n a few days. They could easily run away from dangerous
vessels, or pursue and overtake others when necessary. They are alway
needed for transport, while the time will probably never again come
when mail steamers will not be even more necessary during war than in
times of peace. But this is not all. They fit and train a large number
of marine engineers who are ever ready at a day's warning to enter
efficiently on the naval service. This is a point of greater
importance than is generally supposed. Engineers, however skilled in
the shops, are wholly unfit for the service at sea until they have had
months of experience, and become accustomed to sea-sickness. When one
of our first American mail steamers sailed for Europe, no practised
marine engineer could be found to work her engines. They took a
first-class engineer and corps of assistants from one of the North
River packets; but as soon as the ship got to sea, and heavy weather
came on, all the engineers and firemen were taken deadly sick, and for
three days it was constantly expected that the ship would be lost.

It is abundantly evident from all of the testimony, that most of the
mail packets are capable of carrying a handsome armament. Mr. Atherton
says to me in his letter: "Many of our ocean steamers are fit for
naval service of every description; and they are generally fit for all
transport service." The Report of Lord Canning, the British Post
Master General, to which I have referred, was made in 1853, in
obedience to a Treasury Minute issued by the Chancellor of the
Exchequer, who directed the Post Master General to form a committee,
and report to both houses, on the propriety of continuing and
extending the mail steam packet system; as there had been suggestions
that the sum expended for the mail service was large. These gentlemen
after a lengthy investigation of several months, the examination of a
great number of witnesses, and the record of their testimony in
shorthand, made their report, accompanied by the evidence in a large
volume. At page 5 of the report, in speaking of the requirements for
naval efficiency, they say:

"In arranging the terms of these contracts, the Government seized
the opportunity of requiring that the vessels should be
constructed in a manner that would render them as serviceable for
national defense in war as steam-packets belonging to the Crown
would have been if employed in their stead. A provision to this
e