description :-Dimensions of vessel: Length of deck, 81 feet; breadth of beam, 27 feet; depth of hold, 20 feet; depth of triangular keel from the floor of midship section to its apex, 7 feet. When bumping on rocks or sandbanks, an iron vessel built on this plan, with triangular keel, cannot easily break her back, and sailing on a bowling, the formation of keel keeps the vessel angling up towards the wind.

The fore and aft triangular sails are set on yards secured at the middle in swivels at the bow and stern of the vessel. These yards go right round clear of masts, and can be trimmed to any degree on a circle. For comfort in bad weather, and exactness to a degree, these yards can be trimmed from below by bevel gear. To reduce the triangular sails, as the haulyards are lowered, the spar to which the foot of the sail is laced is turned by a lever handle. On the fore and aft mastheads, swivels are fitted to which the lower lifts are secured. The haulyards go down through the swivels, so that when the yards are turned round and round, the haulyards keep clear of the lifts. The topmast and topgallantmast are to be one spar; when the mast is struck the heel of it steps on deck; and when the shrouds are hauled taut, it is a support to the mainmast. On tacking the vessel the lower yards may either be angled from side to side or they may be swung round. Two good hands working the bevel gear can steer the vessel by the sails.

This proposed new build and rig for fishing vessels has been suggested since the loss of a number of fishing smacks in the North Sea. In stormy weather the smack rig has disadvantages. The sudden gybing of a main boom is at all times dangerous; and the mainmast being stepped before the centre of gravity, when laying-to in a heavy gale of wind, the vessel frequently lays open and exposed to the sea striking against her broadside. It is stated that a vessel can be kept longer under command with the new rig than with any other description of rig. There is no such term as gybing main booms with it; nor do even the storm or manoeuvring sails lay aback against the masts, as is the case with lugger-rigs, a position that makes these sails difficult to be got down when it blows hard. The new rig appears to be worth consideration by those interested.

THE GUNBOAT "OPOSSUM" AMONGST PIRATES.

The recent cruise of the Opossum has been attended with very brilliant results. Lieutenant St. John, her commander, has in one week captured sixteen junks, forty prisoners, fifty three guns; has burnt a pirate village and liberated twenty-seven captives, a week's work to be proud of indeed. Our readers will remember that a few weeks ago we reported the arrival of the Opossum at Macao, with the information that she had destroyed fifteen junks. Since then we have learned some particulars of her adventures.

On Saturday, the 10th of February, Lieutenant St. John applied for leave and received permission from the admiral to go out for a

cruise. He did not at that time know of any projected operations on the part of the pirates, and intended simply to look round and see what was going on. His fires were no sooner up, however, than some of the native merchants sent off to inform him that a number of pirate junks were lying off a place called Pak-shui, on the West coast, just beyond Macao. In that direction, therefore, he steered, and yesterday week flushed the bird's he searched for. At the head of a creek, stood the village, guarded by a battery of three guns-one of them a 55 cwt. gun throwing a 24 lb. shot-and anchored off it lay the piratical junks, fifteen in number. They were all armed, some of them heavily. In all they carried forty-three guns, most of them 18-pounders. They were manned by 200 men, and it must be acknowledged were not a bad match for one boat with only three guns on board, manned by about seventeen or eighteen Europeans, even though these were British seamen. Lieutenant St. John came in so that as he ran down on the junks they were end on to him, and their guns being all in the broadside, were consequently useless. As soon as he came within range he opened a flank fire on the battery, and in a very short time its defenders cleared out. This was the signal for the men in the junks to do the same. The whole 200 scrambled on shore, and off into the interior, leaving the vessels a prey to the gunboat. Lieutenant St. John landed with a small party of men from the gunboat, and while he was on shore, as we understand, the explosion took place on board one of the junks, by which the warrant officer of the Opossum was wounded. He was engaged setting fire to the vessel, when a jar of powder standing on the deck took fire.

There was no explosion in the ordinary sense of the word, that is, no materials were thrown about, and the gunner was burned by flame of the powder, and by a succession of smaller explosions which followed. A boy who was with him jumped overboard and escaped with but few injuries, but the gunner could not swim, and had to run on in the junk. A marine was wounded in another explosion while setting fire to a junk which had been hauled up on shore. After the work had been performed, when the pirates were all out of the way, and the Opossum was busily engaged destroying their crafts, a fleet of forty Mandarin junks came round the point. It seemed that the Imperial men- of-war had been twice beaten off by the pirates of Pak-shui, and were coming down this time in force. The one English gunboat, however, had accomplished the task out of hand, and there was nothing left for the Chinese but to profit by the victory.

