An inclosed space for the reception of ships, either for their security, or for the convenience of building or giving them repairs. This word has been derived, absurdly enough, from the Greek, ἀποκλείω, to receive. That we had it, along with almost the whole of our sea-terms, from the northern continental nations, is sufficiently obvious. Thus, in Flem. it is dok; Teut. dock; Swedish, docka; Suio-Goth. docka; perhaps originally from dekken, to cover, protect, secure, inclose. The dock for inclosing the prisoner in a court of justice is evidently from the same origin.

Docks for the reception of ships are of two kinds, wet and dry.

A wet dock may either have gates, to retain the water in it, so that ships shall constantly remain afloat, or be left open for the tide to flow into and ebb out of it at pleasure; either leaving it dry at low water, or with a certain depth of water remaining in it, according to its construction and situation with regard to the low water mark, and to the ebbing of the sea at spring or neap tides. A wet dock, without gates, is generally distinguished by the name of a basin, which, however, is sometimes indiscriminately applied to a wet dock, whether with or without gates.

A dry dock either becomes dry by the ebbing of the tide, when the gates are left open, or by shutting the gates at low water, and pumping out whatever water may remain in it at that time, by the power of men, horses, wind, or, which is now most commonly performed in the King's dock-yards, by the steam-engine.

A wet dock, therefore, may be defined to be "a basin of water, in which ships may be kept afloat at all times of the tide;" a dry dock a "receptacle in which every part of a ship can be examined, and its defects repaired." Ships may also be conveniently built in dry docks, and floated out by opening the gates; though, in all dock-yards, there are places set apart for this purpose, under the name of slips. A wet dock is called by the French un basin; a dry dock, une forme; and a slip, un calle.

The digging out the earth, and building the surrounding walls of masonry, to prevent the sides falling in, the preparation of the mortar and puzzolana, in the construction of a wet dock, are attended with great labour and expense. The two wet docks or basins of Cherbourg (see Breakwater), which are probably the finest specimens that exist in the world, are estimated to have cost three millions Sterling. The labour of excavation may sometimes be spared, and a series of wet docks or basins conveniently made by turning the course of a tide-river through an isthmus, and placing a pair of gates at each end of the old channel. In this way were the new docks of Bristol constructed, out of the bed of the Avon.

Wet docks are an improvement in navigation and commerce of the utmost importance, but of very modern date in this country; indeed, they owe their introduction entirely to a spirit of individual enterprise in commercial speculation. Liverpool might still have remained a poor fishing village, but for its convenient docks, which not only produce to the town and corporation a large revenue, but ensure to the merchant every possible facility in refitting, loading, and discharging his ships, whatever their burden or their cargo may be, without being exposed to the risk of losing both ship and cargo in a rapid tide river; and, at all events, to an unavoidable delay, occasioned by distance, the weather, or the state of the tides.

Hull is also greatly indebted for the extension of its commerce to its docks. Its old wet dock contains an area of ten acres nearly, and has accommodated at one time 130 sail of such vessels as frequent that port.

London, though unquestionably the first city in the world for its opulence, its commerce, and public spirit, and possessing within itself the powerful internal means of supporting docks, and all other conveniences that trade and shipping may require on the most extensive plans,—London has been the last to try the experiment of docks, except in the case of two spirited individuals, Mr Perry at Blackwall, and Mr Wells at Greenland Dock, both private ship-builders. Notwithstanding the total inadequacy of legal quays, which subjected the merchants to incalculable losses and delays, and in many cases proved absolutely ruinous; notwithstanding the effect of the heavy, expensive, and fatal embarrassments experienced regularly on the arrival of the West India fleets, and the annual losses, by plunder in the river, on West India produce, which, alone, were calculated to amount to L150,000 to the proprietor, and L50,000 to the revenue, and more than the double of those sums, including other branches of commerce,—it was not till the year 1799 that prejudices and private interests were so far removed, as to enable the merchants concerned in the West India trade to obtain an act of Parliament to carry into execution a plan of docks, quays, and warehouses, for the convenience of that trade, on the Isle of Dogs.

The docks of Liverpool were the first of the kind that were constructed in this kingdom, by virtue of an act of Parliament passed in 1708, and from that period the town of Liverpool has rapidly raised itself from a poor fishing village, and a port for coasting vessels, to be the second commercial town and port in the empire; and the plan of improvements now carrying into execution for the enlargement and better arrangement of the docks, will, when completed, render it, for convenience and appearance, in this respect, the very first, not London even excepted.

It appears from a statement, apparently authentic, that, in the ten years ending with 1808, the number of ships that entered these docks was 48,497, tonnage 4,954,204; and the dock duties received L.329,566; and that, in the following ten years, ending in 1818, the number of ships was 60,200, the tonnage 6,375,560, and the amount of duties L.666,438. It may also be observed, that this extraordinary increase has taken place since the abolition of the slave-trade, which, it was asserted, would be the ruin of Liverpool.

The docks of Hull have also been advantageous, though in a less degree, to the wealth and prosperity of this trading town. The docks at Leith, when completed, will afford security and convenience to the increased commerce of the capital of Scotland.

The West India docks on the river Thames commenced in February 1800, and were opened in August 1802. They consist of an outward and a homeward-bound dock, and communicate by means of locks with a basin of five or six acres on the end next to Blackwall, and with another of more than two acres at the end next to Limehouse, both of which basins communicate with the Thames. The outward bound dock is about 870 yards in length by 135 in width, containing consequently an area of more than 24 acres; the homeward-bound dock is of the same length, and 166 yards in width; its area being little short of 30 acres; and the two together will contain, with ease, at least 500 vessels from 250 to 500 tons. The whole are surrounded with a high wall; and, as a security against fire, the moment that a ship enters the dock the crews are discharged, and no person whatever is allowed to remain on board, or within the premises, the gates of which are closed at a certain hour. They are surrounded by immense warehouses which are estimated to contain nearly 10,000 hogsheads of sugar, and an immense quantity of rum. The sum authorized by Parliament to be raised for completing these docks and warehouses was L.1,200,000, and the total expense was probably not far short of one million and a half; yet on this capital, the subscribers have been receiving from a very short period after their opening 10 per cent. which, by the terms of the act, is not to be exceeded; and the term granted is limited to 21 years.

The next set of docks that were undertaken for the advantage of the trade of the capital was the London Docks. These docks are situated in Wapping, and are appropriated for the reception of all ships arriving in the port of London with wine, spirits, tobacco, and rice on board; but not exclusively, ships having on board other cargoes being admitted, on the payment of certain fees. The act of Parliament for incorporating the dock company was passed in 1800, authorizing them to raise a capital of L.1,200,000, but such was the number of houses to be purchased (we believe not less than twelve hundred) occupying the site of the dock, that this capital, by subsequent acts, was extended to L.2,200,000; the dividends on which are limited, as in the West India docks, to 10 per cent. The great dock is 420 yards in length, and 230 yards in width, covering an area of 20 acres. A basin of three acres nearly connects it with the river. The warehouses are very magnificent; the tobacco warehouse is the grandest and most spacious building of its kind in the world; being capable of containing five and twenty thousand hogsheads of tobacco, and the vaults underneath as many pipes of wine. This single building, under one roof, is said to occupy upwards of four acres of ground. These docks were opened in February 1805.

The East India Docks, for the exclusive reception and accommodation of the East India ships, were the last in succession. The act for the incorporation of the Company was passed in July 1803, authorizing them to raise a capital of L.200,000, which was afterwards increased to L.600,000, the dividend, as in the case of the two others, to be limited to 10 per cent. These docks are situated at Blackwall. That for the reception of homeward bound ships is 470 yards in length, by 187 in width, containing a surface of rather more than 18 acres; the outward bound dock is 260 by 173 yards, and is consequently something more than 9 acres. An entrance basin of three acres nearly, and a spacious lock, connect them with the Thames.

A dry dock, requiring to be perfectly watertight, demands the greatest care in its construction: it is sometimes lined all round with wood, but more generally with masonry, mostly of hewn granite. The expense is very considerable, as the foundation, by means of piles or otherwise, must be well secured, all leakage prevented, and the culvers or drains properly constructed, to let in and carry off the water without its undermining the quays or piers. The cost of a complete dry dock will vary probably from L.20,000 to L.100,000, according to the size of the ships it is intended to admit, and the nature of the ground on which it is to be constructed. A dry dock may be single, or made to contain only one ship; or double, to contain two ships; but the former is the most common, because most convenient.

As it is of the utmost importance to preserve the water in a wet dock, and to keep it out of a dry dock, it may be proper to describe the different kinds of gates that are in use for this purpose.

The most common, and, on the whole, perhaps, the best and most convenient, are swinging gates, which open in the middle, and lie flat, one part against each wharf or side-wall of the passage, leading into the dock or basin. The elevation of this kind of gate is represented in Plate LXXI. fig. 3. This kind of dock gate requires to be made of great strength, with sound timber and good iron, and the gudgeons on which the hinges turn, to be well secured into the stone abutments. Care also must be taken, to make the bottom of the passage and the bottom of the gates perfectly plane and parallel, to prevent leakage, and give facility to their opening and shutting, which is usually assisted by rollers fixed in a groove, and performed by means of a small capstan on each pier. Attached to the top of the gates is usually a foot bridge with railing, which, separating in the middle, opens and shuts with the gates. The most simple, but by no means the most effective contrivance for keeping out the water, is the wicket-gate, of which the plan and elevation are represented in Plate LXXI. fig. 5 and 6. It consists of three parts, which, when opened, are removed separately. This gate is rarely made use of unless where the abutments are not sufficiently strong, or their foundation sufficiently secure, to bear the weight of a pair of swinging gates.

A third kind of gate consists of a floating dam or caisson, first introduced into this country by General Bentham, and first applied to the great new basin in Portsmouth dock-yard. They are built somewhat in the shape of a Greenland fishing-boat, sharp at the two ends, narrow, and deep in proportion to the depth of water at the entrance of the dock. The keel fits into a groove at the bottom of the passage, and the two slanting ends rise and fall in corresponding grooves cut into the two abutments. Of this kind of gate, fig. 1 and 2 Plate LXXI. represent the plan and elevation. By letting in the water the caisson sinks in the grooves, and acts as a closed gate; and by pumping out the water, or letting it out to a certain depth, the dam floats, as the tide rises, and the narrow part, rising to the top, is readily disengaged from the grooves, and easily floated away as a boat. The advantages of these floating dams, as stated by General Bentham, are, that they are cheaper of construction than the gates heretofore in use for closing docks or basins; that they occupy less space, are more easily repaired, and one and the same dam is capable of being used, as need may require, in different places at different times. These caissons have also the advantage of serving as bridges of communication for loaded carriages, across the entrances they close, and require much less labour than gates, in opening or shutting up passages into docks or basins; since their occasional buoyancy may be obtained without pumping water, or unloading ballast.

Fig. 7. represents a plan, and fig. 4. a sectional elevation of a dry or graving dock, into which ships are taken to have their defects examined and repaired, coppered, &c. and in which, if necessary, as already observed, ships may be built.

When a ship is brought into a dry or graving dock, she gradually subsides as the water flows out, till her keel rests upon the line of square blocks, which are placed to receive it along the middle for the whole length, and on these blocks she is kept steady and upright by a number of shores or poles on each side, one of their ends being placed on the altars, or steps of the dock, the other under the ship's bends and bottom. As a ship under repair generally requires something to be done to the main or false keel, or at any rate these parts require to be inspected; sometimes to shift the main keel or to add to the whole length of the false keel, it was always found necessary, in such cases, to remove the blocks in order to get at the bottom of the ship; but this operation could not be performed without the more serious one of first lifting bodily the ship clear of all the blocks, and suspending her, as it were, in the air.

This process was performed by driving wedges simultaneously under the ends of all the shores that supported the ship; an operation that required from four to five hundred men to enable them to suspend a ship of the first rate. When the San Josef, a large three-decker, required her bottom to be examined, in 1800, the assistance of almost every artificer in the dock-yard was found necessary to perform this process of lifting her; nor was this the only inconvenience, the ship, thus suspended, suffered very material injury by the pressure of her own enormous weight against the ends of the shores that supported her, such as forcing in her sides, straining the knees and all her fastenings, breaking the trenails, &c.

