Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 1.djvu/232

 and obscure positions, persevered against adverse and embarrassing circumstances, against the doubts, the opposition, and not unfrequently the ridicule of an incredulous world, until at length, truth was triumphant, and mankind now gathers the rich harvest sown by these illustrious labourers."

In 1808, Bell removed to the modern village of Helensburgh, on the Firth of Clyde, where his wife undertook the superintendence of the public baths, and at the game time kept the principal inn, whilst he continued to prosecute his favourite scheme, without much regard to the ordinary affairs of the world. In 1812 he produced his steam-boat, the Comet, of 30 tons burthen, with an engine of three horsepower. The Comet, so called from the celebrated comet which appeared at that time, was built by Messrs John Wood and Co., at Port-Glasgow, and made her trial trip on the 18th of January, when she sailed from Glasgow to Greenock, making five miles an hour against a head-wind. In August of the same year we find Bell advertising the Comet to ply upon the Clyde three times a-week from Glasgow, 'to sail by the power of air, wind, and steam." In September the voyage was extended to Oban and Fort- William, and was to he accomplished to and from the latter place in four days. Mr Bell lived to see his invention universally adopted. The Clyde, which first enjoyed the advantages of steam-navigation, became the principal seat of this description of ship-building; and, at the present time, Clyde-built steamers maintain their superiority in every port in the world. Steam-ships are now launched from the building-yards of Glasgow and Greenock of 2000 tonnage and 800 horse-power; and Clyde-built ships, with Glasgow engines, make the voyage betwixt Liverpool and New York in ten days. Steam-boat building and marine-engine-making received their first powerful impulse from the solution of the problem of ocean steam-navigation. From tables, constructed by Dr Strang from returns furnished to him by the various ship-builders and engineers in Glasgow, Dumbarton, Greenock, and Port-Glasgow, it appears that, during the seven years from 1846 to 1852, there were constructed at Glasgow and in its neighbourhood, 123 vessels, of which 1 was of wood, 122 of iron, 80 paddle, and 43 screw; consisting of 200 wooden tonnage; 70,441 iron tonnage; 6610 horse-power engines for wooden hulls, 22,539 horse-power engines for iron hulls, and 4720 horse-power engines for vessels not built on the Clyde. During the same period there were constructed in Dumbarton, 58 vessels, all of iron, 20 being for paddles and 38 for screws, and having a tonnage of 29,7tfl; and during the last three years of the same period 3616 horsepower engines were made there for iron hulls, and 200 horse-power engines for vessels not built on the Clyde. During the same period, from 1846 to 1852, there were constructed at Greenock and Port-Glasgow, 66 steam-vessels, of which 13 were of wood, and 53 of iron, 41 paddle, and 25 screw; consisting of 18,131 wood tonnage, and 29,071 iron tonnage, 129 horse-power engines for wooden hulls, 5439 horsepower engines for iron hulls, and 4514 horse-power engines for vessels not built on the Clyde. For the whole ports in the Clyde, the steam-vessels built and the marine engines made, from 1846 to 1852, were as follows:—Number of steam vessels built—Wood hulls, 14; iron hulls, 233; in all, 247; of these 141 were paddles, and 106 screws. The tonnage of the wooden steamers amounts to 18,331, of the iron to 129,273. The engines' horse-power in wood hulls was 6739, the engines' horse-power in iron hulls was 31,693; while there was of engines' horse-power for vessels not constructed on the Clyde, 9434, making a grand total of 247 steamers, amounting to 147,604 tons, and of engines 47,766 horse-power. The steam communication which has, for several years, existed betwixt our West Indian and North American colonies and the mother country, has recently been extended to Australia and the Cape of Good Hope, thus uniting Great Britain to her most distant dependencies by new and powerful ties, and literally realizing the vivid description of George Can-