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14 yards of the - lakes, but. also for the tens. of. thousands.. in: 'the, diversified workshops of othe country, for there is 'scarcely, an, industry that is exempt from. contribution to the building | of a 'ship. - , But this, magnificent, as it is, _is the least impressive part of the spec- tacle,, The' 'real spectacle is the mil- lions. 'tpon millions of tons of, ore that these 'ships are to carry to be worked up. into all the forms that material prosperity | _assumes, _ giving employ- ment to countless - artisans. in all parts of ' the" nation; but,' beyond all; provid- - ing a solid base upon which the many- sided edifice of American prosperity is reared. IMPROVING NIAGARA RIVER. When Buffalo marine interests secure © all the improvements which are provided for in the plans calling for a total ex- penditure of $4,500,000 by the federal government, including a ship canal in Niagara river, the harbor at Buffalo will occupy a far more important position among lake ports than it does today, The assurance that these improvements would soon be made has stimulated. ma- ine and steel interests alike and has giv- en affairs at Buffalo Sen a better complexion. It is expected that within the next few weeks the Empire Engineering Corpora- tion of New York, which was awarded the contract for the next installment of work, will begin operations. Lindon W. Bates will be the engineer in charge of the work. .The contract calls for the deepening and widening of the eastern shore of the Niagara river from the foot of Maryland street to a point near the Niagara Range lights. The distance is 6,400 ft. and the cost about $700,000, the amount of the last appropriation. The improvement will practically abol- ish the Black Rock canal, the link con- necting the western terminus of the Erie canal at Tonawanda with Lake Erie! <A wall of stone masonry divides the river and the canal but in several places there is no wall and the river and canal merge. The ship canal will follow the course of the Black Rock canal but as the width called for is 200 ft. the Niagara river will be the scene of most of the dredg- ing. The channel is to be 23 ft. deep, Between Squaw island and the mainland at Tonawanda the waterway will be 400 ft. wide. Here the canal opens into the river and at this point considerable work is to be done. There are few places along the route of the proposed ship ca- nal where the water is more than 8 ft. deep, and the water in the Black Rock canal is only 9 ft. The contract which the government has made with the contractors does not TAE Marine. REVIEW call for the completion. of the work be- fore Dec. 31, 1908. It was. expected that the work would have been started before 'this but from excellent authority it is learned that the delay in commencing the work. is due to. an experiment ,the cor- poration is working out. It is the plan of the company to introduce a new system of dredging. They désire to deviate from the old method drilling and dynamiting and use a hori- zontal machine. The claim is set up that. this iachine will do the work more rapidly: 'and that the: time -lost: now -in: conducting the experiment will be more than made up when the machinery now under construction is put into use, The * chief point of difference between the old and new idea, it is said, is the conversion of the perpendicular drill into one which works in a line parallel with the surface of the water. . Buffalo marine men are hoping that the next appropriation will: provide for the completion of the ship canal from the Niagara Range lights to Tonawanda. This will be a great work. It will in- clude the construction of a large lock, big enough to hold vessels of the largest type in the ore trade. This will re- place the small lock below the Interna- tional bridge and between Squaw island and Tonawanda. The new lock will have a drop of five feet. While the lock now in use there has a similar drop its capacity 'is only for small craft. Dredges are now employed in finishing the old contract given for the widening and deepening of the river from the main. entrance of Lake Erie to the Phila- delphia & Reading docks at the foot of Maryland street. It is hardly likely that this work will be finished this season. If so, it will be late this year. Men who have made a study of the conditions which are likely to shape Buf- falo's future are most optimistic in their predictions. They believe that the ship canal should be a reality in a few years-- perhaps four years. Then, they say, will rise up from the banks of the Niagara river great steel mills and various other industries engaged in the production of iron and steel products, It is now no secret that well known capitalists, famil- iar with the iron and steel industries, have, through their representatives in Buffalo, secured options on several im- portant pieces of property between Buf- falo and Tonawanda. The importance of this improvement upon the steel mak- ing industry of Buffalo cannot be over- estimated. © The officers of the Moran Co., Seat- tle, Wash., are George H. Higbee, president; J. V. Paterson, vice presi- dent and general manager; James Gib- son, secretary and treasurer. of perpendicular ago. ~ balance' by an interest that is so large MARINE HULL INSURANCE. Buffalo,, Aug. 8--There. seems. to be considerable change ahead in' marine hull insurance. Some of it has taken place within score time and some is merely suggested as yet. It seems to be confessed that the control of the business is still held in London, though ° it was stated some time ago that there was home capital enough. to cover all, risks, large as most of them are com-, pared with what "they were a few years, 'Quite likely this holding of the and varied that the balance wheel rolls around only: at a slow rate is best. American capital is too exacting and capricious for some of the endless- chain enterprises which do not show anything but long-interval results, fig- ured out long after the facts have ac- cumulated. The London Lloyds cover the insur- ance world and in so many divisions that earnings are not summed up at the end of a season as the lake under- w-iting used to be, and that interest is now getting to be so much slower to show results that it is no longer possible for the head of the big lake hull office to bundle up his tally sheets before a new session of navigation opens and show them to the compan- ies engaged in marine underwriting as proof that there is money in the busi- ness. Some one is noting that the barge Algeria, which went down, I think in May, held hull policies that were just about to expire from the year before. It is added that she could not have obtained anything like the amount of insurance again that she car- ried then, for this was her eleventh season, and besides the rate would have been quite a little higher. It is predicted, as one of the changes likely to take place soon, and quite likely next season, that the underwrit- ers will throw out all the wooden ves- sels. This opinion was given out the other day by a leading lake underwrite> and it is not at all out of line with the general tendencies of the business. Shippers complain that they now have to contribute to the hull insurance of such craft and they do not like the idea. It is very odd to-the-lay mind. that the days are not so very far past when insurance could be had regularly on class B barges and money was made in the business as:it does not seem to be now, with all the big demands on government for better lights and bet- ter water met and fairly forgotten. It was only a week or so ago that the final form of hull policy was de- cided upon. The action of the Eng- lish authorities early in the present season put an end to the deductible