To remedy these glaring inconveniences and very serious injuries that ships thus placed were apt to sustain, and to effect a saving of time and expense in the operation, Mr Seppings, then Master Shipwright, and now Surveyor of the Navy, contrived, sixteen or eighteen years ago, an improvement, as ingenious as it is simple, by which twenty men will suspend the largest ship in the navy, or rather, which amounts to the same thing, will disengage any one block that may be required in the space of two or three minutes, without the necessity of suspending her at all; and, as a first rate in dock sits upon about fifty blocks, these twenty men will clear her of the whole of these blocks in about two hours; and, as the saving of a day in completing the repairs of a ship, is frequently the saving of a whole spring tide, the docking and undocking of a ship may make, and frequently has made, by this new method, the difference of a fortnight in the time of equipping her for sea.

The block of Mr Seppings, instead of being one solid piece, consists of three wedges, or, more properly speaking, of one obtuse wedge, and two inclined planes, which, when put together and placed under the ship's keel, appear as under, when viewed in the direction or line of the keel:

where G is the wedge on which the keel rests, having its obtuse angle equal to $170^\circ$, and HH are the two inclined planes, each having an acute angle of $50^\circ$. The wedge is of hard wood, having its two sides lined with iron; the two inclined planes are of cast-iron. When one of these blocks is to be disengaged from under a ship's bottom, nothing more is required than a few smart blows alternately on the two sides of the two inclined planes, when they fly out, and the middle part or wedge drops, and the facility of thus disengaging any of the blocks, is in proportion to the quantity of pressure upon that block. The strokes are usually given by a kind of catapulta or battering-ram, being a thick spar or pole moving on a pair of wheels, as KK. This simple contrivance to get at any part of a ship's bottom by removing, in succession, all the blocks without the necessity of lifting the ship, which the removal of any one block required to be done by the old method, is now universally adopted in all the dockyards; and the Lords of the Admiralty marked their sense of the great utility of the improvement, by bestowing on Mr Seppings a reward of L. 1000 for the invention.

Another very material improvement, recently introduced into his Majesty's dock-yards, is that of covering the dry docks and building slips with roofs. The rapid decay of our ships of war by that species of disease known by the name of the dry-rot, attracted very general attention; its effects were well known, but a variety of opinions were entertained as to its causes and its cure. It was quite obvious, however, that exclusion of air and moisture were the two great operating causes in giving activity to the progress of the disease (see Dry-rot); and that a ship in dock, stripped of her planking, and open to the weather in every part, alternately exposed to frost, rain, wind, and sunshine, must at least have her timbers differently affected, some swelled and water-soaked, others shrunk with heat, and others rifted with the wind and frost; and, if closed up with planking in this state, might be expected, at no great distance of time, to exhibit symptoms of a decay. The workmen, too, in the open docks or slips, suffered from the vicissitudes of the weather no less than the ships, and their labour was frequently suspended, to the great detriment of the naval service. The measure of roofing over the docks and slips had long and repeatedly been suggested, but either from prejudice or a false economy, it was only very recently carried into practice, but is now almost universal in all the yards. These roofs are generally constructed so as to be capable of having the sides and ends occasionally closed according to the quarter from which the wind may blow; and, by this contrivance, the timber is prevented from rifting, as it is liable to do, by the action of a thorough draught of wind, and the health of the artificer is prevented from injury. The light is admitted through numerous windows placed in the roof. These roofs are, in general, supported on a row of wooden pillars, and covered with slate, some with plates of iron, and others with shingle. Plate LXXII exhibits the transverse section of a roof thrown over the head of the dock at Plymouth, in which the Foudroyant is repairing; its span being 95 feet 4 inches, and the extreme width 125 feet 4 inches, supported, on the principle of trussing, without a single beam. Another of the same kind is building over the Prince Regent at Chatham, whose span is 100 feet, and the extreme width 150 feet. These immense roofs are constructed after a plan of Mr Seppings. The cost of one of the dimensions above mentioned is from L.6000 to L.7000, which, great as it may appear, will be amply repaid by the superior quality and durability of the first ship built under it; but the same roof, with little or no repair, will, in all probability, serve as a covering for eight or ten different ships in succession. General Bentham who, in his statement of "Services rendered in the Civil Department of the Navy," seems to claim to himself all the inventions and improvements that have been introduced into the dock-yards for the last twenty years, carries his invention beyond a mere covering, and proposes to house over the docks and slips so completely, as to afford "means of heating, warming, ventilating, and artificially lighting the interior at pleasure; the introduction of boilers or steam-kilns for bending the planks, within the inclosure; the introduction of machinery for assisting in various operations, particularly the more laborious ones; the providing room for carrying on all the shipwright's work within the building; besides a variety of lesser works, such as it is found very inconvenient during the building or repairing of a ship, to have executed, for example, in a smith's or carpenter's shop at a distance." Such buildings would not only be enormously expensive, but, in the present crowded state of the dock-yards, utterly impracticable. With regard to the invention of covered docks and slips, they have been used in Venice from time immemorial; and it appeared, from the evidence given by Mr Strange, the Consul at that port in the year 1792, before the Commissioners of Land Revenue, that two-and-twenty large ships had been under covered slips, some of them for sixty years nearly. At Carlscrona, also, there are several covered docks; and both Mr Nicholls and Mr Snodgrass strongly recommended the building of ships under cover nearly thirty years ago.

Among other experiments that have recently been making in the dock-yards for facilitating and expediting the repairs of ships, one may be mentioned, of which many persons are sanguine enough to think that the successful result is likely to be attended with most important benefits to the naval service. It is that of hauling up ships of war, of any dimensions, on building slips, instead of taking them into docks. It is no uncommon practice, at various ports of this kingdom, where there are neither artificial basins nor natural harbours, to haul vessels of the burden of fifty to two hundred tons, or probably larger, upon the beach by means of capstans, to give them repairs; in like manner, most of the large fishing smacks are hauled up for security in tempestuous weather; but the practicability of hauling up ships of war, especially of the larger classes, was a matter of some doubt. Several frigates had, at various times, been hauled upon slips, when the docks were all occupied, and the ease with which the ope- ration was performed, induced the officers of the dock-yard to propose the hauling up of a line of battle ship. The Kent, of 74 guns, was selected for this purpose. It was necessary, in the first place, to take her into a dock, to have proper bilgeways prepared, and to be stripped so as to be made as light as possible, her weight being, according to a calculation made from the water she displaced when afloat, about fourteen hundred tons. To heave up this weight fourteen capstans were employed, and the number of men to work these were as under:

9 men to each bar and swifter, - 1512 8 — to hold on at each, - 112 3 — to each capstan, to attend the fall, - 42 Men on board the ship, and employed in other operations, - 450

Total of men employed, - 2116

The time occupied in hauling her up, after all the purchases were brought to bear, was forty minutes. The expense of preparing her, and the loss and wear and tear of the materials, was estimated at somewhere about L. 2000.

The advantages which slips are supposed to possess over dry docks are many and important. They can be constructed at one-twentieth part of the expense; they occupy less space; they can be constructed on a steep or a shelving shore, and ships can be hauled upon them either in spring or neap tides; whereas a dry dock can only be made in particular situations, and, when made, ships can only be docked and undocked in certain states of the tides; from which circumstance, a considerable delay and inconvenience are frequently experienced. It should be recollected, however, that a large ship must necessarily go into a dock preparatory to her being hauled up on a slip.

It has been considered as not at all impossible, as was suggested some time ago by Mr Perring, the ingenious clerk of the check in Plymouth dockyard, that the whole ordinary may hereafter be laid up on slips, which, if housed over, would unquestionably be the best means of increasing their durability, and preserving them from partial decay. Nor is it certain, that in the end it would not be the most economical mode of preserving them. The expense, as appears from the Estimates of the Ordinary of the Navy, for the year 1817, is L. 187,000 for harbour victuals, harbour moorings and riggings, &c., besides L. 135,000 for wages; the chief part of both which sums is on account of ships of war laid up in ordinary, none of which would be required by placing them on slips. It would, indeed, form a singular revolution in naval management, if ships hereafter should be laid up in ordinary on dry land, whilst the timber of which they are built is now considered to be the best preserved under salt water: a process which, from some experiments recently made, promises fair to be the most effectual prevention of, and a probable cure for the dry rot. (See Dry-rot.) This method of preserving timber has long been practised at Brest, Carthagena, and several other places on the Continent; and the only objection to it in Dock-Yards, some of our ports appears to be the attack of the worm, known to naturalists by the name of Teredo navalis, whose bite is almost as destructive as the dry-rot.

On the other hand, there are very many and serious objections, even were the measure practicable, of hauling up ships of the line in particular, to be laid in ordinary on slips. In the first place, the length of sea-beach that would be required is greater than probably all the dock-yards in the kingdom could furnish. Secondly, the three warrant-officers who are now employed in each ship, and who are the best men in the service, being no longer necessary, would be turned adrift, and, in all probability, utterly lost to the navy. Thirdly, no large ship could be hauled on the slips without being previously taken into a dock to have her bilgeways fitted, and her bottom prepared for placing her on the slip. The time taken for this purpose must necessarily interfere with the other works of the yard, and after taking her out, the preparations for heaving her up, the capstans, blocks, purchase-falls, chams, and a variety of other articles, amount to a very large expense, not less, with the expense of the roof to cover the ship, than L. 10,000 for each slip so hauled up.

Dock-Yards.

Previous to the reign of Henry VIII. the kings of England had neither naval arsenals, nor dock-yards, nor any regular establishment of civil or naval officers to provide ships of war, or to fight them. They had admirals, however, possessing a high jurisdiction and very great power. (See the article Admiral in this Supplement.) And it would appear, from a very curious poem in Hackluit's Collection, called "The Policie of Keeping the Sea," that Henry V. had both ships, officers, and men exclusively appropriated to his service, and independent of those which the Cinque Ports were bound, and the other ports were occasionally called upon, to furnish, on any emergency. By this poem it also appears that Little Hampton, unit as it now is, was the port at which Henry built

"his great Dromions"

Which passed other great shippes of the commoners,"

but what these dromions were no one now can tell; nor is it easy to conceive how the building and repairing of the Great Harry, which in the reign of Henry VII. was launched at Portsmouth, and cost L. 15,000, was managed, considering the very rapid strides made at once from the small Cinque Port vessels, manned with twenty-one men and a boy, to this enormous floating castle; at that time it is well known they had no docks nor substitutes for them.

The foundation of a regular navy, by the establishment of dock-yards, and the formation of a board, consisting of certain commissioners for the management of its affairs, was first laid by Henry VIII., and the first dock-yard created under his reign was that of Woolwich. Those of Portsmouth, Deptford, Chatham, and Sheerness, followed in succession; and the last, excepting the new and unfi- Dock-Yards.

The nished yard of Pembroke, was Plymouth, which was founded by William III.

From the first establishment of the King's dockyards, to the present time, most of them have gradually been enlarged and improved by a succession of expedients and make-shifts, which answered the purposes of the moment; but the best of them possess not those conveniences and advantages which might be obtained from a dock-yard systematically laid out on an uniform and consistent plan, with its wharfs, basins, docks, slips, magazines, and workshops, arranged according to certain fixed principles, calculated to produce convenience, economy, and dispatch.

Neither at the time when our dock-yards were first established, nor at any subsequent periods of their enlargement as the necessities of the service demanded, could it have been foreseen what incalculable advantages would one day be derived from the substitution of machinery for human labour; and without a reference to this vast improvement in all mechanical operations, it could not be expected that any provision would be made for its future introduction; on the contrary, the docks and slips, the work-shops and storerooms, were successively built at random, and placed wherever a vacant space would most conveniently admit them, and in such a manner, as in most cases to render the subsequent introduction of machinery and iron railways, and those various contrivances found in the large manufacturing establishments of private individuals, quite impossible, even in the most commodious and roomy of his Majesty's dock-yards.

The want of a systematic arrangement in our dockyards, independent of machinery, and the enormous expenditure of money laid out on expedients, were questions of frequent discussion among naval men connected with the various administrations of the navy, and it was thought by many that it would be more desirable to construct an entire new dockyard in some eligible situation, on an extensive scale, than to continue the improvements in the old ones. For this purpose, so early as the year 1765, the attention of the naval administration appears to have been turned to the Isle of Grain in the river Medway, along the shore of which is a fine expansive sheet of deep water. A dock-yard thus placed, on a systematic plan, would supersede that of Chatham on one side and Sheerness on the other; but it was discovered on boring that the substratum was so loose and sandy, as not to admit of a solid foundation. General Bentham, however, revived the project in the year 1800, which he seems to claim as his own, and painted the situation in such glowing colours, and as affording so many advantages for a grand naval arsenal, that the Lords of the Admiralty were induced to order a fresh set of borings to be taken. They were carried to the depth of sixty feet, and were every where found to consist of sand and mud, and totally unfit for the construction of basins, docks, and such solid buildings as are required for naval purposes.

