NA TURE 



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THURSDAY, JUNE 6, i( 



MODERN NAVAL ARCHITECTURE 

 A Manual of Naval Architecture. For the Use of 

 Officers of the Royal Navy, Officers of the Mercantile 

 Marine, Shipbuilders, and Shipowners. By W. H. 

 White, Assistant Constructor, Royal Navy, &c. 

 (London: John Murray, 1877.) 



NO one acquainted with our own and foreign navies 

 can doubt that at the time of the establishment of 

 the Royal Naval College at Greenwich Great Britain had 

 been falling very much astern of other countries in the 

 professional education of its naval officers. In the days 

 when ships were all pretty much alike, and differed 

 chiefly in forms and proportions, the greater progress of 

 other navies in technical science was, perhaps, of no 

 great moment; but in days like -the present, when the sea 

 teems with experimental ships flying the royal and 

 mercantile flags of this country, the neglect of known 

 principles, or the failure to discover others, may have the 

 worst results. It was for this reason, among others, that 

 the writer of these remarks long since joined those who 

 pressed for the establishment of a Naval College worthy 

 of the country and of the time, and it was doubtless for 

 this reason also that the Government of the day — and 

 more especially Mr. Goschen, then First Lord of the 

 Admiralty — founded the great Naval Institution which 

 now flourishes at Greenwich. It is there that Mr. White, 

 the author of the work before us, has been engaged in 

 expounding naval architecture to naval officers and other 

 students, and it was in the performance of that important 

 duty that he felt the need of such a work pressed upon 

 him. 



Mr. White is himself, in no small degree, the product 

 of previous acts of wisdom on the part of Boards of 

 Admiralty; and as those Boards very often come under 

 just censure for their errors and omissions, it is a pleasure 

 to be able sometimes to record their wise and enlightened 

 doings. Mr. White was a distinguished student (and 

 afterwards a Fellow) of that Royal School of Naval 

 Architecture at South Kensington which Lord Hampton 

 took so much pains in promoting, and which the Ad- 

 miralty founded ; having been elected to a studentship at 

 a competitive examination in a Royal Dockyard School, 

 where he had previously undergone a good and extensive 

 grounding in elementary, and indeed in more than 

 elementary, science. It is gratifying to know that Mr. 

 White, like all the naval architects of high position at 

 present in the Admiralty, thus represents a successful 

 system of Government training, commencing in the 

 Royal Dockyard Schools, and advancing through higher- 

 class royal schools, to the most eminent spheres of 

 professional influence. 



The object of the present work is to supply to naval 

 officers, and to such others as may need or desire it, a 

 statement of the general principles which underlie the 

 profession and practice of.' the naval architect. With- 

 out some clear and definite knowledge of these 

 principles it is not possible for naval officers to apply 

 modern vessels to their designed services with skill and 

 success. The loss of the Captain and the foundering of 

 Vor,. xvni. — Xo. .%•/) 



the Vanguard afforded dramatic examples of the class of 

 disasters which may be expected to result and must 

 result from the imperfect handling of modern vessels ; 

 and if all the facts of the case could be known, the loss 

 of the Eurydice would probably be brought more or less 

 within the same category. In the case of the Captain 

 notwithstanding the grievous well-known defects of her 

 design, the laws which regulate a ship's stability and 

 power to carry canvas if known to and applied by those 

 in command of her, would have suggested the paramount 

 necessity of shortening sail in the wind which capsized 

 her; and the evidence taken after the sinking of the Van- 

 guard points clearly to the fact that the prompt closing 

 of certain water-tight doors, and other like measures 

 wQuld, in all probability, have saved the ship, or at least 

 have given her ample time for reaching shallow water. 

 As regards the Eurydice it is well-known that she was an 

 experimental vessel, designed by a naval officer many 

 years ago, and that some not very usual features tending 

 to reduction of stability entered into her form. It is 

 obvious that in all such cases — and indeed in the cases of 

 all ships — a knowledge of the principles which enter into 

 their construction and use should, as far as possible, be 

 communicated to those upon whom is placed the respon- 

 sibility of employing them under all the varying con- 

 ditions of sea-service ; and this not merely for the 

 purpose of secu -.ng their safety, but also with a view to 

 their efficient and economical employment. Only the 

 few persons who have had special opportunities of 

 observing the facts can imagine the extent to which 

 the performances of ships in steaming, in sailing, and 

 in other operations, depend upon the knowledge 

 and skill of those who command and work them. 

 It is not too much to say that, as regards vessels which 

 in the main resemble each other, the differences in the 

 officers who command them usually obliterate altogether 

 the distinctive qualities of the vessels themselves, and 

 the relative skill of their designers. To the readers o 

 Nature it is doubtless needless to dwell upon the de- 

 sirability of the naval officer, whether of the royal or the 

 mercantile marine, possessing the knowledge of ships, 

 and of naval principles, which Mr. White's work is 

 designed to convey. 



In composing this work the author has shown himself 

 most judicious in determining the limit beyond which it 

 would not be well to carry theoretical investigation in 

 addressing naval officers. In each of those chapters in 

 which a temptation to over-indulgence in this respect 

 would most be felt by a man highly trained in the theory 

 of naval architecture, the self-restraint of the author is 

 obvious, and deserves all praise. The book is readable 

 throughout by all naval officers who have availed them- 

 selves with energy and spirit of the educational advan- 

 tages which the royal navy now affords to every officer, 

 and it presents to them, for the first time, a sound, well- 

 selected, and trustworthy summary of naval science such 

 as was beginning to be most strongly felt in the merchant 

 no less than in the royal navy. 



In his first chapter the author explains the buoyancy of 

 ships, their subdivision into compartments, and the effect 

 of admitting water into compartments variously placed, 

 and discusses with clearness and with the latest infomia- 

 tion the vexed question of freeboard. The accuracy and 



