STEAM IN THE SOUTH PACIFIC.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1755, 21 May 1913, Page 8

STEAM IN THE SOUTH PACIFIC.

A GREAT DEVELOPMENT, Tho advent of tho Uiuou Steam Ship Company's colossal and palatial liner Niagara may fairly be said to constitute an epoch in the maritime history of theso southern lands. A correspondent of tho ..ydncy "Daily Telegraph" remarked, apropos of tho event, that other notable steamers that liavo entered i'ort Jackton liavo demonstrated tlie steady development of ship-building, but it mii;lit .surely be asserted that none had awakened greater interest ill the potentialities ot ocean transit than tiiis new red tunneled liner.

r i"??' i *1? -J, 11 Sydney awoke to i L J, 1 , ' 0. Company's mail jioat Chusan, 700 tons, had arrived from .Southampton in 79 days, and the journals ol that day proclaimed the fact under tho heading, "Steam at Last." A public ball was held to celebrate tho event, and a similar function marked the arrival of the Great Britain, a steamer which was warranted to vpyago to and from Liverpool under W days. As a matter of fact, tins grand old ship, wliich had a registered tonnage of 351)0, made her passages m nearer 50 than W days. In 1671, the St. Usyth arrived in Melbourne, 45 days from London, and when tho Lusilania, the pioneer of (ho Orient line, covcred tho same (instance 30 days, the possibilities arising out of such abbreviation of time and space were regarded with proat satisfaction. Many oi Iho present generation will lerneinbar the sensation which was caused in 3632 when the Austral, which was termed "tho ship of tho age," reached Sydney, and shortly afterwards sank in iSeutral Bay through a coal port having been Jett, (pen. Xow "a shin of another ago has arrived, a ship, we mav caU our own, for sho belongs to both sides of tho Jasman Sea.

J-ho history of the development of steam traffic between Australia and New Zealand, and incidentally of the rise of tlw Union Company, is a remarkable one: In 185S, the A.S.N. Company held a contract to carry (he mails between Melbourne and Wellington, and some of its steamers wore employed a little later to transport troops lor tho Maori war. In 18G1, the same company was running the Wonga Wonga and Kangitira to meet tlie rush of gold diggers from Melbourne to Otago, and in the next year a regular monthly service from Sydney to AVellington was inaugurated by tho latter vessel. Thereafter the A.S.N. Company seems to have been too much occupied with its operations on the coast of the mainland to give more than spasmodic attention to the New Zealand trade.

In ISG3, when the West Coast rush set in, M'Mechan, Blackwood, and Co., of Melbourne, ran the Alhambra, a steamer of 800 tons, to Hokitika, and tho Tasmania S.N, Company withdrew their steamer City of Ilobart from the SydneyIlobart line, to compete with her. Tho Tasmanian boat, though slightly smaller than the Alhambra, was half as fast again, and it is rororded that she sometimes made two trips to her rival's one. In the result, however, the tortoiso won, for tho hare displayed a decided weakness for breaking down, which, the owners ascribed to tho fact that too much had been taken out of the engines on the voyage from Glasgow. The T.S.N. Company then ordered two new boats from Scotland, ono of which was the Southern Cross, which held tho blue ribbon in these seas for at least a dozen years. She had been built as a bloekado runner for tho Confederate Government, and was one of the ships seized on tho stocks by the British Government, in consequence of the warning of the United tSates regarding the depredations then being commjtted by the Tyne-built cruiser Alabama. Tho second steamer was tho Dorwent, now a collier well-known in Sydney Harbour. The registered tonnage of each' of these steamers was about TOO. Unfortunately for the prospects of tho Tasmanian Compauy, so far as the New Zealand trade was concerned, both boats made long passages out under sail, for ill tho meantime M'Mechaiy Blackwood, and Co. bought-and'stcamecl out'tho Oineo, of nearly 1000' tons, and secured'a firm foothold before their competitors were ablo to meet tiro requirements of tlio trado. The M'M'rch.m-Ulackwood tine continued to flourish through the later sixties, aiyl the only opposition it had is the New Zealand-trade was that of tho Hero, a fine boat owned by Grice, Sumner and Co., of Melbourne, and commanded by the well-remembered Captain Thomas Logan. The Hero had been built, as a yacht for tho King of Sweden, and she was not only splendidly fitted up, but wns very fust. ~ Her tonnage was about 800. She was tho first steamer to make round trips from Sydney to Melbourne, via. the New Zealand pork. When the ill-slarred Panama and New Zealand Company cancelled all its services, M'Mechnn, Blackwood, and Co. bought most of its branch steamers, including the Rangitoto, Prince Alfred, llararua, and Claude Hamilton. This firm was also Tunning UlO Aldin?n and Coorong in the Melbourne-Adelaide service, so that in 1870 .it possessed quite a respectable float. A littb later they added tlio Otago, and the. Albion, two boats of 1000 and SOO tons respectively. Tho latter, after.vards renamed the Centennial, li"S at tho bottom of Taylor's Bay, Sydney Harbour, as the Tcsult of a collision. Tn IS7G this firm built tho Arawatta and Ringarooma, and these speedy ships, which had a tonnage of 1200, greatly raised'ihe standard of comfort and efficiency wl\ieh had previously existed in Australasian wat.?r.s.

