prising a total of seventy-four government vessels, with two or three war steamers, while Brazil has forty-two vessels belonging to the government, carrying seven hundred and seventy-five guns.

The naval establishment of Sardinia possesses a force consisting of fifteen vessels of war, armed with four hundred and forty-six guns; the number of government vessels, besides sloops and brigs of war, being eight, mounting, when armed, three hundred and thirty-six guns. The two Sicilies possess a naval force consisting of two ships of the line, five frigates, and ten smaller vessels; comprising a total number of seventeen government vessels, and two or three war steamers. The kingdom of Spain owns a naval force of twenty-one vessels, carrying three hundred and forty-eight guns; and Portugal, fifty-nine vessels of war-the number of guns not being ascertained, but the naval peace establishment amounts to about four thousand five hundred men. Mexico possessed a naval force, recently in commission, which consisted of three brigs and two steamers, as well as eighteen smaller vessels, the whole mounting fortytwo guns. We have exhibited a condensed view of the respective naval forces of the principal maritime powers of the world, and we now proceed to a consideration of the comparative commerce of those nations.

Great Britain exceeds every other nation, not only in the amount of its naval force, but also in its commerce. During the year 1843, there were twenty-three thousand eight hundred and ninety-eight merchant vessels belonging to that empire, and during the following year it was ascertained that it possessed nine hundred steam vessels, with a tonnage of one hun dred and thirteen thousand six hundred and seventy-seven tons. At the present time she has twenty-four thousand and sixteen vessels, with a tonnage of three millions forty-four thousand three hundred and ninety-two tons, employing one hundred and seventy-five thousand six hundred and ninety-one men. The United States, which stands next in the amount of its commerce, possesses nineteen thousand seven hundred and twenty ves. sels, with an aggregate tonnage of two millions four hundred and sixteen thousand nine hundred and ninety-nine tons, those employing one hundred and eighteen thousand seamen. We have seven hundred and forty-five vessels in the whale fishery, a tonnage of three hundred and sixteen thousand and nineteen tons employed in steam navigation, the total number of vessels upon the lakes being seventy-fifty-six of which are steamboats.

The commerce of France employs thirteen thousand seven hundred and eighty-two vessels; Sweden, five thousand four hundred and fifty, with a tonnage of four hundred and seventy-one thousand seven hundred and seventy-two tons; Holland, one thousand one hundred and ninety-five; Russia employs about two hundred and thirty-nine thousand tons in the foreign and coasting trade; the two Sicilies have nine thousand one hundred and seventy-four; and Austria, perhaps, six thousand one hundred and ninety-nine vessels of all descriptions. Turkey has two thousand two hundred and twenty vessels, which are employed in the foreign and coasting trade, embracing a tonnage of about one hundred and eighty-two thousand tons. The kingdom of Sardinia, including Genoa and the island of Sardinia, possesses, moreover, three thousand five hundred and two vessels, which are employed in the foreign and coasting trade, embracing an ag gregate tonnage of one hundred and sixty-seven thousand three hundred and sixty tons. Denmark possesses in the foreign and coasting trade, three thousand and thirty-six vessels, comprising a tonnage of one hun

dred and fifty-three thousand four hundred and eight. Portugal has seven hundred and ninety-eight vessels, and a tonnage of eighty thousand five hundred and twenty-five; and finally, Spain possesses two thousand seven hundred vessels, with an aggregate tonnage of eighty thousand, including vessels of every description which are employed in the foreign and coasting trade.

Having given this condensed view of the comparative naval forces and commerce of the principal maritime powers of the world, we subjoin the following statistical tables, exhibiting the relative naval power of each nation, and the amount of commerce belonging to each, in the order of their naval and commercial strength, from which we may learn the proportion which the naval force of each government bears to the actual amount of commerce which it possesses.

NATIONS, IN THE ORDER OF THEIR COMMERCIAL IMPORTANCE, WITH THE NUMBER OF GUNS

TO EACH ONE HUNDRED THOUSAND TONS OF COMMERCE.

