[169] It is only due to the memory of the late Mr. MacGregor Laird, who, with his brother, the late Mr. John Laird, M.P. for Birkenhead, did so much to encourage Ocean steam navigation in its infancy, to state that the _Sirius_ was placed on the Transatlantic service on his recommendation, and that, so early as 1836, he was chiefly instrumental in founding the British and American Steam Navigation Company which chartered this vessel from the St. George Company. See letter from Mr. A. Hamilton of St. Helen’s Place, London, “the friend and executor of the late Mr. MacGregor Laird,” which appeared in the _Shipping and Mercantile Gazette_ of the 15th May, 1873: in this paper, also, appears a copy of a letter which Mr. Laird, under the signature of “Chimera,” addressed to the _Liverpool Albion_ on the 28th December, 1835, in reply to Dr. Lardner’s fallacious prognostications that a steam voyage across the Atlantic was “perfectly chimerical,” from which I take the following extract: “By what process of reasoning Dr. Lardner has fixed the ultimate size of steam-vessels for the Atlantic at 800 tons and 200 horse-power does not appear, which is the more to be regretted, as it must be a peculiar one, from the size of the vessels very little exceeding that of several in the coasting trade, and the power being much less; but I am not bound to take this for granted, particularly as all my experience has proved that we as yet have never had to complain of the size of the vessel if the power has been proportionately increased; on the contrary, the Dublin boats have crept up from 250 to 500 and 600, and the Clyde from 200 to 400 tons, and other lines in the same proportion. In reasoning, therefore, upon a line of steam communication between Great Britain and New York, I must reason from analogy, and fortunately Dr. Lardner gives me the data. The _Leeds_, it appears, makes the voyage to and from Bordeaux, a distance of 1600 miles, with one supply of coals. The _Leeds_ is, I believe, 420 tons and 140 horse power, and her displacement between her light and load marks will be about 80 tons to one foot, or perhaps only 70. Now, the distance from Liverpool or Portsmouth to New York is 3000 nautical miles or 3500 statute miles, a little less to Liverpool. Suppose the _Leeds_ be trebled in capacity, so that her displacement should exceed 200 tons per foot draught, it is not necessary to treble her power, as double power propels more than double bulk: but allow her 300 horse-power, her light draught of water would be about 11 feet with her machinery on board, and with 800 tons of dead weight on board, about 15. I take the consumption of coals at 30 tons per day, and a mean speed of 10 miles per hour, and at an expenditure of 525 tons of common coal, or 420 of Langennich, I land my passengers in New York, Portsmouth, or Liverpool in something less than fifteen days. I have not allowed anything in this calculation for