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happens for the want of some particular precaution, or whenever a new means of safety first presents itself, the impulse of the public is to say, 'Why is this not adopted in all cases?' and legislation, supposed to be omnipotent, is called in to enforce it. It would be impossible to give a complete list of the cases of this kind which have happened, even within our own recollection; but the following are some of them. In some instances the Legislature has interposed, in others it has not, and in some it has interposed and has subsequently withdrawn its interposition. 'Boats may sometimes save life in case of wreck ;' therefore let all ships be provided with boats according to a certain scale; which, by the way, it is often found impossible to enforce, and as often useless when enforced.* But boats may sink, therefore let them be fitted as life-boats; boats are often swamped in lowering, let them be fitted with Clifford's or some other patent apparatus; boats are useless unless properly manned, therefore let all captains be compelled to drill their crews in boat-exercise; boats' crews suffer from hunger, therefore require shipowners to carry provisions and water ready stowed in these boats; boats cannot possibly carry all the persons on board, therefore require collapsing rafts; boats may be too long in lowering to save a drowning man, therefore let there be lifebelts and life-buoys ;† life-belts and life-buoys may be of bad material, therefore prescribe their materials and make. A ship in danger should make signals of distress, require her to carry guns and rockets; when stranded she should be able to communicate with the shore, require her to carry rockets and lines for the purpose; her crew may not know how to use the rocket apparatus, require them to be drilled and examined in it; axes and tools are needed to cut away masts and rigging, require every ship to carry them; her pumps should be ample, prescribe the size and character of every ship's pumps; they may be choked by cargo, prescribe the way in which they shall be fitted and protected. Cables and anchors may part, require them to be tested; the test may injure them, require a breaking as well as a testing strain; the testing-machine may be imperfect, let it be inspected by Government; it may be fraudulently or negligently applied, place it in the hands of Government. Masts may be so large and heavy as to capsize a

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*Boats are useful in the House of Commons; but in the terror and confusion of tempest and shipwreck they are too often useless. The Schiller' and the 'Deutschland' were both amply provided with boats, and they were lost within sight and hearing of our own shores. Yet in the one case, out of 372 souls on board, the ship's boats saved 27; in the other, out of 219 souls, they saved one.

In the case of the 'Schiller,' many of those who were drowned had lifebelts on.

ship; prescribe their size and character. The iron of which ships are built may be bad, prescribe its quality and let it all be tested and warranted by Government. Rivets are ill put in, let a Government inspector in every building-yard watch the workmen as they fix them. Iron bulkheads may be useful in case of leak, require them in every iron ship; they may be insufficient, specify therefore their number and size, though by so doing you actually limit what the good shipbuilder would himself do. Compasses suffer deviation, therefore require that they shall be adjusted; the adjustments may be inaccurately made, therefore let the adjusters be examined. Safety-valves are needed for boilers, therefore prescribe safety-valves; safety-valves may be tampered with, therefore require them to be locked up. Deck cargoes are sometimes dangerous, therefore prohibit all deck cargoes, or let the Government say what deck cargoes are dangerous and what are not. Ships are sometimes overloaded, therefore let the Government say how deep every ship may be loaded. Cargoes are sometimes badly loaded, therefore let Government say how every cargo is to be stowed; rules concerning stowage will be evaded, let there be inspectors to see that all ships are stowed according to rule. Crews are badly lodged, prescribe the accommodation to be given to them; they are badly fed, prescribe their food; they are badly tended in illness, prescribe their medicines; the deck-houses in which they are lodged are sometimes washed away, prohibit deck-houses altogether, and require them to be lodged below; when lodged below they want air and ventilation, and are sometimes tempted to plunder cargo, require them to be lodged in deck-houses. Seamen are often incompetent, require their seamanship to be tested, and let Government stamp and warrant every A.B.; they come on board drunk, let a Government officer see that they are sober; they come on board diseased, let a Government doctor inspect their persons, and warrant them healthy. Iron ships are dangerous, proscribe iron. Long ships are dangerous, let no ship be built whose length is more than seven times her breadth. Speed is sometimes dangerous, therefore let no steamer traverse the narrow seas by night at more than seven miles an hour. Such are a few, and only a few, of the proposals which philanthropists have urged, in many cases with success, upon Government and upon Parliament.

Now the first thing to be observed upon legislation of this kind is that it is perfectly endless. Every new accident, every new invention, every new circumstance and condition of navigation, brings with it new perils and new precautions; and if the Legislature is to adopt, define, and stereotype every detail

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which it may be in some circumstances useful to adopt, it will indeed be taking on itself not only an endless task, but one which, like Penelope's web, will need undoing almost as fast as it is done.*

There is, indeed, one way in which, whilst retaining the principle of prescription and supervision, this endless detail of legislation may be avoided, viz., by_vesting absolute powers and discretion in some public officer. The Legislature may abstain from saying, 'A ship shall be built, fitted, equipped, loaded, and manned in a particular manner;' and may say instead, Let her be built, fitted, equipped, loaded, and manned in such manner as some Government officer may require.' The Statute Book is thus relieved of a certain quantity of details, and more flexibility (assuming that the Government officers know their business) is given to the rules. But the certainty of what has to be done is less, and the chance of arbitrary interference greater. So far as regards the fettering of the free action of the shipowner, and relieving him from responsibility, the result is the same.