By the tables which we have here given, it is perceived that the naval force of the United States is smaller than that of any other nation, compared with the actual amount of our own commerce. Besides the vessels employed in this service, we have thirteen sailing and eight steam vessels in the revenue department, embracing a tonnage of four thousand five hundred and fifty-three tons, mounting sixty-six guns, and manned by seven hundred and sixty-nine officers and men. This force is, we suppose, liable, in an extraordinary emergency, to be called into the naval service of the government.

The navy is generally considered an important arm of the public defence, and recommendations have been offered from time to time, regarding the increase as well as the reduction of this branch of the public service, the merits of which we do not propose to discuss. We hope, however, that the moral sense of the more civilized nations of modern times, will be disposed to adjust their differences by the sober judgment of reason, as disputes between individuals are quieted before judicial tribunals, rather than through the trial by battle, the relic of a barbarous age.

Art. IV. QUARANTINE LAWS AND REGULATIONS.

THE propriety of quarantine regulations is both acknowledged and denied by a large number of medical men, and men of large commercial experience. The public press, also, enters into the controversy, and contradictory sentiments and opinions are entertained and expressed by men who seem equally well-informed upon the subject, and who can, or ought to have, no personal or private interests to advocate, except those which operate for the general good. For years, the subject has been agitated in this State, and the result is the present quarantine law, one of the acts of the last Legislature of New York.*

All quarantine laws or regulations ought to accord with the progress of medical science, with the knowledge derived from commercial experience; or they ought to be as little burdensome to commerce as a proper regard for the health of the community will admit of. All will agree to the soundness of these general principles, and that all restrictions upon commerce, in the nature of quarantine, that are not necessary to the safety of the public health, ought to be abolished.

The House of Assembly of 1845, appointed a committee of three to examine the then existing quarantine laws applicable to the port of New York, and to report the result of such examination, as well as to suggest such alterations in the laws as they should deem expedient, at the next session of the Legislature. This committee met in the city of New York, last summer, examined the quarantine grounds, visited the vessels at quarantine, and also the wharves, docks, shipping, and their cargoes, in the cities of New York and Brooklyn. They addressed notes to merchants, physicians, and others, who were supposed to possess valuable information on the subject of their appointment, and solicited replies from them. They personally examined many practical merchants, with a view to learn such facts, a knowledge of which has been the result of long experience.

The result of their labors was a voluminous report, which, with the accompanying documents, consisting chiefly of replies from physicians and others whom they interrogated, occupies some three hundred octavo pages. They also framed an act, which they recommended in the place of the then existing quarantine laws; and which act, with some little alteration, affecting no important principle, has now become the law of the State.

The new law is in some respects more restrictive, and in others less so, than the law it abrogated. All vessels having had on board, during the voyage, a case of small-pox, or infectious or contagious disease; are sub

* A correct copy of this law will be found under the head of "Commercial Regulations," in the present number of the Merchants' Magazine.-ED.

ease.

ject to such quarantine as the health-officer may prescribe. This regula. tion is to be enforced at all seasons of the year, and constitutes a new feature in the quarantine laws applicable to this port. No one having the least regard for the public health will object to this restriction. Hundreds of our citizens are annually attacked with this terrible and loathsome disIt is admitted that the small-pox originates principally from foreign sources. A single ship having the small-pox on board, may be the means of spreading the disease throughout the city, State, and a great portion of the Union. Those emigrants who arrive at New York, and proceed directly to the interior, along the line of our canals and railroads, would, had they been exposed to the contagion which produces small-pox, be the cause of spreading the disease through densely populated sections of the country. Therefore, we consider this part of the new quarantine law to be founded upon the wisest principles of humanity; and whatever burden it may impose upon commerce, is necessary to the safety of the public health.

A statement of Dr. Richard Fraser, who was a passenger in the ship Hottinguer, from Liverpool, in May, 1845, has recently been under consideration of the Committee on Commerce in the House of Representatives. It appears from this statement, that the Hottinguer sailed from Liverpool with three hundred and ninety-seven steerage passengers, a crew of twenty-two sailors, four officers of the ship, and six cabin passengers. A large proportion of the passengers were children, and only a small proportion, of both children and adults, had ever been vaccinated. On the eighth day after departure, two children were attacked with small-pox, which soon developed itself in a virulent form, and both cases terminated fatally. The infection had been, of course, imbibed previous to their coming on board. Great dismay prevailed throughout the ship, for fear that the voyage would be a long one, and that many would fall victims to the disease before their arrival into port. Every precaution was adopted, with a view to the safety of the passengers. The dead bodies, beds, bed-clothes, and linen, were thrown overboard, the instant life had ceased, and their berths were purified with burnt tar. Yet, after all these precautions, and even after the arrival of the vessel, some eighteen or twenty days after the deaths mentioned, several were attacked with the disease. Dr. Fraser then says, "Were this a solitary case, less importance would attach to it; but I have made the subject a matter of inquiry, and find that it is of constant and daily recurrence, in all the emigrant vessels on the Atlantic."

