The activity characterising merchant ship construction, and especially the enormous increase in their dimensions and speed within recent years, have necessarily led to speculation with regard to what form the ship of the future will take. There have not been wanting, indeed, actual propositions and elaborately prepared designs of what the ideal ship should be. A company was sometime ago formed in Washington, U.S., to have three vessels built of a novel type, the patented invention of Captain Lundborg, a Swedish engineer, intended to make the Atlantic passage in five days. It was also announced that the order for their construction had actually been given out, but this is wanting in confirmation. Great expectations were entertained in America regarding what was termed the dome-ship _Meteor_, built on the Hudson in the early part of 1883 from the designs of Captain Bleven. A company had been formed under the designation of the “American Quick Transit Company,” the chief supporters being Boston merchants, to build several large steamships on the proposed lines, but the utter failure of the _Meteor_ to answer the promises of her inventor has relegated the scheme to the vast limbo of unfulfilled American projects. Three years ago or more, scientific journals gave publicity to a scheme of “Ocean Palace” steamship, patented by Mr Robert Wilcox, of Melbourne, Victoria, the claims for which ranked themselves under the heads of speed, safety, and comfort. Double hulls, as in the case of some Channel steamers, were employed, but each of the hulls was divided into two cigar-shaped portions, thus giving to the submerged whole, a quadruplicate character, and which, with its palatial superstructure, was apt to remind one—shall it be said?—of Rome and her seven hills, or Venice and her island base! The design, nevertheless, was to give the least resistance with the greatest buoyancy and stability. The method of propulsion proposed by Mr Wilcox was also novel. He placed a couple of enormous drums fore and aft (between the hulls), which were to be driven by the engines as if they were paddle-wheels. Over these drums was placed a continuous band of iron links, upon which, at suitable intervals, paddles or blades were fixed. A comparatively low speed of engine was to give a high speed of velocity to this band of blades; and as there would be twenty-one paddles, all immersed at the same time, their grip of the water was to be such that there should be little slip. Whether on a serious application of the principles involved in this invention to a ship for the Australian service the voyage would have been made, as was claimed, in 26 days, equal to an increase in speed of 75 per cent., has never of course been determined! Still another scheme, and one which the inventor has been encouraged to prosecute by the recommendations of eminent authorities on both sides of the Atlantic, is that of Captain Coppin, noted for his success in salvage