THE PORT OF LONDON.

Press, Volume XLIX, Issue 14759, 1 September 1913, Page 9

THE PORT OF LONDON.

— ——♦ INSPECTION OF THE WORKS. THE THAMES AWAKE. (T7.OU OCB OWN CORE£SPONT>ENT.) LONDON, July 25. That it :_ quite wrong to suppose ! that the Port of London is not at all alive to the requirements of the times I was evident to all who wero fortunato enough to take part to-day in a tour of inspection of the port works, on the invitation of the Port Authority. Tho tour was arranged by Mr Estill, the'commercial superintendent oi tho port, primarily for tbe benefit of tho New Zealand High Commissioner, but the Agents-General for Victoria, South Australia, West Australia, and Tasmania were also invited, as well As some prominent Australasian producers, notably Mr R. D. D. McLean, of Hawke's Bay, and Mr Cooke, of Australia. Mr Mackenzie was accompanied by the New Zealand Veterinarian (Mr A. Crabb), and the officers of the Port Authority jrresent were Mr Philipson (general manager and secretary), Mr Kirkpatrick (chief engineer), Mr Broodbank (docks manager), and Mr Estill. SPICES AND IVORY. Tho first visit was to the spice and ivory stores at tho London Dockj the nearest to the city. Here, on the ivory floor, lay, piles und rows of tusks from the primest elephants of Africa and India, entrusted to the keeping of tbe Port Authority by merchants all over England. The amount in sight was probably valued at about £'200.000, and ■ was saving up for the next of the four or five sales which aro held in tho stores even,- year. AU the grading and sorting of this vast horde is carried out by officials of tho Port Authority, who wero to lie seen at work handling tho different brands with as little appearance of awe as if they wero sacks of oats or chaff. The best tusk visible weighed about 150 pounds. The two floors above are occupied by a great assortment of spices, cloves; nutmegs, cinchona, and many others, awaiting in as near a state of Nature as possible the appearance of the buyers. Tho man-el is that so much can find consumers. On another floor •■ore such things as quicksilver, held v. tho Port Authority for the owners. One bowl of it, belonging to the houso of Rothschild, wns found casually floating an Sib weight, which could not be held down. In this and neighbouring sheds aro forty acres of floor spaco to accommodate tbe wool which comes for sale to tho Port of London. At present it is almost empty, but ono or two New Zealand brands, notably "Kapu-t-one," made themselves evident. THE WINE VAULTS. Tho last party which went down into the wine vaults, which extend for many ceres underneath tbo dock stores, consisted of Queen Alexnndra and her sister, the Empress Mario of Russia, j who were shown round three weeks ago to tho light of the little torches which [ all visitors have to carry. This cryoted ' vault, constructed about a hundred : years ago, is penetrated by twentyj eight miles of tramway, upon which the wine is brought out when required. I The niost interesting feature, outside ; the barrels, is the fungus which grows on the roof • wherever there is no curI rent of air passing. It is more like j woolly aphis than anything else, and a wag pointed out that as it grows it reverts to tho old form of a bunch of 1 grapes. 1 TILBURY DOCKS. ! Returning to Fenchureh station, we i travelled by train to Tilbury and i boarded the steam yacht Conservator, i from the deck of which wo wero able to ! get a good idea of the extent of the docks and the improvements which are being made, A dozen of tho largest ships afloat lay alongside the quays in tho dock, but on the seaward side tho engineers a"** »restling with the earth and water in the making of a berth long enough to tako the new giant of tho Australian trade, the Ceramic. Tho Midland Railway has just acquired tho Tilbury line, which it proposes to utilise for a fast Continental service, having its point of departure from the Thames mouth. Already the Port Authority has its plans laid for tho construction of a great passenger stage similar to the Princes Stage at Liverpool, and it is hoped that this through route to the Continent, without changing trains in London, will gradually become a strong favourite. The great difficulty with several of the London docks is not their length or depth, but the size of the locks themselves, which have generally been outgrown by the steamers of the last few years. The Albert Dock can take so far all tho ships in tho New Zealand trado— we saw half a dozen or more of them in the dock to-day, including tho Turakina making herself good after tho damage sustained at Rio—but the new dock whicb is beinir constructed just south of the Royal Albert will be specially designed to meet all tho possibilities of increase for many years to come. MEAT DISCHARGING. Wo had a good opportunity, too, of observing the conditions under which meat is discharged in tho Royal Albert Dock, for several of the vessels were unloading. Tho Kaipara was busy putting out a thousand carcases per hour from three ports and sending it by means of travelling ways right along the. quay, to bo s rted at the end under a shelter. The sorting, of course, is not the best that could be devised, and tho Port Authority is anxious to induce shippers to make use of the better facilities that there are in tho newlyequipped sheds whero the Argentine beef was being put out. So far as chutes can be satisfactory, those in use at the Kaipara were so, but there must always be a certain amount of damage. Closo at hand a Noakes elevator, which is used until the meat is got away from immediately below the hatchway, was seen at work, and elicited expressions of approval. American beef was being sorted expeditiously and weighed automatically on an overhead railway arrangement, and tho view was expressed that if a similar scheme could be utilised for mutton thero would be a great saving of handling and damage. The work at the new cold stores at the town end of tho Albert Dock is well under way, and considerable progress has already been made by the contractors, the Pearson Company, with tho new dock. On the whole thero is no longer any ground for the statment that London is doing nothing to keep up to date.