The Oamaru Mail WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE NEW ZEALAND AGRICULTURIST. SATURDAY, JULY 12, 1879.

Oamaru Mail, Volume IV, Issue 1008, 12 July 1879, Page 2

The Oamaru Mail WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE NEW ZEALAND AGRICULTURIST. SATURDAY, JULY 12, 1879.

CftAiss and anchors arc subjects tijxm which we should think Mr. J. U. Rnssel', surveyor to the New Zealand Underwriters' Association, knows something, for he has sent a communication thereon to the

Secretary of the Association. For aught we know, what he says about these thing 3 may be quite correct. At al! events there is not much risk in advocating that anchors should be heavy and chains strong. But Mr. Russell desired to fill up his sheet of letter paper with something, and thought he could not do better than revert to a dissertation on open roadsteads. A celebrated philosopher has said that all men are mad upon some subject or other. If he were asked to name Mr. Russell's weakness he would without doubt reply that it is open roadsteads. Air. Russell states that he thinks the Timaru roadstead unsafe, and that " if large vessels are to continne trading to the jdaemt referred to, it is morel}- a matter of time when some great calamity will happen." As the writer lias only prc- • v-totisly mentioned Timaru in his letter, wc are in some doubt as to what other port or f:o.t.-i are intended by the word •' places." But. as he has never lost an opportunity, for reasons inexplicable to those whose opinions would be reckoned of more value than his were li-- not the Surveyor of the I'mtcnvriters' Association, of decrying the port of O-imaru, we sup]K>se that he is paying tts further attention. It is pretty safe to lay the responsibility of foretelling that some great calamity will some day happen at "the places referred to" upon "all nautical mcn. :: We do not intend to comer Mr Russell by challenging him to name the nautical r.uthorities who have displayed such clt'vemesit, because the matter is of no importance. It simply means that if «. wait, lout,' enough the predicted great cr.lr.in: tics' will occur. The same might bo said 'jf my port in the Colony. U'e have u vessels stranded in the safest ports of

the Colony, and we have lately rend of wrecks occurring in those ports, whilst ten amall vessels rode oat unscratched one of the most fearful storms that have visited these parts. It is true that the Franklin Belle aabore here daring the late gale, when

so many vessels met with a similar fate in other parts of the Colony. But the result of the enquiry was such as to lead to the supposition that the port was not biameable for the catastrophe. We will say but little about the statement that iron vessels are different from wooden ones. It will be generally conceded, we think, that they are constructed of d fferent material. But when Mr. Kussell expresses an opinion that " a large iron ship stranding at Oamaru or Timaru would nettle down at such * a distance from shore that all on board would in.vitahly [>crish," we are constrained to remark that *.ve have never had any experience of such an occurrence here, although a man occupying Mr. Russell's position should lie able to predict what would occur under such circumstances. Wc have, however, read of iron vessels coining to grief at other places, and think that, perhaps, Mv. Russell is justified in hinting at the necessity for putting an embargo on the construction and uhc of iron vessels, on account of tlicit danger. Mr. Uusaell has endeavored to meet our assertion that our hatboi works have rendered our harbor safe by saying that the longer the Oamaru Breakwater is made the greater the " chance of vessels being driven against it. Mr. Russell may be a useful official and an able authority on matters nautical, although we have never heard anybody say so ; but he is ignorant of the simple characteristics of this port. Vessels awaiting berthage accommodation always lie north of the Breakwater. If they should happen to drift, they would do so under the influence of a sou'-east swell, which would carry them far to the northward of the Breakwater. Only north-east influence could drive vessels on to the Breakwater, and every Oamaru schoolboy knows that sucli an influence has never yet been known to operate to the injury of vessels lying in the roadstead. Mr. Russell's hightalntin language is more admirable than his judgment. In vivid word-painting he says that he would rather be "up in a nalloon than in avesseldrivenagainstour Breakwater. He would rather be a mile up in the air, hanging on to the fragments of a burst balloon, than on a vessel so situated. If he knows as little about burst balloons as lie appears to know about the Oamaru Harbor, this portion of his letter is worthless, except as a magnificent flight of imagination. If we were asked to choose between the two disasters, reason would be useless in assisting us to decide. "We have never been placed in either awkward situation, nor can we meet with anyone who has, but wc should think that theoneisaboutas unliketyto occur as the other, either to Mr. Russell or anyone else in these parts. The surveyor to the New Zealand Underwriters' Association is an imaginative man, and, perhaps, in the absence of something better to do, if wc were similarly situated, gifted, and salaried, we, too, mijht resort to the expedient of maligning opon roadsteads.