TW> genesis of the Union Line began in 1575, when a number of Duuedin business men floated the company to cater for the coastal trade. Tho initial operations were conducted upon a decidedly ui.prctcntions seals, for the aggregate toimape of the three vessels employed was only 7'21. Howevtu-, it. was not long before the llawca and Taupo, two handy boars, each of tliO tons, possessed of Rood speed, were built. In 1870 tli-» company was so firnilv established (hat it was able to purchnse the Jl'Meclmn-Blackwood fleijf, which had aiready included Ilobart in its itinerary. The Union Company now bejrani to extend its operations by leaps and bounds, and a largl. l number of new ships wero ordered from the Clyde. Among these was tho famous flier, the Botomahana, which arrived in 187". This remarkable stcamor easily developed 17 knots, ond verv soon broke all accords. She iras, moreover equipped in a style unapproachod by any colonial craft of the dav. In the icarly eighties the company's" trade expanded enormously, and as a consequcn:o many ships were added to its fleet. The Wakatipu and Hauroto were soon followed by a bunch of faster and laTgur boats, anion? which wore the Tarawera, Manapouri. Wnirarapa. Waiiiora. and To Anau. Later, the Mnraroa and Waikare met the demand for increased speed and Breaker (onnafe. In 181)1 the Tas'manian S.N. Company, which had lost three of its boats ju a short time, was absorbed by the Union Company for the consideration of 50.000 shares. As a result of this transaction tho newly-built T.ilune, tho Oonah, I'nteena, Flinders, Flora, and Corinna became red funnel liners, and a trade which has since marvellously developed passed to'tho new owners. In 18S7 the company inaugurated a direct service between New Zealand and Calcutta, which has called for the employment of lalre ships. Tho connection of' tho Union Company with tho trans-Pacific mail services dates from 186(1. The two lines which it is now running from Sydney to Vancouver and San Francisco have necessitated the provision# of those splendid mail liners the Makura, Tahiti, and Jlarama, ami now of tho imposing Niagara. Whilst, the company has been striking out to compete with other great concerns engaged in ocean transit, it has not failed to maintain its prestige in homo waters. If. showed that it was alert to tho advantages of the 'turbine when it adopted (hat inched of propulsion for the Maheno, the Loongana, and the Maori, though the ro-cently-nildcd Maungamii, which has already established a great imputation for speed and comfort, was fitted with reciprocating engines, Sinco 1801 Huddart, Parker, and Co. have teen running a service of fine boats between Sydney and Melbourne, via tho New Zealand ports; but the Union Co. has continued to enjoy practically a monopoly of Hi® Dominion coastal trade, inclucling the carriage of coal. The traffic requirements of the company liavo becomo so great that no fewer than 70 steamers with an aggregate tonnage of 200,000 have had to be provided lo meet them. Tho fact that 'tho Union Co. has achieved such wonderful results in less than 10 years not. only establishes that i(« management has been enterprising ami efficient, but that the trade of tho Commonwealth and the Dominion ro-.ts on such a substantial ba,-is that; those who cultivate it sedulously may expect to bo ."witU both htiads,