STEAM COMMUNICATION WITH ENGLAND, via PANAMA.

Otago Witness, Issue 75, 23 October 1852, Page 4

STEAM COMMUNICATION WITH ENGLAND, via PANAMA.

(From the Sydney Morning Herald, August 24th.)

The establishment of the Australasian Pacific Mail Steam Packet Company, the more carefully it is considered, the more fully do its promised advantages become apparent to those who are the most deeply interested in rapid steam communication between England and her colonies in Australasia and New Zealand. The danger which the late Parliamentary Committee suggested in respect to British mails and treasure crossing the Isthmus of Panama, — it being in possession of a foreign power, — has been for some time discarded as the most groundless of fears ; and the two wealthy and influential English and American associations — the Royal Mail Steam Packet and the Pacific Steam Navigation Companies — are now acting in cordial co-operation with the Isthmus Railway Company, and conveying passengers, mails, and treasure (the latter under safe insurance) from San Francisco to London and New York. We have very recently referred to the well-considered arrangements, not only for completing the railway across the Isthmus, but for establishing a new line from Panama to Sydney via New Zealand ; the additional information, however, which now reaches us by every northern mail, enables us to continue a most attiactive subject. In the able prospectus of ths Australasian Pacific Mail Steam Packet Company, it is set forth that the rapidity and certainty of communication which is essential both to the due development of the noble colonies of the Crown in the southern hemisphere, and the maintenance of a close bond of union between those and the mother country, cannot be effectually and permanently secured by any measures which shall not gi\e to Sydney, the capital of those seas, that pre-eminence of advantage from the establishment of steam packets which is properly her due. Now we do not desire to underrate the advantages which Sydney will share with the sister settlements, to the west and south, by the establishment of two lines of steamers by the way of the Cape of Good Hope, and of Egypt and Singapore. We have already disclaimed the idea of raising the shadow of a shade of opposition to either of these lines; but we nevertheless deem it due to the position which Sydney occupies as the capital of Australasia, to invite careful attention to the superior advantages which the Panama route promises beyond any other which the two others are enabled to offer her.

By the Cape route, the distance from London to Sydney, with detentions at the Cape, King George's Sound, Swan Itiver, Adelaide, and Melbourne, it is calculated vill be performed in from 68 to 73 days. By the Egypt and Singapore route, and touching at the Society Islands and New Zealand, the outside calculation of time is 59 days ; and intelligent travellers, well acquainted with the line, assort that the distance can be easily performed by first-class vessels (such as the Royal Mail Packet Company now have on the line from Southampton to Chagres, and as the Australasian P.M.S.Pv Company pledge themselves to place on the line between Panama and Sydney), in the now almost incredibly short space of forty-two days. In a paper upon this subject, which appears in a late number of the London " Athenceum," and obviously written by an experienced hand, the point recently urged by ourselves, as to the rapidity with which a voyage to Sydney may now be made, even taking New York by the way, is forcibly dwelt upon. The writer observes, that the ordinary rates of time for the steamers between Liverpool and New York, is 11 days ; and from New York to Chagres, 9 days. He allows 12 hours to cross the Isthmus, and 28 days for the distance between Panama and Sydney, with detentions for coaling at Tahiti, and landing passengers, and delivery of mails at Auckland. This makes a total of 49 days; but he shews that if fast steamers were placed between Southampton and Chagres, and between Panama and Sydney, the whole distance would be done without difficulty in 42 days. And here it will not he out of place to observe, that new propelling powers, new methods of economising fuel, and various other important improvements are on foot, by which the increased speed of steam ships may soon be carried to an extraordinary extent. The Australian Bomareng Propeller will soon be tested by English engineers ; and whilst we look forward with natural anxiety to the adap ; tatiom of this motive power which, if successful, will reflect so much credit on the colony, we are enabled to add that another improvement, equally promising in its results, is about to be

forwarded hence to London, by a gentleman not generally known to be highly skilled in mechanical science, namely, Mr. E. Dejas Thomson, our excellent Colonial Secretary. We have seen the model of a new paddle-wheel, invented by him ; a description of which, as he is about to patent it, we are not at liberty to give ; but for which we have no hesitation in predicting a roost favourable reception in scientific circles. To these inventions, as well as to the improvements thereupon, which, in spite of patent laws, the keen competition of European engineers will soon effect ; and to the many other methods of increasing speed, and reducing time and space, we are now emboldened to look with confidence and hope ; and to expect from their application that the communication between Great Britain and Australasia will be performed, at no very distant period, in little more than thirty days.

At New Zealand, the establishment of the Panama route is regarded with the highest satisfaction ; and it has been proposed that the new Provincial Council be petitioned to recommend a public grant in aid of the operations of the Australasian P. M.S. P. Company between Panama and New Zealand and New South "Wales. We are aware that a similar course has been suggested in Sydney ; but whether the Company, so well organised as it appears to be, and in such friendly connexion with other wealthy and influential associations, is in a position to require assistance, from either colony, seems to be questionable.

By the latest papers received frem San Francisco, we learn that the shipment of treasure for New York and London, via the Isthmus, was increasing to an immense extent. By the steam-ship " Tenessee," which sailed on the 2nd of June, gold dust was shipped to the amount of 1,920,446 dollars ; and it was expected that the consignments for New York would be delivered in twenty-four days, and those for London, via the West Indies, in thirty days. We learn from the same source that the railway line across the Isthmus is thus laid out : — from Aspinwall, Navy Bay, to Frijoli, twelve miles ; from the latter place to Gorgona, twenty-five miles; and thence to Panama, twenty-six miles — a total of sixty-three miles, nearly one-half of which is already opened for the railway carriages, and the other half easily and cheaply performed by the aid of mules.

The writer in the " Athenaeum" well says, that nothing but the speediest intercourse with Europe will now satisfy Sydney, " who can afford to buy her own pace." In this we heartily concur; and whilst we fully admit the great advantages to the Western and Southern colonies of Australasia, which the steam lines by the way of the Cape and Singapoie must yield to them, we should he blind indeed to our own interests if we did not give, for New South Wales, the preference to a route which promises to be accomplished in three weeks or a month sooner than the former ones; which also secures for Sydney rapid and direct intercourse with the populous and rich producing countries of North- West and South America, and the Islands of the Carribbean Sea ; and which, in a word, will place us, by the speediest means, that can be conceived, in possession of the daily history of the world and its leaders, and, at the same time, to enable those at a distance to correctly calculate those immense resources which, in their extraordinary development, foreshadow a stupendous problemfor the future of the Australian colonies. Our data and change grow every day : they should be kept in view, therefore, every day; and by no means can this be done but by the mighty power, whose application to our uigent wants we are now recording, and by whose aid will be soon polished and smoothed down many features of Australia's rough outside, which includes the germ of civilization, happiness, and wealth, for untold millions.