The following text may have been generated by Optical Character Recognition, with varying degrees of accuracy. Reader beware!

* x MARINE REVIEW. [September 2, TWO LARGE TRAMP FREIGHTERS. ORDERS HAVE BEEN GIVEN TO THE MARYLAND STEEL CO. FOR THE, NUCLEUS OF A FLEET OF OCEAN STEAMERS. The order placed by Kidder, Peabody '& Co. of Boston with the Mary- land Steel Co., Sparrow's point, Md., for two freight steamers of be- tween 11,000 and 12,000 tons capacity is of the utmost significance. These ships are but the nucleus of a fleet of similar vessels. For several years this firm, in connection with persons interested in the Boston & Phila- delphia Steamship Co. and the Boston Towboat Co., have desired to enter the freight carrying business on a large scale and have watched the cost of building American ships as compared to their earning capacity. Even now they realize that the ships would cost less if built abroad, but they are encouraged to pay the difference for the sake of sailing under the American flag and conducting their business from Boston as a home port, where it will be under their personal supervision. The vessels are distinctly of the tramp class and are to sail to ports all over the world, obtaining a cargo wherever it may be carried at a profit. It is the pur- pose of the Boston company to become a factor in the business of carry- ing big freights between large ports, as the draught of their ships would keep them out of small ports. The ordinary tramp steamer is only half this size. These ships therefore will show an economy in fuel and wages for the cargo carried. The vessels will draw 27 feet of water and will tbe fairly speedy. 'Mr. Alfred Winsor, who is now president of the Boston & Philadelphia Steamship Co. and the Boston Towboat CGo., has been selected as the president of the new company, which, however, will be entirely independent. Over $1,500,000 is involved in the enterprise. The steamships are to be of the following dimensions: Length over all, 505 ft.; between perpendiculars, 488 ft.; beam molded, 58 ft.; depth to the upper deck, 40 ft.; with straight stem and elliptical stern and three complete steel decks. They are to be schooner rigged, with two masts and one smokestack; six water tight. bulkheads and two partial bulk- heads, with a double bottom extending the entire length of the ship. In No. 3 hold will be a deep ballast tank fitted for water ballast, having a capacity of 1,000 tons, making a total water ballast capacity of about 2,500 tons. On deck will be fitted nine cargo hatches and ten side derrick posts. On these derrick posts and the masts will be a full equipment of cargo derricks for the rapid handling of the immense cargoes which these ships will carry. There will tbe placed about the decks twelvé double- cylinder steam winches, to be used in connection with the cargo derricks. Forward will be fitted a steam windlass and a full equipment of stockless anchors, each weighing 10,600. Ibs. A steel deck house will be fitted . amidships for the accommodation of the deck officers. Above this will be a chart room and pilot house, and above these a navigating bridge, con- taining a full equipment of telegraphs, both to the engine room and the steam steering gear room aft. Alongside of the engine room casing will be fitted the quarters of the engineer officers. A galley, equipped in the most modern manner, will be fitted aft of the engine room casing. The quarters for the sailors and firemen: will be fitted in a deck house aft. A direct connected steam steering gear will.also be fitted in this house, but arranged to be controlled from themavigating bridge. On each side of this deck house there will be fitted a powerful steam warping capstan. _ The propelling power will consist of a twin-screw, triple expansion, - surface condension engine, cylinders as follows: High pressure, 2314 in.; intermediate pressure, 3914 in,; low pressure, 63 in. in diameter, and a stroke of 45 in. These engines are to develop about 5,000 H. P. when running at ninety revolutions per minute. The propeller will be 15 ft. in diameter, and when running at the above speed will drive the ship at the rate of 14 knots per hour. A complete equipment of pumps for the feed- ing of the boilers and the pumping out of the ballast tanks and bilges will be installed; also a Worthington feed heater for the purpose of heat- ing the feed water. A large evaporator, cavable of making forty tons of fresh water every day, will also be furnished. The ships will be lighted throughout: by electricity, the plant being installed in the engine room, capable of furnishing 300 lights. There will be four single-ended Scotch flue boilers, 15 ft. in diameter and 12 ft. long, built to the requirements of the United States inspection laws, fora working pressure of 200 lbs. to the sq. in: Each boiler will have three corrugated furnaces, 42 in. in diameter, and a total grate surface of 280 sq. ft., the total heating surface being 11,000 sq. ft. Howden's forced draft will be installed in a most complete manner. The coal bunker capacity in these ships will be 850 tons, and 400 tons in the reserve bunker. 