TERKIBLE EXAMPLES. 117 



I saw her go out of the river. She is sure to be lost." She was lost, and nearly twenty 

 men returned home never more. 



Mr. Plimsoll tells another story of two gentlemen, who told him one day that they 

 saw a vessel leaving dock ; she was so deep that, having a list upon her, the scuppers 

 on the bow side were half in the water and half out. (A " list " means that she was so 

 loaded as to have one side rather deeper down than the other ; the ' ' scuppers " are the 

 holes in the bulwarks that let the water out that comes on deck from the rain, the washing, 

 or the seas breaking over her.) They heard a slight commotion on board, and a voice said 

 to the captain : " Larry's not on board, sir." He had run for it. Nothing could be done, 

 for lack of time, to seek him, so they sailed without him. And these gentlemen heard the 

 crew say, as they slowly moved away from the dockyard : " Then Larry's the only man of 

 us '11 be alive in a week." That vessel was lost. 



Another large ship was sailing on a long voyage, from a port in Wales, wilh a 

 cargo' of coal. A gentleman called a friend's attention to her state. She was a good 

 ship, but terribly deep in the water. He said, "Now, is it possible that vessel can reach 

 her destination unless the sea is as smooth as a mill-pond the whole way ? " The sea 

 evidently was not as smooth as a mill-pond, for that ship was never heard of again, and 

 twenty-eight of our poor, hard-working, brave fellow-subjects never more returned to 

 gladden their wives and play with their children. 



Mr. Plimsoll saw a large ship put to sea one day. She was so deep that a friend 

 who was standing by said to him as she went : " She is nothing but a coffin for the poor 

 fellows on board of her." He watched and watched, almost fascinated by the deadly peril 

 of the crew, and he did not watch for nothing. Before he left his look-out to go home, 

 he saw her go down. 



Even more touching are the records of some visits made by him to the sufferers left 

 behind to mourn the fate of their husbands, drowned in leaky ships which should never 

 have left port. 



" In this house, No. 9, L 11 Street, lives Mrs. A r R e. Look at her she is 



not more than, two or three and twenty, and those little ones are hers. She has a mangle, 

 you see. It was subscribed for her by her poor neighbours : the poor are very kind to each 

 other. That poor little fellow has hurt his foot, and looks wonderingly at the face of his 

 young mother. She had a loving husband but very lately, but the owner of the ship on 



which he served, the S n, was a very needy man, who insured her for 3,000 more 



than she had cost him. So if she sank he would gain all this. Well, one voyage she 

 was loaded under the owner's personal superintendence ; she was loaded so deeply that the 

 dockmaster pointed her out to a friend as she left the dock, and said emphatically, ' That 

 ship will never reach her destination.' She never did, for she was lost with all hands 



twenty men and boys. A R complained to him before he sailed that she was 



' so deep loaded.' She tried to get to the sands to see the ship off with Mrs. J r, whose 



husband was on board. They never saw their husbands again. 



<' In this most evil-smelling room, E Q C Street, you may see in the 



corner two poor women in one bed, stricken with fever (one died two days after I saw them), 

 mother and daughter. The husband of the daughter, who maintained them both, had been 



