THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 27, 1934 THE NEW CUNARDER

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXI, Issue 21916, 27 September 1934, Page 10

THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 27, 1934 THE NEW CUNARDER

Centuries of sea history are alive in the British sentiment that hails with pride the launching of the new Cunarder, largest and fastest liner in the world. Here is an achievement to thrill the heart of a nation owing more than any other to triumphs of ocean voyaging in war and peace. No matter what changes the years have brought, whatever lessening of peril or modifying of adventure with their dulling of the sea sense, salt air is still welcome in British nostrils as a native breath. The widespread Empire tells a tale not yet finished, a tale of daring forays and quests and migrations across the face of the deep, and of homecomings that are quite as much a part of the vital experience. Out and back, to go out again and again, the seafaring shuttles haye made their guided way, ever weaving in wider pattern the life of this pathfinding people, bent on ransacking horizons and making new homes in far places of the earth. Others have thus done well and are neither forgotten nor unpraised, but circumstances, including a heritage of blood from many sources, decreed ages ago that Britain's isle should be a seedpod of maritime harvest, generation by generation. They are traitor to deepest instincts that feel no warming throb as this giant vessel, product of British minds and hands, goes down the slipways and takes the water. Her very size—a tonnage of 73,000 and accommodation for 5500 souls in a floating town replete with every conceivable amenity—captures thought. Her equipment, when completed as she continues to lie in her "fitting basin," will be superb. Her speed of 30 knots, to be attained without a disturbing tremor and controlled with effortless skill using devices of which our forefathers never dreamed, will set her apart as a passenger-ship reducing distances. She represents a purpose as well as an enterprise, and the purpose is worthy to rank with the best in national and international endeavour.

It must be realised, of course, that this gigantic product of the seaspirit of Britain, embodied in financial courage, designers' art and the labour of a host of zealous workmen, will have limits set to her early usefulness. British shipping has lately suffered a decline; the demand for passenger and cargo carrying seriously decreased when the economic blizzard struck, and since then there has been cause for anxiety lest the glory thus shattered should prove to have departed for ever. And the colossal dimensions of the new Cunarder mean that not many ports will be immediately capable of accommodating her. To spend fully £4,500,000 on her construction, much of the outlay being guaranteed by the State exchequer, may seem foolishly speculative. Had this been done in more prosperous times, the 'criticism runs, the project would have been less open to doubt of its wisdom. When it was suspended after it had been in progress for a year, regrettable as the halt was because of its depriving thousands of employment, this course had warrant. Why resume—some asked — while the prospect was unfavourable, by reason especially of the bid other nations were making for a share in an industry of transport not extensive enough to keep British yards fully active? The pessimism was unjustified. No depression can last for ever. Signs of commercial revival had come again to Britain when the Treasury advances were authorised to complete the ship. Other peoples were seeing rifts in the clouds. Hence the French Government agreed to stand behind the Compagnie Generale Transatlantique in its decision to lay "the keel of a vessel larger than this Cunarder. The fact is that her launching is on a rising tide of trade, its flow already evident. She will be ready to profit by the revived demand for transport facilities ; more than that, she will contribute to that demand, and particularly assist to hold for Britain the position so vitally essential to national wellbeing.

In this launching, then, is a wisely brave answer of hope to the fears that too long have been allowed to obstruct the outlook. And the news that she is to be followed by a still larger sister-ship, larger indeed than the Normandie to be built by the French company, strengthens the assurance that the days of restricted maritime enterprise are definitely over. In this hour of achievement is a call to think again of the progress due to such enterprise. The first Cunard liner, a cockle-shell compared with the leviathan of this launching, was set afloat upon the Clyde less than a hundred years ago; on the day, to be exact, when Captain Hobson was receiving the earliest group of signatures to the Treaty of Waitangi—February 6, 1840. New Zealanders, looking back over that little span of years and freshly familiar with that time of imperfect facilities of ocean transport, can readily appreciate the advance that has been made in worldwide shipping, and realise how greatly that advance has helped to make economic development possible. The pioneer Cunarder then launched played her part in bridging the Atlantic with mails and passenger traffic; the new Cunarder, there can be no doubt, will do likewise on a scale befitting the days awaiting her completion. Confidence mingles with pride as the auspicious launching is achieved.