'The vessels will be manned by a captain and three deck officers, a chief engineer and three assistant engineers and thirty-five men, making a total of forty-three men. WINTER NAVIGATION ON LAKE MICHIGAN. A dispatch from Ludington, Michi, says that if the present plans of the Pere Marquette Railway officials are carried out, the company will have during the coming winter the greatest fleet of winter steamers that ever navigated Lake Michigan. It is given out that the Hart line steamer Petoskey, which is now under season charter to the 'Pere Marquette com- pany, and covering the Holland!Milwaukee route with the F. & P. M. No. 4, will be retained permanently by the company, and perhaps pur- chased outright. Both these boats are to be pulled off the Holland run very soon, and will handle the rapidly growing freight and passenger busi- ness between Ludington and Milwaukee. The car ferry 'Muskegon, which is running from Muskegon to (Milwaukee during the fruit season, is badly needed to help out the car ferry Pere Marquette, which is making two trips daily between Ludington and 'Manitowoc and still is unable to handle the business. The fleet, then, that will trade out of Ludington during the coming winter will consist of F. & P.'M. steamers Nos. 2, 3, 4 and 5, the Petoskey and the car ferries Pere 'Marquette and 'Muskegon. The No. 5 is now under charter to Thomas Fitzpatrick and Capt. Doyle, but she will be at Ludington at the close of navigation. Ever since the big car ferry Pere Marquette came to Ludington the Pere Marquette people have ex- perienced comparatively little difficulty in maintaining continuous winter navigation. The leviathan enters the channel twice each day and leaves a passage through the ice which will readily admit one of the smaller steamers. With two car ferries next winter Ludington harbor will remain wide open. BENNETT AND DREXEL YACHTS. The steam yacht Lysistrata, recently sent off the stocks by William -- Denny '& Bros, of Dumbarton, Scotland, to the order of 'Mr. J. Gordon Bennett of the New York Herald, is one of the largest steam pleasure yachts in the world. As a strictly private pleasure vessel she is probably rivalled, as regards dimensions and tonnage, by the floating palaces of some other American millionaires--the Valiant, for example, built for . W. K. Vanderbilt by Laird & Co. of Birkenhead, exceeding her in tonnage by 100 tons. In length of keel, however, and the quality of great speed to which that length contributes indirectly, the Lysistrata is in- tended to equal, and perhaps surpass, anything ever built. She is from the designs and has been built under the close personal inspection of Mr. G. L. Watson of Glasgow, whose name, perhaps, more than any other, is unbrokenly associated. with. success in the production of vessels of this high class. The new vessel is to replace the owner's present yacht Na- mouna, and has a length over all of 314 ft. 6 in., and on water line of 285 ft., a breadth extreme of 40 ft., and a tonnage--Thames measurement-- of 2,082. She has a straight stem, and a long stern with a full poop, a long shade deck amidships, and a short turtle back forward. Unlike other large yachts, she is provided with only one mast, which is placed aft of the funnel, and has a short yard for signalling purposes only. Besides the shade deck, on which there are large deck houses, there are the main sand the cabin decks, on which the private rooms, dining saloons and bath rooms are skilfully grouped and most iavishly furnished, several of the state rooms being 20 ft. square. The officers and crew have fine accommodation on the cabin deck aft, and rooms and every convenience are provided for stewards and private servants at the forward part of the cabin deck. The machinery of the Lysistrata consists of two sets of four-crank triple expansion engines and four single-ended cylindrical multi-tubular boilers; the whole by Denny Bros. and calculated by them to give her a very high rate of speed. A member of the firm, in speaking of this at the launch, stated that her owner would thereby be able to utilize her in any capacity, either peaceably or in war. Thete is undergoing completion at the present