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OUR LIGHT-HOUSE ESTABLISHMENT.

"Myriad lights illuminate the sea, Encircling continent and ocean vast, In one humanity."

THE HE protection of commerce is a serious thing; for modern science, skill, and enterprise have given to navigation a broad development, which makes past achievements shrink to insignificance. Over three-fourths of the earth's surface, the pathless keel glides onward, and innumerable vessels weave a mesh of circling tracks around the world such as no Ariadne of the sea can unravel. To us, the Argonauts, Ulysses, Æneas, and all who, through the Pillars of Hercules, sought Atlantis, are only heroic by courtesy of the imagination. However we may admire Vasco, Columbus, or Cook, we cannot conceive any Camoens so insane as to frame a Lusiad in this age of steamers. Two thousand years ago, commerce cautiously crept along a few hundred miles of shore; now, all seas are whitened with its sails, and the obscurest precincts of barbarism testify to the ubiquity of commercial enterprise and the extent of modern navigation. From Archangel to Patagonia, from Grinnel Land to Cape Town, and throughout Oceanica, the adventurers of commerce range in quest of whatever will minister to human necessity, convenience, taste, or luxury. No longer is the shore hugged; but it is, rather, dreaded as dangerous. No peril suffices to prevent each year from contributing its increment to the amount of life and property afloat, until we may well ask when and how this rapid crescendo will terminate. It is a fearful thought, that the sea is becoming a great cemetery. Had we a true census of the living now on the ocean, and of the dead beneath its surface, we should stand alike aghast at both resalts. Vast, indeed, is the multitude of those who now go down to the sea in ships," and vast, too, is that portion of man's wealth which has at some time been thus transported. When, therefore, we advocate the best possible system of aids to navigation, our advocacy concerns an interest such as none can gainsay, and a seafaring multitude whose security touches the inner life of the nation.

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Isolated states can only take fragmentary parts in establishing a univer

sal system of aids to navigation, which shall look to giving security to the world's commerce as a unit. Each civilized community is certainly bound to make its own coasts as secure as it can. Barbarous shores, where no local power exists competent to erect a light-house, have hitherto been mainly left in congenial darkness. But the time must come, perhaps it has come, when civilized nations, in the name of our common humanity, shall associate themselves for the purpose of devising and executing some appropriate system of aids to navigation, wherever they may be needed.

It would be an enduring honor to our country, judiciously to take the initiative in this field, and thus to testify that its fostering care follows the American flag over all waters. It would certainly be no impossible achievement of diplomacy, to form a Board, forever neutral, in which all the associated nations should be duly represented according to tonnage, and which should have power to light all shores now in darkness. Till such a consummation is realized, each nation is, at the least, bound to take good heed that no unnecessary dangers beset its own coasts.

Two widely dissimilar systems of light-house support have been extensively practiced. The first continues to prevail in England, Scotland, Ireland, Holland, Denmark, Norway, and Sweden. It consists in levying special light dues on vessels passing each light, either by special collectors or by arrangement with the collectors of national customs. The other system prevails in France, Prussia, Russia, and the United States. The government, assuming the system of aids to navigation as a national trust or duty, proceeds, in these countries, by direct appropriations, to construct and maintain the works required for this object. The first system is miserable in theory and practice. It has in England led to utterly indefensible extortions. It affords either too little revenue to properly effect its purpose, or so much as to breed gross corruption and maladministration. It lacks

unity, is limited in responsibility, involves costly machinery of collection, and has almost every attribute of a bad system. As all maritime nations derive a large portion of their revenues from import customs, it is peculiarly proper that the cost of all aids to navigation should be defrayed by their general treasuries. By a direct national assumption of the light-house establishment, it is disentangled from all private privileges, and can be organized in the simplest and most efficient manner. In respect of international comity, there is as much to commend the national as there is to condemn the extortional system. Toll-gates are always public nuisances, and every petty tax hampers commerce with disproportionate vexations and obstructions. It is truly ungracious for Great Britain, Holland, etc., to levy exorbitant light dues on our vessels, while we are maintaining as many free lights as all the tax-gatherers combined; but it is a downright imposition for England to impose on foreign vessels, under the guise of light dues, a large portion of the 8,766 pensions paid by the Trinity House Corporation to decayed British seamen and their families. The intelligent mercantile opinion in Great Britain is undoubtedly strongly averse to the whole system of light dues, with its concomitant extravagancies and pension list; nor do we think any disinterested man of sense can examine the relative workings of the English and French light-house systems, without mingled contempt and indignation towards the former, and nearly unqualified admiration of the latter.

