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2 MARINE REVIEW. 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. - SupscripTrov--$2.00 per year inadyanee. Single copies10centseach. Convenient binders seut, pust paid, $1.00. Advertising rates ou application. Entered at Cleveland Post Office as Second class Mail Matter. The 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, onthe 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 owned on the lakes. The classification of the entire lake fleet on June 30, 1895, was as follows: : Gross : Number. Tonnage. RUGRINGVOSSCIS Scie er rrectahieeceeeret ee niev el cus setucstar scesecese 1,755 857,735.13 Sailing vessels ie 15100 800,642.10 MIELE Orc ccccrecceccesseoneses z sony 487 83,081.91 3,342 1,241,459.14 The gross registered tonnage of the vessels built on the Jakes during the past axe years, according to the reports of the United States commissioner of navigation, is as follows: Year ending June 30, 1891 111,856.45 ef ee i 1892 19 8 335,433,98 ST. MARY'S FALLS AND SUEZ CANAL TRAFVIC. (/vom Oficial Reports of Canal Officers.) St. Mary's Falls Canal. Suez Canal. 1895* 1894 1893 1895 1894 1893 No. vessel passageg............. 17,956 14,491 11,008 3,434 8,352 8,341 Tonnage, net registered...... 16,806,781] 13,110,366] 9,849,754!| 8,448,383] 8,039,175] 7,659,068 Days of navigatiou.............. 231 234 219 365 365 365 + ® 1895 figures include traffic of Canadian canal at Sault Ste. Marie, which was about ¥ per cent. of the whole, but largely in American vessels. It was fortunate for the Cleveland-New York canal boat enterprise that the tow of steel canal boats which they had on Lake Erie in the big blow of a week ago suffered no loss. The little boats weathered at anchor off Dunkirk one of the worst storms of the season, while some vessel men who pin great faith in sails and trim ships were giving them up as lost and predicting high rates of insurance for the bal- ance of the fleet in future. But after all, these canal boats are the best kind of a risk for the underwriters. Their time on Lake Erie between Cleveland and Buffalo is only a very small portion of the whole time in commission, and when they are in the open lake they are worked along the shore with great care. A question relating to the life saving service comes up in connetion with the anxiety caused by these boats being out in the storm referred to. The tow had put into Hrie on the way to Buffalo to avoid an expected blow. Favorable weather followed, but before leaving Erie again the men in charge of the canal boats consulted the local weather bureau officials by means of telephone con- nection with the life saving station. There were no further indications of bad weather and the boats put out into the lake. They had been gone hardly fifteen minutes when the life saving station was notified that there were certain indications of stormy weather of the worst kind. The canal boats were then not more than two miles out in the lake but no effort was made to warn them of the danger which they were about to encounter. If the life savers had authority to charter a tug, or had other means of reaching the vessels, they could have prompted them to seek shelter. This is not written as a criticism of the Erie crew. or of life savers generally, but it would seem that as the service is intended to save life it might also be applied in some cases to the prevention of conditions that would bring about loss of life, From present indictions Capt. James Millen of Detroit will be the next president of the Lake Carriers' Association. He certainly will be accorded the honor if an arrangement can be made whereby vessel owners Will be given assurance that they will not be called upon dur- ing the coming year to fight the Detroit interests that have advocated the bridging of the Detroit river. There isstill a strong tendency, how- ever, in favor of having the presidency of the association go to Chi- cago, and the influence of Buffalo members may yet be urged in that direction. When the association meets in Detroit in January it is quite probable that reports will show a membership during 1896 of more than 700,000 net tons, as against about 600,000 net tons at the close of 1895. This isa creditable increase, upon which the executive officers of the association are to be congratulated, but there is still a very large amount of tonnage, represented by first-class vessels, that is not in the association, but which should bear its share of the expense. attending the kind of work in which the organization is engaged. Time and money are spent by the officers of this association on legis- lation and in dealings with the government, all of which is for the benefit of the entire lake marine. Mr. James Corrigan and other act- ive members in Cleveland have taken up the task of assisting President J. J. H. Brown in inducing vessel owners who are not now in the association to list their vessels. Japanese naval attaches in this country have finally concluded all arrangements with the Cramps of Philadelphia and the Union Iron Works of San Francisco for two armored cruisers. The vessels will be modeled after the Yoshino, recently built by the Armstrongs, English ship builders. They will each cost $1,250,000, be of 5,700 tons displacement, and attain a speed of 21 knots. The length on the water line will be about 330 feet; extreme breadth 51 feet, and mean draft 20 feet, with a maximum indicated horse power of 1,700. Each will have a primary battery of four 8-inch breech-loading and eight 5-inch rapid fire guns, and a secondary battery for twelve 6-pounder rapid fire, four 1-pounder rapid fire, and four gatling guns. The contracts will call for completion within two years. Japanese naval attaches in Europe are about to close negotiations for several other vessels. The Armstrongs will build a twin ship to the Yoshino, and two first-class battleships. Yarrow will probably be awarded con- tracts for five 150-ton, 24-knot torpedo boats, and several torpedo de- stroyers. Normann & Co. of Havre, leading French ship builders, will build five 150-ton , 24-knot torpedo boats, and it is probable that the contract for an equal number of torpedo boats will be awarded to one of the several German firms, with whom negotiations are pend- ing. In a series of articles on "This Country of Ours,"which Ex-Presi- dent Harrison has been writing for the Ladies' Home Journal, consid- erable attention is given to the reconstruction of our navy, and the ex-president pays a tribute to the late John Roach. "We had no great ship yards, and no ship builders with the capital, the skilled labor and the experience to fit them to enter this new field," he writes. "John Roach, however, had the courage to believe that he could create a competent shop and build new vessels. He put every- thing at risk and should have had better treatment from the govern- ment than he received. He was fairly entitled to some of the profits that have since accrued to those who have walked in the path he blazed."' In the early days of the screw propeller big diameters were sought on the theory that the greater the diameter the greater the speed. This theory was, of course, soon discarded, and some of the stories told as to how the efficiency of the smaller screw was discov- ered are interesting. One is to the effect that a vessel was sent to sea with a screw so large that it was deemed best to cast each blade in two parts and then weld them together. During a storm all three blades of the propeller broke at the welding, reducing the diameter by more than two-thirds. 'lo the surprise of the captain, the vessel shot forward at a speed such as had never been attained before. En- gineers then experimented with small propellers and discovered that they were much more effective than large ones. Although our own navy has investigated and laid aside the ques- tion of oil for fuel, the German authorities are about to equip several of their vessels with appliances for using oil and the British admiralty is also disposed to conduct experiments along this line on an extensive scale. A British third-class cruiser is to be fitted with apparatus for consuming the oil. The chief difficulty, according to reports from England, has been to prevent objectionable smoke and smell, but it is claimed that this difficulty is now being avoided toa very great extent, or at least considerably modified. Probably no line of securities listed in New York was more favor- ably affected by the result of the election than those known as the iron stocks. Minnesota Iron Co. and Illinois Steel scored big advances and are now almost double what they were several weeks ago. LS The Review has excellent photographs of lake ships. ial ll i ln a a a .