They landed 1,600 men and burnt the village, and Lieutenant St. John handed over to them the greater number of the captured junks and guns, after having destroyed the rest. He then went to Macao, and sent back his wounded men to Hong Kong. On Wednesday, off a place called I-mum, he fell in with a large heavily armed junk, about 30 feet longer than the Opossum, carrying eight guns, big enough to have hoisted her Majesty's small ship Opossum on board altogether if she had had the proper machinery. The junk was at once recognised as the vessel of which the gunboat, on information received, was in

search. When she was stopped her owner was prepared with all the documents necessary to prove him a most respectable trader, only carrying guns for his own protection; but it happened that Lieutenant St. John had on board the Chinaman who really owned the vessel. She had, it seems, been entrusted to the man now found in possession of her, who had never afterwards accounted for her to her owner, but had turned pirate instead. When confronted with the Chinese mer

chant on board the Opossum, he saw that his game was played out," and resigned himself to his fate with Asiatic fortitude. He made no further attempt to defend himself either by arguments or physica! force, and together with forty companions was conducted by the Opossum to Quang-hai, and given over to the mandarins. By them he was recognised as a man of great influence on the West coast. and his crew will be sent on to Canton, and there is no reason to doubt the fait that awaits them. The captives we spoke of above were released at Pak-shui before the village was burnt.

Hong Kong Daily News.

H.M.S."CURACOA" AT THE SOUTH SEA ISLANDS.

He

Her Majesty's steam corvette Curaçoa, Commodore Sir William Wiseman, arrived at Sydney on the 13th of October from a cruise among the South Sea Islands. The following is an account of her proceedings:

"We sailed from Sydney on the 4th of June last, and made a good passage to Norfolk Island. Arrived there on the 9th. The quondam Pitcairners received us with great hospitality. The commodore returned their civility, by permitting the band to be landed for their amusement, and by getting up a very fair ball two nights before our departure. The weather being very boisterous, we were detained here by the ship having suddenly to leave the roadstead and put to sea, many of the officers being on shore at the time. The ship having returned again on the 13th, we proceeded to sea, and met with foul winds for some days. Sighting Sunday Island, we at length arrived at Savage Island, from whence after a short stay we sailed for Pango Pango, a beautiful harbour in the Island of Tutuila, one of the Samoan Group. Here the natives performed their war-dance on board, to the great amusement of all.

"Our next visit was to Apia, the capital of the Samoan Group, in the Island of Opolu, where we received great kindness from Mr. Williams, her Majesty's consul, and the European residents. After five days' stay we proceeded to Vavau, in the Friendly Islands, and remained there about two days. On the 17th of July we arrived at Tonga-Tabu, the capital of the Friendly Group, where the great King George (for he is a giant in stature) paid his respects to the commodore, who received him with his yards manned and other honours due to royalty. On leaving the ship the King was saluted with twenty-one guns. Leaving the Friendly Islands we made for the Fiji Group, the

first island we touched at being Ovalau; from thence we went to Mban, a small island in the Fiji Group. Upon our arrival King Thakambau, with the principal chiefs of the island, visited the ship. On one occasion he was accompanied by the queen, who is a wonderful woman in bulk and stature, a giantess in fact, calculated to take the first prize in any competitive exhibition of the relative proportions of the fair sex in any part of the world whatever. Upon the king leaving the ship he was saluted with twenty-one guns.

"On the following day, when the commodore returned his visit, Thakambau saluted him from his battery consisting of four small guns, with which his liege subjects were occupied fully half a day. Kandoa, also in the Fiji Group, was next visited; after which we made for Aneitum, an island in the New Hebrides Group, where we found H.M.S. Esk, with our English mail. We remained at Aneitum four days, and sailed from thence to the Island of Tanna, in the same group, accompanied by several missionaries in their schooner, the Day Spring. The day previous to our departure, the commodore, in consequence of the cruel treatment which British subjects had suffered from its cannibal inhabitants, conceived it to be his duty to shell the villages in the vicinity of the ship, and to land a force of small-arms men and marines to destroy their villages, canoes, and plantations,-a just retribution for the barbarities they had committed, and a warning to them for the future. We had one seaman wounded, who was shot through the abdomen: he was taken on board, and died shortly after. The exact number killed and wounded among the Tannese we were not able to ascertain, but we believe it must exceed twenty.

