blishment, but it is not so large as might be expected, arising from so much of the business being carried on in the docks, private warehouses, and elsewhere out of doors.

London is the great place of import for East and West India produce, that is to say, groceries and wines, besides carrying on a great trade with the corn, timber, and tallow countries, and in wool, drugs, and manufactured articles of luxury. The tonnage of ships entering from foreign parts is about 1,500,000 tons yearly; from the colonies, 500,000 tons; and from the English and Irish coasts, 3,000,000 tons; making an aggregate of 5,000,000 tons. The coal trade largely employs the coasters. Much of the foreign business of the port is in the intercourse of steamers with France, Flanders, Holland, and Dutchland. As London is the great entrepôt for England, for the supply of shipping, and for the neighbouring Continent, the warehousing business is large. The Custom House business has, therefore, a relation to these various cir

cumstances.

From the time of the Normans, the Customs have formed a large part of the government revenues; and from the Revolution of 1688, direct taxation has been so little applied, that the prejudices of many of the population, and the interests of others, are strongly enlisted in favour of indirect taxation. The impositions of duties for protecting home interests likewise upheld this feeling. Within the last thirty years, however, this system has been greatly modified, and the Customs transactions of the port of London have been altered in conformity. Begun by Huskisson, and carried out by Peel, all duties on exports are abolished, as are those on raw materials, corn, and most articles of food, while as far as possible all duties of small returns are abrogated. Thus the duties are chiefly levied on groceries, wines, spirits, and tobacco. Upon all other articles, therefore, the functions of the Custom House are virtually statistical, and although returns are made of them, there are no charges. The export business gives some trouble to the Custom House, as articles are taken out of the bonded warehouses, and have to be examined; and wine, spirits, and tobacco, being subject to inland excise, are under peculiar regulations for shipment. (See pp. 121-123.)

Two great aids of the Custom House are the warehouses and the docks (see article "Docks"). The landing-places were anciently at Billingsgate and Queenhithe, where the examination of goods could be readily effected; but now the landing, instead of taking place at the King's Quays, is carried on along the whole shores of the Thames, below bridge, and from time to time the government has authorized wharfs to be places for the landing of goods, under the name of "Sufferance Wharfs." Warehouses are likewise licensed for the storing of goods until payment of duty, under the government and merchants' keys, and as a bond is given for the due security of the goods, these are called "Bonded Warehouses." At these wharfs and warehouses departments of the Customs are established. These establishments, the wealthy proprietors of which are known as wharfingers, are, however, surpassed by the docks and warehouses belonging to the great corporations, each of which carries on the trade of a sea-port, and requires a large customs' staff. The bonded warehouses are likewise seats of manufacture, for many articles are allowed to be prepared and manufactured in bond, for use at home, or for shipment abroad. The merchant can thus, without the payment of duty, receive goods from abroad, and prepare them for the use of some other foreign market.

The Custom House, in Lower Thames Street, is the chief seat of business, and the establishment is presided over by a board of commissioners, with a chairman and deputy-chairman. None of the commissioners or officials is allowed to sit in Parliament, or even to vote for a member, as the patronage has always been looked upon with jealousy. It is under the control of the Treasury, who undertake the parliamentary responsibility.

The board have a secretary and staff, surveyor for buildings, and staff, and solicitor and staff. The chief departments are those of the surveyor-general, the receiver-general, the examiner, and comptroller of accounts, the inspector-general of imports and exports, which is the statistical office, the registrar-general of shipping, the long room, the landing department, the check, the Queen's warehouse, the coast guard, the water guard, and the alien registration.

In the Long Room of the Port of London, in the Custom House (see plan above), notices are given of the arrival and departure of shipping, the entry and clearing of goods (see interior view, p. 339.) The landing department, the check office, and the water guard, take charge of a ship on arrival, put officers on board, examine the goods on landing, and assess the duties. The superior staff consists of landing surveyors and landing waiters, under whom are 30 gaugers, 120 lockers, and 180 weighers. On the water guard are tide surveyors, having a staff of 500 tide waiters, 60 watchmen, and 80 watermen.

The registrar-general of shipping gives certificates of registry to English shipping, which are the title-deeds of the ship. Lloyd's register is for shipping of all nations, and has reference to the character of the ship. It is the business of the Alien Office to register all foreigners entering by sea, but the regulations of importance in time of war are now much relaxed.

The Customs establishment is regularly organized, with scales of promotion for the several ranks of officers, and having superannuation and other benefit funds.