The imperfection of the naval yards to the eastward, the extension of the boundaries of France towards that quarter, the occupation of the great naval port of Antwerp, and the uninterrupted command of the Scheldt and the ports of Holland by Dock-Yard that power, rendered an enlargement of the means of naval equipment in the eastern dock-yards of England, or a new naval arsenal, indispensable. For the latter purpose, the banks of the Thames were considered, in every point of view, as preferable to those of the Medway, the entrance into the latter being narrow, and having a bar across it; on which, at low water of spring tides, there is only 14 or 15 feet of water; whereas the navigation of the Thames is at all times uninterrupted, excepting by the badness of the weather. It communicates directly with the great market of London, in which every description of stores, foreign and domestic, is accumulated; and the trade of the Thames is the great source from which the fleet is supplied with seamen. The marshy peninsula of Northfleet was considered by naval men, who had turned their attention to the subject, to possess every possible requisite for the establishment of a royal dock-yard, on an extensive scale. It was sufficiently removed from the mouth of the river to be completely sheltered, yet near enough for ships to proceed to sea with one wind. In the river between Northfleet and the sea, there is plenty of water for the largest three-deckers to proceed with all their guns, ammunition, stores and provisions, on board, and almost with any wind, if moderate. A copious stream of good fresh water runs across the peninsula. The soil afforded plenty of earth, suitable for bricks; the foundation was excellent for docks, slips, wharfs, and buildings of all kinds. It was sufficiently near the metropolis for speedy communication with the naval departments, and to receive stores in barges and the river craft. It was capable of being defended both on the land and river side; and when the whole was raised to the height of twelve feet with a dry gravelly soil, from the excavations of the docks and basins, there could be no doubt of the healthiness of the situation. By the direction, therefore, of the Lords of the Admiralty, a complete survey was made by Messrs Rennie and Whidbey, who furnished a plan and estimate of a naval arsenal, on a magnificent scale, within which all kinds of machinery were proposed to be employed, for the making of anchors, sawing of timber, rope-making, block-making, &c. Iron railways to be laid from the timber wharfs to the timber fields, from thence to the mills and pits, and from them to the docks, slips, and workshops. The estimate, it appears, was about six millions sterling, which Mr Rose, in his letter to the late Lord Melville, calculates, with the fortifications and unforeseen expenses, to amount actually to ten millions; an expense which the minister did not venture to propose, though there can be little doubt that, when the case was fairly stated to the public, and the necessity of increasing our naval establishments to the eastward had been made apparent, no violent opposition would have been made to a measure, which tended to keep up our naval superiority, and which was the less objectionable, as none of the money would have been taken out of the country, but circulated within it, to the encouragement of the arts, trades, and manufactures of the kingdom.

The Board of Revision made a detailed report on the merits of the plan, which, however, as the exe- Dock-Yards.

cution of it was delayed, was not printed; but the real reason was supposed to be, that of the very gloomy view taken by the Commissioners, of the disadvantages and imperfections of the present dockyards, which Mr Rose seems to think, and, indeed, it is generally thought, is by no means warranted, and that those disadvantages, in that report, are greatly exaggerated; perhaps to enhance the value of the North-fleet plan, of which they seem to have been much enamoured. Imperfect as the old dockyards are, chiefly from their having risen, as before observed, to their present state, by a succession of expedients and make-shifts, they are, nevertheless, far superior to any similar establishments on the Continent of Europe; if we except the unfinished arsenal of Cherbourg, whose magnificent basins (see Breakwater) are certainly unequalled, and the space surrounding them capable of being turned to every possible advantage. M. Ch. Dupin, a French officer, who lately examined all our dock-yards with a skilful eye, pronounces them as far superior to any on the continent. We have heard much of the magnificent basins and the covered docks of Carls-crona, but the one has been greatly overrated, and the others are merely covered over with shed-like roofs; nor is there the least likelihood that the plan will ever be finished. We have been told likewise of the superior advantages of the naval arsenal of Copenhagen, where every ship has its appropriate storehouse. This plan has been adopted at Brest, and is reprobed there by every naval officer, and the officers of the yard, as most inconvenient, and a great waste of room, by having the most bulky and the most trifling articles stowed together in the same zoom. A better arrangement is, that of having certain magazines appropriated to certain kinds of stores, and arranged according to the class or rate of ship for which they are intended; and if appropriated or returned stores, the name of the ship to which they belong painted in front of the birth in which they are deposited. This is the system generally followed in our dock-yards.

The great point in which our naval arsenals are most defective, is the want of wet-docks or basins; which, however, are, to a certain extent, compensated at the two principal dock-yards of Portsmouth and Plymouth, by two magnificent harbours, in which the whole navy of England, when dismantled, may be moored and laid up in ordinary, in perfect security. The want of basins, however, in our dockyards, are most severely felt in time of war, when the expeditious fitting out of the fleet becomes so very desirable. One at Portsmouth, on a small scale, has been found of incalculable advantage to that yard; and a larger one, now constructing at Sheerness, will probably make that yard of sufficient capacity to supersede the necessity of a new establishment at North-fleet, or in any other situation to the eastward.

The perfection of a dock-yard, then, independent of the advantages of machinery, which are but contingent, may be considered to depend upon one or more extensive basins, surrounded by spacious wharfs or quays. By means of these a prodigious saving of time, labour, and expense, may be saved, in every stage of the progress of fitting out a ship for sea, Dock-Yards from the moment she is launched from the slip, or taken out of a dock, as well as in dismantling a ship on returning to port to be paid off and repaired, or laid up in ordinary. For this purpose the docks and slips should occupy one of the sides of the basin, with working sheds for carpenters and joiners, smiths' shops, saw-pits, and seasoning-sheds between them. The ship, when completed on the slip and launched into the basin, may then be taken immediately into the adjoining dock to be coppered. From this she proceeds to the second side of the basin, in the corner of which is the ballast wharf; the remainder of the side will probably be occupied by the victualling department, with appropriate stores in the rear for various kinds of provisions, and behind these the bakery, brewery, and slaughter-houses; on the wharf the iron tanks for holding water, now universally used for the ground tier, in lieu of wooden casks. These are taken on board next after the ballast, and, together with the superincumbent casks, would be filled in the ship's hold, by means of flexible pipes to convey the water into them. The provisions would, at the same time, be taken on board at the same wharf, in front of the victualling stores. The third side might be appropriated to the ordnance department, with the gun wharf extending along the whole side, and the gun-carriage storehouses, magazines, &c. in the rear. The fourth side would be occupied as the anchor wharf, with the cable storehouses, the sail lofts and stores, rigging loft, and magazines for various stores in the rear. Behind these again, on the first side, containing the dry-docks and building-slips, the ground would be appropriated to the reception, birthing, and converting of timber, from whence iron railways would lead to the saw-mills, saw-pits, and workshops, all of which would be placed on that side. On the second side a pond or basin for the victualling lighters and craft, with wharfs communicating with the manufactories and storehouses. The same on the ordnance or third side; and on the fourth side might be placed the ropery, hemp storehouses, tar-houses, with a basin for hemp-vessels, lighters, &c. Communicating with the great basin on the building side, and also with the river or harbour, on the shore of which the dock-yard is to be formed, should be a mast-pond, with a lock for the storing of spars; in front, the mast-houses, top-houses, capstan-houses, and a slip to launch the masts into the pond. Here, also, might be placed the boat-houses, and boat-pond.

A peninsular situation, like that of North-fleet, having, at least, three-fourths of its shore surrounded with deep water, is peculiarly favourable for some such arrangement as is here mentioned; as any number of locks and canals might be made to communicate with the river, so that ships coming into the basin might not interfere with those going out, nor the lighters and other craft bringing their several species of stores, with either, or with one another. By such an arrangement a ship would be equipped for sea at half the present expense, and within half the usual time. A ship fitting out for an anchorage distant from the dock-yard, as at the Nore and Spithead, is liable to every inconvenience and delay; Dock-Yards as all her guns, stores, provisions, and water, must be carried to her in dock-yard lighters and other craft, into which and out of which they must be hoisted and rehoisted; liable to delay from bad weather and contrary winds; to be stowed alongside the ship, to the total loss or damaging of their cargoes; added to which, is the loss of time in going backwards and forwards, especially to the artificers; the desertion of the men; the accidents from the upsetting of boats; and many other evils of a magnitude not easily to be calculated, and exceeded only by the disappointment and vexation that unavoidably occur when ships are preparing for some particular and pressing service; all of which, when ships are fitted out in a basin for sea, are avoided. Here no delay, no embezzlement, no desertion, can take place. A ship in returning from sea may be docked and undocked into the basin with all her stores on board; and if to be paid off, instead of keeping the crew on board for weeks, till all the stores have been delivered into the dock-yard, the ship, by the proposed plan of basins, would remain securely in the basin, to be stripped at leisure by the riggers and labourers of the yard, and the crew become immediately available for other ships. Of the many superior advantages of wet docks for laying up ships to discharge, over the practice of exposing them in rivers or harbours, the shipping interest of the port of London, Liverpool, Bristol, and Hull, can best testify, more especially that of London, which has taken the precaution to surround the docks with high inclosing walls, by means of which all access is barred, and all possibility of embezzlement prevented.

From a brief description of the royal dock-yards as they now stand, a general idea may be formed of their several capacities, advantages, and defects. Taking them in succession, according to their vicinity to the capital, the first is

Deptford.—The front or wharf wall of this dock yard, facing the Thames, is about 1700 feet in length, and the mean breadth of the yard 650 feet; the superficial content about thirty acres. It has three slips for ships of the line, on the face next the river, and two for smaller vessels, which launch into a basin, or wet dock, 260 by 220 feet. There are also three dry-docks, one of them a double dock, communicating with the Thames, and the other, a smaller one, opening into the basin. With these restricted means, even with an adequate number of workmen, its capacity for building ships, or for large repairs, must be very limited; but in the occasional repair of fourth-rates and frigates, and in the fitting out of sloops and smaller vessels, a great deal of work was performed at Deptford in the course of the war. The proximity of Deptford dock-yard to the capital is, however, of great importance, in the convenience it affords of receiving from this great mart all the home manufactures and products which may be purchased by contract for the use of the navy. It is, in fact, the general magazine of stores and necessaries for the fleet, from whence they are shipped off, as occasion requires, to the home yards, the out-ports, and the foreign stations, in store-ships, transports, coasting sloops, lighters and launches, according to the distance to which they must be sent, to the amount, in time of war, of more than 30,000 tons Dock-Yard a-year.

The principal stores deposited in Deptford dockyard are small cordage, canvas and ships sails, to an immense amount; beds, hair for beds, hammocks, slops, and marine clothing; anchors under the weight of about 75 hundred, which are generally made by contract; all above that size being manufactured in the King's dock-yards.

The great magazines for the reception of these stores consist of a large quadrangular building, with a square in the middle, of three stories in height, with cellars underneath, in which are contained pitch, tar, rosin, and turpentine. The length of each side of these store-houses is nearly the same, differing from a square only by some eighteen feet; this length is about 210 feet, but they vary in width from 46 to 24 feet.

Parallel to the west front of this quadrangle is the rigging-house and sail-loft, 240 feet, and nearly 50 feet wide, in which all the rigging is fitted for ships and stowed away, the sails cut out, made, and placed in proper births for their reception, as well as for various other stores of a smaller kind.

On the eastern extremity of the yard is a long range of building, called the pavilion, in which the beds, hammocks, and slop-clothing are kept, and in which also are the house-carpenters', the joiners', and wheelwrights' shops. This building is about 580 feet long, by 26 feet wide.

The remaining buildings usually appropriated to the different services of a dock-yard, are all to be found at Deptford. A good blacksmith's-shop, a plumber, glazier, painter-shops, seasoning-sheds, store-cabins, saw-pits, mast-house and pond, boat-houses, mould-loft, timber births, besides good houses and gardens for the principal officers; with several coach-houses and stables, so that the whole space is completely filled up in every part.

