8S REMINISCENCES, ETC. 



much the same way as Mr. Scott Russell afterwards ex- 

 perimented, lu 1830, Mr. Wood, of Port Glasgow, con- 

 structed a boat for the Paisley and Ardrossan Canal, on the 

 "hollow line" iprmciple forward ; and in the same year 

 Mr. Brown, boat-builder, of Brown Street, Glasgow, built 

 two for the Clyde and Forth Canal on the same plan. This 

 was four years before Mr. Scott Russell says, in a letter 

 which we now proceed to give, that he discovered the wave 

 of translation. It is probable that the attention of scientific 

 men had been directed to this question for some time 

 before the experiments were applied to the Scotch canal 

 boats ; that Mr. Assheton Smith and Mr. Scott Russell, 

 both men of great sagacity and practical talent, saw, it 

 may be at the same period, but without communication 

 with each other, the soundness of the theory projected. 

 Mr. Scott Russell was the author of several valuable papers, 

 and built a model vessel to demonstrate the principle ; but 

 Mr. Smith was the first to show, by the example of his 

 sailing yacht Menai and of the Fire-king, that the supe- 

 riority of the hollow water lines was an established fact. 

 So little apprehensive was Mr. Smith of the failure of his 

 plan, that he made public a challenge in BeWs Life, to the 

 effect, that the Fire-king (whose speed had not been tried at 

 that time), should run against anything then afloat from off 

 Dover Pier, round the Eddystone Lighthouse and back, for 

 5,000 guineas, or a still higher sum if required ; the 

 challenge to remain open for three months, that the Ame- 

 ricans might see it, and the editor of BelVs Life referred 

 to, if accepted. That challenge was not accepted, and not a 

 farthing would the editor charge for inserting so gallant an 

 offer. On the first trial of the Fire-king in the Garloch, 

 Mr. Scott Russell was on board, and was among those who 

 expressed his admiration of her lines, and of the way she 

 went through the water. In 1857, Mr. Smith, hearing 

 that Mr. Scott Russell had claimed what he always called 

 his lines, authorized Mr. Napier to ascertain upon what 