"The day after our departure a party of natives coming accidentally upon an unexploded shell in the bush, were seized with a curiosity to see the contents of the brass percussion fuse: they squatted them. selves round the shell, and began to beat the fuse with a stone, when it suddenly exploded, killing six of them and wounding others. The next morning we sailed for Erromanga, and anchored in Dillon's Bay, when the commodore landed and visited the sandal-wood station of Mr. Henry, who he found had only just returned from Sydney. He also saw Mrs. Henry, who informed him that during her husband's absence the natives had besieged her castle, and had carried on a prolonged attack from the opposite side of the river, some thirty or forty yards in width, from whence they kept up a harassing fire upon the station buildings. These islanders were aware of her husband's absence, and she bravely kept her ground, with the few retainers she had at command, against the barbarian, anthropophagite hordes, until they raised the siege, and fled to their mountain homes. Vita Harbour, in Sandwich Island, was the next place we visited. From thence we proceeded to Havannah Harbour, another port in the same island. After a short stay we sailed for Vanua Leva, an island in Banks' Group. Here we fell in with Bishop Patteson, of the Melanesian mission, whom the commodore had engaged to meet here in his schooner, the Southern Cross, and who afterwards kept in company with us until our departure for the Solomon Group.

We then proceeded to the Contrarieties Island, in the Solomon Group, passing through the Santa Cruz Group on our way. From thence we went to Ugi or Gulf Island; and after visiting Recherche and Wano Bays, in the islands of St. Christoval, Marau Sound, in Guadalcanar; Mboli Bay, in Florida Island; and St. George's Bay, Ysabel Island, all of the Solomon Group, we finally bade adieu to Bishop Patteson, who left for Curtis Island, and took our departure for Erromanga, where we arrived on the 25th of September. The purport of our second visit being to ascertain whether the natives were disposed to be more amicably inclined towards the British residents in the island. In consequence of the ill treatment to which British subjects had of late been exposed at Dillon Bay, the commodore was induced to inflict some little punishment on the natives of Sivu, a village on the coast a short distance from Dillon Bay, by throwing a few shot and shell into the place; and instructing Mr. Gordon at the same time to inform the natives that a man-of-war would visit the island next year, and inflict still further punishment upon them if they did not in the mean time amend their ways.

We took our departure for New Caledonia on the 26th, arriving on the 30th. On our arrival we found the governor, M. Guillain, had just returned from an expedition to the West coast of the island, to inflict summary punishment on the natives for the murder of several French subjects, whom they not only killed, but devoured afterwards. We remained a week at the Port de France, where we received great hospitality from the governor and residents, and finally took leave of our friendly allies, and then made sail for Sydney."

Hants Telegraph.

CHARTS AND BOOKS PUBLISHED BY THE HYDROGRAPHIC OFFICE, ADMIRALTY, in May, 1866.—Sold by_the_Agent, J. D. Potter, 31, Poultry, and 11, King Street, Tower Hill, London.

535.- Brazil, North Coast, San Marcos or Maranham Bay, Lieutenant Tardy de Montraval, F.I.N., (1s.)

1,241.-Ice Chart of the Southern Ocean, 1866, (2s. 6d.)

930.-Philippine Islands, Moluccas Islands, anchorages, plans of, 1847, (1s. 6d.)

2,454.-Philippine Islands, Luzon Island, northern portion, Lieutenant C. Montero, Spanish Navy, 1859, (2s. 6d.)

1,019.-Cochin China, Yu-lin-kan and Gaalong Bays, also view, French survey, 1817, (1s. 6d.)

1,114.-South Pacific Ocean, Tonga or Friendly Islands, from various documents, corrected to 1866, (2s.6d.)

2,421.-South Pacific Ocean, Auckland and Campbell Islands, with Port Ross and Perseverance Harbour, various authorities, 1810-40, (1s. 6d.) EDWARD DUNSTERVILLE, Commander, R. N.

Admiralty, Hydrographic Office, 21st May, 1866.