10 tons of coal; her worst day's run under steam was 166 miles, with a consumption of 14 tons and 8 cwt. of coal. Her total consumption of coals was only 193 tons 17 cwt. The pressure of steam was 11lb.

Thus her remarkable voyage was made principally by means of her extraordinary sailing powers, and her screw propeller was emphatically auxiliary. Her engines are only of 200 horse-power, and, with all the fuel that she can possibly require, occupy but a moderate proportion of her tonnage, thus leaving ample space for cargo as well as passengers. Contrast this with the Great Britain, the first great experiment of the same enterprising firm. She was under-rigged as a sailing vessel, and her screw, which could not be unshipped, was always in requisition. Her consumption of coal was from 35 to 50 tons per diem. She consumed about 1,200 tons from Melbourne to the Cape, and must have consumed about 2,500 on the homeward voyage. She had to seek for and take in coal at Algoa Bay, at Simons Bay, at St. Michael, (Azores,) and at Vigo Bay in Spain. Large as she was, she had little room for cargo, and although she had plenty of passengers, her voyages must have entailed loss on her owuers.

After the failure of their first great experiment one cannot but admire the thorough English pluck of the owners of the Royal Charter in thus trying a new venture. I firmly believe they will succeed. The ship is "booked full" for the homeward voyage already. She will have a full cargo, and will most likely carry home every ounce of gold accumulated for shipping up to the date of her sailing—namely, the 22nd of May.

NEW BOOKS.

Narrative of THE EXPEDITION of an American Squadron to the China Seas and Japan, performed in the years 1852, 1853, and 1854, under the command of Commodore M. C. Perry, United States Navy, &c., &c. By Francis L. Hawks, D.D., L.L.D. New York, Appleton: London, Trubner. 1856.

Aperire terram gentibus would be the fitting motto for this Expedition to the exclusive land of the Japanese, now likely, through American enterprise, to be visited as other exclusive lands are in the same remote portion of the globe. We say American enterprise, for although we have likewise concluded a treaty of commercial intercourse, it may be a question whether we should have done it now.

The narrative before us opens with a lucid and extended introduction, setting forth the reasons for the expedition, and the advantages of opening the country, the early history and origin of the Japanese, their government, their singular manners, customs, and religion, which introduces the subject of the past relations of the empire with the Western civilized nations, and first and earliest the Portuguese, followed by the Dutch, our own countrymen, and the Russians, who, as might be expected, from being the last in civilization and naval strength, have made the least impression among these interesting people. The best progress in comparative intervals of time, has evidently been made by the United States, whose numerous vessels in the Pacific are more likely to profit in larger numbers than ours by the proximity of these islands to their shores.

A closer view is then taken of the Japanese character,-in their arts and civilization, agriculture and mineral wealth, with their resources for trade,

which then brings us to the treaties that have been just concluded. A view is also taken of the part which Dr. Von Siebold, in the service of the Dutch, has taken in reference to the present expedition, and his extraordinary patronizing proceedings regarding it. On the whole, in the space of something less than a hundred pages, we have in this introduction as interesting an account of the Japanese in all the foregoing points of view as could be condensed into so small a space. The expedition, consisting of the U.S.S. Mississipi, joined afterwards by the Powatan, the Susquehana, and the Saratoga, sailed on the 24th of November, 1852, from the Chesapeake for Japan, taking en route Madeira, St. Helena, the Cape, Mauritius, Point de Galle, and Singapore. Afterwards Hong Kong. Nagasaki of Loo Choo as Basil Hall left it, (but as Lew Chew we suppose it is to be Americanised,) and leaves Yedo Bay, after delivering the President's letter, on the 17th of July, proceeds to Lew Chew, where they arrived on the 25th, and proceeded from thence to the Bonin Islands, of which group possession seems to have taken by right of prediscovery, in the circumstance of an American whaling captain, Coffin, in 1823, having visited Peel Island previous to the Blossom, when possession had been formerly taken, but too late. With this, however, we have nothing to do-the Bonins will promote the civilization of their quarter of the globe as well in the hands of the Americans as in ours, and perhaps sooner. From thence the Mississipi proceeds to Macao and Hong Kong, where she is in December, 1853; and in January following departs for Lew Chew, en route to Japan to receive the answer to the President's letter.itgiler

The expedition entered the outer bay of Yedo on the 11th of February; and after an obstinate manœuvring on both sides, the Japanese to prevent, and the Americans to effect it, the expedition was received in Yoku-hane Bay, when the reply of the Japanese emperor was delivered, a long list of presents interchanged, all the preliminaries settled, and the important treaty was concluded, and sent home by Commander Adams in the Saratoga, and followed afterwards by the Mississipi, the expedition being concluded at New York on the 23rd of April, 1855.

