FIREPROOF PASSENGER STEAMER. 185 



advantage, if any, was and is in favor of boats of the type of the steamer New York, 

 in that they carry their passengers more comfortably and, all things considered, 

 at as little cost, although on the one hand we have a triple-expansion twin-screw 

 vessel and on the other a single-cylinder surface condensing beam engine with fea- 

 thering wheels. An actual comparison was made from the books of both companies 

 as to the cost of maintenance and operation, but only in regard to the propulsive 

 power itself, but as Mr. Taylor, who personally handled this entire matter, is here, 

 he can tell you better than I just what was found. 



I would suggest to Mr. Donnelly that if we desire to progress to the limit in 

 the matter of safety, why put in boilers at all, or have any fire on the vessel? Why 

 not institute, say three Diesel engines, and be without fire? Personally I see no 

 reason why architects and builders should approach this question of fighting fire 

 on board a boat in any different manner than that which we would meet this same 

 question in our own homes. We should and must consider the cost in applying 

 our refinements, but above all, take every possible precaution to prevent a fire 

 from gaining headway. In my opinion, had the General Slocum been tied up along- 

 side of a dock in the city of New York, with all its fire-fighting facilities, both on 

 land and by water, and the fire started, the loss of life would have been almost as 

 great as it was with the boat out in the river. 



Mr. George W. Dickie, Vice-President: — I am going to say one or two words, 

 because when I read this paper I got quite a shock. Apparently I had been boasting 

 for a good many years about something that was not so. I thought when I was an 

 apprentice that I had worked on the first, or about the first surface condensing engine 

 for a steamboat that had been built, and I am not near old enough to have done that, 

 if the statement in the paper is true, that the surface condenser was brought into 

 service twenty-five years after the date of the Clermont. The Clermont was 

 launched in 1807, and twenty-five years later than that would bring us down to 

 1832, which was just thirty years before the time when I worked on what I thought 

 was about the first surface condenser for a steamboat that had been made. 



I think this is a good paper to bring before this Society, because it is one of 

 the kind that opens up the way to a lot of discussion, like the challenging of state- 

 ments which have been made here, and I think it is a good thing to have a paper 

 that is full of that sort of thing, because otherwise we would not have heard anything 

 about the things we heard about to-day. Some ten years ago I took a trip on a 

 very fast passenger steamer, the Columbia, from Glasgow to lona, this steamer 

 making 24 miles an hour, was a side-wheel steamer, feathering wheels, engines 

 making 44 revolutions per minute, oscillating 3-cylinder compound, two low pressure 

 and one high pressure in the center. It was one of the most admirable pieces of 

 engineering work I had ever seen. I made strict inquiries as to the consumption 

 of fuel, and was told that it was 2.1 pounds per indicated horse-power per hour, and 

 I think it is very unfortunate that comparisons should be made in a paper like this, 

 taking something that is exceedingly old and amongst the first attempts to do any- 



