have in one season not been enabled to pass the falls at all, while other boats the same season might pass them three or four times.

Ques. 9. When you said that boats formerly were of 12 to 17 feet beam, &c., what period of time did you refer to?

Ans. About the year 1822 or 1823.

Ques. 10. Have you had any experience, on your boat, in lowering chimneys with derricks, or in lowering in any manner at any other place than the canal at Louisville?

Ans. I have had a little experience in lowering with derricks. I made one trip on the John Hancock, which lowered with derricks. She ran from Cincinnati to New Orleans. I have had no experience in lowering chimneys except at the canal at Louisville. There was no place on the Ohio and Mississippi rivers that required chimneys to be lowered but the canal bridge, until the Wheeling bridge was erected, that I have any knowledge of.

Charles Ross,

A witness sworn on the part of the complainant.

Ques. 1. Where do you reside and what is your age, and has your deposition been heretofore taken in this cause?

Ans. I reside in Cincinnati, and am 44 years old; and my deposition has been taken in this cause, and is at page 67 of the record. Ques. 2. Have you been engaged in the steamboat navigation of the Ohio river? If yea, in what capacity, and how long?

Ans. I have continually since 1822, and was on the river before that time; and most of the time in the trade between Cincinnati and New Orleans. I have boated some from Cincinnati to Pittsburgh in the early days of my boating. I have made some 3, 4 or 5 trips within the last 10 years, from New Orleans to Pittsburgh, on the larger boats. When I first went to Pittsburgh I went in the capacity of mate on a steamboat. I was then a young master. Shortly afterwards I madea trip from Cincinnati to Pittsburgh on a keel boat as master. Between 1822 and 1845 I went several times as passenger from Cincinnati to Pittsburgh and back. Within the last 10 years I have been from New Orleans to Pittsburgh on a large boat, as commander. The name of the steamboat was the General Pike. She carried about 400 tons. I have been master of steamboats for the last 12 years. I was piloting steamboats between Cincinnati and New Orleans for about 12 years previous to that. And for about 6 years previous to that I was piloting flat boats between Cincinnati and New Orleans, as captain.

Ques. 3. What changes have been made in the construction of steamboats navigating the Ohio river, since you have been engaged in the business, in respect to the dimensions of boats and their chimneys?

Ans. There have been great changes made in the construction of steamboats and their machinery. The changes in the hulls of the boats have been from short to long ones, and of easier models for speed or running; shallow holds in general, wider beams, lighter timbers, &c.

The change in machinery has been in adding more power to the boat by creating more boilers and more fire surface. In some instances the boilers have been made longer. In early steamboating an 18 feet boiler was considered long. It was commonly 36 inches in diameter. Some of these short boilers had single 12 to 15 inch flues, running through them; and some were cylinder boilers, without flues. At this day a 32 feet long boiler with two 14 inch flues is very common. In fact a majority of our boilers are 40 inches in diameter with double flues. They will now average near 25 feet in length. It is common to have two engines on the boat now instead of one. The cylinders have been increased in size and number, and many of our finest boats have 10 feet stroke. There are a few boats that have 4 cylinders with two engines called the clipper engines. The chimneys have also been increased in height, and diameter, very much. I have never measured the heights of any of these tall chimneys; but would judge many of them I have seen to be at least 80 feet from the surface of the water to their tops.

Ques. 4. State whether in your opinion these changes have proved beneficial; and what effect they have produced on the commerce of the river?

Ans. These changes, of course have been beneficial. They have made faster boats, and more comfortable for traveling and the carrying of passengers. They have made traveling cheaper. Transportation of goods is now obtained for a great deal less money; and there is no doubt it has enhanced the commerce of the country and made business that never would have existed had it not have been for the improvements of steam navigation. It is my opinion that steam navigation has made this country what it is in a great measure.

Ques. 5. Suppose the Louisville canal to be enlarged or the falls improved, so as to admit the passage of larger boats, what would be the effect upon the dimensions of packets trading from Pittsburgh to St.Louis and other ports below Louisville.

