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June, 1914 ship building bounties, $13,428,737. Germany, with but a small coast line to patrol, contributed $2,301,029 for mail subsidies; and Japan, $5,413,700 for mail subsidies and bounties. During thé same period the United States paid over to foreign steamship owners $1,228,032 for carrying the mails of her people. Thus are we not only paying alien steamship owners $300,000,000 for delivering our mer- chandise for us, but also contributing from our national treasury $1,228,032 towards perpetuating the very condi- tions of servitude that renders us ab- solutely dependent upon their good will to market our surplus products. Nor could we, in time of war, invoke the aid of these military powers that our patronage supports, if they hap- pened to be neutral between the bel- ligerents and ourselves. At the present time, foreign govern- ments are spending over $46,000,000 annually on certain types of merchant steamships, to promote the welfare of their people. It is not material how the expenditures are described; the fact, common to them all, is that strong economic reasons at home de- mand of each of these governments that certain types of ocean steamships, under its own flag, be kept in opera- tion on certain routes and where they could not otherwise exist; and these governments are willing to pay enough to get them. z Difference in Cost of Operation In this same connection it must not be overlooked that the specific amounts subscribed to individual routes, with the aid of competition, is made to conform in amounts to about the difference between cost of operation and the revenue received from the trade. The amounts paid, of course, vary, according to circum- stances, in their relation to the amount of private capital invested in each particular venture, but they never ex- ceed this difference and rarely ever reach it. To illustrate, it cost Eng- land; in 1907. © £332,784 sterling to subsidize the Peninsular & Orient- al Steamship Co. to maintain two sail- ings a week to India. This amount was equal to about 8 per cent on the company's capital stock and deben- tures; but it cost the P. & O. steam- ers £333,0K) sterling for Suez canal dues, so that the subsidy did not make them whole even on this ex- dense. Without knowing the tacts, Marine Rev--Feby 4--Pomeroy ¥ the average c.itic would say that to pay a subsidy of 8 per cent on the working capital would be contributing an uneatned increment to the special THE MARINE REVIEW interest receiving it, whereas, nothing could be further from the truth. If, from the standpoint of public good to their own people, the mari- time policies of these foreign powers cannot be condemned, such policies should apply with equal force to our government, as we are rapidly becom- ing more of a manufacturing than an agricultural exporting country. Let us now consider the consistency of adopting such a policy, with other forms of our present national expend- itures. Mail Service In 1908 the United States spent $77,- 943,221 for delivering the mails on land throughout the states; of this, but $43,588,012 was paid to railroads for interstate transportation; the entire balance of $34,355,209 was expended within state boundaries for rural de- liveries. Post office statistics show that these rural deliveries were carried on at a great expense to the federal government. However desirable it may be to continue these rural deliveries, it cannot be denied that they are a direct contribution to special people (interests) within state limits; nor can it be claimed that as instrumentalities for the expansion of trade, they are as productive as would be the same amount expended in establishing com- munication with foreign markets seek- © ing our products. Yet nothing ap- proaching that amount has been hint- ed at for the latter purpose. But if it is proper for the national treasury to help pay for placing citizens, with- in state lines, in communication with each other, it cannot be inconsistent for it to place those same people in communication with foreign traders, when their own state has not the con- stitutional right to do so. To claim consistency in the former and deny it in the latter case, is absurd, Again, the federal government each year appropriates about $1,000,000 for maintaining the state militia, in all the states; in return for this, these regi- ments become auxiliaries to the Unit- ed States army, although they remain at home as the body-guard of their states. Is not this, in a way, am 4n° vasion of "state rights"? I am not arguing against the practice, but only claiming it justifies federal suppirt of | ocean mail routes. It is not likely that any thoughful person will dispute, in the light of what other nations have accomplished for their people by subsidizing ocean mail routes where otherwise = i t a grea .¢ could not exist, tha He le would public good to all our peop 241 result from unhampered communica- tion, by regular fast mail steamers, with those foreign markets that will serve us both as buyers and as sellers. And if this be true, congressmen are disloyal to their constituents, if they do not enact into law the recommen- dation made by President Taft in his last message to subsidize within prop- er limits a merchant marine, for the emancipation of our industrial slavery. Dredger for Little Current} A dipper dredge, which is being built for the C. S. Boone Dredging & Construction Co; of Toronto, tor usé. at. Little 'Current, Ont, was launched by M. Beatty & Sons, Ltd., at Welland, Ont. April 13" It 15° of steel, 100 ft. long, 40 ft. wide, 10 ft. deep at bow, and 8 ft: at stern. It is of the crane type, the crane being 40 ft. long. The dipper is of 5 cu. yds. capacity, the dipper handle is 61 ft. long, which will allow it to make 40 ft. of water. The main en- gine is double cylinder, 15 in. bore x 15 in. stroke, the boiler 10 ft. diameter x 12 ft. tong, of the "Seotch marine type. Each bow anchor or spud is operated by an independent reversible engine, 10 in. bore x 10 in. stroke, compound geared, the anchors being raised and pinned up by steel cable. The engine for handling the stern anchor is 9 x 9 compound geared. On each side of the deck forward is a 7 x 7 double cylinder, triple fric- tion, drum engine, to be used for warping the dump scows into posi- tion, _ The attempt to raise the Keystone Transportation . Co's SS. Sher storm, which is lying in deep water near Kingston, work on which was commenced last fall, will be resumed as soon as the weather permits. The diver who went down last year re- ported the vessel was in very good condition considering the time she had been under water. She was wrecked in Shippewa Bay, Oct. 26, 1912, her cargo being valued at about $300,000. The salvage has been un- dertaken by A. J., Lee, Westmount, Que., with the view chiefly of de- veloping certain of his theories as to the use of compressed air for such purposes, in an extreme case, such as the Keystorm has been decided to be. The Harlan Hollingsworth Cor- poration, Wilmington, Del. has been awarded a contract by Sudden & Christian, San Francisco, for a new steamer 293 ft. long, 48 ft. beam and 25% ft. deep.