History of merchant shipping and ancient commerce, Volume 4 (of 4) by W. S. Lindsay
1843. She was considered a remarkably fine model, and of very unusual
length in proportion to her beam, her dimensions being 195 feet extreme
length, close upon 33 feet extreme breadth, and 18½ mean depth of hold.
Her burden was 888 tons. The log of this vessel from 28th of March
to 13th April, 1851, will be found in the Appendix to a Report of a
Committee of the House of Commons, 1851, p. 565, where the merits of
the screw are examined.
[143] The “screw” which Mr. Stevens used in his boat cannot have been
of a practical character, or the Americans would not have allowed so
valuable an invention to lie dormant for 35 years.
[144] Mr. Woodcroft patented, on the 18th of November, 1826, a
mode “for propelling boats and vessels,” but no specification was
enrolled; and on the 22nd of March, 1832, he “prolonged” his patent
“increasing-pitch screw-propeller,” which he then fully described. (See
“Specifications of Marine Propulsion,” Part XI. p. 112.)