466 REPORT OX THE TRANSIT OF STOCK. 



again and again I have seen animals squeezed over the side 

 of the pier into the water, in attempts to drive a greater 

 number in than the boat would hold. The ferry-boat now 

 plays a very subordinate part to what it once did ; but still 

 the practice of overcrowding both sheep and cattle in it ought 

 to be repressed. 



Transit by Sea. — In the northern and western islands stock 

 are carried over sea in small sailing vessels, generally only half- 

 decked ; but as these approach more to the ferry-boat in character 

 and use than to the sea going vessel, it appears unnecessary to 

 notice them further ; and the following remarks will be confined 

 to the consideration of the conveyance of stock in the modern 

 vehicle of rapid sea traffic — the steamer — sailing vessels being 

 now very rarely used for the conveyance of stock. 



It can scarcely be said that any steamers are built for the 

 purpose of carrying stock only, and this probably accounts for 

 the very indifferent accommodation provided for stock in most of 

 them, viz., that the vessels have to be applied to two purposes,, 

 which require different kinds of accommodation, and are accord- 

 ingly built in the simplest form, leaving the erection of fittings 

 which would facilitate the conveyance of stock to be put up in a 

 temporary manner as occasion requires, and for the reason ap- 

 parently, that the erection of these fittings in a permanent form 

 would render the vessel comparatively useless for the conveyance 

 of other kinds of cargo, hence all that is done is to fix rings- 

 around the bulwarks and sides of the holds, to which the animals 

 can be secured, when stock forms the cargo. 



Perhaps it may help the consideration of the subject 

 to describe first the usual quarters into which stock are 

 stowed on board steamer. On deck, the shape and appearance 

 of which every one knows, there are usually two or more pens 

 enclosed with strong paling, and the spaces around the bul- 

 warks, from the quarter-deck to the forecastle, devoted to stock. 

 The holds, which are not quite so well known, may be de- 

 scribed as large dark apartments, varying in size, according to 

 the size of vessel. Generally they are from 50 to 80 feet long, 

 25 to 35 feet wide, and from 7 to 9 feet high. All the light in 

 them is supplied by the hatchway, so that in the lower hold at 

 least darkness only is visible, and even in the upper one there is- 

 only twilight. Ventilation, properly so called, there is none, the 

 hatchway being the chief vehicle of air as well as light. When 

 the weather admits of it, the ordinary ventilating effect of the 

 open hatchway is increased by stretching a sheet of canvas from 

 the lowest point at which fresh air is wanted, to a point about 

 10 feet above the deck, and at such an inclination that the part 

 of the sheet above the deck forms an angle of 45° with a line 



o 