But in the next place, without asserting that practical legislation can be entirely guided by the logical application of any given principle, it seems to us that there are strong à priori objections to legislation proceeding on the principles we have been describing; and these objections may be summed up as follows:

1. By such interference you are setting two people to do the work of one. Double management is notoriously inefficient. One bad general is better than two good ones.

2. You set those who have less experience of management, and less personal interest in the result, to control those who have more.

3. You incur serious danger of corruption. The pay of your official is and must be small compared with the interests he has to control; and if the shipowner is the man he is represented to be, he will be only too ready to bribe. Nor can this be prevented by any exercise of administrative supervision. What, for instance, can the Government know of surveyors appointed, as Mr. Plimsoll now desires, by a Vice-Consul in some remote port

* Mr. Plimsoll, only a short year since, would have been satisfied with compulsory survey and compulsory load-line, as the two things needed for the safety of the Mercantile Marine. He has since learned that some grain ships have been lost by the shifting of their cargoes; and now he is urging the Government, with his wonted vehemence, to enforce on all corn-carrying ships a stereotyped system of stowage, elaborated to the minutest details; and this for a trade which in the year 1872 brought one hundred millions of hundredweights of food to this country, and which in the present year will probably bring more.

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of Russia, America, or Spain? If they are dishonest, you have the worst of all possible results, viz., a bad ship declared to be good by a lying official certificate.

4. But setting aside dishonesty, control is either apt to become formal and a sham, or if zealously exercised, to be rigid, embarrassing, and a hindrance to legitimate business. Sufficient attention has not been given to this point. The tendency of an honest and zealous official, if courageous, is to exaggerate his own importance; if timid, to free himself from responsibility; and in either case to make his requirements more and more stringent. In no case has he at heart the commercial success of the undertaking, and his requirements, if excessive or unreasonable, may make just the difference between commercial profit or loss. In the case of shipping this is peculiarly dangerous, for nothing is easier than to transfer ships to a foreign flag, or to transfer freights to foreign ships, which we cannot subject to our restrictive regulations. And these ships, thus exempted from British control, may then be owned, manned and navigated, by the same men who now own, man and navigate them under the British flag. Already there are ominous symptoms of this form of mischief. Cases have appeared in the newspapers, from which it appears that there has been an organised business set up for the purpose of making colourable transfers of British ships to nominal Belgian owners, for the purpose of escaping the Board of Trade survey. Canadian shipowners are growling at what they call Plimsollian legislation, and threatening to press for a separate Canadian national flag and jurisdiction-a step, it is scarcely necessary to say, which would not only be attended with the most serious practical inconvenience, but which would break one of the last and most important of the ties which still bind the colony to the mothercountry. Finally, there is reason to apprehend that the action of the Board of Trade may, even under the present law, injure a class of vessels and of trade which it is most important to protect and preserve. There is a numerous class of small coasters which would scarcely pass any official survey, but which, being manned and navigated by the same men who own them -themselves some of the hardiest and most experienced sailors in the world-are, for all practical purposes, much safer than many finer vessels. To drive such men from the trade by official surveys and requirements, however it might suit the purpose of wealthy competitors, would not only be a personal hardship, but a national evil. In fact, those who wish to protect the sailor too often forget that vexatious protection from possible risks may destroy the very employment by which he exists. Vol. 141.-No. 281.

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5. A rule fixed by law must necessarily be the minimum that prudence requires; otherwise it becomes an arbitrary restriction on the legitimate profits of the British shipowner. But this minimum is no sooner fixed by law than it becomes a maximum ; and owners and builders, who would otherwise do more and better, build, load, and equip down to this rule. For instance, the Government are asked to fix load-lines-a matter of the very greatest difficulty, since the depth to which a ship may be properly loaded differs with the infinitely-differing elements of size, form, and construction of ship, nature of cargo, stowage of cargo, nature of voyage, and season of the year. To fix the line too low is to handicap the British shipowner and to injure the trade, or to drive it to a foreign flag; therefore the line must be fixed as high as is consistent with ordinary prudence. The moment that it is so fixed it becomes the line to which the shipowner will, as a matter of course, load down; and down to which all his neighbours and rivals, who might, and would very possibly, have otherwise adopted a safer course, must and will load down also. The Government load-line thus becomes the means of lowering the general standard of prudence and safety. This is no mere speculation. The law prescribing a certain number of iron bulkheads in iron ships was repealed because it was found that it led to the adoption of fewer and less effective bulkheads than builders adopted without the law.

6. Many excellent things, the adoption of which is desirable for public safety, e.g., life-boats, safety valves, bulkheads, &c., are not things which can be once for all settled, defined, and prescribed, but things of gradual growth, invention, and improvement. Had any of these been defined by law at any past time they would probably not have been what they are now; and were they now prescribed and defined by law future improvement would be checked. This is a most insidious form of evil, for we do not know the good which we thus prevent. It is no answer to say that Government control will be intelligent, and will encourage improvement. It is not Government or its officers who invent or adopt inventions, and those who do are far less likely to continue to improve when Parliament or Government has defined and prescribed a definite course, the adoption of which frees them from responsibility.

7. Lastly, it is impossible to maintain at the same time any general system of Government control, and any effectual responsibility on the part of the shipowner. At present the shipowners, when they do not protect themselves by insurance and

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