THE STORY OF THE SEAMAN. By John Forsyth Meigs.
2 Vols. J. B. Lippincott Company. New York. 1924. $10.00.
Reviewed by Rear Admiral C. F. Goodrich, U. S. Navy, Ret.
The author of this monument of research and erudition was graduated from the Naval Academy in 1867. He served with exceptional credit in various capacities ashore and afloat, chiefly identifying himself with advances in ordnance and gunnery, branches of naval science in which he became an accepted authority. He was one of the most promising officers of his time, for whom his colleagues predicted a brilliant future with none to dispute him. Then two cruel blows fell upon him in rather quick succession. In 1891, a medical examination showed him to be color blind, a defect of vision of which it is believed that he was unaware. Naturally, he was placed upon the retired list. His knowledge of ordnance was so appreciated by the Bethlehem Iron Company, (later and at present, the Bethlehem Steel Company) that it promptly engaged him to assist in its armor plate and gun making work, a fresh undertaking at that time, due to the building up of our new Navy. In this respect he was of great help, both to that company and to the Navy itself. Unhappily for him, some Congressmen thought, or pretended to think, that an officer’s standard of honor was so low that he could be guilty of using his acquaintance with those in authority at Washington and with the records and methods of the Department for the benefit of his employers, and to the detriment of the Navy. This preposterous and wholly unjustified contention found such favor at the Capital that little difficulty was encountered in passing an act prohibiting a naval officer, even on the retired list, from accepting employment by a firm or corporation manufacturing supplies of any kind for the government. Meigs had then to choose between abandoning this occupation, so dear to his heart, or resigning his commission. He adopted the latter course in 1896, that he might still prosecute what he considered to be his life’s work. Thus our service lost directly, although it continued to profit indirectly, by his skill and ingenuity, an able and universally regretted member. He has, however, a high place among that galaxy of clever graduates which has done so much for the nation and for humanity in countless ways, astronomical, industrial, scientific and literary.
In 1910 he left Bethlehem and, as is said in the introduction to the volume under review, “took on the studies of the art of maritime transport and the protection of traffic which have resulted in this book.” These studies were temporarily interrupted during the World War to resume his activities as an ordance engineer. After the Armistice, he returned to his historical investigations.
The Story of the Seaman seems to be rather misleading as a title, implying, as it does, a tale or a series of yarns and episodes. Such, distinctly, it is not; rather, is it an exhaustive encyclopedia of nautical art from the earliest day to the middle of the last century. As a mine of maritime information it is unique and priceless; as a proof of the part of the seaman in advancing civilization, it is indispensable; as evidence that the command of the sea has always been essential in war, it admits of no challenge.
These volumes reveal an astounding assiduity in combing the very oldest records for the beginning of ships and sailors and for keeping up a research for data on the growth and use of vessels which covers all except the most recent history. The reader will perceive that his references are drawn from practically all times, all sources and all languages.
Herodotus, the Heimskringla, Pericles, Cicero, Offa’s Saxon Chronicle, Sir Walter Raleigh, the Old Testament, Marco Polo, Nansen’s Northern Mists, Arrian, Assurbanipal, Hesiod, Yule, Homer, Chaldea, Tyre, Sidon, the Vikings, Magellan, Babylon, Ancient Egypt, Pliny, Strabo, Assyria, Nineveh, Phoenicia, Rome, Carthage, Hannibal, Hamilcar, Darius, Pausanias, Ptolemy, Da Gama, Columbus and scores of other cities, countries, historians, sea fighters, cartographers and voyagers of discovery pass across his desk as he selects pertinent material for his accounts of ship building, ship rigging and ship propulsion; of the life of sailors, galley slaves and armed men afloat; of naval actions in ancient days and the Middle Ages. In short, it is impossible to name any form of maritime or naval activity during those periods which is not adequately treated in these pages.
Yet it must be conceded that this magnificent and abundant information is not as readily available as could be wished. It was apparently gathered and is presented, to a large extent, chronologically and not according to subjects. The table of contents gives only brief chapter headings. A new one, including the paragraph and section captions, would be valuable. The index might well be much fuller. Doubtless, the premature death of the author accounts for the absence of these desirable features. The fact that the punctuation is faulty tends to strengthen the presumption that the master’s hand was lacking in the final labor of preparing the manuscript for publication. A bibliography would have spared much space in the footnotes, while an occasional map or chart for the period covered in the text would be most welcome.
It is the duty of the reviewer to point out the demerits of a book, in this case a very unwelcome one; yet, after all is said, these are but insignificant flaws in a marvelous picture.
The reviewer suggests that the readers (and he hopes there will be many of them) will benefit more and with greater interest by systematically following up one subject at a time rather than by going through the book Page after page. A few of these topics may be mentioned merely as examples, since these volumes are rich in data on every phase of the seaman’s life and progress. Of especial appeal to the naval officer is Sea Power. Its preponderant importance from the earliest times is here established beyond question. The ordnance expert can trace the growth of artillery from its inception (missile throwing by hand) through the catapult, the bow and cross bow, and the introduction of guns and muskets up to its present stage. The navigator and nautical astronomer might draw from these pages an account of the means and instruments used in bygone days for finding a ship’s location at sea, as well as of ancient and later map making, lighthouses, etc. The naval tactician could well follow suit with a study of fleet maneuvers from their first examples; from the reports of Aegospotamos, Salamis, Ecnomus and other battles. Incidentally, he could touch upon the matter of signalling between ships. A wide and fruitful field is open to the naval constructor who cares to take up the history of his art. In this connection the reviewer is glad to be able to put him into communication with the results of the labors of the eminent Egyptologist, Dr. David Paton, which carry back this history to the oldest heiroglyphics. The naval surgeon could furnish a short treatise on ancient naval hygiene, such as it was; the humanitarian, another on what passed for discipline; the historian, one on the great voyages of discovery of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries and the naval aspects of the Crusades; the economist, one on the growth of sea-borne commerce. None of these literati would need to go much outside Meigs’ rich volumes.