The foregoing is necessarily a brief view of the proceedings of this important expedition, which will have obtained for us in almost every point of view more information than we ever possessed regarding Japan. The work before ns, from which it is taken, abounds with interesting information to the general reader as a history of the country as well as all expeditions connected with it, and the seaman, thanks to the imperturbable steadiness of the American officers charged with the surveying operations, will find a goodly collection of hydrographical matter, along with charts, which will be of great importance to him. By the way, it is to be hoped they will appear on a larger scale than than those given in the book, to which we shall find ample occasion to return hereafter, as abounding with matter of high interest to nautical readers.

THE MATE AND HIS DUTIES-containing Remarks on Discipline, Causes of Mutiny, &c., &c. 3rd Edition. Rockliff, Castle Street, Liverpool. It is but a few months since we welcomed the first appearance of this little brochure, on one of the most important subjects connected with our mercantile marine, viz., “the duties of the mate," and here we have it in a third edition. No better proof can there be, not only of how much it was wanted, but also of how much it is appreciated.

Among the additions to this edition, we find the following trite remarks on the neglect of the compass on board merchant ships generally, for which as we have already proposed a remedy in these pages, we shall here repeat them. Among the duties of the mate it is here very properly said, that "It should

be insisted upon, as one of the duties of the morning watch, to observe the sun's amplitude when rising, (if visible,) and enter it in the log slate in the place engraved for it. If this observation was taken as regularly as the meridian altitude, we should have less mistakes iu variation and deviation, and the compass would not be so often blamed for misleading the mariner as it has been of late years."

"There is some excuse for neglecting the amplitude at sunset, for there are many things to divert the attention of the mate of the watch about that time: but in the morning the sun's appearance is watched and waited for as a signal to turn to,' and such a simple and at the same time important aid to the navigator should never be neglected."

Now this is excellent advice to the mate, and no one differs from it,--that too much attention cannot be given to obtain the variation on all such and even other occasions. But we are met with difficulties, The author is not insensible of them, and alludes as follows to the obstacles in the way of this very simple and at the same time important process." He very properly observes as follows: Here it may not be out of place to remark, that notwithstanding the many improvements in binnacles, there is room for another that seems to have escaped the attention of the manufacturers. The difficulty of taking exact bearings by the binnacle compass is felt by every seaman when a light or headland is suddenly reported, and very often not till after the bearings are pencilled off on the chart, is it found that they were not taken correctly; and bearings taken by two persons at the binnacle compass seldom agree to half a point, scarcely ever to a quarter,-an important difference in cross bearings. An amplitude or standard compass on deck will remove this difficulty; but it is useless to talk of these to many coasters, who like to take bearings by the compass they steer by, and who have no room on their decks for extra ones, nor in their brains for difference of variation, this space being already occupied by the variation marked on the charts: therefore, if some addition or change of form was made to supply this desideratum, it would be a valuable one."

The worthy author of the foregoing is not aware, perhaps, that this is already done even for coasters. For should these important little craft not have room on their decks for the tripod stand carrying Becher's Repeating Compass Card, it may as effectually be placed over their binnacles, and there equally serve the purpose for which it was intended (that of enabling any ship to use her binnacle compass for the magnetic work of the ship), as it will do on the deck of any larger vessel. No doubt the brains of these coasting commanders are troubled sufficiently without having the deviation of an additional compass to consider, and why should they not use their binnacle compasses as if they were azimuth or standard compasses. This has already been done on board that splendid ship the Royal Charter, the binnacle compasses of which have thus been employed for the observations of azimuths and amplitudes, and those immediate bearings required suddenly so well known to seamen. The coasting captains are quite right in their desire to work their binnacle compasses, without being troubled with others; and we promise them that what is very properly expected of them as stated by the author of the Mate and his Duties" will be obtained without any additional calculations by the Repeating Compass Card" above-mentioned. It is well known to be impossible to use the binnacle.compass alone for these purposes, and yet it is the compass of the ship, and therefore ought to be so employed in its own legitimate work. We

* See "The Binnacle Compass corrected by itself, or the Deviation found with one Compass by both Methods: arts. 9 and 10, also p. 44. Published by Potter, 31, Poultry. Reprinted from the Nautical Magazine, 1855.”

hope yet to see this important auxiliary to the compass as successfully used in that portion of our mercantile shipping in which no additional compasses known as standard or azimuth compasses appear to have yet found their way, or are likely to do so, as it has been on board the Royal Charter, when important bearings, amplitudes, &c., will certainly be more commonly observed than they have hitherto been.

NEGLECT OF THE WARNINGS GIVEN BY THE BAROMETER.

The Bombay Times of the 9th inst., has a long article on the cyclone which has just cominitted such fearful ravages on their town and shipping, for which we regret we cannot afford space; but the following observations are of too great importance to the lives of many brave men to be passed over :—

"The ships Forfarshire, the Hastings, the Palinurus, and steamers George Russel Clerk, Sir Jamsetjee Jejeebhoy, Phlox, and Snake, furnish the sacrifice required at the shrine of slighted science. When just a fortnight before one of the most extensive and varied collections of meteorological instruments ever brought together between the tropics, was exhibited and explained in a state of integrity and dissection, in the rooms of the Geographical Society, the whole European assemblage that could be mustered numbered five not one of these, save the President, being connected in any way with marine or mercantile affairs. A fine of £40,000 is perhaps not too much to pay for an exhibition of apathy unparalleled in any civilized shipping port in the world save in India; the only pity is that the loss should not fall exclusively on the shoulders of those who have occasioned it, and it may be as well to remember that similar instalments will from time to time be demanded so long as a state of matters such as this endures. The Feroze either had no barometer on board, or, while making straight for the hurricane track, did not think it worth while to consult it, or at all events to report the results; and amidst the trivialities written out for the use of the Marine Office, this momentous piece of nautical intelligence finds no place.

