364 INTERNATIONAL LAWS POR THE 



enough to earn nothing, as the law now stands the owner 

 remains responsible, and the crew walk ashore free men 

 with no responsibility. It is a question whether in this 

 case the owner and crew ought not to be responsible to 

 the tradesman in proportion to the share each stood to 

 receive, and not the owner to be responsible for the 

 whole. 



To compensate the tradesman for running this risk 

 it might be suggested that, when provisions have been 

 supplied to a boat sailing by the share, he should be 

 entitled to be present at the settling up to receive the 

 amount due to him. This right doubtless would only 

 be exercised in exceptional cases, and not when the 

 owner was known by the tradesman to be an honourable 

 man. 



Cases have been known where the owner has received 

 this money at the settling up, and appropriated it to his 

 own use for other purposes, afterwards liquidating, and the 

 tradesman has had to suffer, although the money to pay 

 for the provisions he supplied was duly earned and paid 

 by the crew as far as they were liable. It very often happens 

 that a portion of the crew live a long way from or have 

 no home, and these immediately commence to live on board, 

 and even those who live at the port will probably live on 

 board but go home to sleep. Men have openly admitted in 

 some cases that they have shipped to what may be termed 

 the " by voyages," not that they expect to earn anything, 

 but "just to ease the old woman at home by keeping their 

 heads out of the cupboard," which means that the owner 

 will have to pay for the provisions whether the vessel earns 

 anything or not. 



It must here be noticed that in the last ten or fifteen 

 years a vast change has taken place in the way the crews 



