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HISTORY OF MARINE ARCHITECTURE.

who {trained every nerve to counteract by theoretical study the practical ef-fects of the British seaman’s ardour.

Nor was improvement solely confined to the form and dimensions of ships,but extended to the materials of which they were in part built. In orderto counteract the peculiar quality of swift sailing which the French frigatespossessed in so eminent a degree, an experiment was made of building vessels ofthe same force with fir. They in some measure answered the intended purpose,being built, as they were, on the spur of the occasion ; but the want of durability'(for none of them continued, though the utmost care was taken of them, morethan six or seven years in a condition fit for service) prevented a perse-verance in the practice. It had been the constant subject of complaint for aseries of years that the French ships, independent of that advantage in sailingwhich they derived from their form, possessed that, which was of scarcely infe-rior consequence, of having their bottoms much cleaner than those of theBritish were. The different mode in which hostilities were carried on bv thetwo countries contributed to produce this effect. It was the constant practice withthe French government to keep their ships in port till they found a favourable op-portunity offered of making, or attempting to make, their intended stroke, sothat, whenever they appeared at sea, they w r ere always in prime order. Onthe contrary, it was the custom W'ith Britain to keep the fleets constantlyat sea, as well in the Atlantic as the Mediterranean ; the natural consequence ofwhich conduct was, that in a few months the ships became so foul as to be ut-terly incapable, except by the intervention of some change in the wind, orother fortunate accident, of overtaking their antagonists. The injury whichthe worm invariably effects against the bottoms of vessels which are unprotectedby that species of covering called sheathing, is well known ; and has, some cen-turies since, in the infancy of the British marine, occasioned the loss of manyexcellent ships, till the remedy just mentioned was brought into general use. Thefirst mode that was adopted, continued to be practised for a considerable num-ber of years, till the substitution of a new contrivance, or covering, respectingwhich the first experiment was made in the year 1758, caused the former, aftera sufficient trial of the new invention, to be totally laid aside, at least in respectto the ships belonging to the royal navy. It will here be necessary to enter intoa particular description of the different methods that have been practised inthe sheathing of ships, from the original adoption of the measure to the presenttime : the first was a thin covering of deal or fir plank, into which the wormspenetrated, but which, consequently, preserved the bottom itself till they sofar demolished the covering as to acquire an easy passage into the interior part,an' injurv which took these destructive insects some time to effect.

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