The mention of the possibilities just enumerated indicates the catholic, all-embracing scope of Meigs’ investigations and leaves one wondering how any man could have gone over so much ground and so thoroughly in the few years he was able to devote to it. To the average reader a long life would seem hardly adequate for such an achievement.
The Story of the Seaman will long remain the undisputed authority on the topics of which it treats. No library of reference, no student of nautical history can afford to be without it. As a basic encyclopedia, it deserves the widest circulation.
CUGLE’S PRACTICAL NAVIGATION.
By Charles H. Cugle. E. P. Dutton and Co. New York, 1924.351 pages.
$6.00. Reviewed by Commander Benjamin Dutton, U. S. Navy.
The avowed intention of this book is to present the subject of navigation without presenting any of the theory. The method adopted under each sub-head is to first state the problem. This is followed by the necessary definitions with little or no discussion. Then follow elaborate rules to guide the student in each step of his solution. Finally numerous problems are stated and completely solved.
Following the scheme of the book as outlined above, the student may take up each subject in navigation, learn what the problem is, where to get the necessary data for its solution, what to do with these data, and finally, to get the result, with only the smallest idea of the reasons behind it all.
The author has taken pains to make his rules provide for all possible situations and to make them aid the student in every step of his work. This, no doubt, is extremely necessary for the man who learns his navigation in such a manner. Probably many ambitious men in the merchant service who lack an academic education find it convenient to follow some such scheme in preparing themselves for officers’ billets. They can thereby dodge the necessity of gaining any real knowledge of astronomy or of the theory of mathematics higher than arithmetic. It is problematical whether they save any labor in the end. Certainly the art is robbed of most of its interest when learned and practiced by this method.
Since men have learned to navigate by this method it must be conceded to be practicable. Should the reader chance to come across a copy of the book it will repay an examination, for it will show what poor tools some of his fellow mariners use in finding their way about the seas.
NORTH STAR NAVIGATION. By L. M. Berkeley.
White Book and Supply Co. New York, 1924. 86 pages. $3.75.
Reviewed by Commander Benjamin Dutton, U. S. Navy.
The following statement appears in the preface of this splendid little book: “the North Star, is. . . . the most important body, next to the sun, in the seaman’s calendar.” Influenced by this belief the author has worked out something new in navigation. Not many practical navigators will agree with the statement, but this will not detract from the admiration they will experience for the scholarly manner in which the author has developed and presented his subject. The method depends upon a function which, it is believed, has never been used in navigation heretofore; that is, the position angle from the North Star. This position angle, as the author uses it, is what an hour angle would be if hour angles were measured with reference to Polaris instead of the pole.” Two of these position angles are necessary for the solution; first, that of one of the principal navigational stars visible in north latitudes, and second, that of the north pole. Simultaneous altitudes of Polaris and another star having been taken these position angles are readily obtained by the formulas and tables which the author has prepared. This involves no more labor than the solution of a time sight. Once the position angles are obtained, the solutions for latitude and longitude and the azimuth of the North Star are very expeditiously and accurately made. For this solution no knowledge of the approximate position is required, other than enough to enable the navigator to determine the Greenwich date and time. The results are entirely free from errors due to an error in the latitude and longitude by account. The entire solution requires little more labor than the solution by logarithms for two lines of position and no plotting is required to determine the fix. If the North Star were a bright star, and not, as it is, a faint star which is difficult to observe except under the most favorable conditions, the method would recommend itself, for it is simple and accurate. The method is available only in restricted latitudes, and within those latitudes only when the conditions are favorable for an observation of Polaris. Therefore it is not believed that it will be accepted very widely, because it introduces a new theory and a new set of tables, for only occasional use, in a field where the present method of determining lines of position is much more widely applicable, and gives results sufficiently accurate for the practical navigator.
To those officers who anticipate studying the book it is recommended that they first read the preface, then the conclusion, and, as soon as they enter the text, plot the figures on the plane of the horizon. The first two steps will put the reader in touch with the author’s incentive, and the third will present the figures in the manner in which we are accustomed to work with them and make the discussion easier to follow.
Cory Issues Splendid Bulletin Describing Ships’ Telegraphs
and Associated Equipment
Immediately after the introduction of ships’ telegraphs by Cory, in the year 1862, telegraphs became the universal standard for engine room, docking, steering, anchor and fire room orders, and rudder angle indicating.
The new Cory Bulletin, “Ships’ Electrical and Mechanical Telegraphs, Gongs, Voice Tubes and Accessories, No. 85-29-A,” contains a wealth of description and illustrations, and may be obtained by sending a request card to Chas. Cory & Son, Inc., 183-7 Varick St., New York. Just mention this publication when writing.