Before entering on a detailed exposition of our own light-house establishment, it will be a useful preliminary rapidly to review the history and present condition of light-house administration in other countries. Historic records indicate, that but few light-houses existed until quite recent dates, and these must have been extremely inefficient. The Colossus of Rhodes, the Pharos of Alexandria, the towers of Sestos and Abydos, the towers at Ostia and Ravenna, one on the coast of Batavia, the tower of Corunna, the stone light-house of Cassio, Cæsar's altar at Dover, and the Roman structures at Holywell and Flamborough-head, are all we can name, anterior to the truly magnificent Corduan tower at the mouth

of the Garonne, begun in 1584 and finished in 1610. This tower enjoys the eminent distinction of having been the first one furnished with each of the two systems of illuminating apparatus, now in use, and of having been always an exponent of the highest proficiency in sea-coast illumination. The Eddystone, Bell Rock, Skerryvore, Carlingford, Genoa, Belle-Isle, Čarysfort, Sand Key and Brandywine towers, with many others, may be mentioned as celebrated or striking works of art and engineering. We much doubt if the renowned Alexandrian Pharos would, in any rational and practical respect, even as a construction, bear comparison with these.

The general control of the English lights is now vested in the Trinity House Corporation of Deptford Strond. This body was recognized by Queen Elizabeth, as "a company of the chiefest and most expert masters and governors of ships, incorporate within themselves," and she conferred on it the offices, rights, and emoluments of buoyage, beaconage, and ballastage. The charter now in force was given by James II. In 1851, the Trinity Board consisted of thirty-two Elder Brethren-the Duke of Wellington being Master, Capt. Sir J. G. Pelly, Deputy Master, and Jacob Herbert, Esq., Secretary: twenty of the Elder Brethren were naval and merchant captains, and eleven were admirals or heads of departments. In 1844, there were, in England, sixty-five fixed and twenty-five floating lights under the Trinity Board, besides seventy-five fixed and nine floating harbor or local lights, primarily under Trinity House direction, and secondarily under local boards or managements. The Admiralty list of 1854 gives a total of 183 English lights of all descriptions. In the year 1831-2, the gross collection for sixty-nine English lights was £162,717, the collection charge £16,914, and the expense of maintaining the lights £45,013; leaving £100,789 net surplus levied on shipping in one year more than was required for supporting the lights. In 1844, the total light and buoyage dues received by Trinity House, from seventy-two establishments, amounted to £254,910. In 1843, the whole revenue of Trinity House was £300,190-of which only £59,746 was expended in the maintenance of lights, and £111,537 directly on aids to navigation.

The light-houses of England were, to a great extent, built under grants to individuals as rewards for political services, eminent dirty work, and high birth. The misery of a disgraceful history hangs around them still. An ancient odor of Old Sarum, makes it unpleasant to retrace their annals, and the extortionate rates, in various instances, established, indicate that the Vikings had abandoned the sea and contracted a fondness for the shore. In 1822, the select Parliamentary committee on commerce somewhat investigated Trinity House matters; and in 1834, and 1845, two successive select committees on light-houses, both headed by Mr. Hume, thoroughly exposed the vices of the prevailing system, and recommended various important modifications, especially the extinction of private light tenures, the abandonment of light dues, and the formation of a central Board for Great Britain and Ireland. In 1836, Trinity corporation was empowered to purchase certain outstanding private lights and leases. Ten lights and leases were thus bought in at an aggregate cost of £1,182,546, most of which stands as a debt against the corporation-a striking proof of the extortionate character of the legalized light dues. Some of the officers of Trinity Board have since set up the monstrous pretension, that the English lights are not held by the Board in trust; but that the corporation has an absolute fee simple ownership of them, and can do what it pleases with the dues. Nothing but a pretension thus broad would afford a decent justification of the long endured Trinity pension system. The admission of such a claim makes the light administration totally irresponsible to Parliament, and excludes all guarantee against the indefinite continuance of exorbitant rates. In illustration of the oppressive operation of these rates, we may instance, that in 1844, four 368 ton vessels paid £643, light dues. In Scotland, a single small coasting steamer, which really made no use of the lights, had to pay £702, light dues, in a year. Imposts so utterly unreasonable, cannot be meekly borne forever by navigation. America has a special right to protest against this system, and such a protest would be obligatory, were not the English lights actually very good, and well kept, despite the vicious exactions by

which they are supported. We believe the Trinity Board, now, really does its duty as well as it can-that it is not responsible for the faults of history from which it suffers, and that a liberal, humane spirit among its members affords a fortunate corrective to the bad tendencies of an irresponsible light due. system, and gives a pledge that its worst evils will, ere long, be abated.