Ans. If the canal was made larger, or the obstruction which is called the canal, was taken away and the navigation past the falls made easy, there is no doubt but we would have better boats and more trade between ports above the falls and ports below. Facilities for navigation create trade and travel.

Ques. 6. State whether lowering steamboat chimneys, in order to pass a bridge, is attended with any danger, expense or delay; and in what particulars?

Ans. It is always attended with expense to create an apparatus to lower them with. In lowering the chimneys, there is always danger of loss of life and limb, let them be high or low. The higher the chimneys, the greater the danger, and the more impracticable it is to get them up or down. It is a dangerous operation to let down these low chimneys which pass the canal. In a majority of cases, we use a pole to assist in getting the chimneys down; with guys and braces. But in those tall chimneys, it would be impossible to raise a pole that would reach to their tops, or anywhere near them. And I

do not think that any one yet has learned how to get these tall chimneys down with safety. As regards detention, if a plan could be found out to raise and lower them, with any thing like safety, and it be in the day time, and in fair weather, they might be gotten down and up again while the boat was under way. In a dark night, it would be a dangerous matter to lower or raise them; even our common low canal chimneys. I have frequently left mine down until daylight, because I considered it dangerous to raise them in the night. It is dangerous to send a man up to key them. He could not do it in the dark. In bad weather, I never pretend to put them up; but have let them down. If a man was up on the ladder, or climbing up in the night time, and the boat should happen to strike, which is a common occurrence, the man would be apt to be injured, and the people about him on the deck, would also be in danger of being injured or losing their lives. I have climbed the ladder myself, when I was not willing to trust a man to go up, in bad weather, by daylight. The boat frequently strikes something in the bottom of the river. Ques. 9. What effect has lowering chimneys upon their duration? Ans. Chimneys that are frequently lowered and raised by hinges, are subject to being indented and gotten out of shape. I wore out a pair of chimneys before my boat was half worn out, on account of lowering them and raising them at the canal bridge; by denting and warping, by the strain that naturally occurred from the purchase on them in raising and lowering them. Once the top of one of my chimneys fell, but caught in the guys and almost ruined the chimney; and I was as well fixed for raising and lowering as any other boat on the river. The danger would be much less in lowering them in the canal than there would be in lowering them, while under headway on the river. We always lower them when lying still in the canal or at the wharf before entering the canal. The reason why we don't lower them while in motion, when in the canal, is because the boat constantly strikes against the sides or bottom of the canal, and keeps the boat rolling more or less. If the boat was under headway in the canal, we could lower them if it were not for the striking of the boat. Ques 10. State your opinion, and the reason for it, with regard to the safety, utility and economy of high chimneys, with large diameters, on steamboats designed to navigate the Ohio river?

Ans. In the building of the chimneys higher it does not make the navigation any more safe, except that it gives the sparks a better clearance. Indeed boats with tall chimneys do not throw out as many sparks as boats with lower chimneys; the tall chimneys appearing to evaporate the sparks. The utility is in creating a draft to make steam more easily; and the economy is in gaining speed. I answer these questions from knowledge obtained by practice.

Cross-examination.

Ques. 1. Are you engaged in steamboating now?

Ans. I am not, and probably never shall be again. I was engaged in it some last winter, and might have been engaged all the time on

some of the best, as master, if I would choose to act. I was offered the command of one of the best boats on the river engaged in the Cincinnati and New Orleans trade. But I have gotten tired of the business and wish to quit it.

Ques. 2. What boat did you command last?

Ans. The Simon Kenton. I went a few trips on her to accommodate the captain. The last boat I had the regular command of was the General Pike. I sold and left her two years ago this fall.

Ques. 3. Had she, and did the other boats which you have commanded in the Cincinnati and New Orleans trade, have boilers of 30 feet or more in length?

Ans. The General Pike had four boilers, 24 feet 6 inches in length; and 42 inches in diameter. The boilers of the Andrew Jackson, which I commanded, might have been 30 feet long, and they might have been less. This is the only boat in that trade, that I have commanded, that had boilers as much as 30 feet.

