Shipbuilding, to Britain, may with perfect justice be styled a NATIONAL ART. It is one even more ne cessary to our national existence than those miracles of mechanical skill which have placed our arts and manufactures on so proud and elevated a level. De stroy our naval superiority, and our lofty pre-eminence in commerce will soon be humbled in the dust. The navy is the sinews of our st•ength—the arm that gives us all our political importance, and makes the name of Britain known, respected, and feared in the remo test regions of the globe. And what, we would ask, is the proud term Nnvy, which as Britons we so often quote with exultation and hope, but a name identified in the closest and strongest way with the art which it is the object of this paper to illustrate? Give to our navy, therefore, we would say, not only numbers, but every advantage which science and intelligence can be stow. Let naval architecture be regarded peculiarly as a national art. Let its first elements, its feeblest beginnings, as well as its highest attainments, be fos tered and encouraged. Let public honours and na tional rewards be bestowed on those who add to its perfection. Let our men of science be induced, like Euler, Bouguer, and D'Alembert, to look to it as an object to which their high attainments may be applied, with the full and certain prospect of honour and re nown.
Some steps towards this most desirable end may, however, be traced in the establishment of the College of Naval Architecture in Portsmouth Dock-yard, an institution which has already done much good, and which, if continued with energy and spirit, will do much more. Before the establishment of this college, the officers and leading men of our dock-yards were drawn from the working men of those establishments; and they were recruited by means of apprentices, des titute, in many cases, of the commonest rudiments of education. From such men, excepting perhaps a few highly gifted minds, what else could be expected but the same blind routine of practice that distinguished their forefathers? Accordingly, we find that the com missioners appointed in 1795 to revise the civil affairs of the navy, remarked, that the class of persons from whom the foremen, the master shipwrights, and the surveyors of the navy were chosen, " had no oppor tunity of acquiring even the common education given to men in their rank of life; and that they rise to the complete direction of the construction of ships, on which the safety of the empire depends, without any care or• provision having been taken, on the part of the public, that they should have any instruction in mathematics, mechanics, or in the science or theory of naval architecture." The death-blow to this most lamentably imperfect system, was however given by the establishment of the college before alluded to; and we have only to hope that the success of the institu tion will be commensurate to the wishes of its most sanguine admirers. The candidates for admission are examined before the commissioners of the dock yard, the professor of the Royal Naval College, and the lieutenant-governor. They are required to be in timately acquainted with the English language, so as to write it grammatically, and from dictation; they are to be able to read and translate the French lan guage; they must be well grounded in the first six books of Euclid, together with the eleventh, and alge bra as far as quadratic equations. At the period of examination also, a printed paper is placed before each candidate, containing a number of geometrical and algebraic problems, which he is required to work out on paper; and those are selected as the successful candi dates who have displayed the greatest talent in the examination. During the seven years that they re
main in the establishment, they resume the study of' geometry with its applications; enter on a more en larged course of algebra, pursue trigonometry, ex amine the theoretical and practical details of mechan ics and hydrostatics, and close their inquiries on this interesting head, by an enlarged course on the differ ential and integral calculus. In the theory of naval architecture, they study the admirable papers of At wood, contained in the Philosophical Transactions,' and also some of the best continental works on the subject. After obtaining sufficient elementary know ledge, they are employed in constructing original de signs of ships of war, ascertaining their displace ments, the centres of gravity of their displacements, and of the whole masses of the ships and their equip ments, considered as heterogeneous bodies. To this is added, the most exact and accurate inquiries con nected with the stability, both according to the meta centric method of Bouguer, and to the more perfect and precise investigation of Atwood. Comparisons also are instituted—the qualities of English ships are compared with those of a foreign built—their several properties are analyzed—the good qualities are com bined so as to remedy the bad, and to produce in their ultimate application the most perfect design.
But it is not to theory only that their attention is directed. The practical details of the art receive a large proportion of their attention. They are effect ually taught how to lay off ships in their practical construction, and in making the drawings which are necessary for the execution of the work in the pro gress of the building. The adz and the line are put into their hand like the humble operative at the dock side, and a vigilant practical shipwright examines into the minutest. details of their duty. Engaged there fore in the morning, we will suppose, in studying the theory of their profession—in calculating the dis placement—in investigating the properties of the mid ship section—estimating the power and influence of the sails—or endeavouring to catch a glimpse of the deep and recondite laws that regulate the resistance of fluids—they turn in the afternoon to the practical details of their art—in shaping and adjusting timbers —filling up the component parts of Seppings' diago nal framing—bolting together the timbers of his cir cular sterns, and observing in those numerous cases which the eye of theoretic intelligence is in general so ready to catch, the actual application of rules which occupied their morning thoughts. What else, we would ask, is necessary to make a complete and perfect shipwright? He has the amplest and best theories known continually before him, and the most enlarged practice, to exemplify their application. During this course of rigorous and unrelaxing la bour, both of body and mind, annual examinations are held before the commissioner of the dock-yard, the admiral of the port, the lieutenant-governor of the college, and the first lord of the Admiralty. These examinations, both in mathematics and the theory and practice of shipbuilding, are very severe, and con siderable study and preparation are required to pass them with credit. After finishing their course of studies at the college, they are removed to the differ ent dock-yards, to fill the situation of subordinate officers; from which situations it is the professed in tention of Government to promote them to those of the higher offices, and eventually to that of surveyor of the navy.