AN EXTRAORDINARY FEAT.

Press, Volume XLIV, Issue 6924, 2 December 1887, Page 6

AN EXTRAORDINARY FEAT.

Following upon the telegraphic report of an extraordinary trip made by the P. and O. Company's new steamer Victoria to Bombay (says the Argus) comes the wonderful voyage of thc Orient Company's Ormuz, which has just reached Adelaide after the fastest run on record. The Ormuz has travelled from Suez to Adelaide at a rate much faster than the average speed of railway trains on most of our lines, and nearly as fast as on the main lines, and she has landed the mails hours before another magnificent ship— the Carthage—whose mails left London a week previously. It is when we see thes; results that we can gauge the improvements made within recent years in ship and marine engine building. Very few years ago a 51 days' run was the talk of the day. and when the St. Osyth came hitherwards and placed us in possession of letters six weeks old, it was thought th it nothing better could be done. Year after ye.ir, however, the record was beaten and now we have such vessel running as the Ormuz, which can land mails in 23 days from London, the Victoria, .th- Oroya, the Britannia, and the Orizaba, w.hich are making or will make the voyage to Australia almost equal in knots per hour to voyages across the Atlantic. Such good steamers as the Orient, Carthage, Austral, and Rome, .though uew, are becoming by comparison prematurely old, and the fleeter palace- which now plough the seas will merely have their day. Of course there must be a limit to record breaking, but how far or how near that limit may be, cannot of course be stated. The "present and prospective advantages may be' more clearly estimated. In the "first place, we are very likely to have a much faster mail service than is to be actually stipulated for in the contract to be signed within the next few days or weeks. If we had insisted on delivery within 28 days, the companies would have demanded heavier subsidies, liut we are promised this service without undue cost. ; Competition fo- passenger traffic, apart from the natural rivalry between two great proprietaries, will operate to our advantage in thii respect, aud bring us int. much close* communication with kith and kin acroas the water,