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12 MARINE REVIEHW. DEVOTED TO LAKE MARINE AND KINDRED INTERESTS. Published every Thursday at No. 409 Perry-Payne building, Cleveland, Ohlo, : by John M. Mulrooney and F. M. Barton. SunscripTion--$2,00-per year in advance. - Single copies 10 cents each. Convenient binders sent, post paid, $1.00. Advertising rates on application. Entered at Cleveland Post Office as Second class Mail Matter. Tfie books of the United States treasury department on June 30, 1895, contained the names of the 3,342 vessels, of 1,241,459.14 gross tons registerin the lake trade. The number of steam vessels of 1,000 gross tons, and over that amount, on the lakes on June 30, 1895, was 360 and theiraggregate gross tonnage 643,260.40; the number of vessels of this class owned in all other parts of the country on the same date was 309 and their tonnage 652,598,72, so that half of the best steamships in allthe United States are pymned on the lakes. The classification of the entire lake fleet on June 30, 1895, was as ollows: Gross Number. Tonnage. STODINNVESSO Sates cares caecctccceees oscsdessccts caste vsccscssorcceccrrs Do 857,735.13 BILINEVESSC Sic aiecscrctecccssececccccrsccrcconsnacecssesceerecaene 100 300,642.10 MMT OMe tee rca ce. correc erste sts cescencsncussnettonssateeteved 487 83,081.91 NG Gan i ctess cdo asets is Ratcdeunees 3,342 1,241,459.14 The gross registered tonnage of the vessels built on the lakes during the past lye years, according to the reports of the United States commissioner of navigation, is as follows: ' Year ending June 30, 1891.......c.....scccceeee ss PR CR clei 204 111,856.45 sy ee ff USO Unwsssasssevvem cs cossceteccuceessteancae 169 45,968.98 e eg HIRO BS eee es eeetan Pers os <vstesavecess 175 99,271.24 = " Ss NSO teererantesmenmsteseraerensncersecccastee 106 41,984.61 ss s es BOSH eemieee are yr oiccsictvtonensesccsees 93 36,352.70 STS eu leneaaestec tcesese stat tsenceeesateyeecossuesbaeoaeens 347 335,433,98 ST. MARY'S FALLS AND SUEZ CANAL TRAFKIO. (From Official iReports of Canal Officers.) St. Mary's Falls Canal. Suez Canal. 1895* 1894 1893 1895 1894 1893 No. vessel passages.,............ 17,956 14,491 11,008 3,434| 8,852 3,341 Tonnage, net registered...... 16,806,781| 13,110,366] 9,849,754]| 8,448,383] 8,039,175] 7,659,068 Days of navigation.............. 231 234 219 865 865 365° * 1895 figures include traffic of Canadian canal at Sault Ste. Marie, which was about ¥ per cent. of the whole, but largely in American vessels. _ Ensign William C. Cole, another naval officer who has been on the lakes just long enough to become acquainted with vesselmen and to gain a knowledge of the lake business that would enable him to be of special advantage to the department in its hydrographic work, has been ordered to sea. He goes to the Raleigh of the North Atlantic squadron. Mr. Cole has been in charge of the branch hydrographic office in Cleveland and was deservedly popular. It is unfortunate that changes in the stations of both army and navy officers occur so fre- quently on the lakes. Changes on the coast are probably made as often as they are on the lakes, but in the coast districts of the light- house service, army engineer corps, hydrographic service, etc., the work is much the same in one section as it is in anotlier. On the lakes the conditions differ from those on the coast, and still in nine cases out of ten the new government officers coming here are men who have never seen the lakes. A light-house inspector from the Gulf of Mexico or the Pacific coast is ordered to Chicago, Detroit or Buffalo. When he. learns of the extent of commerce and the size of vessels, he expects to find navigators using nautical instruments of all kinds and following the science of navigation in all its parts. It takes time to convince him that the business of the lakes is more readily handled by an abun- dance of land marks, by numerous coast and harbor lights and signals, and by the proper lighting and buoying of connecting channels. But the officer of the light-house or hydrographic service has hardly ad- justed himself to these new conditions when he is'moved to some other station. There is a vast difference in river and harbor improvement work here also, and officers of the army engineer corps should be per- mitted to remain longer on lake stations than is the case with some of them. ei During national campaigns in the past flags of Republican and Democratic standard bearers were about evenly divided on lake ships. There was at least no such great difference as there is at present. Not a Bryan flag is to be found on a lake ship anywhere, while whole fleets may be seen passing up and down the Detriot and St. Clair rivers with McKinley and Hobart flags at mastheads. Ship chandlers have had wholesale orders from the big lines, "The jig was up," as one vessel owner put it, when Capt. "Willie' Young of Vermillion hurried into the Perry-Payne building recently and