The number of men employed in this yard, in time of war, may have been about fifteen hundred, of whom about one-half were shipwrights, and other artificers, and the other half labourers. There were, besides, in constant employ, eighteen or twenty teams of four each, of horses, to drag timber and heavy stores.

Adjoining to the dock-yard is the victualling-yard, the completest establishment of the kind, perhaps, in this or any other kingdom, though still capable of much improvement in the arrangement. Its frontage to the Thames is about 1060 feet, and mean depth 1000 feet, containing about 19 acres. This space is laid out in a more convenient manner than any of the dock-yards, for answering all the purposes which were intended. The general storehouses in front of the wharf wall, the cooperage, the brewery, the butchery, and the bakery, are all separate and complete in themselves. Besides all the requisite offices for keeping the accounts, there are houses and gardens for eight of the principal officers of the yard; and when the old wharf wall shall have been repaired, and carried out a little farther into the river, for which a sum of L. 27,000 appears on the estimate of 1817, the victualling-yard will be complete in all respects, according to the present arrangement.—(Navy Estimates for 1817.) Dock-Yards. The cooperage is spacious and well laid out. The staves are all sawed by hand, and this operation employs about 100 sawyers in time of war. Mr Brown of Fulham has succeeded, it seems, in making casks by machinery, by which seventeen men in nine hours are stated to be able to complete 300 casks, whereas, by the ordinary method, the same number could only complete about eighty. The brewery is well arranged, so is the bakery; and the butchery, consisting of a yard for keeping the cattle, with pens for sheep and hogs, two spacious slaughtering-houses, cutting and salting houses, by the abundant supply of water and constant washing, are kept in the cleanest order, and free from any disagreeable smell.

In the salting season 260 carcases have been slaughtered in each of the two days in the week appropriated to killing, and the hog hanging-house is capable of containing 650 carcases.

The total number of coopers, sawyers, bakers, and labourers employed during war, in the victualling yard at Deptford, amounted probably to twelve or thirteen hundred.

Woolwich Dock-yard.—This first and most ancient of the dock-yards presents a frontage to the river of 3300 feet; the breadth very irregular, from 250 to 750 feet, and contains an area of about 36 acres. It has five slips, which open into the river, three of which are for ships of the line, one for frigates, and one for vessels of a smaller class. It has three dry docks, one a double and one single dock, all of them capable of receiving ships of the line. With all its imperfections, Woolwich yard, with a complete establishment of artificers, has been of great service both in the building and repairing ships of all classes. Some of the largest and finest ships in the navy have been launched from Woolwich yard, among which may be mentioned the Nelson and the Ocean. In fact, it is chiefly as a building yard that Woolwich ought to be considered as of much importance; and even in this respect it has, of late years, much deteriorated, owing to the increasing shallowness of the river, and the immense accumulation of mud, which is found, in a very few weeks, completely to block up all the entrances into the docks and slips, and along the whole length of the wharf wall. It is stated, in the Eighth Report of the Select Committee on Finance (1818), that "the wharf wall at Woolwich, owing to the action of the tide on the foundation, is in a falling state, and in danger of being swept into the river, it being secured only in a temporary manner, and requires to be immediately rebuilt in a direction that will preserve it from similar injury hereafter, and prevent, in a great degree, that accumulation of mud, which has, in the course of the last ten years, occasioned an expense of upwards of L. 125,692; and would threaten, in time, to render the yard useless."

It was, in fact, found necessary to diminish the depth of the hold of the Nelson, in consequence of the Trinity Board having stated that no vessel drawing above 19 feet of water could be navigated down to Erith Reach, and one even of that draught not without difficulty and danger.

The magazines or storehouses are not to be compared with those of Deptford. They are more confined, and, owing to the narrowness of the yard, and the progressive additions made according as necessity required, there is little or no methodical arrangement. As far, however, as regards the building and repairing of ships, its conveniences may be reckoned superior to those of Deptford. The new mast-houses and mast-slip, the new mast-ponds, and the houses for stowing yards, topmasts, &c. with the locks under them, are all excellent. The timber births are well arranged, and the addition recently made to the western extremity of the yard will allow the stacking of several thousand loads of timber, and of classing it according to the purposes to which it may be applicable; and when the new smithery, and the line of wharf-wall shall be completed, the dock-yard of Woolwich will become an important and valuable naval arsenal.

A considerable quantity of cables and cordage are manufactured at Woolwich; but the ropery is most inconveniently situated at a distance from the dock-yard, and great part of the town intervenes between them. Its length is 180 fathoms, but so narrow, that the hemp store-houses, of three stories high, come close to the spinning-house on either side. These store-houses are capable of containing about 2000 tons of hemp, and the cellars underneath them about 6000 barrels of pitch and tar. The hemp stores in the dock-yard are capable of containing about 2000 tons more.

In the present state and situation of the ropery, it would scarcely admit of the introduction of machinery, as has been done in most of the great private manufactories. The process of tarring, or passing the yarns through heated tar, and then drawing them through apertures in an iron plate, is performed at Woolwich by four horses. The laying of a cable of twenty-two or twenty-three inches is performed by the simultaneous exertion of 170 or 180 men, and requires upwards of an hour of the most severe exertion of strength, especially on the part of those who are stationed at the cranks, who not unusually break a blood-vessel by the severity of the labour. The simple and beautiful machine, invented by the late Captain Huddart, performs with more accuracy the same process, and with the attendance of only three persons.

Woolwich dock-yard seems to be complete in all the usual appendages of artificers, work-shops, store-cabins, offices for the clerks, houses and gardens for the commissioner and the principal officers of the establishment. The number of men employed during the war amounted to about 1800, of whom nearly 1100 were shipwrights and artificers, and the rest labourers. The number of spinners, knitters, layers, labourers, &c. in the ropery, might be about 260. Upwards of twenty teams of horses were daily employed in this yard.

One of the four divisions (the 4th, consisting of Marine thirteen companies) of Royal Marines are stationed at Woolwich, where barracks, and all the necessary buildings, have been erected for their accommodation on shore.—(See the article MARINES.)

Chatham Dock-yard.—This dock-yard is situated on the right bank of the Medway, to which it pre- Dock-Yards. Dock-Yards. gents a line of river wall at least 5500 feet in length; the width at the upper end being 400, in the middle 1000, and at the lower end about 800. The superficial contents may be estimated at about 90 acres. It has six building-slips on the front, from which ships are launched into the river; three of these are for ships of the line; and three for frigates and smaller vessels. In the same front are four dry-docks communicating with the Medway.

The inconveniences arising from want of arrangement are less felt in Chatham than in any other of his Majesty's dock-yards; and it could not perhaps be materially improved, if, on the same site, an entirely new dock-yard was to be planned. At the southern extremity of the yard is the ropery, hemp and yarn houses, rigging houses, a range of storehouses, 1000 feet in length, by about 50 in breadth, in front of which, along the wharf, are the anchor racks, extending nearly a thousand feet. Next to these are the slips and docks, with the working-sheds and artificers' shops close in the rear, an excellent smithery, timber-births, seasoning-skeds, deal and iron yard, &c.; and beyond these, on the eastern extremity of the yard, the officers' houses and gardens. The commissioner's house, and excellent garden, are situated nearly in the centre of the yard. The lower, or north-eastern part of the yard, is occupied by mast-ponds, mast-houses and slips, store boat-houses and slips, ballast-wharf; timber-births, and saw-pits.

With all the advantages of interior arrangement, Chatham dock-yard still labours under that great defect to which most of the dock-yards are liable, from the injudicious manner in which the wharf walls have been constructed; without any regard being paid to the ebbing and flowing of the tide, or the currents of rivers, projecting in one part and retiring in others; the consequence of which is, that eddies are formed, and a constant accumulation of mud takes place along the line of the wall, and particularly in the openings of the dry-docks, the slips, and the jetties. Of late years, however, since the attention of engineers has been called to this important subject, every opportunity is taken, in the repair of the wharf walls of the dock-yards, to correct the injurious effects arising from their improper direction; and as the river wall of Chatham is rebuilding, there is no doubt that due attention will be had to the line in which it is to be carried, so as to obviate the evil so universally complained of.

There is no wet-dock or basin in Chatham-yard, but the Medway, flowing along it in a fine sheet of water, in some degree answers the purpose of one. The whole river might indeed be converted into a magnificent basin, by pursuing the same plan as that adopted in forming the new docks at Bristol. This would be effected by cutting a new channel for the river through the chalk cliff below Frindsbury Church, opening out a little above Upnor Castle, and continuing the new channel across the marsh near St Mary's Creek, so as to open out into Gillingham Reach, close to the fort. Here a basin might be constructed wherein ships might be equipped in all respects ready for sea, whenever the wind and tide should be favourable. At present, owing to the shallowness of the water, and the crooked navigation from Chatham round Upnor Point, they are obliged to take in their water and ballast at one place, their stores and provisions at another, their guns, powder, and ammunition at a third; in consequence of which, a ship is usually longer in getting out to sea from Chatham than even from Deptford. If this new channel was made for the river, the whole space from the first reach below Rochester Bridge to St Mary's Creek, at the lower extremity of the dockyard, might be converted into one magnificent basin.

Chatham, being a building, a repairing, and refitting yard, the establishment of men was much greater in war than Woolwich or Deptford; the number of shipwrights, other artificers and labourers, being upwards probably of 2000, besides that of the rope yard, which might amount to about 250.

A considerable piece of new ground (about 2000 feet in length by 200 in breadth) has recently been added to the upper part of Chatham dock-yard, on which is erected one of the completest saw mills in the United Kingdom, under the direction of Mr Brunell. The mill is situated on high ground, and close to the margin of a deep circular basin or reservoir of water, dug down to the level of the Medway; with which it communicates by a tunnel or subterranean canal, passing through the mast-pond. From the side of the reservoir, opposite to the mill, proceeds a long iron railway, supported on a double row of iron pillars; and alongside of and parallel to this railway, on the side next to the dock-yard, are a continued series of stages for the reception of timber after it has been sawn into plank. A steam-engine, of the power of thirty-six horses, sets in motion all the operations of this mill, which may thus be briefly enumerated: 1st, It drags up the large balks of timber through the canal into the reservoir, as they are wanted. 2d, It lifts up these large logs to the margin of the basin, carries them into the mill, and places them on the frame under the saws. 3d, It saws them with the greatest nicety into planks of any required thickness. 4th, It takes the pieces away thus sawn, and places them on carriages of iron. 5th, It drives these carriages along the iron railway to any required distance; and, 6th, It deposits the sawn timber on the stages, ready to be used, in any part of the dock-yard where it may be required. From these stages it is conveniently conveyed to the docks or slips by single horse carts or trucks, with great expedition, down an easy descent, and without the least interference with any of the works carrying on in the yard. The whole of these operations are conducted by about ten or at most twelve men.

This mill is supposed to be equal to the power of fifty saw-pits and nearly one hundred sawyers, and is capable of supplying the dock-yards of Chatham and Sheerness with all the straight-sawn timber that they can require. But the great advantage of the plan is, in its application of the steam-engine to the management and arrangement of timber, by which the labour and expense of a great number of horses are saved; and, what is of still greater importance, Dock-Yards.

The obstruction and impediments to the general services of the yard are avoided, which the dragging about of large balks to and from the saw-pits, with teams of four horses each, occasion in all the other yards. It allows, besides, the large space of ground, which these saw-pits would occupy, to be appropriated to other purposes.

The first division of Royal Marines, consisting of twenty-one companies, is stationed at Chatham, in excellent barracks, situated near to one of the extremities of the dock-yard. (See art. Marines.)

There is a small victualling depot, situated partly in the parish of Chatham and partly in that of Rochester, from whence the ships at Chatham and at Sheerness and the Nore receive a supply of provisions and water; but no articles of ship's stores are manufactured. The store-houses are sufficiently capacious for containing all the stores that can be required for the ships fitted out at the two ports on the Medway. The establishment consists of an agent, clerk of the check, storekeeper, and their respective clerks, which, with the messengers, porters, labourers, &c., may amount to about 90 persons.

Sheerness Dock-Yard.—This dock-yard is situated on a low point of land on the island of Sheppey, whose soil is composed of sand and mud brought from the sea on the one side and down the Medway on the other, and has so much contracted the mouth of this river, as completely to command the entrance of it. The situation, in a military point of view, is a most important one, particularly from its vicinity to the North Sea, and to the anchorage at the Nore; by which anchorage and the works of Sheerness, the mouths of the Thames and the Medway are completely defended.