Scotland can boast of its Bell Rock and Skerryvore towers, and of the names of Brewster and Stevenson, so honored in light-house history. In 1786, an act of Parliament established the Board of Commissioners of Northern Lights," now consisting of twenty-five members, serving gratuitously, who are chiefly provosts, baillies, and sheriffs, without a single nautical or scientific member. It would seem singular and unaccountable, that a lawyer light-house board should have the honor to preside over one of the most efficient, economical, and well-managed establishments in the world, were it not that Robert, Alan, and David Stevenson have, successively, long filled the post of Northern Lights engineer, with full power to bring their talents effectively to bear on the construction, apparatus, inspection, and administration of these lights. The Secretary-an officer now of much importance-is Mr. A. Cunningham. The Bell Rock Committee does most of the business of the Commissioners, and from an incidental origin has become permanent. It is certainly a most unlucky organization which gives no place for men like Brewster and Forbes, in the direction of lights. The northern lights are supported by tonnage light dues-the gross amount levied being £37,463 in 1834, and £44,117 in 1843. An examination of receipts and expenditures, shows a tolerably economical administration, and reveals no extortion in the aggregates, though the operation of these dues must be quite unequal, and, in some cases, extremely oppres sive. All the public lights of Scotland are under the charge of the Commissioners-the local, or harbor lights, being maintained by special dues, and managed by local trustees. In 1844, there were twenty-nine public lights, and thirty-eight local ones, in Scotland. In 1851, the total number was seventy; and in 1854 it was eighty-five. As a whole, the northern light establishment (not its organization or revenue system),

does honor to the country, and is admirably administered.

The lights of Ireland are under the charge and control of the Ballast Board, or "Corporation for preserving and improving the port of Dublin," and their administration is a special branch of the duties of this Board. It consists of twenty-two members, five of whom are Dublin municipal officers, and seventeen are life members, chiefly merchants; also, a Comptroller, Secretary, Inspector, with an Assistant, and a Superintendent of light-vessels. The inspector is the engineer, and main executive officer, and this post has long been filled by Mr. Geo. Halpin. The establishment is supported by light dues, the amount of which, levied in 1834, was £45.773, and in 1844, £57,465. The expenditure of surplus dues has been quite faithfully applied to building new lights, and a reasonable economy characterizes the administration. The constructions have been very thorough, and though the organization seems anomalous, a rigid accountability has, in fact, prevailed. The total number of Irish lights, in 1844, was sixty, of which, twenty-seven were general coast lights, twenty-nine harbor lights, and three floating lights, under the Ballast Board, besides one free light. In 1851, this total was sixty-six, and in 1854, it was seventy-three.

Some of the British colonial lights are among the best and most useful in the world. We may specify the Morant Point, Gun Cay, Cay Sal, Gibbs' Hill, and Cape l'Agulhas, as peculiarly valuable. In 1853, the aggregate number of lights in the British North American colonies was 117. There were then twenty-seven English lights on the West India Islands and the coasts adjacent. In Africa, there were, in 1853, nine English lights, and of the seventy-five lights on the Asiatic coasts, and the East India Islands, a large part are British.

"The Merchant Shipping Law Amendment Act," which went into operation on Oct. 1, 1853, is a highly important legislative step towards a liberal fiscal policy in the administration of the British lights. It is a most honorable monument of the ability and enlarged views of Mr. Cardwell, M. P., a man among the foremost in sagacity and good works. This act, while leaving most of the prior organization un

touched, subjects the Trinity Board, the Commissioners of the Northern Lights, and the Ballast Board, to a thoroughly effective and practical supervision by the Board of Trade, which consists of "the Committee of Privy Council, appointed for the consideration of matters relating to Trade and Foreign Plantations." The act consolidates all the light and ballast dues of the Trinity, Northern Light, and Ballast Boards, with the receipts of the Board of Trade under the mercantile acts of 1850, and 1851, into "the Mercantile Marine fund," the account of which is kept by her Majesty's Paymaster General, and its application is directed by the Board of Trade, the Sovereign and Privy Council fixing, from time to time, the amounts chargeable to the fund on account of the several light establish ments. All estimates, accounts, and expenditures, must be sanctioned by the Board of Trade; and it has power to make loans for repairs and new constructions. It has, moreover, power to appoint persons with full authority to inspect light-houses; and Trinity House, with the sanction of the Board of Trade, is authorized to direct the other boards, concerning .the erection, continuance, removal, or alteration, of any lighthouse within their respective jurisdictions. The effect of this act is to concentrate, in London, the fiscal management of all the lights, buoys, etc., of the United Kingdom (some harbor lights, etc., excepted), and to make all chargeable to one fund, regularly administered by the Government, and only applicable to legitimate marine purposes. It is the first decided step towards an abolition of port dues, and it has already effected a most welcome reduction of their amount. Those who effected so great a reform, will scarcely rest till Great Britain has freed her ports from all obnoxious charges, and has ceased to peddle beneficence by tonnage rates. The host who should demand a penny from each person who entered his house, as a "due" for supporting his entrance lamp, is no fit model for a great nautical nation to imitate.