demanded of all hands that he be directed to Mark Hanna. He wanted a McKinley button and flag of the same kind for his steamer. He got both and declared that be was to break the record of a life of some sixty or more years by voting for McKinley. ---- -- In a recent issue of Review referred to the favorable opinion that vessel owners had formed of Col. G. J. Lydecker, on account of the courteous treatment received from him since he has been stationed at Detroit as successor to the late General Poe. The Marine Journal of New York referring to the note in the Review says: "Col. Lydeckep couldn't help being courteous if he desired to be otherwise. He comes of a stock that were never excelled in courtesy. His father, the late John R. Lydecker, at one time deputy collector of New York, was a gentle. man of the old school, kind, courteous and true. He was an intimate personal friend of President Arthur and a prominent man in the coun- cils of the Republican party in New York state."' The American Ship Builder of New York, usually correct, falls into a strange error in its last issue. A picture of the Cunard linep Lucania, showing the big steamer in an approaching position, is printed with this line under it: "This picture will give our readers a good idea of the enormous size of the steamship Lucania's funnels which are 22 feet in diameter." The picture shows an immense pair of funnels, but it happens to be a reproduction of a lithograph in which the artist made the smoke stacks about three times what they ought to be in proportion to the length given to the ship. The last issue of the Iron Trade Review, Cleveland, contains an extended account of the 1896 meeting of the Lake Superior Mining In- stitute. This organization is made up of mining engineers and others interested in the development and operation of Lake Superior iron mines. Mr. A. I. Findlay, editor of the Iron Trade Review, was in attendance at the meetings of the association and his report of the pro- ceedings is complete. Technical Training for Engineers. Of late years, many of the engineerng concerns throughout Eng- land and Scotland have reduced the five -year period of apprenticeship _to young men who were striving to become marine engineers and who profited by attending, at night and during the winter period, some of the numerous schools where a technical training might be secured. The British board of trade recently decided that where apprentices have the advantages of engineering laboratories the time should count' in proportion of three years to two. There is still a prejudice, how- ever, in England, as well as in this country, against the young men who are advanced by technical education. Fairplay of London, deal- ing with the subject as it presents itself on the other side, says: "Tt is only to be expected that engineers of the old school who have worked their way to the front can have little sympathy with the modern type of engineer, and look upon all such experience as so much humbug. But they must not forget that the engineering of the present time and that of their day are two-totally different things. The hammer and chisel are superseded by the machine. No employer would ever think of employing manual labor now where it was pos- ; sible to substistute machinery, so that the days of the hammer, chisel, and file are gone, and in their stead the engineer is merely a machinist which requires practically no manual labor, but as much intelli- gence as possible. Then again we have advanced from simple en- gines with boilers of ten pounds pressure to tubulous boilers of 250 to 300 pounds, and quadruple and even quintuple engines, not to speak of forced and induced draught. Are these changes brought about by -- hand or by head? There can be no difficulty in deciding. Technical education is a necessity, and whether it be attained by attending classes at night or by attending technical colleges, to those who can afford the same, it is only fair that such time, if properly applied and the necessary certificates obtained, should count as part of the appren- ticeship of the engineer, After all, what is required of a sea-going en- gineer to obtain his certificate is this same technical education which the engineering chiefs referred to sneer at. The very first thing a sea-going engineer does is to stay at home for a voyage and go toa school to be workéd up in drawing and mathematics. What man- ual labor is there to do for a sea-going engineer on a well-appointed set of engines such as there are in the big lines? Practically none; it 1s all head work. A breakdown may occur at long intervals when a little manual labor is required, but even such is minimised with the. tools at the disposal of the engineers. No, we can not afford to sneer at technical training for engineers in these days, as we are getting too far advanced, and in order to keep in the front we must give more and more encouragement to the technical training of our budding engineers, "'