 

 the nth of the following month. Such 

 a lengthy trip did not augur well for 

 future steamship enterprise, because the 

 clippers were doing the run in many 

 days less, but there were occasions when 

 the wind-jammer took considerably more 

 and caused great anxiety to owners and 

 passengers and the friends of the latter. 



The Royal William is also historic in 

 the fact that by her sale to Spain at a 

 period when that country had some little 

 trouble on, the Canadian steamer became 

 the first steam warship sent on active 

 service. All honour to the Spaniards, who 

 saw before our own Admiralty what a 

 valuable asset a steam-driven warship 



