276 SAFETY FISHING-BOATS. 



human probability might have been averted by the adoption of an 

 expedient by which open fishing-boats might be preserved from 

 the risk of a sea falling on board of them. Living as I do in one of 

 the most exposed positions of this exposed and stormy coast, I am 

 unfortunately able to bear ample testimony to the benefits which 

 would arise from the general adoption of such an expedient, and 

 supported as I am by the opinions of practical persons, to the evi- 

 dent utility of the very simple plan which I feel that I have some- 

 what imperfectly described. I can recall to my recollection at least 

 one occasion within the last ten years when an ordinary fishing-boat 

 was, in the presence of numerous but helpless spectators, swamped 

 within a short distance of the shore, and all hands perished. Again, 

 I was not long ago told by a fisherman that, in running for the 

 harbour from the fishing-ground on a dark and stormy night, he 

 heard a cry of distress, as he was borne swiftly before the tempest 

 past the wreck of a swamped boat, one end of which probably 

 the fore cabin rudely and imperfectly representing a water- 

 tight compartment maintained its position above the water 

 after the other portion of the boat had been submerged. Upon 

 this precarious safety stood the sole survivor of the crew, who 

 hailed with the energy of a drowning man the welcome advent 

 of apparent rescue. But the wreck slowly disappeared before 

 my informant was able to stay his boat, with the intention of ren- 

 dering assistance. And who that witnessed them can forget the 

 scenes enacted on these coasts in August 1849? T ne fleet of boats, 

 being unprotected to any extent by decks, and therefore unable 

 to live in the heavy sea which suddenly overtook them at the 

 fishing-ground, crowded in disorganised masses towards the en- 

 trances of the nearest harbours, and amongst a fearful list of other 

 casualties a fishing-boat, which was descried from this brought up 

 at anchor, rode in safety for a time, but was swamped and her 

 crew drowned, through her increasing proximity to the breakers 

 on the approach of low water. 



I venture to think that such calamities as these, with a number 

 of others, some of which have been seen, but many of them oc- 

 curring in dark and stormy nights have been witnessed by no human 

 eye, would, under Providence, have been averted, had there been 

 a general adoption of the simple principles which I have described 

 as entering into the construction of the safety fishing-boats devised 

 by the Royal National Life-boat Institution. Already five of these 

 boats, with safety fittings such as I have described, have been 

 built by the Institution and placed at selected stations one of 