Although the Customs regulations are greatly improved, they are much open to objection, the Treasury and the board, from jealousy of their officers, causing serious impediments to business. The landing surveyors and waiters have arduous duties imposed upon them in the assessment of charges, according to quality or value, and even ad valorem duties are found to be productive of evils. The Custom House has the power of taking goods which it considers undervalued, at the merchant's valuation, with 10 per cent. added, and these are sold at the periodical Custom House sales, when, if a profit is realized beyond the duty, the officer shares in it. It therefore happens, sometimes, if the importer has made a good bargain, it is taken from him by the Customs, and the profit beyond 10 per cent. becomes theirs.

DOCKS.

THE DOCKS of London show at once to the observer the great enterprise and prosperity of the port of London. It will readily be conceived that a population of 2,000,000 of persons must necessarily, to a great extent, be supported by its trade and commerce-its proceeds in money value far exceeding in amount that of any other community in the world. The merchant is the dealer with the trading universe, the tidal Thames bringing with its flow the treasure of near and distant nations; and, with the aid of steam, persons of all nations come to us with objects of business and mutual interchange. The plan in p. 341 shows the singular figure of the Thames, and the relative situation of each dock; see also pp. 344, 348, and 349, for diagrams of Her Majesty's Dockyards of Deptford and Woolwich.

The following are the names of the Docks of which there are public companies, to which are added those of the Government Yards.

East and West India Docks, instituted 1799.
East India, instituted 1803; united 1838.
Dock Master, Captain Evans.

London Docks, 1802.

Secretary, J. D. Powles, Esq.

Commercial Docks, 1807.

Superintendent, William Jones, Esq. Grand Surrey Canal Dock.

Superintendent, William Mc. Cannon, Esq.

St. Katherine Docks, 1828.
Secretary, Sir John Hall.

East Country Dock.

H. M. Dock Yard and Arsenal, Woolwich.
Superintendent, Commodore H. Eden.
Master Shipwright, Oliver Lang, Esq.
Deputy do., James Peake, Esq.
H. M. Dock Yard, Deptford.
Superintendent,

Master Shipwright,

In addition to the above, there are a great many private docks for the building and repairing of ships, for the construction of iron

Secretary and Superintend., A. Sherriff, Esq. vessels, and for the fitting of engines to vessels Regent's Canal Company, 1812. of all tonnage, and the making and embarking of steam engines.

Secretary, E. L. Snee, Esq.

By King Richard the First's first charter granted to the citizens of London, the corporation became conservators of the River Thames, extending westward from London Bridge to the River Colne, near Staines; and, eastward, over the port and waters of the Thames, ports and creeks, and also over the River Medway, as far as Yantlet Creek, in Kent, and Leigh, in Essex. The Corporation of London have the right of regulating shipping, and of all other things concerning the navigation, and of licensing and permitting wharfs, docks, &c. Subsequently the extent and limits of the Port of London, as far as relates to Her Majesty's Customs, are declared by the Court of Exchequer to extend to the North Foreland, in the Isle of Thanet, then northward in an imaginary line drawn to the opposite point, called the Haze, on the coast of Essex, through the Gunfleet Beacon, excepting the privileges of the Ports of Sandwich and Ipswich, and the several creeks, harbours, havens, &c., belonging to them. (See woodcut, p. 354.)

The property in the rivers and rivulets that fall into the Thames, their fish, and the soil beneath, within certain boundaries, are vested in the Corporation of London. The divisions of the Port of London, as defined by the by-laws and customs of the harbour service, are the Upper Pool, the Lower Pool, Limehouse Reach, Greenwich Reach, Blackwall Reach, and Bugsby's Reach. Several dredging machines are constantly in operation for effectually cleansing the river. Since the institution of the Corporation of the Trinity House, in the year 1515, 400,000,000 tons of ballast have been raised in the River Thames. In an account taken in the year 1831, the Receipts were ..£30,239 178. 9d. Cost of procuring the same... 23,741 15 11

ST. KATHERINE'S DOCKS being the nearest to London Bridge, we shall briefly describe these the most recently-constructed docks. The old Hospital of St. Katherine, and 1250 poorly-tenanted houses which stood on the site, were happily removed, together with the vicious and badly-housed inmates, who numbered nearly 12,000 persons. The company for the construction of these docks was formed in 1824, and the docks were opened on the 25th October, 1828. The capital first raised was £1,352,800, and an additional sum of £800,000 was also raised. The space included within the outer wall is about 24 acres, about eleven of which are wet docks; they consist of two docks, communicating with each other by basin, and are surrounded by large and lofty stacks of warehouses, and wide and commodious quays. The lock leading from the river is 180 ft. in length, and 45 ft. in width, between the entrance gates, and is so constructed that vessels of upwards of 600 tons burden may pass and repass three hours before high-water, so that outward-bound ships from these docks can reach Blackwall before the tide begins to recede. The depth of water at the top of the spring tides, on the sills, Trinity datum, is 28 ft.; at the dead neap tides, 24 ft.; at low water spring tides, 10 ft.; and at low water neap tides, 12 ft.; so that vessels of upwards of 800 tons register are docked and undocked without difficulty, and the depth of the water at the entrance exceeds that of any other wet dock in the Port of London, as may be seen by the table in p. 342:

Vessels are also docked and undocked by night as well as by day; an advantage first introduced in the Port of London by the St. Katherine Docks Company.