We do not know what action, if any, the Committee of Commerce have taken upon the subject. But so far as the port of New York is concerned, the existing quarantine law of this State will do much to remedy the evil. Could we be equally positive respecting the propriety of quarantine laws, with a view to prevent the introduction of yellow and other malignant fevers, as we are in relation to the small-pox, few would be found to deny their necessity. The contagiousness of small-pox is beyond dispute; not so with yellow fever. Intelligent men cannot, therefore, oppose all quarantine laws, and will only be found to disagree respecting the extent of the restrictions it may be necessary to impose upon commerce, in order to guard properly the public health. It is the duty of the public authorities to dissipate, as far as practicable, all local causes of disease, and to prevent, as far as practicable, their introduction from abroad.

The periodical visitation of yellow fever in this city, was the cause which led to the enactment of former quarantine laws in this State. Now,

if yellow fever, or the morbific malarious matter that causes it, cannot be imported, there can be no necessity for quarantine laws to prevent its introduction from abroad. So far as the object of quarantine laws is to prevent the introduction of malignant fevers, and particularly the yellow fever, they must be utterly useless, if these fevers, or the causes that engender them, cannot be imported. The important question then is, "Can yellow fever be imported by sea into this port ?"

This was one of the interrogatories put to several medical men by the committee appointed by the Assembly of New York, to examine the quarantine laws. A reply to this question involves, in some measure, the question of contagiousness or non-contagiousness of yellow fever. Hence, another question was put to certain medical men by the committee, "Is the yellow fever communicated by personal contact, or by an infected atmosphere, or both?" Among some eight or ten medical men of considerable experience and high reputation in their profession, but one was found who did not admit the necessity of quarantine laws with a view to guard the public health; yet they were nearly unanimous in their opinion, that yellow fever could not be communicated by visiting the sick, out of a district in which the atmosphere was infected with the contagious malaria. In other words, it could not be communicated by personal contact; and hence, that it is not contagious in this limited sense of the term. It is necessary to understand what is meant by the term contagious, when applied to disease, before we can assert whether yellow fever, or any other disease, is contagious. No controversy can be profitable, or be likely to elicit truth, unless those engaged in it give to important terms a like definition. What, then, is the definition of the term contagious, when applied to disease? Perhaps the most perfect definition is a disease that may be communicated, either by contact with the person who has it, his clothes, or other articles coming from his person; by breathing the atmosphere containing the morbific exhalations that emanate from his system, or by coming in contact with, or handling certain articles of merchandise coming from the country or place in which the disease exists.

Every disease that can be conveyed in this manner is said to be transportable, or importable, from one country into another. In order to avoid the sterile discussions which the terms contagious and non-contagious have occasioned, some medical writers have employed the terms transmission and transmissible. It is denied by no one, that the origin of yellow fever, in its native climate, that is, where it is endemic, or peculiar to the country, is caused by breathing an atmosphere containing the morbific malarious matter capable of generating it. That this morbific matter, whatever it may be, is transmissible from place to place, from country to country; that it can be imported in the holds of vessels, the baggage of seamen and passengers, in the merchandise on board, is a question decided by such an array of positive affirmative testimony, that the contrary opinion is abandoned by all intelligent men. Yet yellow fever cannot be communicated by visiting the sick. Upon this point, there is very little difference of opinion. "If," says Dr. Vache, "by contagion, is meant prepagatia from one person to another by contact, then I unhesitatingly say it is not contagious." "The evidence that yellow fever is not a contagious disease," says Dr. Hort, "and therefore cannot be communicated by personal contact, is overwhelming."

It is evident that both these gentlemen use the term contagion in a lim