As a situation for a dock, the objections to which it was liable are now in a fair way of being removed. On account of the low swampy ground on which it stood, fevers and agues were at one time so prevalent, that shipwrights and other artificers were literally impressed and compelled to work at Sheerness. In process of time, however, a town sprung up close to the dock-yard, and with it some little improvement by drainage, embankments, and other measures. Still it continued, till a very short time ago, an unhealthy and disagreeable place. As a dock-yard, it was totally destitute of all convenience or arrangement; and the whole premises mixed among wharfs and buildings belonging to the Ordnance Department, did not exceed fifteen acres of ground. The store-houses were dispersed in various parts of this space, and in so ruinous a state, that a ship hauled up in the mud was by far the best in the whole yard. It had two small inconvenient docks for frigates or smaller vessels. It was, in fact, a mere port of refitment, and might be considered as an appendage to Chatham.

From the very limited capacity of Sheerness, and the mighty preparations in the Scheldt, originated the magnificent project of the naval arsenal at North-fleet, which, from a change of political circumstances, and from the important improvements now carrying on at Sheerness, is not likely ever again to be revived. The Finance Committee (Eighth Report) say, they have learnt "that the re-establishment and extension of the yards at Sheerness and Chatham may be considered as superseding, under any circumstance that can now be likely to occur, the plan contemplated for a naval establishment at North-fleet, on so extensive a scale as to require the expenditure of several millions."

Those improvements appear, indeed, to be of that magnitude as to render any establishment at Northfleet wholly unnecessary, by making Sheerness, when finished, as complete a dock-yard, and perhaps more so, than any other in his Majesty's dominions. Previous to carrying into execution this important undertaking, a committee of engineers and others was appointed, among whom was Watt, Huddart, and Jessop, whose plan was afterwards minutely examined, and some slight improvements suggested therein by Mr Rennie. The first stone was laid on the 19th August 1814, and the whole will probably be completed in the year 1822; at an expense not far short of one million Sterling.

The advantages arising from the adoption of this plan are, 1st, The addition of nineteen acres of ground to the dock-yard, by taking in the whole of the muddy western shore of the Medway, beyond the low-water mark of neap-tides, and getting rid of the offensive and unwholesome smell which it perpetually occasioned. 2dly, The construction of a wet dock or basin 520 feet in length by 300 in width, equal in surface to three and one half acres, and capable of containing a fleet of ten sail of the line, in which they can take on board all their stores, ammunition, and provisions, and be equipped in all respects ready to proceed to sea. The entrance into this basin is from the Medway, through a lock that is closed by a floating dam-gate. 3dly, The construction of three dry docks on the eastern side of the basin, and opening into it, each capable of holding a first rate ship of the line. 4th, Ample space for constructing store-houses, mast-houses, mast-ponds, and slip, smithery, and artificers' workshops of every description. 5th, A farther extension of the dock-yard, by the addition of ten or twelve acres of a low marshy tract of land called Major's Marsh, which at present is below the level of the sea, and the water kept out, as in Holland, by embankments, but which will be raised several feet by the excavation of the basin, the dry docks, and the mast-ponds, so as to allow of drains to carry off the water to the shore, affording space for timber-births, houses and gardens for all the officers of the dock-yard, as well as for the Admiral Commanding in Chief at Sheerness and the Nore. These additions, together with some part of the premises held by the Board of Ordnance, will make the whole area of the new dock-yard of Sheerness amount to upwards of fifty acres. The wharf wall on the south side of the basin in front of the intended mast-houses is 100 feet, and that on the river front 60 feet in width, lined on both sides with as complete a specimen of good and beautiful masonry of granite as any in the kingdom.

The usual officers with their clerks amounted, during the war, to about 50; and the shipwrights, artificers, and labourers, to about 800; the shipwrights being the most numerous, as the principal part of the work was confined to the repairing of small vessels in the yard, but mostly to repairs of the fleet afloat at the Nore or in the Medway.

Portsmouth Dock-yard.—Portsmouth dock-yard will always be considered as the grand naval arsenal of England, and the head-quarters or general rendezvous of the British fleet. The dock-yard, accordingly, is by far the most capacious; and the safe and extensive harbour, the noble anchorage at Spithead, the central situation, with respect to the English Channel and the opposite coast of France, and particularly with regard to the naval arsenal at Cherbourg, render Portsmouth of the very first importance as a naval station; and, in this view of it, every possible attention appears to have been paid to the extension and improvement of its dock-yard. The sea wharf-wall of this yard, extending in the direction of north and south along the western shore of the harbour, is about 3500 feet in length; and the mean depth may be 2000 feet, and it incloses an area of more than one hundred acres.

In the centre of the wharf-wall, facing the harbour, is the entrance into the great basin, whose dimensions are 380 by 260 feet, and its area 2½ acres. Into this basin open four excellent dry-docks, and on each of its sides is a dry-dock opening into the harbour; and all of these six docks are capable of receiving ships of the largest class. Besides these is a double dock for frigates, the stern dock communicating through a lock with the harbour, and the head dock with another basin about 250 feet square. There is also a Camber, with a wharf-wall on each side 660 feet in length, and of sufficient width to admit of transports and merchant ships bringing stores to the dock-yard. In the same face of the yard are three building-slips capable of receiving the largest ships, and a small one for sloops, besides two building-slips for frigates on the northern face of the yard, and a smaller slip for sloops. The range of store-houses on the north-east side, and the rigging-house and sail-loft on the south-west side of the Camber, are magnificent buildings, the former occupying nearly 600 feet in length, exclusive of the two intermediate spaces, and nearly 60 feet in width, and the two latter 400 feet. The two hemp-houses and the two sea-store houses occupy a line of building, which, with the three narrow openings between them of 25 feet each, extend 800 feet. The ropehouse, tarring-house, and other appendages of the ropery, are on the same scale. The two sets of quadrangular store-houses, and the two corresponding buildings, with the intervening timber-births and saw-pits, at the head of the dry-docks, issuing from the great basin, are all excellent and conveniently placed. The smithery is on a large scale, and contiguous to it is an iron-mill, a copper-mill, and a copper refinery, at which is remelted and rolled all the old copper which is taken from ships' bottoms; and here, also, are cast bolts, gudgeons, and various articles of copper used in the navy. The number of sheets manufactured in one year of the war amounted to about 300,000, weighing above 12,000 tons, on which it has been calculated that a saving of at least £20,000 was effected for the public, besides obtaining a good pure article. Most of these were constructed under the direction of General Bentham. (Bentham's Services, &c.) At the head of the north dock are the wood mills, at which every article of turnery, rabiting, &c. is performed for the use of the navy, from boring the chamber of a pump to the turning of a button for a chest of drawers. But the principal part of these mills is the machinery for making blocks, contrived by that ingenious artist Mr Brunell (see Block-Machinery), which cannot be regarded without exciting the highest respect for the talents and skill of the author.

The northern extremity of the dock-yard is chiefly occupied with seasoning-sheds, saw-pits, and timber-births,—the working boat-house, and boat-storeroom. On the eastern extremity are situated the houses and the gardens of the Commissioner and principal officers of the yard; the chapel, the royal naval college, and the school of naval architecture. The former institution has recently been remodelled, and the latter is a new establishment formed by the recommendation of the Commissioners for revising the civil affairs of the navy, for the education of a certain number of naval architects, known by the name of the "Superior class of Shipwright Apprentices." These two establishments were combined, by order in Council of the 30th January 1816, under the following regulations:

Naval College.—The number of students not to exceed, in time of war, one hundred; in peace, seventy; of whom thirty are to consist of the sons of commissioned officers of the navy, and to receive their board, clothing, lodging, and education, free of all expense; the remainder to consist of sons of noblemen, gentlemen, civil and military officers, on payment of L.72 a-year. The age of admission from 12½ to 14 years. A bond is to be signed by their friends, in the penalty of L.200 for the first class, and L.100 for the second class, in the event of any young gentleman being withdrawn from the navy before he has served the proper time to qualify for the commission of lieutenant. (See article Navy.) No student to remain at college longer than three years; at the end of which, or sooner, if he shall have completed the plan of education, he is discharged into one of his Majesty's ships, the college time being reckoned two years of the six required to be served to qualify for such commission.

Naval Architectural School.—The number of students not to exceed twenty-four. Candidates for admission examined at stated periods, the degree of merit alone giving preference for admission; the age of entrance from 15 to 17, and the duration of their apprenticeship seven years. The students are lodged, boarded, and educated, free of all expense, and have the following yearly allowances: 1st year L.25, 2d L.30, 3d L.35, 4th L.40, 5th L.45, 6th L.50, 7th L.60. And at the expiration of their apprenticeship they are eligible to all the situations in the ship-building department of his Majesty's dock-yards, to be there employed as supernumeraries, until regular vacancies may occur; provided the apprentice shall have completed the plan of education, and certified by the professor to be properly qualified.

The consolidated establishment of the two departments consists of a governor, who is the first Dock-Yards.—Lord of the Admiralty for the time being; a lieutenant-governor, who is a post-captain in the navy, with a salary of £800 a-year, and apartments; two lieutenants of the navy with £200 a-year each, apartments, and an allowance for board. A professor, who is a graduate of the University of Cambridge, with a salary of £700 a-year, and apartments; a master of classics, history, and geography, with £350 a-year, and apartments; three assistant-masters, well skilled in mathematics, the first with £250, the two others £200 a-year each, with an allowance for house-rent; besides masters for teaching drawing, dancing, fencing, and the French language, and two sergeants of marine artillery. In addition to which, is a superintendent of the school for naval architecture, a professional ship-builder, brought up in one of his Majesty's dock-yards, to instruct the apprentices in the practical part of ship-building.

The professor has the charge, and keeps the rate of all the chronometers, which may not be in use, belonging to the navy; and all midshipmen in the navy are now required to pass their examination in the theory of navigation, at the naval college, by the professor, in presence of the admiral commanding in chief, and the lieutenant-governor. (See Navy.)

The strength of Portsmouth dock-yard, during the war, was considerably above 4000 working men, of which about 1500 were shipwrights and caulkers; the joiners and house carpenters were nearly 500; the smiths 200 nearly; the sawyers 250; the riggers and their labourers nearly 200; and scavenge and labourers of various kinds nearly 700; and the ropeyard employed about 350 persons.

There are two victualling establishments at this port; the one in Portsmouth town, the other across the harbour, at a place called Weevil; both of them inconveniently situated for supplying the ships with water and provisions, more especially such as may have to take them in at Spithead. The former consists chiefly of provision-stores and magazines, with a tide-mill and a bakery; at the latter there is a cooperage and a brewery. The total number of persons employed, including the officers, at the two establishments, during the war, amounted to about 500.

The noble building for the reception of sick and wounded seamen is situated on the Gosport side of Portsmouth harbour. Being appropriated to the military branch of the navy, it will be described under the head of Navy.

The second division of Royal Marines, consisting of eighteen companies, are stationed at Portsmouth, in barracks, which are inconveniently situated in the town; and eight companies of the Royal Marine Artillery have their head-quarters at Fort Monckton, not far from Haslar Hospital. (See the art. Marines.)

Plymouth Dock-Yard.—The naval station of Plymouth is inferior only to that of Portsmouth; and, in point of its more westerly situation, as considered with reference to the grand naval arsenal of Brest, it is superior even to Portsmouth. It possesses one of the finest harbours in the world, capable of containing, in perfect security at their moorings, not less than a hundred sail of the line; and, when the Breakwater shall be completed, it may then boast of an excellent roadstead for eighteen or twenty sail of the line. The dock-yard, however, has only one small basin, without gates, whose dimensions are 250 by 180 feet; and contents little more than an acre; but the excellent harbour of Hamoaze, on the western bank of which the wharf wall extends, almost compensates for the want of one, especially as the depth of water allows the largest ships to range along the jetties, and receive their stores on board immediately from the wharf.

