Proceedings. 7 



of a consulting Naval Architect, and making other good 

 suggestions, all of which were immediately adopted. The 

 Southport Local Committee, after careful deliberation, 

 obtained, through the Institution, a sailing lifeboat, designed 

 by Mr. G. L. Watson from their sketches, which is the 

 most powerful existing lifeboat, and non-righting. I had 

 corresponded with some of the chief officials of the Institu- 

 tion, and with other good authorities on lifeboat work, in 

 1867-68, in connection with a paper on lifeboats, read by 

 me before the Manchester Institution of Engineers, in 

 which I ventured to challenge the self-righting boats as 

 compared with the Tubular and the Norfolk boats; and 

 twenty years continued attention to the question had 

 materially strengthened my convictions. Having obtained, 

 with some difficulty, working drawings of all the types of life- 

 boats used by the Institution, I got working models made to 

 one-twelfth or one-sixteenth scale, ascertained their ' curves 

 of stability* and other chief elements for comparison, 

 prepared a paper on the subject, and was favoured by the 

 Building Committee of the Institution with a long discus- 

 sion on it, on May 6th, 1889. The Committee then requested 

 their Naval Architect, Mr. G. L. Watson, to embody some 

 of my suggestions in a design for a large Sailing Lifeboat, 

 not self-righting. Having read a resume of my paper 

 before the Institution of Naval Architects on March 28th, 

 1890, I received most encouraging letters from Mr. R. E. 

 Froude, and from several naval architects, and eventually 

 the Committee of the Lifeboat Institution very liberally 

 offered me £600 to pay for a non-righting Rowing and 

 Sailing Lifeboat on a modified plan, resulting from con- 

 ferences with Lancashire honorary officers and coxswains 

 of the Institution. But our deputation made the further 

 request, which was kindly granted, that this liberal offer 

 should be set aside and Mr. G. L. Watson commissioned, 

 with 'a perfectly free hand,' to design a lifeboat to compete 



