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HISTORY OF THE INDIAN' NAVY. 527

may be regarded as one of the most remarkable on record. This
will be readily conceded, when we consider the conditions of
the experiment. The ' Hugh Lindsay' was a steamer of only
411 tons, with two eighty horse-power engines, built to carry
five and a-half days' consumption of coal, and drawing eleven
and a-half feet of water, while she was required to perform a
voyage of 3,000 miles, of which 1,(541 were across the Indian
Ocean to the first coaling station at Aden. To enable her to
efiect this long flight, she took on board sulficient coal for
eleven days, for which purpose more than two-thirds of the space
abaft, intended for accommodation, and also half of the fore-
hold, were filled with coals ; this, together with stores and
provisions for the voyage to Suez and back, no less a distance
than 6,000 miles, increased her draught of water to thirteen
and a-half feet, and it is certain her safety would have been
seriously imperilled had she encountered bad weather. J'revious
to undertaking the voyage, a collier brig, laden with <)00 tons
of coal, under convoy of the ' Thetis,' had been despatched to
the Red Sea, so that a supply was ready stored at Aden,
Jiddah, and Suez. The experiment was a trimnphant success ;
Aden was reached on the olst of !March, the whole distance
having been covered under steam alone, and the Hugh Lindsay'
'
arrived with only six hours' consumption of coal in her
bunkers. Commander Wilson called at ^locha to deliver
despatches and at Jiddah for coal, and arrived at Suez on the
22nd of April, having been thirty-two days and sixteen hours,
including stoppages. From Suez he forwarded the despatches
and the mail of three hundred and six letters, together with u
despatch to the India House reporting his arrival, and enclosing
a copy of his log, which was jjrinted in the appendix to the
evidence taken before the Tarliamentary Conunittee of 1834.*

* After receiving volumiiioug evidenop, tlio Committee of tlio House of
Commons arrived at the following Resolutions on Steam Xiivigiition in Indiii :
1. That a regular and expeditious connnunication with India bv ineiins of
steam vessels is an object of great importance to Great Britain and to Imlia.
2. That steam navigation between Bonibav and Sue/, having, in live >ucces»ivp
seasons, been brouglit to the test of experiment (the expense of which has been
borne by the Indian Government exclu>ivcly), the ])racticabilif v of an expe-
ditious eommuuicatiou by that lino during tlie north-east monsoon haa bwn
established.
3. Tliat the experiment has not been tried during the south-west monsoon,
but that it appears from the evidence before the Committee, that tiio eommuni-
cation may be carried on during eight niontiis of the year, .lune, .luly, August,
and September being excci)ted, or left for the results i.f further experience.
4. That the experiments which have been nuide, have been atlemled with very
great expense, but that, from tlic evidence before the Committee, it appears that
by proper arrangements the expense nuiy be materially reilueed ; and, under that
impression, it is expedient that measures should bo immediately taken for the
regular establishment of steam communication with India by the Red Sen.
5. That it be left to Jlis Majesty's Government, in conjunction with the East
India Company, to consider whether tho communication should be in the Grst