To Sir Edward Reed and other shipbuilding officers the appointment of this brilliant amateur to the supreme control of the department seemed an act of war, not only on professional architects, but upon naval architecture itself. They admitted the success of the Symondite ships in speed and certain sailing qualities, but denied the correctness of his principles and strenuously resisted his innovations. A great breadth of beam was particularly objectionable to the scientific builder; not only did it imply a large resistance to the passage of the ship through water, but it contributed to an excess in metacentric height, abnormal stiffness, and an uneasy motion. “For a time his opinions triumphed; but after a while the principles expounded by his subordinates (Creuze, Chatfield, and Read) were accepted as correct, while not a single feature of Sir William’s system of construction is retained, except certain practical improvements which he introduced.”[37] [Illustration: ‘Victoria’ Breadth = 59′ 2″ Length = 204′ ‘Caledonia’ Breadth = 53′ 6″ Length = 205′ Fig: 1. ‘Vernon’ Breadth = 52′ Length = 176′ ‘Barham’ Breadth = 47′ 10″ Length = 173′ 8″ Fig: 2. TYPICAL SECTIONS OF “SYMONDITE” AND CONTEMPORARY SHIPS] Nevertheless his opponents, as before remarked, freely acknowledged the value of his services to the country, especially in breaking down the restrictions which had hitherto been imposed on constructors in respect of dimensions. His biographer pays tribute to the intuitive genius which enabled him to tell at a glance the trim required for a sailing ship, and to sketch out, as a brilliant impromptu, the best form of hull. But were these efforts entirely spontaneous? Were they not the reward of hidden and persistent work, observation, and calculation, carried out for years by the young officer who never let a sailing ship come near him without contriving to board her and ascertain her principal properties and dimensions? Here, surely, is the undramatic but praiseworthy method by which he attained success: a method, essentially scientific, which enabled its user, even without knowledge of other important principles governing ship design, to perform a national service in revolutionizing our methods of naval architecture.