342 Plan for Life-saving Stations in Mid-Ocean . [May, 
hundreds of precious lives has gone down with all on board, 
or only a few left to tell the mournful tale, this question of 
life-saving stations far out away from land has presented 
itself in a very forcible manner, and the mind seems impa- 
tient and would leap at once to the rescue to prevent or 
lessen the fearfulness of such catastrophes. But no sooner 
is this thought through the brain than “ How ?” presents 
itself. How overcome this huge difficulty in the way ? how 
make this connecting link , the cable, that shall secure the 
vessel or buoy to the anchorage at the bottom ? After a 
number of years’ thought on this subject a suggestion finally 
occurred to me whereby, I think, this connecting link may 
be made a practical thing, and no longer be in the way of 
the consummation of this auxiliary to the safety of ocean 
travel, and the means of taking regular mid-ocean observa- 
tions the same as on land. For the cable proper I would 
not have anything unlike cables in general, yet would sug- 
gest a galvanised iron-wire cable similar to those used on 
large derricks, in place of the regular chain as employed by 
vessels for anchoring, as on the whole I think it would be 
stronger. But then the matter of the kind of cable in this 
connection just now is not of much importance, the principal 
point being now how to construct and lay it so that it will 
be a practical thing. 
Some parties who have thought on this question have 
suggested the anchoring of an immense buoy, and making 
of this a huge store-ship, &c. In this place I would remark 
that I think that a buoy properly shaped and constructed 
would be better than a vessel, for the reason that the upper 
portion of the cable could be so arranged as not to interfere 
with passing vessels. Experts say that the trouble with the 
buoy and cable would be twofold : first, the great length of 
chain would require it to increase very fast in size as its 
distance increased from the bottom in order simply to have 
sufficient strength to hold itself up. Secondly, this great 
weight would necessitate a buoy or vessel of such huge pror 
portions as to make the thing as a whole simply impracti- 
cable in the way of cost, &c. 
Sometimes it may be best to have the strength of a thing 
concentrated in one support or bearing, but in general the 
more we divide it up the better ; and this would seem to be 
the idea to follow out in this cable or connecting link. 
There would be no trouble in constructing a number of 
small buoys. So in the place of one huge buoy, which ex- 
perts say would have to be so large, I would have a number 
of smaller ones, and these I would have at intervals of 