"In saying this we beg to be understood that we are not casting the slightest blame on the Observatory, where the work of observation, that properly belonging to them, seems to have been admirably performed. Until of late years meteorological science has been treated with open and avowed contempt under the marine department,-our ships used never to be possessed of any thing like decent instruments, or in the majority of instances any meteorological instru ments at all. In 1849 the most beautiful set of barometers ever manufactured was brought to Bombay chiefly for the use of the Indian Navy, only one of them was ever taken out of store, and if a few of their ships are sunk now and then in consequence of their obstinate persistence in ignorance, it is exactly what might be expected. The Observatory was, we presume, never asked for information, and did not probably like to intrude it where it might be supposed unwished for. If Sir Henry Leeke is not sufficiently alive to these things, he only errs as his predecessors did before him, and is, we believe, more desirous of enlightenment than they."

Very truly does the Editor remark here that a fine of £40,000 or four lakhs of rupees, which we suppose to be the amount of damage done to the shipping, has been the just penalty paid for the apathy of the majority of the Bombay mercantile public to the warning voices which, both there and here, have so long laboured to advise them of how to understand the cloud no bigger than a man's hand," which betokens the coming, danger of these fearful visitations; but when he further tells us that either the Feroze had no

barometer on board, or while making straight for the hurricane track did not think it worth while to consult it, or at all events to register it," we think it a public duty to drew attention to this astounding and incredible fact, for the presumption arising here is distinctly that she had no barometer, or did not know the use of it, as she certainly did not understand her position if she was "making right for the hurricane track." This fact is incredible to all but ourselves, who know, certainly, of one of the large Bombay steamers, which was carrying troops from Madras at the commencement of the Burmese war, which certainly had then no barometer on board, and no secret was made of the fact ! We believe, moreover, that it was never distinctly known if the Cleopatra steamer, which foundered in the Buckinghamshire Cyclone on the Malabar coast in April, 1847, was furnished with one.

We say that it is a public duty to draw attention to such disgraceful facts, and we do so upon the plain ground that if there are such wretched and contemptible wrongheads who thus show themselves so plainly ignorant of what every sailor of the commonest acquirements in the present day is acquainted with, and so stolidly determined not to learn their professional duties, such men are not perilling their own useless and perhaps mischievous lives,-mischievous in the position they unfortunately hold and in the example they set: they peril by their contempt of science the public property and the lives of their crews, and sometimes of two or three hundred brave soldiers who with their officers are passengers on board. Let our readers suppose what would be their feelings if they could look a little into futurity and read side by side such passages the following:

Bombay, 15th April, 1856.

The gallant 42nd Highlanders, the last of whose laurels were, as our readers recollect, gathered in their noble charge at the battle of the Alma, and whose war shout at the storming of Sebastopol was the counterpart of that at Seringapatam in the last century, landed yesterday in fine health and spirits at the Apllo Bunder, and are to march to Poonah in a day or two. We learn with pleasure that it is contemplated to invite the officers to an entertainment, at which we doubt not to see the proud ensigns of this indomitable corps with all their hard earned trophies blazoned so thick upon then attracting every eye and thrilling every English heart.

,

Bombay, 15th April, 1858.

We announce, with seelings of the deepest regret, the mournful fact that the fate of the 300 men of the gallant 42nd, embarked on the H.C. steamer Goolmal, is but too certain, Letters have been received in town from an Engineer officer, who was a passenger on board, and who with three men are the sole survivors, from which we learn the following details.

Our readers will recollect that this wing of the regiment was hurried down from Poonah and embarked for Cochin in consequence of the great rising in Travancore, and that we remarked at the time that the weather was somewhat suspicious, and that we trusted due attention would be paid to the indicatives of the barometer, lest a cyclone should be met with on the coast. The Engineer officer who writes, and who is well known to have been a sailor in his boyhood and as a firstrate man of science perfectly understanding the use of the barometer and the Law of Storms, states that, finding a heavy N.E. gale coming on, and that there was no barometer on board, the appearances all being those of a cyclone, he had warned the captain of his danger, showing him the indications of an aneroid which he had with him. This advice was rudely scouted by Captain Wrongham; the vessel steamed on till she met the awful centre and the shift of wind from the Westward, which carried away the funnel, masts, and rudder, and finally drifted the ship, already swamped and in a sinking state, into the breakers about Cassergode between Mangalore and Cannanore, where no au