THE SUEZ CANAL.

HATEVER may be thought of the purchase of the Khedive's shares in the Suez Canal, as a stroke of finance, there can be but one opinion upon it as a stroke of policy. The unsettled aspect of affairs in Eastern Europe, owing to the rapid decadence of the Ottoman Empire; the position of the Khedive as a semi-independent, but embarrassed Viceroy; above all the interests of an Indian Empire; pointed to the urgent expediency of England's acquiring a voice, if not a control in the management of the modern highway to the East. The ministerial explanations of the purchase, and of the circumstances which immediately led to it, leave no room for doubt that if England had not availed herself of the opportunity to secure a material interest in the Canal, France would have done so; negotiations for the investment of French capital were on foot, and were only defeated by the promptitude with which the offer for purchase was made by our Government, accepted, and arranged. The Khedive's monetary position was critical; he had locked up in the Canal shares a far larger amount of capital than he could afford to part with from his exchequer, and it became with him a matter of necessity to realize. The terms on which the shares were purchased may be liable to criticism, though viewed simply as a speculation, and having regard to the future of the Canal, we do not think that Her Majesty's Government have much difficulty in defending the transaction. The shares are, for the present, unproductive, but, until they become productive, the Khedive has undertaken to treat the advance upon them as a loan, and to pay interest upon it. The commission of 2 per cent., paid to Messrs. Rothschild for advancing the money, from which that firm receives some £90,000, may be regarded as a very handsome, perhaps excessive, remuneration for advancing a sum of four millions odd. But if the purchase be politic and justifiable, the cost at which it was accomplished is but a very secondary consideration to a country like England, and having in the results such important interests at stake. But if we turn from the question of finance, to that of the policy involved, we shall be at no loss to recognise the greatness of the opportunity of which Her Majesty's Government have availed themselves, and the magnitude of the results which must flow from this act of statesmanship. In the five years which have elapsed since the opening of the Suez Canal, in 1869, the British tonnage passing along that highway has not only been steadily on the increase, but has almost monopolised the traffic. In 1874, the total number of vessels using the Canal was 1,183, representing a net tonnage of 1,541,251 tons. Of this fleet, 898 vessels, of a net tonnage of

1,209,612 tons, were under the British flag-that is to say, the British tonnage was 71 per cent. of the entire tonnage passing through the Canal in 1874, and when the returns are made up to the close of 1875, they will show a still further increase in favour of the British flag. Such a traffic, connecting two great sections of the commerce of the earth, has been in the hands of a private company, who have framed rules respecting the navigation, and asserted also the right to exercise powers of taxation to an extent by no means justified by the firman under which they were constituted. The vast and increasing interest which England has in the trade through the Canal, has made her naturally impatient of such a state of things, and suggested that to obtain some control in the management of the Canal had become a national duty. The purchase of the Khedive's interest, to the extent of £4,800,000, may not give the required control, but it will assuredly give England a voice-and a potential voice in the control of the new highway. But the true import of the purchase is, that it indicates a policy which will not stop with the possession of the Khedive's shares and the authority which may attach to that possession. England having advanced so far, must go on, not to appropriate the Canal to her own interests by purchase, but to negociate and carry out an arrangement for the purchase of the Canal by the maritime powers, and for its management under an international commission. In the capitalization of the Sound Dues, of the Stade Toll, and of the Elbe Dues, England took the initiative, and contributed a large, if not the largest, quota. There would be no greater difficulty in the purchase and neutralization of the Suez Canal than there was in effecting those comparatively minor arrangements, by which maritime commerce has so substantially benefited. There would be this difference, no doubt, that, in the three cases named, the capitalization of the dues ended the question. The Governments of Denmark, of Hanover, and of Holland, claimed the right of levying tolls on shipping passing through the Sound and the Belts, the Elbe and the Scheldt. The abolition of the tolls was simply a question of price, and of money payment. The purchase of the Suez Canal will involve the transfer of the works and their maintenance to a commission on which all the leading maritime States would be represented, and who would each have a voice and authority in the management proportioned to the amount of the purchase-money contributed by each State. We have already suggested that a commission, such as that to which the control of the works and navigation of the Danube was subjected, under the Treaty of 1856, would be effective for the management of the Suez Canal in the event of the completion of an international arrangement for purchase of the works. Lord Derby, during the last session, expressed himself in distinct terms as favourable to the project of placing the Canal under an international syndicate, and

