ON STEAM-BOILER-EXPLOSION LEGISLATION. 7 



accident. Now it will be seen that before this principle can be applied to 

 the prevention of boUer explosions, some serious qualifications must be made. 

 It has already been seen that boiler explosions are not accidental. To term 

 a boiler explosion an accident is to mislead, and thus do much mischief. 

 Boiler explosions may be prevented by common knowledge and common care ; 

 and these every boiler-owner is bound in justice to his workmen to exercise. 

 A boiler-owner has no right to insure himself against the pecuniary results 

 of his own neglect which may cost the lives of his workpeople. To this it 

 may be replied that when the principle of insurance has been applied to 

 boUers, inspection has been coupled with it, and further, that it is the interest 

 of insurance offices that such should be the case, since, inasmuch as they have 

 dividends to pay, they are bound to inspect in self-protection. This view 

 obtains very general currency. It is, however, a total fallacy that the joint- 

 stock insurance principle, as at present applied, affords any inducement to the 

 adoption of inspection. This can be plainly shown in a few words. The 

 object of a joint-stock company is clearly pecuniary profit — not philanthropy ; 

 and this being the case, such a company woidd not expend a pound to save a 

 shilling. Now it appears, from data which have been accumulated for years, 

 that the risk of explosion with steam-boilers is about one in two thousand ; so 

 that the cost of insurance is Is. per =£100. The cost of an annual " entii-e " 

 examination, which is essential to sound inspection, may be taken in round 

 numbers as about 20s. per boiler. Thus, inspection costs about 20s., while 

 insurance costs Is. ; or, at all events, inspection costs much more than in- 

 surance. Consequently it will pay an insurance office better to allow boilcz's 

 to blow up, and pay compensation, than to prevent explosions aud pay for 

 inspection. Inspection is dear, insiu'ance is cheap. Inspection eats away 

 the dividends. The interest of a joint-stock company, therefore, is to lavish 

 insurance and stint inspection. 



There are further points in the mode in which joint-stock insurance is at 

 present applied to steam-boilers which may be called attention to. Insurance 

 companies adopt scales of charges according to the risk run ; and thus they 

 class the boilers A, B, and C, as they may be first-, second-, or third-rate. 

 This is insuring boilers simply on the principle of risks, and ignores altogether 

 the danger to life. If boilers can only be worked at a risk, they should not 

 be worked at all. Again, the charge for insurance rises according to the 

 pressure of the steam. This is to tax progress, and make a market of 

 engineering enterprise. Again, insurance companies charge so much for the 

 first ^100 insured on a boiler, the same amount for the second =£100, the 

 same for the third ,£100, and so on, though the payment for the insurance of 

 the first ,£100 included the charge for inspection. In this arrangement the 

 value of inspection appears to be ignored. The danger of explosion is 

 assumed to be as great after the charge has been paid for inspection as before. 

 An accidental-death company, insuring railway-passengers' lives, could not 

 adopt a scale of charges that would more consistently ig-nore the principle of 

 prevention, and adopt that of hazards. Again, insurance companies pay 

 compensation in case of minor damage, which emboldens a boiler-owner to 

 neglect any precautionary advice given in consequence of the inspections. If 

 he employ an inferior attendant in order to save 5s. a week in his wages, and 

 the boiler becomes injured thereby, the cost of repair is paid by the company, 

 and not by himself. This system entu'ely absolves a boiler-owner from the 

 results of his own neglect. 



These remarks will suffice to show that the principle of insurance, as at 

 present applied to steam-boUers by joint-stock companies, is not all that is 