These docks have also a wharf between the Tower and the dock entrance, of 187 ft. river frontage, for the accommodation of steam-vessels, where passengers land and embark free of expense, at any time of the tide, and without the intervention of boats. Convenient waitingrooms for passengers and their luggage are constructed, and excellent arrangements made for the landing and shipping of carriages, horses, cattle, &c.

The warehouses, vaults, and covered ways, will contain 110,000 tons of goods. The diameter of the columns to support the superincumbent weight above are sufficiently ample to support the greatest weight. The works were designed and executed from the designs and under the superintendence of the late Thomas Telford, and the warehouses under that of Philip Hardwick, Architect.

In 1846, the gross receipts were £229,814 14s. 10d.; gross debits, £124,269 14s. 7d.; leaving a balance of profit amounting to £105,545 08. 3d.

The next undertaking of this nature, going down the river, are

THE LONDON DOCKS, which are nearly adjoining to those of St. Katherine, and are situated in Wapping. They extend from East Smithfield to Shadwell, and were originally intended principally for the reception of ships laden with wine, brandy, tobacco, and rice. These docks consist of two capacious docks; the western dock covers an area of above 20 acres, being 1260 ft. long, and 960 ft. wide, and the eastern dock an area of 7 acres. The tobacco dock and warehouses are between them, the dock exceeding 1 acre in extent, and used solely by tobacco ships. The entrances to these docks are the Hermitage, or upper entrance, which leads to the western dock through the Hermitage basin; the Wapping, or central entrance, which communicates with the same dock through the Wapping basin, covering an area of more than 3acres; and the Shadwell, or lower entrance, which communicates with the eastern dock, through the eastern basin. This lower entrance, which is of recent construction, is one mile below the Hermitage entrance, and three-quarters of a mile below the Wapping entrance. The entire quantity of ground comprised within the outer boundary wall of the docks is 71 acres and 3 roods.

The warehouses are capacious in size, convenient in arrangement, and magnificent in design and execution. The great tobacco warehouse, on the north side of the tobacco dock, is the largest, finest, and most convenient building of its sort in the world. It is rented by Government at £14,000 per annum. It will contain 24,000 hogsheads of tobacco, and covers the immense space of nearly 5 acres. There is also a very large tobacco warehouse on the north side of the tobacco dock.

Under the warehouses is a series of the most magnificent vaults in the world, which include an area of more than 18 acres, and have convenient and ample stowage for 66,000 pipes of wine and spirits: they are the great depôt for the stock of wines belonging to the wine merchants of London.

These docks, constructed by the late John Rennie, Engineer, were opened on the 30th January, 1805, and the first vessel admitted was a fine brig called" The London Packet," from Oporto, laden with wine. All ships bound for the Thames, which were laden with wine, brandy, tobacco, and rice (except ships from the East and West Indies, which use their own docks, were obliged to unload in these docks for the space of 21 years from the date of their opening; but this monopoly having expired January 30th, 1826, the use of these docks is optional, as is the case with the others.

The entrance from the Thames at Shadwell was constructed in 1831, by H. R. Palmer, Engineer, and the lock-gates of these docks are ingenious and scientific examples of the skill of both these engineers.

In 1844-45, the new tea warehouses, capacious enough to receive 120,000 chests of tea, were erected. This great establishment comprises in the whole an area of 90 acres; with three entrances from the Thames, viz., Hermitage, 40 ft. in width; Wapping, 40 ft. in width; and Shadwell, 45 ft. The whole structure cost £4,000,000 of money.

The next important work of skill and science in our Port, proceeding down the river, is THE GRAND SURREY CANAL, the spacious and convenient docks of which are situated at Rotherhithe, adjoining to and on the upper side of those belonging to the Commercial Dock Company.

The entrance from the Thames is between King and Queen Stairs and King's Mills, nearly opposite the lower entrance to the London Docks. The situation, plans, and extent of this and all the docks, are fully described in "The Public Works of Great Britain," large folio. Proceeding downwards in this survey, toward Blackwall, the next scientific work is

THE REGENT'S CANAL AND BASIN, which was projected by John Nash, Architect, and reaches from the Thames at Limehouse to the Grand Junction Canal at Paddington. The basin is commodious and well suited to its trade, and the canal, having two tunnels, proceeds up the