FOOTNOTES:
[239] In 1816, according to the official returns, the merchant navy of the United Kingdom amounted to 2,783,933 tons; and in 1835 to 2,783,761 tons, or a fraction less; but we know that, at the former period, there were a great many more vessels on the Register than there actually existed, from the fact that no means were then taken to ascertain the losses, or to erase from the records vessels which were lost.
[240] The entries and clearances of British vessels engaged in the Foreign trade during the years 1816-18 averaged annually 21,735 vessels, of 3,180,472 tons; while for the three years previous to 1836 they averaged 27,390 vessels, of 4,628,450 tons, and, on the accuracy of these returns at both periods, we can depend.
[241] “Imperfect charts” were often then made to cover, as I fear may be the case to some extent now, incompetency, drunkenness, or carelessness. Indeed, about that period, they frequently served as excuses when other objects were in view. I remember a ludicrous instance of this. When a boy at school in Ayr I used to accompany my uncle to “the meeting of owners” of the brig Eclipse, in which he held some eight or ten 64th-shares. Every spring, the owners met on board to discuss matters relating to her affairs, and to dispose of what I recollect best, a round of salt beef, sea-biscuits, and rum-and-water. The Eclipse had hitherto been invariably employed during the summer season in the conveyance of timber from some one or other of the ports of New Brunswick to Ayr. On one occasion, a tempting freight had been offered for her to proceed to Quebec, and the owners, in conclave assembled, had all but unanimously decided to send her to that port. While, however, the discussion was going on, her skipper, Garratt, or “old Garratty,” as he was called, seemed very uneasy, and gulping down an extra tumbler of rum-and-water, he at last said,—“Weel, gentlemen, should you send the Eclipse to Quebec I’ll not be answerable for her safety.” “How so?” asked one of the owners. “Ah,” said Garratty, drawing his breath, “the charts are a’ wrang in the St. Lawrence. Yee’l ne’er see the Eclipse again gin ye send her to Quebec.” The skipper carried the day.
It is much to be regretted that Shipowners, when they leave their captains to provide their own charts (instead of supplying them), do not stipulate that they are to be the best and the latest. I remember a ship and cargo (numerous other instances could be produced), valued at 70,000l., lost near Boulogne from the master mistaking the two lights at Etaples for the South Foreland lights; and this, as appeared by the Board of Trade inquiry, because his Channel chart, which was thirty years old, had not the Etaples lights marked on it. Indeed, it so far appears that the large passenger steamer Deutschland, whose loss at the present moment (30th December, 1875) is now in course of investigation, was steered by an old chart.
[242] See Appendix to ‘Final Report of Unseaworthy Ships Commission,’ p. 600, and Summaries, p. 781, where this and other similar returns will be found.
[243] See Appendix to ‘Final Report of Unseaworthy Ships Commission,’ p. 682, and Summary, p. 768.
[244] See ante, [page 299].
[245] General Merchant Seaman’s Act, 7 & 8 Vict. cap. 112.
[246] 8 & 9 Vict. cap. 116.
[247] See ante, [page 350], note.
[248] 30 & 31 Vict. cap. 124.
[249] This Bill consolidated all previous Acts; but from its dimensions, or some other cause, it has not yet passed, though frequently presented to the House of Commons for consideration.
[250] Mr. Samuel Plimsoll was first returned to Parliament in December, 1868, as one of the members for the town of Derby, which he had unsuccessfully contested three years previously. In the ‘Parliamentary Companion’ he is described as a “coal-merchant,” and author of various pamphlets on the coal trade, and on the ‘Rights of Workmen,’ and of a ‘Plan to have Fatherless and Motherless Children cared for instead of being consigned to the Workhouse.’
[251] This Bill contained 696 clauses, and replaced 90 Acts or parts of Acts.
[252] See Parl. Paper, C. 287, 1871.
[253] Merchant Shipping Act, 34 & 35 Vict. cap. 110. “Unseaworthy Ships.”
