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THE MARINE RECORD. 2 Notes. Tue shipping of Nova Scotia shows a decrease of 9 vessels and 741 tors during the past year. There are now on the registers of the Province 2,775 vessels of 462,404 tons. The total number of vessels now registered in the marilime pro- vinces is 8,950, of 680,054 tons. Tum right ring is evidenced in a communication from Mr. A. Vanderbilt, of the Wheeler Condenser Works, New York, who thinks that in five years, along the coast of the United States, there will a force of 25,000 naval reserves armed, equipped and ready for service on all 6ccasions. I is reported that the New York office of the American Steel Barge Co., owners of the whaleback steamers and barges, will run a line of barges from Mobile to the West Indies to carry coal, This company or its leading stockholders, owns large Bessemer ore properties in Cuba, and itis stated that it will go Jargely into the importation of Bessemer ores, and establish at some Atlantic or Galf porta distributing point for these ores, erecting large handling and conyeying machinery, etc. Proresson MH. A, Hazen, of the Washington weather bureau, than whom no man is better qualified to voice an opinion on the subject, has expressed doubt as to the success of the dynamite rain-making theory. There is no doubt that great concussions frequently produce rain, he says, and this theory he has traced to Plutarch, who lived long before the invention of gunpowder. In the war of the rebellion it was shown that only about seven per cent of the battles were fol- lowed by rain. A company has been formed to construct a canal from the head of Port Moody to the Pitt river, British Columbia, con- necting the water of Burrard inlet with the fresh waters of the Pitt and Fraser rivers. The distance, according to the report of the engineers who have made a preliminary exploration of the projected line, is less than 3} miles to tidewater in the inlet from the banks of the Pitt river, and a little over four miles to those of the Fraser, an entrance to which will be made by the first named stream a short distance below the railway bridge. A CORRESPONDENT writing to the New York Journal of Commerce asks if they can be held for the whole of an unpaid wharfage bill against a schooner that we own only one-six- teenth of? We are not agent or consignee of this vessel, but part owner only. The inquiry elicited the tollowing reply. Ordinarily any member of a partnership may be held liable for the whole of a debt owing by his firm. But an act of Con- gress of June 26, 1884, provides in section 18 that ‘the in— dividual liability of a shipowner shall be limited to the pro- portion of any or all debts and liabilities that his individual share of the yessel bears to the whole; and the aggregate liabili- ties of all the owners of a vessel on account of the same shall not exceed the yalue of such vessel and freight pending.” Under this law our correspondents are exempt from liability for more than their proportionate share of the debt unless they personally made the contract or adopted it as their own after it was made, See 35 Fed. Rep, 669, CHatrMAN BuANcHarp of the House Committee on Rivers. and Harbors states that in order to enable the committee to bring in a river and harbor bill at an early day it will be absolutely necessary that the time of the committee be absorbed as little as possible in hearing delegates that seek to make arrangements in support of the improve- ment of particular localities. Delegates are, therefore, he said, not expected or encouraged and will not be heard except upon application previously presented through a Senator or Representative and after the same has been allowed, a date fixed and a specified time not exceeding one hour for a given project alloted. After February 10 such delegations will not be heard at all. Senators and Representatives will not be, as heretofore, formerly invited to appear before the committee, but such as present themselves will be accorded a brief time to present such matters as they desire. Mr, Blanch- ard says the Engineer reports are very full, and but little else ie needed by the committee in its work. Exo iserr Wm. MacDonaxp, of the ferry steamer J. G McCullough, of the New York, Lake Erie & Western R. R. Co., writes the Forrest Silyer Bronze Packing Co., No. 115 Liberty street, New. York, as follows: In answering your favor relating to the *‘Silver Bronze Packing” on the double— ended screw ferry boat John G. McCullough, of the N. Y., L. E. & W. BR. R. Co., 1am pleased to say that it has giyen full and complete satisfaction. Your packing holds water and steam under high pressure without requiring any soft pack- ing to help it out, and without the usual severe friction of other metallic packings under high steam. In my opinion, one of the best features of your jacking is its automatic action —for since it requires no attention or adjustment, the liability of its being screwed up too tight is entirely removed, and the danger, common to other metallic packings, with which I am familiar, of melting them out or heating the rods, is avoided, _ T always take pleasure in recommending your ‘“‘Silver Bronze Packing,’’ because I believe it to be the most reliable and economical, also the best packing in every respect, in the ‘market’ I take great pride in showing it in operation on my — to all who are in a position to appreciate a good pack- shall be glad to have you send anyone aboard of the ugh whom you wish to have see it working. This boat ON LIGHTHOUSE CHARACTERISTICS, The plan for a systematic arrangement of the United States light house establishment, in so far as it relates to the character- istic of lights, »s proposed by Captain F. A. Mahan, corps of engineers U, 8. A. engineer secretary (temporarily) of the lighthouse board, and a full account of which was printed in our issue of November 26, 1891, advocated a system of flashing characteristics. The discussion pro. and con. of this proposed system has not been so general as the importance of the change to lake mariners would seem to