The first steamer despatched by the co-partnery was one of Messrs. Burns’ Liverpool and Glasgow steamers, the UNICORN. She sailed from Liverpool for Halifax and Boston, under the command of Captain Douglas, on Saturday morning, 16th May, 1840. She carried the mails and a limited number of saloon passengers, the passage rates being—to Halifax £30, to Boston £33 each. The BRITANNIA, the pioneer steamer of the British and North American Steam Packet Co., was despatched on the 4th July, 1840, being the first of four wooden paddle-wheel steamships, the others being the ACADIA, CALEDONIA and COLUMBIA. These vessels were uniform in size and power, being 207 feet long, 34 feet 4 inches broad, and 22 feet 6 inches deep. Their gross tonnage was 1,154 tons, and their engines of 740 I.H.P. drove them at an average speed of 8½ knots per hour. The reception given to the BRITANNIA on the termination of her maiden voyage by the citizens of Boston was most enthusiastic. Nor was the goodwill of the merchants confined to banquets and complimentary speeches for, when the BRITANNIA was ice-bound in Boston Harbour, in February, 1844, they liberated her by cutting a canal through the ice, seven miles long and 100 feet wide. [Illustration: EUROPA and AMERICA. Cunard Steamship Co.] In 1843 the Company added to their fleet the HIBERNIA, and in 1845 the CAMBRIA, each of 1,040 I.H.P. and of 1,422 tons gross, with an average speed of 9¼ knots. On the expiration of the Postal Contract the Government stipulated that the existing mail service should be doubled, that the steamers of the Company should be capable of carrying guns of the largest calibre, and that a steamer should leave Liverpool every Saturday (calling at Holyhead if required) for New York and Boston alternately; the Boston steamer to call at Halifax, and the New York steamer to do so also, if required by the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty. In consideration of these augmented services the annual subsidy was increased to £173,340, at which figure it remained for twenty years (1847 to 1867). To meet the new requirements, the AMERICA, NIAGARA, CANADA and EUROPA, of 1,825 tons, and 2,000 I.H.P., with an average speed of ten and a quarter knots, were built and added to the fleet. A few years later the Collins Line, heavily subsidised, was started with the avowed object of “sweeping the Cunarders off the Atlantic.” This opposition lasted until 1858, when, having lost two ships, and being refused any further subsidy by the United States Government, the Collins Company collapsed, and the remaining ships were withdrawn. During the continuance of this opposition the Cunard Company added steadily to their fleet larger and more powerful steamers. The ASIA and AFRICA were built in 1850, and were each 266 feet by 40 feet by 27·2 feet, of 2,226 tons gross, with engines of 2,400 I.H.P., and of an average speed of 12·5 knots. These were followed in 1852 by the ARABIA, the last of the wooden paddle steamers.