The most systematic and efficient light-house establishment in the world, is, doubtless, that of France. It has always been well and nationally administered, and is distinguished for its uniform economy, efficiency, skillful selection of sites, adaptation of structures,

and general perfection of towers and apparatus. Whatever contributions science has had to offer, have been candidly and promptly received, as might be expected, from the eminent scientific character of its governing commission. In 1851, the Channel, Ocean, Mediterranean, and Colonial lights of France numbered 198, of which 132 were lens lights, and of these, thirtyone were of the first, six of the second, eighteen of the third, and seventy-three of the fourth order. We have before us a detailed estimate of the annual expense of lighting and maintaining the French light-houses, dated in 1848, in which the grand total amounts to 400,936 francs, or about $80,000. Constructions and special repairs of course make separate items. All the lighthouses, buoys, and sea-marks of France are under the direction of the Lighthouse Commission, composed of naval officers, officers of the corps of bridges and roads (ponts et chaussées), and members of the Institute, all distinguished for scientific and professional attainments. The preparation of plans and estimates, the details of administration, and the execution of constructions and repairs, appertain to the general directory and departmental engineers of the ponts et chaussées. The secretary of the commission, an officer of ponts et chaussées, is of especial importance to the establishment, as on him devolves the management of the corre spondence and the direction of the office of the commission, besides the import ant duty of inspection. This office has been successively filled by Augustin Fresnel, his brother, Leonor Fresnel, and now by L. Reynaud. In 1851, the commission consisted of the minister of public works, Arago, Mathieu of the Institute, Rear-Admiral Mathieu, De Hell, Leroux, Tretté de Laroche, L. Fresnel, and Reynaud, secretary. Such men know how to stimulate and welcome improvements, and faithfully to administer a high trust. Who can wonder that the world owes so much of its present light-house knowledge to France! Political hacks and noble dolts would be sadly out of place in a commission so long honored by the devoted services of Augustin Fresnel, the profound analyst, the peerless optician, and the exquisite

inventor.

In Holland, the light-house establishment is under the department of the

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marine, and is specially directed by the inspector general of pilotage. In 1844, there were in Holland forty-eight lights, sixteen of which were fitted with lenses, and ten were of the first class. They are very well managed, and the Schouwen light is equal to any in the world. They are supported by light dues, varying at different ports. The annual cost of maintaining a first class light is $2,269, and of a harbor light $284. In Belgium, there were, in 1846, one coast, three tide, and two harbor lights. The Danish lights, buoys, etc., are under the charge of the General Board of Customs and Commerce at Copenhagen, and are administered by the "Inspector of Canals, Harbors, and Lights." A peculiar feature is, that there is a local inspector for each light, who is a person of standing and intelligence. In 1846, there were fortyfive Danish lights, seven of which were lens, and four were floating lights. In 1855, there were sixty-three. are supported by the Sound dues or light dues, and have a very good reputation. In Prussia, the lights are under the control of the minister of finance. There is an apparent lack of system in administering aids to navigation; but as Prussia in 1846 had only eleven lights, this may be unimportant. There are no special light dues; but the provincial or commercial authorities, who receive the port dues, appropriate enough to maintain the lights, beacons, and buoys. The annual expenditure at the Terchoff and Ancona lights is about $300 for each. In 1844, there were thirty-four lights in Norway, sixteen of which were general coast lights, and eight were lens lights. There were forty-seven in 1855. They are said to be well kept and administered, and they are supported by light dues. Sweden had twenty-nine lights in 1844, of which one was floating, eleven fixed, seven revolving, one intermitting, and nine harbor lights. Of these, eight were lens lights. In 1855, the number was thirty-seven. They are managed by officers of the Swedish navy, are supported by dues, and are regarded as quite good. In 1846, Russia had six floating, forty-nine fixed, five revolving, and three beacon lights, and sixty-nine unlighted beacons. They have since been undergoing rapid improvements, and the younger Soleil has, under government patronage, established the manufacture of light-house

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