time at Greenock another palatial steam yacht from Mr. Watson's designs, the owner in her case alsa being a wealthy American, Mr. A. J. Drexel of Philadelphia. An outstanding point of difference between 'Mr. Bennett's vessel and this -vessel--the 'Margarita--is that the latter has a very long and graceful cut-water stem and a long overhanging stern; so that while the overall length is 323 ft., as compared with the Lysistrata's 314% ft., the length on load line is only 272 ft., as against 285 ft., and the tonnage under 2,000, as_ against 2,082 tons. Her breadth is only 36% ft., as against 40 ft. It goes without saying that sumptuousness and luxury also characterize the living accommodation on board the (Margarita, which was built by Scott & Co., Greenock. The arrangements as to decks and apartments are not unlike what has been described as pertaining to the Dumbarton-built vessel, Mr. Watson, of course, having been responsible for these features in both ves- sels. The drawing room exténds the whole width of the yacht, and is finished in Louis XV. style; the dining room is in Chippendale, a fine, airy apartment high up in the vessel, and lighted by a dome skylight; the library is in Empire style, in which Spanish mahogany artistically carved has been freely used; and the smoking room is in old English style, with oak panelling. Her machinery is of the twin-screw triple-expansion four- crank type with Thom's arrangement of valves and gear. There are two double-ended cylindrical multitubular boilers to work under high pres- sure. The designed indicated horse-power of the engines is 5,000, and the speed on trial 17 knots. Elaborate auxiliary pumping and other ma- chinery is plentifully present in the machinery department, which also in- cludes refrigerating and electric lighting plants, the former being designed for 1,200 Ibs. of ice per day, and the latter for 800 lights. The mechanical ventilating and heating systems are on a most perfect scale. The Mar- garita will have a crew of sixty-eight all told, and her first long cruise will be to Japan. GERMANY'S SUBSIDIZED AFRICAN STEAMSHIP LINES. __ Efforts are now being made in Germany to secure the extension of the imperial mail subsidy to limes running to South Africa. In 'May, 1890, the German government entered into a contract with the East African Steam- ship Co. for the payment of subsidy to a line of steamers running direct ' from Hamburg to the chiefharbors of the German protectorate on the East African coast. In addition to this main line, coast service was estab- lished within the limits of the protectorate and the Portuguese possessions, and later a regular service was established between Bombay and Zanzibar. On the main line there are sailings from Hamburg every fourteen days, the coast line steamers sail monthly, and the Zanzibar-Bombay service is every two weeks. On the main line a minimum speed of 10% knots is required; for the coast service no rate of speed is specified. The imperial subsidy for these lines amounts now to about $225,000 per annum. The effect of this subsidy is shown in the increase of the freight traffic on these lines from 21,651 tons, valued at $3,050,000, in 1891, to 78,517 tons, valued at $9,784,750, in 1898. The measure of benefit to German commercial in-- terests is found in the increase in the value of German goods carried from about $1,500,000 in 1891 to about $4,778,000 in 1898. Furthermore, the maintenance of this service has caused the building of no less than nine new steamers in Germany, of 25,603 tons registry and costing about $2,750,000. The expiration of the contract of 1890, under the terms of which this service was established, is being made the occasion for an effort to secure not only a continuance of the original subsidy but also an extension of the service to South Africa and the increase of the speed requirements in order to equal the time made by the steamers of the French ""Messageries 'Maritimes." The pending bill for the renewal of the contract of 1890 calls for the payment of subsidy up to a maximum of $337,500 per annum for a period of fifteen years; service is to be maintained direct between Ham- burg and Cape Town via the west coast, and also between the same points via east coast and Suez canal, with local service between all important points on that coast. To perform the contemplated service there will be required two large steamers now ready, five large steamers still to be built at a cost of $625,000 each, and four intermediate vessels of medium size, to cost about $325,000 each. It is by such a progressive policy as this that German trade is being pushed into every corner of the globe. ;