Plymouth dock-yard extends in a circular sweep along the shores of Hamoaze 3500 feet, its width about the middle, where it is greatest, being 1600, and at each extremity 1000 feet, making its superficial contents about 96 acres. In the line facing the harbour are two dry-docks for ships of the first rate, a double dock for 74 gun ships, communicating with Hamoaze, and another dock for ships of the line, opening into the basin. There is, besides, a graving-dock without gates, and a canal or camber similar to that in Portsmouth yard, for the admission of vessels bringing stores into the yard; which, communicating with the boat-pond, cuts the dock-yard nearly into two parts. There are five jetties projecting from the entrances of the dry-docks into Hamoaze, along side of which ships are conveniently brought when undocked. All these are situated between the centre and the northern extremity of the harbour line. On the southern part are three building slips for the largest class of ships, and two for smaller vessels, the outer mast-pond and mast-houses, timber-births, saw-pits, and smithery. Higher up, on this end of the yard, is an extensive mast-pond and mast-locks, with plank-houses over them; and, above these, three hemp magazines, contiguous to which is the finest ropery in the kingdom, consisting of two ranges of buildings, one the laying-house, the other the spinning-house, each being 1200 feet in length, and three stories in height. In the construction of the new rope-house no wood has been used, excepting the shingles of the roof, to which the slates are fastened. All the rest is of iron. The ribs and girders of the floors are of cast iron, covered over with Yorkshire paving stone, and the doors, window frames, and staircases, are all of cast iron, so that the whole building may be considered as proof against fire.

The northern half of the yard, besides the docks and basin, with all the appropriate working sheds and artificers' shops, contains a cluster of very elegant stone buildings, ranged round a quadrangle, the longest sides being about 450 feet, and the shortest 300 feet. Within the quadrangle are also two new ranges of buildings, in which iron has been used in the place of wood. These buildings consist of magazines for different kinds of stores, rigging-houses, and sail-lofts. The northern and upper part of the yard is occupied by a range of handsome houses, with good gardens behind them, for the commissioner and the principal officers of the yard, the chapel, the guard-house, and pay-office, stables for the officers, and the teams, and a fine reservoir of fresh water for the supply of the yard.

Plymouth is not only a good building and repairing yard, on account of its excellent docks and slips, and the great length of line along the Hamoaze, but Dock-Yards also a good refitting yard, and was fully occupied during the war with the refitment of the western squadron, employed in the constant blockade of Brest. The number of men borne on the establishment of this yard might have been about 3000, of which about 800 were shipwrights.

Plymouth Victualling Establishments.—The victualling establishments are here, as well as at Portsmouth, unconnected, and, in fact, dispersed in three different places: the cooperage and the brewery being at South-Down, near Mill-brook, on the farther side of Hamoaze; the bake-house and principal stores at the entrance of Sutton-Pool, in the Catwater, and the slaughter-house on the Devil's Point at the head of the Sound. The total establishment of the victualling department at this port, officers included, amounted to about 400 persons.

Plymouth Hospital.—Is a handsome building of stone, or rather a series of separate buildings, regularly arranged, in which respect, as admitting a freer circulation of air, it is perhaps superior to that of Haslar. (See Navy.)

Marines.—The third division of Royal Marines, consisting of 20 companies, are stationed at Plymouth. The barracks are conveniently situated at Stonehouse, very airy, and sufficiently spacious. (See Marines.)

Pembroke Dock-Yard.—This dock-yard has been established but a very few years, and is intended merely as a building-yard. It is situated on the southern shore of Milford Haven, not two miles from the town of Pembroke. It includes an area of about 60 acres, its surface descending in a gradual slope to the water's edge, along the shore of which is ample space for a couple of dry-docks, and at least twelve building slips, over which it is intended to erect a connected series of roofs, which will not only be attended with much convenience to the workmen, but also with a great saving of expense. The slips, being built of wood, on a limestone foundation, are erected at a very trifling cost; and the only works of any considerable expense in the yard, will be that of the dry-docks, each of which will amount to the sum of L. 60,000 nearly. For a new building-yard, a small store-house will be quite sufficient, and an old ship hauled up, serves all the purposes of one at present. There is no commissioner, nor is the usual establishment of officers completed. The total number of persons of all descriptions employed in the yard are under 500.

Ordinary of the Dock-Yards.—At each of the ports where there is a dock-yard (Pembroke excepted), a certain number of ships when put out of commission, or new ships not yet commissioned, are laid up in what is called a state of ordinary, and such ships, till very recently, used to be placed under the immediate charge of the commissioner, the masters attendant, and other officers of the dock-yard. But a new system has lately been adopted, both with regard to the fitting of the ships for their better preservation, while thus unemployed (Day Rot), and also as to the care and management of them by naval commissioned officers living constantly on board. (See Navy.)

Capacity of a Dock-Yard.—The capacity of a dock-yard for building, repairing, and refitting ships of war, depends upon so many circumstances, that it scarcely admits of calculation; chiefly, however, on the facilities afforded by a suitable arrangement of dry-docks, building slips, and basins, and on the number of shipwrights and other artificers borne on the strength of the yard. In building new ships, where the materials are at hand, and no interruptions occur, the capacity may be ascertained to a tolerable degree of accuracy. To complete the building of a 74 gun-ship, it is calculated that the labour of one man would be required for 18,000 days, or of 18 men for 1000 days, or about 54 men to finish her in one year. A dock-yard, therefore, with 500 good shipwrights, might be expected to launch from eight to ten sail of the line every year, if the conveniences of the yard admitted them all to be employed on building. But with regard to repairs, they are so various and so uncertain, that it would be next to impossible to form any calculation that should at all approach to the truth. A writer, well-versed in naval matters, in attempting to prove the sufficiency of our dockyards, without having recourse to private merchant yards during war, has stated, that by an uniform system of management, "the annual regeneration of ships of the line may be safely reckoned at twelve sail, and that of frigates at eight sail;" and that besides, there "might be docked for casual repairs, in the course of one year, two hundred and sixty-seven sail of ships and vessels of war." (Letter to Lord Melville on the General State of the Navy, 1810.)

When Henry VIII. first established a regular management of the dock-yard at Woolwich, he appointed a board, consisting of certain commissioners, for the management of all naval matters; and it is curious enough, as appears from the Pepysian Collection of Manuscripts in the University of Cambridge, that the regulations which he made for the civil government of the navy, and which were, in the reign of Edward VI., revised, arranged, and turned into ordinances, form the broad basis of all the subsequent instructions given to the several officers, to whom the management of the civil affairs of the navy has been committed. (First Rep. Nav. Rev.)

The Commissioners of the Navy then consisted of the Vice-Admiral of England, the Master of the Ordnance, the Surveyor of the Marine Causes, the Treasurer, Comptroller, General Surveyor of the Victualling, Clerk of the Ships, and Clerk of the Stores. They had each their particular duties; and once a week they were ordered to meet at their office on Tower Hill, and once a month to report their proceedings to the Lord High Admiral.

In 1609 the principal officers for conducting the civil affairs of the navy were suspended in consequence of many abuses being complained of; and other commissioners were appointed, with powers to manage, settle, and put the affairs of the navy into a proper train, and to prevent, by such measures as might appear to be necessary, the continuance of the many great frauds and abuses which had prevailed. A similar commission was renewed in 1618, which in a full and minute report detailed and explained those frauds and abuses.

That commission, which ended on the death of James I., was renewed by his successor, and remained in force till 1628, when it was dissolved; Dock-Yards, and the management of the navy was restored to the Board of Principal Officers, as established by Edward VI.

In the disturbed reign of Charles I., the navy was suffered to go to decay; but by the extraordinary exertions of Cromwell, it was raised to a height which it had never before reached; but again declined under the short and feeble administration of his son.

On the restoration of Charles II., the Duke of York was appointed Lord High Admiral; and by his advice a committee was appointed to consider a plan he had drawn out for the future regulation of the affairs of the navy, at which he himself presided.

"In all naval affairs," say the Commissioners of Revision, "he appears to have acted with the advice and assistance of Mr Samuel Pepys, who first held the office of Clerk of the Acts, and was afterwards Secretary of the Admiralty; a man of extraordinary knowledge in all that related to the business of that department, of great talents, and the most indefatigable industry."

The entire management of the navy was now in the hands of the Duke, as Lord High Admiral, by whom three new commissioners were appointed to act conjunctly with the Treasurer of the Navy, the Comptroller, the Surveyor, and Clerk of the Acts, as Principal Officers and Commissioners of the Navy; a book of instructions, drawn out by Mr Pepys, was sent to the Navy Board for its guidance; a rapid progress was made in the repair and augmentation of the fleet; but being called away, in consequence of the Dutch war in 1664, the example of zeal and industry set by Mr Pepys was not sufficient, in the Duke's absence, to prevent neglect and mismanagement in every department except his own.

From 1673 to 1679, the office of Lord High Admiral being put in commission, at the head of which Prince Rupert was placed, the King, by Mr Pepys, arranged all naval affairs; but in the latter year, when the Duke was sent abroad, and Mr Pepys to the tower, a new set of men were made commissioners of the navy, who, without experience, ability or industry, suffered the navy to go to decay. "All the wise regulations," say the commissioners of revision, "formed during the administration of the Duke of York, were neglected; and such supineness and waste appear to have prevailed, as at the end of not more than five years, when he was recalled to the office of Lord High Admiral, only 22 ships, none larger than a fourth rate, with two fire-ships, were at sea; those in the harbour were quite unfit for service; even the 30 new ships which he had left building had been suffered to fall into a state of great decay, and hardly any stores were found to remain in the dock-yards." He reappointed Mr Pepys as Secretary of the Admiralty; he set about an inquiry into the characters and abilities of the first ship-builders in England, and by the advice of Mr Pepys, joined Sir Anthony Dean, eminent in that profession, with three others, to the former principal officers, in a new commission. The old commissioners were directed entirely to confine their attention to the business of a committee of accounts. To each of the new ones was entrusted a distinct branch of the proposed reform; and it appears, that, highly to their credit, "they performed what they had undertaken, in less time than was allowed for it, and at less expense;" having completed their business to the general satisfaction of the public, two months before the Revolution.

The business of the navy, thus methodized and settled, remained undisturbed by that event. The commissioners of revision justly observed, that "the great work of re-establishing the fleet, and restoring order, industry, and discipline, in the dock-yards, accomplished in so short a time by the commissioners then chosen, with so much care, proves, in the most convincing manner, how much depends on having the civil affairs of the navy placed under the management of men of real ability, professional knowledge, and uninterrupted industry."

It will readily be supposed, that the vast increase of our naval force since that time, has necessarily required many additional orders and regulations, some of which, from circumstances, are not compatible with each other; some given to one dock-yard and not to another; others in one yard became obsolete, while they continued to be acted upon in another; so that there was no longer that uniformity in the management which it is so desirable, indeed so essentially necessary to preserve. From the year 1764 to 1804, when his Majesty appointed a commission "for revising and digesting the civil affairs of his navy," the attention of the Lords of the Admiralty and the Navy Board had frequently been directed to this important subject; but owing to various causes, nothing was done to forward so desirable an arrangement, except that Sir Charles Middleton (afterwards Lord Barham), when comptroller of the navy, classed and digested under distinct heads, in a book for that purpose, all orders and regulations prior to the year 1786. The commissioners of naval inquiry, appointed in 1803, state the necessity of revising the instructions, and digesting the immense mass of orders issued to the dock-yard officers, and regret that a work of such utility should not have been completed. The late Lord Melville, to whom the navy is perhaps more indebted than to any single individual, and who, from the active part he had long taken in its concerns, was well aware of the irregularities and disorder which prevailed in the dockyards, on his appointment to the administration of naval affairs, determined to carry into execution a complete system of reform and of uniform management, in all the several departments. The commission consisted of Admiral Lord Barham, John Fordyce, Esq. Admiral Sir Roger Curtis, Bart. Vice Admiral Domett, and Ambrose Serle, Esq. They made fifteen distinct reports; the date of the first being June 13th, 1805; of the last, the 6th March 1808; all of which except two have been printed, by order of the House of Commons, and mostly carried into effect by his Majesty's Orders in Council. One of the two not printed, is an inquiry into the state of the navy at different periods, and of naval timber; the other relates to the formation of a new dock-yard at Northfleet, which, however advisable and even necessary the design of it might have been considered, at the time when Bonaparte was energetically carrying on his mighty plans, for the creation of a naval force to contest the power of Dock-Yards—the ocean with Great Britain, will, as has already been observed, no longer be thought so, under present circumstances.

Uniform System of Management introduced.

