DOCK WORKS AT BLUFF HARBOR.

Southland Times, Issue 1544, 1 March 1872, Page 3

DOCK WORKS AT BLUFF HARBOR.

Sib, — It is an old and much-esteemed adage in the " land o' cakes" that he who "bodes asilk gown may get the sleeve o't," and thinking of this good old saying has induced me to write you, suggesting that our contemplated railway improvements, &c, &c., will be to a certain extent incomplete, unless we have at the seaboard termini of our railway line a good water bearing dock, for the convenience of loading and discharging ships of considerable tonnage. The easy construction of a good j dock at Bluff Harbor is patent, I venture to assert, to anyone having the smallest share of the bump of constructiveness, in many localities on the most sheltered side of that fine harbor. The cost of such a work would probably be coviparatively small, as all the material in the shape of abundance of the finest Btone for the construction of the dock walls is to be had in the immediate vicinity, and were the dock placed in a proper locality might even possibly be furnished from the stone quarried in excavating the basin of the dock. Is it premature to suggest that some of the engineering talent in the country might be profitably employed in fixing an eligible site for such a dock and making the needful estimates as to the cost of a deep water dock (size to afford a 22 feet depth of water on the dock sill at neap tides, and to be of dimensions to contain and berth not less than four ships of 150 tons burthen at a time.) Such an estimate carefully prepared might induce local capitalists to establish a " dock company," which would be, I believe, ere long a divideod-paying concern ; and even should our local capitalists be afraid of such an investment, the free ventilation of the capabilities of Bluff Harbor for such a work of public utility might induce European capitalists to embark in the undertaking. In even proposing such a work we must of course look largely to the future, and at present it would be no answer to say it would not pay, unless the party who said so was prepared to limit to very narrow dimensions the trade in grain, wool, minerals, timber, &c, &c, which must have an outlet at Bluff Harbor as the natural port of the fine country behind it. I need hardly point out the saving of risks any dock affords, as surely these are evident to anyone the least acquainted with commerce, but to those unacquainted with commerce they might be shortly enumerated as — Ist. Saving all risks of lighterage or transport coastwise for goods destined for over-sea ports. 2nd. Saving insurance risks on ships and cargo. 3rd. Saving risks of damage to cargo and saving risk of loss or pilferage. 4th. Saving time, which in these days is commercially of vast account. To these might be added many other items, but as my only object in addressing you is to brine: thus early to public notice the indubitable adaptability of Bluff Harbor for the construction of docka, I will not further trespass on your space at present. — I am, &c, Wet Dock. ♦ ■—