[254] It was entitled ‘Our Seamen: an Appeal by Samuel Plimsoll, M.P.,’ and was “dedicated to the Lady Gracious and Kind who seeing a labourer working in the rain sent him her rug to wrap about his shoulders.” Virtue and Co., Ivy Lane, London.
[255] See ‘Our Seamen,’ pp. 11, 12.
[256] ‘Our Seamen,’ p. 14.
[257] See ante, [p. 318], note.
[258] It may not now be the case, but I have known a chain cable, made of the best iron, and it would only be iron of the best description which could stand such a strain, stretched from 150 fathoms, its length when manufactured, to 155 fathoms after it had passed through the testing-machine. Such an enormous strain must injure the fibre of the iron, and, thereby, its elasticity, even though most of this stretch would probably be due to the links fitting closer into each other, and the actual stretch of the iron itself only a small portion of the whole. But in either case the elasticity of the fibre would most likely be injured, perhaps destroyed.
[259] There were two Reports: “Preliminary” and “Final.”
[260] See Parl. Paper, 349. Session 1873.
[261] I believe that there is much justice in these complaints. Indeed, it cannot be otherwise if official surveyors are honest and vigilant. For instance, some new danger or evil arises, and some new remedy is invented. Consequently, the surveyor says:—“I must provide for this,” and he makes the requirement; the trade call for uniformity, and the specific thing required becomes a general stereotyped Board of Trade rule, checking further improvement, and making shipbuilders build down to it.
On this point, my old friend, Mr. Alfred Holt, of Liverpool—and there is no one more competent to offer an opinion on such a subject—in a letter I had from him the other day, remarks with great force:—“The real objection to Government survey is this: no Government can insist on more than average standard of efficiency; but most of those ships of which the nation is proud are built to a much higher standard. Now, suppose two ships competing for freight, one of the high class I describe, and one of low type just sufficient to pass survey. Both have got certificates; these have blunted the discrimination of underwriters, so that premiums are alike on both, and, naturally enough, shippers send their goods by the one that asks least freight. Is it in human nature that the conscience of the good Shipowner will remain tender? He sees a vessel of much less strength, and not nigh so efficiently manned, go to sea, perhaps a foot deeper than his, earning the same rate of freight, and carrying a Government certificate of competency. Is he likely to keep up to his old standard? and won’t he be compulsorily degraded to the other’s level? All these surveys only help the bad, while they injure the good. I may say of ground tackle that, although since the Act passed, it has become difficult to get any very bad, it is equally difficult to get any really good. I believe, in my own case, that the cables I have got since the Act came into operation are worse than those I got before.”
[262] The recommendation might have been advantageously extended to any other properly constituted tribunal, as it is most desirable that all such disputes should be promptly settled, and especially in the port where they arise, or its immediate locality. An appeal in all cases to the central Board in London might inflict unnecessary hardship upon the shipowner, and lead to other mischievous consequences.
[263] Although the present system, which originated with Lloyd’s, stands much in need of reform, I think the recommendations of the Commissioners on this subject require still further consideration before they are adopted.
[264] The latter portion of this recommendation also requires further consideration. While a second trial would be a double expense, it would not facilitate getting evidence on the first inquest because the captain would still be able to say,—“I shall not give evidence which may be used against me.”
[265] There is no use hiding a fact which my experience on this Commission and elsewhere has too clearly revealed. It is this, that the officers of the Navy as a rule (there are exceptions) are much less inclined to the amalgamation, under any circumstances, of the seamen of the merchant service with those of the Royal Navy than the officers of the Army are to coalesce with the Volunteers. They desire, and it may be due to their patriotism, to have a large standing navy, as large in peace as in war if they could get it; while they do not care to be troubled with the drilling of relays of seamen from the merchant service when they can obtain young men expressly trained, solely at the expense of the State. They do not, or will not, understand the vast natural resources this country has within itself—far greater than any other countries,—or, indeed, than nearly all other countries combined, available in the hour of need.
[266] See Report, ‘Manning the Navy.’