From these reports have been established, for the first time, in all his Majesty's dock-yards, one uniform system of management, by which incalculable advantages are said to have been derived to the public, in the preventing of frauds, in the saving of labour and materials, and consequently time and expense, and in securing better workmanship in the construction of ships, which is perhaps of all other considerations the most important.

The management of the dock-yards, and of all the civil affairs of the navy, is entrusted to certain commissioners appointed by patent, of whom the comptroller of the navy and three surveyors, and seven other commissioners, form a board at Somerset House, for the general direction and superintendence of the civil concerns of the navy, subject to the control of the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty. At most of the home yards and of the foreign yards is a commissioner of the navy, who is always a naval officer, of the rank of post-captain. The foreign yards, over which a commissioner presides, are Bermuda, Cape of Good Hope, Gibraltar, Halifax, Jamaica, Malta, Quebec, Kingston, including the lake-establishments, and Trincomallee, which, with the five belonging to the home yards, Woolwich (including Deptford), Chatham, Sheerness, Portsmouth, and Plymouth, make the whole number of commissioners of the navy amount to twenty-four. The salary of each of the Home Commissioner is L.1000 a-year; that of the Comptroller L.2000. The salary of the Foreign Commissioners L.1200 a-year, except that of the Cape of Good Hope, which is L.1800, and Trincomallee which is L.3000 a-year. They are also entitled to very liberal superannuations when unfit for further service; and at their death, their widows receive a pension for life of L.300 a-year.

The establishment of the navy-office at Somerset House consists of eleven commissioners; a secretary and assistant secretary; two secretaries to the committees of accounts and stores; an assistant to the surveyors; a receiver of fees and paymaster of contingencies; and 150 clerks with salaries from L.800 to L.90 a-year, besides a surveyor of buildings and six draughtsmen, messengers, porter, &c.—the total annual expense of which, as voted by Parliament in 1817, amounted to L.77,504, 18s. 6d.—(Ordinary Estimate of the Navy.)

The treasurer of the navy is a high and responsible officer, appointed by the crown, and removable at pleasure. His salary was L.4000 a-year, but has recently been reduced to L.3000. The establishment of the navy pay-office at Somerset House consists of a paymaster and deputy, three cashiers, one for the navy, one for the victualling, and one for the allotment branch; an accountant, inspector, a superintendent of the payments of the dock-yards, resident in London, sixty established and eighteen extra clerks, besides six pay clerks and three conductors of money at the four pay-ports, Portsmouth, Plymouth, Chatham, and Sheerness. The annual expense of this establishment, as appears from the navy estimates of 1817, amounts to Dock-Yards L.43,241, 15s. 4d.—(Ordinary Estimate.)

To each of the four dock-yards, Deptford, Portsmouth, Plymouth, and Chatham, are victualling establishments for supplying the fleet with provisions and water; and also at Dover, Cork, Cape of Good Hope, Gibraltar, and Malta. There is no resident commissioner at any of the victualling establishments, either at home or abroad; but the superintendent of the victualling-yard at Deptford, which is the great depot of provisions for the fleet, is a post-captain in the navy. At each of the others, the duty of providing, and of issuing provisions to his Majesty's ships, is entrusted to an officer named the "Agent Victualler." The victualling of the navy was formerly under the direction and superintendence of the navy board; but at length the navy increased to such a magnitude as to render a separate establishment necessary, to which the furnishing of all supplies of provisions, both at home and abroad, should be entrusted, subject to the control of the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty. The victualling board at Somerset House consists of a chairman and deputy-chairman, the former with a salary of L.1200, the latter of L.1000 a-year, and five other commissioners with salaries of L.800 a-year each; a secretary to the board, and a secretary to the committee of accounts; a registrar of securities, and 136 clerks, with salaries varying from L.800 to L.80 a-year, according to their class and length of service, the total annual expense of which amounted, in 1817, to L.45,541, 13s. 4d.

The Commissioners of Victualling are also allowed to retire on superannuations when unfit for service, and discretionary pensions settled on their widows and children.

The Transport Board having been dissolved at the end of the war, its twofold duties were divided between the Navy and Victualling Boards; those which concerned the hiring of transports devolved on the Commissioners of the Navy, and those which related to the sick and hurt department, on the Commissioners of the Victualling Board, on whom also devolves the direction and superintendence of all the naval hospitals at home and abroad.

The principal officers of an established dock-yard are, 1. The commissioner. 2. The master attendant. 3. The master shipwright. 4. The clerk of the yard, and the check. 5. The store-keeper. 6. The clerk of the survey; to which have recently been added the subordinate officers of timber-master, and the master measurer. There are besides several assistants to the master attendant and master shipwright, foremen, sub-measurers, quartermen, and converters, surgeon, chaplain, boatswain, warden, &c. The enumeration of the establishment of salary-officers of one yard, Portsmouth, for instance, will serve to convey a general idea of the whole.

1. The Commissioner's salary L.1100 a-year (all others L.1000); three clerks with salaries from L.400 to L.120.

2. Two masters attendant, one at L.650, the other at L.500 a-year; one clerk to both.

3. Master shipwright, L.720 a-year, three clerks from L.300 to L.120. 4. Clerk of the check, salary L.600; eight clerks from L.400 to L.80. 5. Storekeeper, salary L.600 a-year; twelve clerks from L.400 to L.80. 6. Clerk of the survey, L.500; eight clerks from L.400 to L.80. 7. Clerk of the rope yard, L.350; one clerk. 8. Engineer and mechanist, L.600 (at Portsmouth only), with a draughtsman; one clerk. 9. Timber master, salary L.500; seven clerks from L.250 to L.80. 10. Three assistants to the master attendant at L.220 each; one assistant to the timber-master, L.200; three assistants to the master shipwright, L.400 each. 11. The master-measurer, L.250 a-year; ten clerks from L.200 to L.80. 12. Thirty-five foremen from L.250 to L.80 each. 13. Sub-measurers, quartermen, and converters, from L.180 to L.160 each. 14. The master mast-maker, sail-maker, boat-builder, joiner, house-carpenter, brick-layer, smith, ropemaker, rigger, painter (wood-mills, metal-mills, mill-wright, at Portsmouth only); with salaries each, from L.260 to L.200 a-year. 15. 22 Cabin-keepers from L.100 to L.60 each. 16. A surgeon, L.500; assistant L.200. 17. Chaplain, L.500. 18. Boatswain, L.250. 19. Warden of the gate, L.200.

Watchmen, warders, and rounders.

The total amount of the salaries paid to the above mentioned officers in the year 1817, in Portsmouth yard alone, was L.50,065, 5s. (Estimates of the Ordinary of the Navy, 1817.)

The duties of these several officers may briefly be summed up as under:

The Commissioner has full authority over all officers and other persons employed in the dock-yard and ordinary; can suspend any officer until the decision of the Lords of the Admiralty or Navy Board shall be taken, sends a daily report of transactions relating to the shipping, to the Admiralty, and another more detailed report of the transactions of the yard, to the navy office; he is to see that the officers of the several departments be diligent and attentive to their respective duties; to visit the storehouses, and examine the stores received from the contractors; to use every means for preventing embezzlement of stores; to examine any ship or vessel meant to be purchased or hired, to see that she is fit for the service intended; to superintend the general monthly muster of all the men belonging to the yard, and to the ordinary once each quarter; to control the quarterly payments of the yard, and of all ships where there is no pay-captain specially appointed for that service; to co-operate with the commander-in-chief, captains, and officers of his Majesty's ships in commission; and, generally, to adopt such regulations and instructions for the management of the yard as may appear to be most expedient for the benefit of the public service.

Master Attendant.—The duties of this officer are highly important both in the dock-yard and afloat. Of that part of the latter, however, which gave him the responsibility for the general care and management of the ships in ordinary, he has been relieved by recent regulations, in consequence of the ordinary being placed under the superintendence of commissioned officers of the navy. He has still, however, to take care that the iron ballast of ships laid up in ordinary be ready for sea service; that the ships have on board a proper quantity of shingle ballast to keep them down to a proper depth in the water; that the ships be arranged at their moorings according to their respective draughts of water; to see that when any ship is put in commission, the iron ballast be stowed according to the established plan; to see that the moorings are of a proper size; to lay them and the transporting buoys down, and to take care that they are kept in a proper state of repair; not to permit any merchant vessel to lie at them, or alongside of the ships in ordinary; that no strange boats loiter about the ships, or wharfs, or jetty-heads. He is to attend the docking, grounding, and graving all of his Majesty's ships, by day or night; to take charge of them while transporting from and to their moorings; to give assistance to all ships in distress, within the limits of the port and neighbourhood; to appoint craft for the conveyance of stores to or from his Majesty's ships, all the sailing and other craft belonging to the yards being under his directions; to survey all ships tendered to Government, in company with the master shipwright and clerk of the survey; he is to keep an account of the entry and discharge of all sailmakers, riggers, and riggers-labourers, employed in his department of the yard, whom he is to examine as to their qualifications; to visit frequently the sail-loft and rigging-house, and, in conjunction with the master, sail-master, and master-rigger, settle the work that is to be done on every succeeding day; he is carefully to inspect the qualities and dimensions of all stores with the storekeeper and the respective masters of the trades, rejecting all such as may not be agreeable to contract. He is to take care to provide rigging and stores in due time, for every ship that shall be ordered to be brought forward for commission; he is to join the clerk of the survey in warranting all stores demanded for a ship refitting; to examine all the boatswain's stores landed from a dismantled ship; and all sails, cables, cordage, and other old stores, before they are delivered into the charge of the storekeeper; and, in company with the storekeeper, frequently to examine the state of the stores. These, and numerous other duties connected with the receipt and expenditure of stores, and the distribution of the labour of a very considerable proportion of the strength of the yard, fall to the lot of the master attendant, who is always selected from among the old and experienced masters in the navy.

Master Shipwright—Has the superintendence of Master all ships ordered to be built, repaired, and refitted; is ordered to be present at the launching, docking, and undocking, grounding, and graving of all ships; the disposal of all the shipwrights, caulkers, house-carpenters, joiners, &c. ashore and afloat, the examination of them when entered on the yard; has the sole direction of the boatswain of the yard, of the mast-makers, boat-builders, capstan and top-makers, and Dock-Yards generally all such as are employed on wood-work.

All the carpenters of ships in ordinary are under his directions; all the timber of the yard is at his disposal; and the timber-master, who is more immediately charged with the management of the timber, as to its arrangement, conversion, &c. is to follow the direction of the master-shipwright. He keeps an account of the expenses of the repairs and refitment of ships, as well as of ships building, and assists in preparing the Parliamentary estimates for the extraordinary of the navy in each year. He attends the surveys of ships coming in from sea, and reports the nature of their defects, and when a ship is brought forward for service from a state of ordinariness, he estimates the expense and the time that may be required to fit her for sea. From the master shipwrights are selected persons to fill the important situation of "Surveyor of the Navy."

Clerk of the Check.—Is an officer of great trust, and charged with many important duties. He keeps an accurate account of the entry and discharge of every man in the yard; musters them either himself or by his clerks, every time they pass the gates, into or out of the yard, and checks those that may be absent; keeps an account of the pay earned by every man; musters the ordinary once a month, and every ship in commission at the port at uncertain times; also the crews of all tenders, store-ships, navy transports, and other hired vessels, and all ships belonging to the public service, immediately on their arrival in port. He attends the receipt of all stores, articles, and materials of every kind delivered into the yard, and examines with the proper officers all works performed by contract; takes an account of all stores received as a check upon the storekeeper; of hemp, tar, and other materials for the rope-yard, as a check on the clerk of the rope-yard; receives the money produced by the sales of old stores or chips, and pays the contingent expenses of the yard; attends all the payments of the yard and the ordinary; pays bounty and conduct money; and at the end of every quarter furnishes the Navy Board with complete copies of all his accounts.

Storekeeper.—This officer has the charge of all the storehouses in the yard, and stores of every description, as well manufactured articles as raw materials, with the exception of timber and hemp, which are in charge of the timber-master and clerk of the rope-yard respectively, until manufactured, when they are also delivered over to the storekeeper. Attended by the clerk of the check, the clerk of the survey, and the other respective officers and musters of the trades, he carefully inspects the qualities and dimensions of all articles received into the yard, and rejects all such as may not be agreeable to contract, or abates of the price or quantity according to any deficiency that may appear; each species is then entered in a rough book, and, when checked and examined, is brought into the ledger. He has the sole charge of all slops, beds, bedding, and marine clothing; but he is not charged with old stores returned into the yard, such as sails, cables, copper, &c. until the master attendant, or master-shipwright, in their respective departments, have examined and charged him with them, by a note under their hands. At the end of every quarter he transmits to the Navy Office all the rough receipt books, vouchers of receipts, and issues, with Dock-Yard correct abstract, and a quarterly balance of stores on hand.

