HISTORY OF MARINE ARCHITECTURE.

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exceptions, in respect to the superior class of shipping, the same causes naturally-producing the same effects. The inhabitants of Norway and those of the north-ern parts of Russia, particularly Archangel, which had suddenly become theemporium of marine architecture in that quarter of the world, appeared to haveoutstepped in an instant the limits which custom seemed to have prescribed tovessels built merely for the purposes of commerce. A considerable number ofvessels issued from Archangel and the ports of Norway which equalled in magni-tude British ships of fifty or sixty guns, some of them being of nearly twelvehundred tons burthen. They were built principally of fir : The materials ofwhich they were formed were almost new in modern practice, and the extentof the adjacent forests, which produced scarcely any other species of timber,certainly gave birth to the experiment. The result fully answered the expecta-tions and hopes of the architects who contrived them, but the cargoes whichthey conveyed, being principally analogous to those of which the ship itself wasconstructed, in great measure insured them from misfortune; but when, bydegrees,success created confidence, and caused the extended introduction of the same ves-sels into other occupations incapable of contributing to the safety of the vesselso fully as the first, they were found by no means dangerous or unsafe, par-ticularly in the earlier part of their lives, if the term be allowable. Sweden, aftera short time, followed the example of her neighbours, and instances are notwanting of ships under this description having been employed in the time ofwar, by the southern powers, particularly France, as transports and as store-ships.

Long fallen from that height which she had for so long a space of timeheld in the maritime world, whether considered as a warlike or as a commer-cial state, Venice, contracted within herself, appeared content with that sharein mercantile pursuits of which the acquiescence and liberality of states morepowerful than herself permitted her the enjoyment. The share which wasallowed her seemed perfectly sufficient to the maintenance of that splendour,that luxury, and those dissipated habits of life, which the Venetians had gradually-entered into from the time when the dazzling brightness of the warlike cha-racter which they once possessed began to tarnish and lose its lustre. Theirconduct seemed similar to that of a ruined man, who wishes to drownthe memory of the slate of affluence from whence he has fallen in a con-tinued round of riot and debauchery. Their insignificance secured them fromthe envy of other countries, and their agreeable manners produced a con-stant influx of wealthy foreigners to their city-, who, pleased for a time with

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