474 Loss of Life at Sea. (O&tober, 
of the masts and sides of the hull, together with the ever- 
varying resistances from onward, and from rotatory motion ; 
while in the case of the model there is but one motor, and 
one influence ruling, that and gravity being common to both. 
Nor can it be conceived with any approach to correctness 
that the place of the operator’s hand, as specified in* Mr. 
Froude’s illustration, ‘‘ holding ever so tightly the strings,” 
can represent the pommt of buoyant suspension of a ship, or 
even on the principle that her motions are analogous, as 
they are not, to those of a conical or other pendulum, nor 
that the three strings represent the lines of buoyant power 
meeting in the hand of the operator. 
These forces, as the ship rolls or is inclined, are con- 
tinually changing in direction and in amount, as it were, 
first on one string then on the other; therefore the point of 
suspension and length of strings are continually changing. 
Lastly and conclusively, the conditions of Mr. Froude’s 
illustration require that the ship shall be suspended by three 
or more strings or something analogous; and not that only, 
but that the wave or waves on which she partially and tem- 
porarily floats shall also be like as in the tray experiment sus- 
pended; not that alone, but that each wave as it arrives up 
to and passes under her shall be likewise so suspended; nor 
that only, but that the ship, the sea, even to the depth to which 
any portion of the ship is immersed, and a portion of which is 
always below the limit of the depth of wave motion, and all 
altogether shall be supported on three or more strings, and 
be all moved together and to the same extent by an invisible 
hand communicating motion from one point above the ship; 
whereas everyone must know, if he knows anything about 
the motions of ships at sea produced by waves alone, that 
instead of this imaginary hand or power moving the ship 
from above, the ship is always in a seaway moved from below 
without the intervention of strings, and that the water and 
not strings or a hand or anything analogous is the motor, 
and which, unlike the hand and strings in the experiment, 
never succeeds in wholly imparting its own motion to the 
vessel floating on it. 
There is nothing of that which is required by Mr. Froude’s 
theory, which is therefore a mere fiction; and though there 
doubtless is a superstructure of superior mathematics built 
up by him, yet as it is baseless, his conclusions could not be 
otherwise than erroneous and proportionably deceptive, and 
the adoption of them could only lead to the damage of our 
ships and danger to the lives, if not also to the death, of 
some of our seamen; and so it has proved in the sad fate 