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his lordship has since, and recently reiterated, this expression of his views as a responsible member of the Government. The truth is, that like most other matters in these days, the transfer of the Suez Canal to an international commission, or syndicate, is but a question of money. estimated cost of the Canal was £8,000,000 sterling. The subscribed capital was about £13,000,000. But, it is said, the works have cost £19,000,000, or £6,000,000 more than the entire capital. To buy up the existing shares would, therefore, not be a very heavy undertaking, and the debt, in the shape of preference capital, might remain on the concern at the stipulated interest. But these arrangements of ways and means are minor considerations. The Suez Canal being a great international highway, cannot be suffered to remain in the hands of a private company. It is an exalted and imperative duty which England owes to her Eastern. Sovereignty, and her vast maritime commerce, to terminate a state of things inconsistent with the interests of both. She has already taken the first step in the direction of securing the position in reference to the modern highway to the East, which it is impossible she could abnegate. The next step will be, as we believe, and as sound policy seems to indicate, in the direction of obtaining the consent of the maritime powers to an arrangement for placing the Canal under international control and management. To such an arrangement no valid objection could be urged; while the advantages which would result to the maritime trade of the world are obvious. The question of the powers of taxation which an international commission should possess, and, indeed, must possess, for the purpose of maintaining the Canal, need not present any difficulty. Such powers are possessed and exercised by the Danube Commission, and by conservancy bodies in various directions much nearer home. So long as tolls are charged on an intelligible and fair basis, merchants and owners of shipping will not object. But especially will they be inclined to acquiesce, when they know that the highway in respect of which they are charged is placed under equitable and responsible control.

EMIGRATION FROM LIVERPOOL.-According to the returns supplied by the emigration officials at Liverpool for the past month, it appears that of vessels "under the Emigration Act," there sailed to the United States seven ships with 588 passengers. Of vessels not "under the Act," there sailed to the United States 27, with 1,174 passengers. There also sailed to Nova Scotia 2 ships, with 34 passengers; Victoria, 2, with 24 ; West Indies 6, with 72; East Indies 6, with 38; Africa 4, with 32; and South America 6, with 127, making a total of 60 ships and 2,089 emigrants. The number in the corresponding month of last year was 2,900.

DIRECT-ACTING SPRING SAFETY-VALVES.

N reading the February number of the Nautical Magazine I find a letter from Mr. H. R. Robson, President of the Institution of Engineers and Shipbuilders in Scotland, in which he says I am under a gross mistake in thinking that the safety-valve in question "is"-(I have not said anything whatever about what it is;"I was speaking about what it " was ")-fitted, as he thinks, and which he endeavours to hold up to ridicule. Before proceeding to discuss the point raised, I trust Mr. Robson will understand distinctly that not one word of the argument appertains to him personally. My purpose is to deal with the type of valve, and with that only.

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Fig. 13 is the valve, copied as near as possible from the transactions of the Institution, and is half-size. Applying the ordinary rules of construction, T T' is the upper surface of the valve's disc, and, with the exception of its junction with the spindle, is a straight line. LL' is the lower surface of the valve's disc, and, with the exception of its junction with the feathers, is also a straight line, and parallel with T T. The valve is 4" diameter, and " thick in the disc, and the spindle is " diameter, and when pointed in the usual way penetrates right through the disc, as at P. No draughtsman would design such a structure; for if he made TT a straight line, he would put the boss B B' on the lower side of the valve to support it under the thrust of the spindle, where the valve and spindle were two separate pieces, the one pointed and the other recessed. And if he were to make the lower surface LL' a straight line, then he would cast a boss on the upper side of the valve into which the recess would be drilled, and so maintain the relative strength of the valve at the centre, where strength is most required. But by the drawing there is no boss either on the upper or lower surface of the valve, which shows that the valve was never designed for the spindle to be a separate piece from the valve. Through the whole stages of manufacture there is not a man into whose hands this valve, with a separate spindle, would fall but would detect the error. The draughtsman would never make such a drawing. The pattern-maker would never make the pattern, and it is so glaring a mistake and so unskilled a design that it is a question whether the moulder would not see it. In the usual course of manufacture, it would then pass into the hands of the liner-off of the work, thence to the turner, neither of whom would pass it through their hands without calling their foreman's attention to the fact that the drill would run right through the valve. It would then pass through the hands of the fitter, and he would detect open daylight through its centre. Finally, it would fall into the hands

of the erecter, and when he put the load on it the spindle would fall right through the valve, inside the boiler. Then the error would be discovered, by whomsoever made.

But that the valve was designed as shown in the drawings of the Transactions of the Institution by Mr. Robson, and that the valve and spindle were one casting, there is the strongest possible evidence. (See fig. 13.) The under-surface of the valve LL is a straight line; not a radial line about it, not even at the junction of the feather F with the