HISTORY OF MARINE ARCHITECTURE.

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imbibing it, serves greatly to nourish and keep them from decay. The mast-ing generally used in the country ships are pohoon masts, chief from the Malabarcoasts ; but for the cordage, what is worth any thing must come from Europe.Their coir ropes, for either running or standing rigging, are more harsh anduntractablc than what is produced from hemp. Coir cables, however, arevery serviceable, and have their peculiar excellencies in opposition to theEuropean cable ; they last much the longest in salt water, fresh being apt torot them. Their anchors are mostly European, the iron being much betterworked. With sails they arc very well supplied by the country manufacture ofcotton into a sail called dungaree, which though not so strong, or lasting as canvas,Holland’s duck, or vitry, is, whilst in use, more pliant, and less apt to split thanthey arc. For pitch they have the gum of a tree called dammer, which is not atall inferior to the other.

“ The tediousness of their method together with the dearness bf the timberthey employ, which much be brought hither from distant places, make ship-building very dear, but at the same time their vessels are very lasting, and can goto sea for many years before any repairs of the hull are at all wanted. Calking ofthe scams, as may easily be conceived, does not come in question here, for ifthey once give way, the whole bottom is of very little value.

“ A ship was lately contracted for at the price of seventy-live thousand rupees*or f. 112 500, Dutch ; and was intended 1 to load one thousand nine hundredcanassers of sugar, or one hundred and nine lasts."

To the foregoing very scientific account of the method practised by the marine-architects of Iiidia in the construction of vessels, it is totally unnecessary to makeany other addition, than to state the extent to which the practice just described, iscarried at the present day. Scarcely was it introduced to their knowlcge, ere it im-mediately became, partially, adopted by Europeans; but although they hesitate notto-give their most unqualified approbation of its superiority and excellence, yet, par-ticular circumstances and objections have caused it to be necessarily pursued withless avidity than it certainly would have been, had excellence and perfection been■the only desiderata in the art. This circumstance forms a certain and incontro-vertible proof that the comprehensive or intelligent mind, improved by long prac-tice and experience, is less liable, on account of its multiplied necessities, to im-prove those principles of perfection which, it may be observed, sometimes militateagainst the supply of those necessities, than the less lively and more contractedimagination which is content with confining itself, to objects less diffused.

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