Ques. 4. What was the length of that part of the chimneys of the Andrew Jackson which lowered?

Ans. I think there were five rings, of about 10 feet. It was three or four years after they commenced running through the canal before they began to put joints on the chimneys to lower.

Ques. 5. How high from the water were the chimneys of the first General Pike, which you commanded?

Ans. They would just clear the Louisville canal when the boat was loaded, with 10 feet water in the canal.

Ques. 6. Among all the boats which you have commanded, which had the highest chimneys?

Ans. The Andrew Jackson had chimneys about two feet higher than those of any other boat I have commanded.

Ques. 7. When was she running?

Ans. She commenced running in 1845 or 1846, and ran until this last summer.

Ques. 8. What boats running above the falls have chimneys as high, in your opinion, as 80 feet from the water?

Ans. I suppose the Telegraph No. 2 would come as near to it as any other; but I can not say that her chimneys are as high. There may be some with higher chimneys. I will not say that there are any boats above the falls with chimneys as high as 80 feet; it is only an opinion. I have never measured any of them. I refer to the Brilliant, the Messenger, the Buckeye State, the Cincinnati, the Ben Franklin, the Wisconsin, the Hoosier State, and the Keystone State. The chimneys of all these boats look to me to be near 80 feet high, when light. They are all high chimney boats, and are all that I can now recollect with very high chimneys.

Ques. 9. How long is it since boilers 30 feet long or more, and of 40 or 42 inches in diameter, with two flues, have been in use on steamboats on the Ohio?

Ans. It is about six years since I first saw them 30 feet long, and about five since I first saw one 32 feet long, and with 40 or 42 inch

diameter. Sixteen years ago I commanded a boat with eight boilers on her, with double flues. Those boilers were 42 inches in diameter,

and not over 18 feet long.

Ques. 10. How long is it since boats began to use two engines on the Ohio?

Ans. Two side wheel engines have been in use since about 1825. Two stern wheel engines were common before that time.

Ques. 11. How long have boilers of as much as 25 feet in length been in use on the river?

Ans. They were quite common in 1840.

Ques. 12. How long is it since chimneys were in use, on the Ohio, as high as those upon boats which you have before named in your answer to the 8th cross-interrogatory?

Ans. It is about eight years. I think the J. M. White had chimneys as tall as any of these packets; she was built at Pittsburgh about eight years ago, for the trade from St. Louis to New Orleans; she never ran above the falls only as she came from Pittsburgh. She was built for St. Louis people. I believe it is more than eight years

since she came down.

Ques. 13. Do you know how high her chimneys were?

Ans. I do not, from actual measurement; but they were very tall. Ques. 14. Do you know her length or tonnage ?

e?

Ans. She was over 200 feet long; too large to pass through the locks at Louisville. I do not know her tonnage.

Ques. 15. How often were you accustomed, when you were in the steamboat business, to pass through the canal at Louisville during each boating season?

Ans. Not less than eight times a season, on an average.

Ques. 16. How long do the chimneys of steamboats, that pass regularly through the canal, usually last?

Ans. I think they do not, on an average, more than three years; it depends on the iron they are made of, and its thickness, and the dif ference of the draft. Some chimneys have hotter drafts than others and will burn more. This is in some measure owing to the construction of the furnace. I have seen a furnace choked up with the ashes and the chimney would become red hot. It is owing to the construction of the furnace, some times, that the chimneys have more draft.

Ques. 17. You have said that among the changes that have taken place in the hulls of steamboats, that the holds were in general shallower, and the timbers lighter than they formerly were; state whether this has been the case to a greater extent in boats built to run above Cincinnati than in boats built to run below?

Ans. Rather to a greater extent in boats to run above the falls than in boats to run below. Among those below the falls there is no material difference in this respect.

Ques. 18. How long does a boat usually last which is built in the light manner that they now build boats to run above the falls?

Ans. The average natural lifetime is about five years. But the