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"TAE MARINE REVIEW 23 a record-breaker in size. Some of. the earlier rafts re- quired eight months or more to build but various econo- mies have been introduced which have cut down the time for an ordinary log leviathan to a few months. One of the most important factors in present practice is found in the employment of the floating cradle. The earliest rafts constructed by Mr. Robertson were built on shore, resting obliquely upon The raft made up of spars and piling for export will be towed to the Orient by two of the most powerful tug boats at the port of San Francisco, and the little fleet will be accompanied by a collier or oil steamer with fuel for the tugs. Based on the valuations of $45,000 and $60,000 placed upon former rafts containing 450,000 and 600,000 linear feet of piling, respectively, the raft. designed for Shanghai should in- timber _ foundations and were launched only with great. diffi- culty and considerable © danger to the raft: All this is obviated by the modern floating cradle, a skeleton framework, the ribs of which are so. dovetailed that al- though any _ required weight can be sup- ported, as the anchor- ed cradle sinks deeper into the, water with the increasing - weight as the rait is assem- bled, the mere with- drawal of keypins suf- fices to permit the di- vision, of the. cradle lengthwise. into. two sections, which when drawn. apart' allow the raft to. slip into the water. Iron chains are now largely depended upon to hold the logs of the raft in a compact mass and over 120 tons of chain are utilized in the construction of the average raft. A main chain of exceptional stength runs fore and aft through the center of the log mass and at right angles to this main chain at intervals of twelve feet are smaller cross chains which ex- LAUNCHING A LOG RAFT FROM A FLOATING CRADLE. voice about $75,000. It is. estimated that the advanced price which. will be derived from the sale of the logs when the raft is broken up at its destination in the far East will more than counterbalance the increased expense of. towitig the -rait across the Pacific. LOADING COAL AT BUFFALO Buffalo, Aug. 15.--The return to this port of the Lig steamer Ball Bros., after taking out the lar- gest coal cargo of the season, 9,425 net tons, next to that of the Wol- vin last season, prompts some' questions as to how this port is getting on with. tonnage of that size. The reply is not so very flattering, though it might easily be worse. Of course it is easy to rush the lake tonnage forward faster than it is possible to improve the harbors and their appliances. It costs money to rebuild docks, deepen channels and lengthen slips and there is no quick and direct return in freight earnings as there is in the case of the tend to the sides of the raft and there connect with encircling chains. By this arrangement so intimately are all the chains connected that any strain on the main chain during the tow- ing process is commu- nicated to and shared by all the other sup- pe-tsok the raft: As a further protection there is constructed at either end of the raft a bulkhead of heavy timber, held firmly in place by strong steel cables. A 6 or 8 in. hawser is used in towing these large rafts. The aver- age raft is taken down the Columbia river by one large tug, assisted by a stern- wheel steamer at the after end of the raft, the latter be- ing provided primarily for steering purposes, for. experi- ence has demonstrated that when one. of these rafts is stranded considerable difficulty may be encountered in getting it off. For ocean towing two sea-going tugs are. provided. LARGE LOG RAPT WITH vessels themselves, so the plan too often is to get along as well as possible with what there is and let sailing masters grum- ble if they will, so long as the -usiness is done somehow. Probably the only way to keep such things up to > ¢he- standard of the ves- sels is to put them into the hands of vessel own- ers and even then it is a question if they would be so very prompt in tearing the old slow structures down and building faster ones, though what a lot of. kicking it would stave _ off. No matter how slow. we are in some direc-- tions the other slow fellow hears from it when he lets our vessels wait for him. Well, the Buffalo coal trestles. are mostly decidedly old. They were all built in the days when a 5,000-ton vessel was a monster, only the. Fie, which was pretty thoroughly reconstructed about half a dozen years ago, being at all modern, in the lake sense of the word. DERRICK AND TUG..