The stores belonging to each ship at the port are kept in their proper store-births, and marked with the ship's name to which they belong; and when a ship is to be brought forward for commission, all her stores are immediately placed in the birth belonging to the ship. All stores are marked by the storekeeper with the broad arrow, the distinguishing mark of the king's stores. The difficulty of examining the immense quantity of certain articles of stores, operated at one time against any examination whatever; and it generally happened, on the appointment of a new storekeeper, that the quantities in store differed very materially with the balances in the ledger; but, of late years, this evil has been remedied by obliging the storekeeper to compare the quantities on hand with the balance in his books, whenever any species of store shall be reduced so low as to admit of its being done without inconvenience to the public service. It is obvious that, although every practicable check has been adopted on the receipts and issues of the storekeeper, that this officer is charged with a high and responsible situation of trust.

Clerk of the Survey.—The duties of this ancient Clerk of the officer were probably at one time more important than Survey they now are, though he is still charged with a great variety of business, connected chiefly with the store department, on which he is the main check, especially as far as regards the issues of stores to ships in commission, and the returns when put out of commission. He keeps an account of the stores issued to each person, and charges him with the same. He takes a monthly survey of the remains of stores issued for the annual service of the yard. He is to see that the quantity of stores issued to ships when put in commission or when refitting, is conformable with the establishment, and that each ship has neither more nor less than her exact proportion; and he is to supply her commander with a complete survey-book, containing the dimensions of her masts, and yards, and sails, size and length of rigging, blocks, &c. and an account of all the stores committed to the charge of the boatswain and carpenter, whose expense-books are examined, together with the remains, on her return to port, by the clerk of the survey. On the death or removal of a storekeeper, the clerk of the survey, in conjunction with the newly appointed successor, and such others as may be appointed, is to take a complete survey of all the stores in the yard, in order that the new storekeeper may be regularly charged therewith, and become responsible for the same. These are the principal duties; but there are many others which the clerk of the survey has to perform, and which require his constant and unremitting attendance.

Clerk of the Rope-yard has the charge of the rope-yard, and all the store-houses belonging to it, and musters all persons employed in the rope-yard every time they come in to work, and in the evening when they leave work. He attends the receipt of all stores for his department, in which he is checked by a clerk from the Clerk of the Check's Office, and another from that of the Clerk of the Survey;—he attends all payments of the rope-yard, and transmits quar- Engineer and Mechanist.—This officer is of recent appointment, and is borne on the establishment of Portsmouth Dock-yard only; the wood and metal mills, and the block machinery, being confined to that yard; and they require a person of great skill and judgment, not only to keep them in order, but to suggest improvements, and to examine any new invention in mechanics that may be proposed for his Majesty's service in any of the dock-yards.

Timber-Master.—This officer is also of recent appointment. Formerly all timber received into the yard was placed under the charge of the store-keeper, and under the management of the master shipwright and his assistants; the one having no professional knowledge, and the other little or no responsibility while in its rough state. The difficulty of procuring a supply of certain descriptions of timber, and the ravages committed by the dry-rot, have effected a change in the charge and management of this important article highly advantageous to the public service. The timber-master is now the responsible person; and, in consequence of which, more care and attention are bestowed in the classing, stacking, and keeping an accurate account of the receipt and expenditure of timber, than at any former period. Though thirty or forty thousand loads may be in a dock-yard at one time, every single log or balk is marked, numbered, and assorted in so methodical a manner, that any individual piece can, at a moment's notice, be pointed out; and where the master shipwright may demand a piece of timber for some particular purpose, the stack is immediately pointed out where such piece is to be found. To preserve this arrangement—to examine all the timber as it comes into the yard—to keep the account of the receipts and expenditure, with all the various duties attached to this office, require a number of clerks, who are constantly employed under the timber-master.

Master-Measurer.—This officer likewise presides over a department but recently created; and, with the Foremen, Sub-measurer, Quarter-men, &c., forms a large addition to the number of salary-officers in the dock-yards; but the appointment was deemed necessary, in consequence of the new system of building and repairing ships, by what is called Task and Job; the former being applied to the building of new ships, and the latter to the repairing of old ones; both, in fact, mean, the paying for work by the piece, but estimated in a different way. Thus, for building a ship of 100 guns, and 2163 tons, by task, the sum to be allowed was calculated at L.6615, or at the rate of L.3, 1s. per ton; while for a 74 gun-ship of 1620 tons, the allowance was to be L.4374, being at the rate of L.2, 14s. per ton. But as it could not be expected that the workmen would require no payment till this ship was completed, or that they should be paid before-hand, it was necessary to ascertain the progress of the work, in order to pay them a proportionate sum; and, for this purpose, measurers were appointed, who had no interest in the work, to ascertain the value of the part performed. Job-work was attended with greater difficulty. The best estimate of the probable expense of repairing a ship is but a mere guess, as the extent of her defects are not known till every part has been examined. The usual mode was, to measure the works as they proceeded, by the quarter-men, Work checked by the foreman of the shipwrights,—approved by the assistant, who superintended the repair of the ship,—sent to the master shipwright, who, with the prices annexed, forwarded it to the Navy Board.

The Commissioners of Naval Inquiry (Sixth Report) clearly expose the "combination of self-interest which has been permitted to exist against the public, in all the persons who were concerned in the accounts of job-work, and the fictitious manner of making up those accounts." The quarter-men, for instance, were paid wages according to the amount of the earnings of the men under their own superintendence, and the accounts of those earnings were taken by themselves. General Bentham has furnished an instance of the gross abuses which existed under the old system of job-work. "By the regulations of the Navy Board, nothing less than L.5, 2s. was to be paid for the smallest repair of a 34 feet launch. If the above sum should be found inadequate to the payments for the work done to a boat of this class, the repair was then to be denominated a middling repair; in which case L.11, 1s. was the exact sum. Again, if this sum were insufficient, the repair was to be denominated a large repair; and, in this case, although the value of the workmanship might have exceeded the sum of L.11, 1s. only by a few shillings, the expense was to have appeared in the accounts as doubled, and set down L.22, 2s., and nothing less was to be the exact sum paid for this work." Nothing was more common in estimating a man's wages, to find him working three or four tides, and very often three nights, in one day. (Bentham's Services, &c.)

The whole of this system is now done away. The master-measurer being a professional man, has under his directions a certain number of sub-measurers, selected from among the shipwrights of the best characters for integrity and intelligence. These persons are to measure, daily, the work that has been performed in the course of that day by the several gangs of shipwrights, and value it according to a table which, after long experience and accurate observation, has been constructed by the officers and assistants of the yard, in such a manner that every piece of work performed on a new ship, from the keel upwards, and every bolt drawn or driven in the repair of an old one, has its adequate value; and, in order that task and job work should not any longer be, what the Commissioners of Naval Inquiry pronounced it to be, "the source of abuse and fraud," the quartermen do not, as formerly, partake of the earnings of the gang which they superintend, but are now sworn salary officers, whose interest it is, for their own character, and chance of advancement in the service, to see that every part of the work is performed in a proper and workmanlike manner; and the consequence is, that no new work is now paid for that is not actually performed; and that every part of the work is performed in the best possible man- Dock-Yards. By these schemes, it appears that a shipwright could earn generally about 6s. a-day in summer, and 4s. 6d. a-day in winter. The system of measurers, sub-measurers, quartermen, &c., being made salary officers, appears to be attended with very considerable expense; but the whole is a mere trifle, provided it be the means of preventing fraud, and of securing good ships to the navy. (See Ship-Building.) That it does both appear to be the opinion of the best informed officers of the dock-yards; and the advantages which are so obviously to be derived from piece-work, provided the workmen are properly superintended, have induced the Navy Board to extend the task and job scheme not only to all the artificers of the dock-yards, but also to the labourers, where it can be done, as is now the general practice in almost all private manufactories. (Third Report of Commissioners of Naval Revision.)

Master Mast-Maker, &c.—These masters of the several trades have the immediate superintendence of all the work done, and the persons employed in their respective departments; the mast-maker, boat-builder, joiner, house-carpenter, bricklayer, smith, and painter, being under the direction of the master shipwright, and his assistants; the sail-maker and rigger under the master attendant, and the rope-maker under that of the clerk of the rope-yard. Each of these masters have immediately under them a certain number of foremen, who superintend the working men, and take a particular account of the earnings of each. Both masters and foremen are taken from among the most respectable and intelligent of the several trades, and are a most useful body of men in the dock-yards.

Cabin-Keepers.—The store-cabins in the dockyard contain an assortment of stores for the current service, and are placed under the charge of the master shipwright or the master-attendant, according to the nature of the stores which are placed in them. To each of these inferior store rooms is appointed a cabin-keeper, who is charged by the store-keeper with the quantities of the several articles delivered to him, an account of which is entered in his supply-book; and the articles delivered by him on a note from the superior officers of the yard, are entered in his expense-book; and once a-week these books are compared by the superior officer of the department under which the cabin is placed, to see that no waste or embezzlement may have taken place. The cabin-keeper being an officer of trust, is required to give bond, with a respectable security, in the sum of L200, for the due and faithful execution of his office.

Surgeon and Assistant—Have the care of the men belonging to the Ordinary in all cases of sickness or hurts; but of the workmen in the dock-yards, in cases of wounds or hurts only. One or other are required to attend constantly during the working hours, and to muster such of his patients as are able to attend every morning. The surgeon is to examine every artificer, apprentice, and workman, of every description, previous to his entry on the yard, to ascertain his fitness as to bodily strength, and whether Dock-Yards he may labour under any disease or infirmity. He is strictly forbidden to have any professional practice whatever but what may be required by his public duty, and his attendance on the families of the officers resident in the dock-yard.

Boatswain—Has the superintendence, under the master shipwright, and his assistant, of all the scaven-men, labourers, and teams of horses; of the unloading and landing of all timber and other stores; of all the cranes, crane-ropes, slings, &c. and of the fire-engines; and he keeps a daily account of the employment of the scaven-men, labourers, and teams, a copy of which is delivered at the end of every week to the master shipwright.

Warden of the Gate—Has the superintendence of Warden all wardens employed in the yard, and has charge of the gate, through which he is not to permit any stranger, improper person, or foreigner, to pass. He is to see that nothing is carried out of the yard improperly, and to cause the bell to be rung at the proper hour, for the workmen to enter, according to the season of the year.

The principal officers at each of the victualling establishments at home are, 1. The agent victualler. 2. The clerk of the check. 3. The store-keeper. After these come, 1. The master cooper. 2. The master brewer. 3. The master butcher. 4. The master baker. 5. The miller; and 6. The superintendent of the wharf. The agent has L600 a year; the rest from L400 to L200 a-year, and the number of all the salary officers, including the clerks, may amount to about 40 at each of the four victualling establishments at home.

All the officers, clerks, artificers, and labourers of the civil establishments of the navy, are entitled to a pension on their retirement on account of old age or infirmities, proportioned to the length of their services, provided each service shall have exceeded ten years.

The total annual expence of all the branches of the civil establishments of the navy in the year 1817 stood as under:

| Establishment | Annual Expence | |---------------|---------------| | Admiralty-office, with all contingencies | L 53,763 16 7 | | Navy pay-office | L 43,241 15 4 | | Navy-office | L 77,904 18 6 | | Deptford dock-yard | L 27,682 0 0 | | Woolwich | L 32,440 12 0 | | Chatham | L 36,883 10 4 | | Sheerness | L 26,659 6 0 | | Portsmouth | L 59,969 5 0 | | Plymouth | L 45,299 13 0 | | Outports | L 9,687 13 5 | | Foreign yards | L 42,599 18 7 | | Victualling-office | L 45,841 13 4 | | Victualling-yards | L 54,740 7 0 | | Superannuations of the officers, secretaries, clerks, artificers, and labourers retired from all the establishments of the civil concern of the navy | L 55,570 1 8 |

Total annual expence | L 641,784 11 8 |

(Estimates of the Navy for 1817.)