demand in the best interests of navigation, and to further elucidate this feature we quote from a paper by Sir W. Thomson, read at the}Naval and Marine Ex- hibition, held in Glasgow February 11th. 1881, in which the subject has been handled in a comprehensive way. “For a lighthouse to fulfil the reason of its existence, it must not only be seen, it must be recognized when seen. If seen, and not known, a lighthouse is of no use; if not seen, it certainly could not be of use, There has been much of dis- cussion as to what is the primary and most important quality ofa lighthouse. Penetrati've power—to allow the light to be seen in thick weather at as great a distance as possible-—is, of course, the first object to be striven for. The next question is —How to make use of a lighthouse when seen? [€ a sailor deserying a lighthouse from a great distance is in douby whether the light is on a fishing-boat a mile off, or on the mast- head of a steamer three miles off, or on a lighthouse six miles off, it is obvious that the lighthouse in merely letting its light be seen, had achieved but a small part of its task. The ques- tion to be considered is how to know one light from another— how to know a light deseried just above the horizon, and dip- ping now below the horizon, lost sight of for a quarter of a minute, again seen, lost for a little time, and again seen con- tinuously—to recognize it with certainty, and without loss of time, in such circumstances, I take these two cases because, when a celebrated lighthouse engineer was with me on one oc- easion, I said to him, ‘‘Look at that light and tell me what it is; is ita masthead light, or whatis it?” He could not tell. And he fully admitted after that, what he never admitted before—namely, that it was possible to confound a lighthouse light with alight on a steamer’s masthead. Setting aside colour—now generally admitted to be indefen- sible, as a distinction for lighthouse lights, except in the proper use of it, which is to distinguish different directions of the light by coloured sectors to mark rocks or other dangers, or the safe limits of navigable channels—we find all the char- acteristic qualities of lighthouses to come under one or other of the following three descriptions: 1, flashing lights, 2, fixed lights, 3, oceulting or eclipsing lights. The well-known name “Revolving lights,” is habitually limited to flashing lights; but it is liable to ambiguity, because the same revolving mechanism is also applied in many cases to produce the eclipses of “‘occulting or eclipsing lights.’’ An official description of the revolving light is as follows: Rey.-—Revolving light, gradually increasing to full effect, then decreasing to eclipse. (At short distances and in clear weather a faint continuous light may be observed.) This, in fact, includes the description of the flashing light: F,—Flashing—Showing flashes at short intervals, or groups of flashes at regular intervals. A combination of the fixed and flashing qualities, though comparatively rare, constitutes an important characteristic light described as follows: F, and Fl.—Fixed light with addition of white or colored flashes, preceded and followed by a short eclipse. Thus we have really very little of complexity in the funda- mental classification into the three descriptions of flashing, fixed and occulting. In the flashing light, the light is visible for only a short time—a fraction of a second, or from that to five or six seconds and then disappears; and, fora much longer time than the duration of the flash, it remains visible, until it again flashes out as before. In the fixed light there is no distinguishing characteristic whatever, but merely a light seen shining con- tinuously and uniformly. The occulting light is visible dur- ing the greater part of its time like a fixed light, shining continuously and uuiformly, Characteristic distinction is given by ashort eclipse, or by a very rapid ‘group of two or three short eclipses, or of short and longer eclipses recurring at regular periods, ‘‘flashes of darkness,” as they have been called, cutting out, as it were, from the light its mark, by which it may be distinguished, and recognized to be itself and nothing else, in the very short time (from half second at the least, to seven seconds at the most) occupied by the group of eclipses. (Continued in our newt Issue.] eo oe THE MARINER’S COMPASS. A writer in the Nerth China Herald of Shanghai devotes a learned article to detailing and discussing the facts regarding the claim of the Chinese to have invented the mariner’s com- pass. They did not learn the properties of the magnetized needle from any other country. They found it out themselves, though it is impossible to point to the man by name who first observed that a magnetized needle points north and south, He suggests that it came about it this way. The Chinese have in their country boundless tracts of ironstone, and among these no small portion is magnetic. Every woman needs a needle, and iron needles early took the place of the old stone needles, and were commonly used before the time of Ch’in Shihhuang —that is, more than (wenty-one centuries ago. Whenever a needle happened to be made of magnetic iron, it might reveal its quality by falling into a cup of water, when it happened to be attached to a splinter of wood, for example. It came in some such way to be commonly known that certain needles had this quality. The great producing center for magnetic iron is 'T’szchon, in Southern Chihli. This city was very early called the City of Mercy, and the magnetic stone produced there came to be known as the stone of T’szchon, and so @szshih became the ordinary name for a magnet. Later, the Chinese began to speak of the city as the ‘City of the Mag- net,’’ instead of calling it the “City of Mercy.’’ The polarity of the magnetic needle would become known to the Chinese of that city and its neighborhood first. The first one to no tice this polarity would be some intelligent person who com- municated the fact as an unaccountable peculiarity in an age when omens and portents were diligently sought for in every natural object snd phenomenon, The earliest author who mentions the ‘‘sonth-pointing needle’”’ lived in the fourth century B. C. There can be no reasonable doubt that the polarity of the needle was known at that time. The discovery of the fact must have preceded the invention of any myth embracing it. As to the discovery, there is no reason to suppose it was in any way foreiga, be- cause the Chinese use an enormous number of needles, and have an inexhaustible supply of iron-tone. But, though the polarity was known, it was not turned to a practical use till the Tsin dynasty, when Jandscapes began to be studied by the professors of fengshui or geomancy. There was at that time a general belief in the magical powers of natural objects. This was a Buddhist doctrine, and it took firm hold on the Chinese mind of that age. The Chinese philosophers of those times taught that indications of good and ill luck are to be seen all through Nature. The polarity of the needle would take its place in this category of thought. Though it is not distinctly mentioned by writers of the fourth century, yet to their disciples it became an essential part of the landscape compass which the professors of fengshui all use. Kwo Pu, the founder of this system, died A. D. 324, and it was not till four centuries later that the feagshui compass began to assume its present form. The compass used by the professors of geo- mancy for marking landscape indications was first made about the eighth century A. D. It was of hard wood, about a foot wide, and it had in the center a small well, in which a mag- netized needle floated on water. On the compass were in scribed several concentric circles, as on the wooden horizon of our globes. They embrace the twelve double hours, the ten denary symbols, eight diagrams, and other marks. This com- pass was used in preparing a geomantic report of any spot where a house or tomb was to be constructed, sc that the con- struction might not be upon an unluckly site or planned in an unlucky manner. At the same time there was living a Chinese who had studied Hindoo astronomy, and was the im- perial astronomer, and also a Buddhist priest. He noticed that the needle did not point exactly north, and that there was a variation of 2° 95’ [probably a misprint.] This varie- tiou went on increasing till a century later,—that is, till the ninth century. A professor of geomancy then added a new circle to the compass. On this improved compass the first of the twelve hours begins on the new circle at 74° east of north. The compass, it will be observed, grew outof the old astro- logical report or nativity paper, calculated .from the position of the stars, and, prepared in the Han dynasty by astrologers as a regular part of social life, especially when marriages were about to be solemnized. Some of the old astronomical circles are preserved in the new geomantic chart. This was the com- pass used when Shen-Kwa wrote on the south-pointing needle in the eleventh century. This author mentions that any iron needle acquires polarity by rubbing it on a piece of lodestone. He alludes to the variation as a fact which he himself had ob- served, and speaks of the south-pointing needle as an imple- ment used by the professors of geomancy. By them it was employed in the form of a float upon water. After this, in 1122, an ambassador to Corea describes the use of the floating needle on board ship in which he made the yoyage. This is the first instance, the earliest by more than a century, of the use of the mariner’s compasson board ship, found as yet in any book, native or foreign. The existence of the book in which this is recorded settles the question of the first use of the mariner’s compass at sea in favor of the Chinese. At that time the needle floated upon water, supported by a piece of wood, but in the Ming dynasty some Japenese junks engaged in piracy were captured by the Chinese, and the compass in use on board was found to have the needle dry and raised on a pivot, while still pointing southward. ‘The Japanese had learned from the Portuguese navigators to make a compass of this kind, and probably the needles they used were brought from Europe: From this time, the Chinese adopted the prin- ciple of a pivot, and made their compasses without a well of water in the middle to float the needle in. Charts of a very rough kind were probably used, but how far is not known, What is known is that the junk master was aware of the direct- ion in which the needle must point to reach the port to which he was going. Inthe Sung dynasty, embracing part of the tenth, as wel! as the eleventh, twelfth, and part of the thir- teenth centuries, Chinese junks went to Persia and India, The Arabs trading to China directly would learn at that time the use of the compass, and would apply it on board their dhows. From them the Europeans learned this useful inyention. The credit of the discovery, both of the polarity of a mag- netized needle and of its suitability for use by mariners at sea, must therefore, according to this writer, be given to the Chin— ese. It is China also that has the credit for having first no- ticed that any iron needle may be polarized by rubbing it with amagnet. In the thirteenth century the Arabs used a float- ing compass on their dhows. The needle was made to float on the water by attaching it crosswise to a corvstick or splinter of wood. A magnet applied to it drew it into anorthand south direction, They would use Western notation to mark the uarters and intermediate points on the horizon, When, therefore, the mariner’s compass was adopted from them, the Chinese twenty-four points were not communicated. In the European compass the notation of thirty two points is West- ern, and rests on the winds and the sun. In the Chinese prim- itive mariner’s compass the notation is that of the professors of geomancy, und rests on the old astrological division of the horizon into twelve double hours. From the Arab accountwe = learn, what the Chinese accounts do not tell us, that the Chin- — A, ese floated the needle by inserting it in a splinter of wood,