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LVIII. Observations on the immense Loss of Lives through Ship- 
wreck, and Opinions of various Persons concurring, respecting 
the Means to be used to afford Preservation: also, most satis- 
factory Reports on Experiments made by a Life-preserving 
Apparatus, recently invented by H.TRENGROUSsE, of Cornwall. 
Tu E number of lives annually lost through shipwreck cannot be 
ascertained; but it is well known to amount to several thousands. 
Dr. Wilkinson about the year 1763 (taking the average of six 
years) calculated that 4200 British seamen are lost annually; 
and states that in twenty-seven days only, in the month of De- 
cember of that year, the excessive number of 1430 were drowned. 
Another gentieman has stated that in the years 1781 and 1782 
the numbers lost were upwards of 10,000! 
Very recently an author stated the number lost during the pe- 
riod of his present Majesty’s reign to amount to 160,000 ! 
“< Most important to Great Britain in a national view, is the 
preservation of shipwrecked mariners. The exigencies of our 
country demand a peculiar attention to the soldier and the sailor.” 
— Rev. Dr. Gregory. 
** When we consider that scarcely a year elapses unmarked 
with unhappy events of this kind, by which multitudes of mari- 
ners (and others) are precipitated into the same untimely awful 
grave; surely a means of diminishing those misfortunes can need 
no patronage in England, or any other maritime nation.” —Dr, 
Wilkinson. 
Concurring Opinions on the Means necessary to be used to afford 
Preservation. 
“* For the accomplishment of this desirable purpose, an en- 
deavour should immediately be made, for establishing a commu- 
nication between the vessel and the shore.”’—Capt. Keith. 
“« The only certain means of saving the crew of a vessel stranded 
within 200 or 300 fathoms of the shore, is to establish a rope 
communication—but how is this tobe done?””—Cleghorn’s Essay. 
«© A communication by a rope but once achieved, it is easy to 
send on board by it to the vessel, any thing else that might faci- 
litate the conveyance of the seamen to land.” —Capt. Manby. 
“* Resolved, That in case of shipwreck, the grand object is to 
form a communication with the shore; and it appears to this 
Committee, that the most probable means of effecting this ob- 
ject, is to convey a rope, or line, by some projectile force, to the 
nearest land.” —Royal Humane Society. 
‘* Lieutenant Bell’s idea was to project the rope from the 
ship to the shore, which is assuredly the method most to be de- 
pended upon, as the vessel in that case carries the means with 
Vol. 53, No, 253. May 1819. 7 her, 
