The Express.
London, England, 1851-11-22 00:00:00

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LONDON, SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 22.

Tut: unexpected inroad that winter has this week
made upon us clear and cutting in the south of
England.—has on the north-east coast brought with it
gales and snow-storms such u baffle and bewilder
ale mariner in more northern regions. This sudden
change has once more turned our attention to a
theme we have often had occasion to press upon our
readers—the deplorably and disgracefully deficient
'apply of life-boats for the relief of shipwrecked
manners along the British coasts. And it happens
most opportunely that we have, within these few
days, received a copy of an elaborate report of the
committee appointed to examine the life-boat models
sant in to compete for the premium offered by the
Duce of Noarilearittni. %N D.
The kitowledge and skill of the mariner hare un-
doubtedly been augmented of late years; so has the
shill of the ship-builder. But though a wider and
more intimate acquaintance with the nature and
laws of storins, with ocean currents and hidden
'hoes, and an improved marine architecture, may
hewn the hazards to which the mariner is exposed,
his calling must ever remain pre-eminently precari-
ous and dangerous. The distinction that, above all
others, a thickly-peopled and highly civilised mari-
time country ought to aim at, should be the compara-
tive perfection of its provisions for the safety of
seamen stranded on its coasts. Ever and anon the
tempest 'sill break forth with a suddenness and vio-
lence that bids defiance to all human foresight and
skill. On such occasions it is that the seaman is en-
titled to link for efficient aid at the hands of those
in whose service lie commits his safety to the grim
caprice of the winds and waters.
Some notion of the extent of the permanent need
that exists for such aid, may he gathered from an
abstract of wrecks for the
year 1830, taken from
" Lloyds' List," and appended to the report we have
alluded to. In that year the wrecks of British
vessels linine were in number 692, the aggregate
tonnage of the ships damaged or lost being 127,188
tons The number of British and foreign velvets
wrecked in the seas of the United Kingdom in 1830,
was 651. The number of lives lost, as far as can be
aacertailied, was 781. A comparison of the averages
of annual wrecks for a series of years, shows that, ac-
cording to the most severe calculation of chances,
aomethin4 nearly appreaching to this amount of
casualties may be constantly expected; that there
am but slender grounds of hope that the general
number of wrecks can he much diminished. Can,
then, the means of rescuing the lives of those who
are jeipantised thereby be rendered more efficient?
For a wealthy, a powerful, and withal a humane
maritime people, these means, it must be confessed,
are shamefully inefficient. In England and M'ales,
with a sea-board of 2,000 miles, there are only 73
life-boats. Of these, 43 are stationed on the east
emit, with the exception of the boat belonging to
our old friends of the Crewe Charity, they are gene-
rally elliiient. Eros Dover to the Land's End, a
distance of 1211 miles, there are seven life-boats (one
for reel', 60 !) and none at Penzance, where
most t. ea el. Erna the Land's End to the Sulway,
a distatti iif !MO miles, and including the important
ports of Ila,tol and LiverpouLthere are 28 boats,
one-half of a hich are unserviceable. On the Isle of
Man there is not a single life-boat, though it is in the
midst of the great traffic of Liverptsil, Glasgow, Bel-
fast, and I fuldin, and much exposed to wrecks. Scot-
land, with a sea-board of 1,300 miles, and a stonily cli-
mate, has s life-boats, some of which are unserviceable.
Orkney and Shetland are entirely destitute of any
provision for saving lives in shipwreck ; and with
the exception of l'ort Logan, in Wigtonshire, where
there is a mortar, the whole west coast of Scotland,
from the Solway to Cape \Vein'', is in the same con-
dition. Ireland, with 1,400 mill:sof toast, has tf life-
boats, all of them inefficient.

lest in importance to life-Imats arc the mortars
and roil, ts of Captain MAN liY. 'l•o the committee
on the Northumberland premium we are indebted
for the statistics of these useful inventions in the
United K ingelom. I n England and Wales there are 91
stations winch have rockets, 3$ Which have mortars
atom.. and 38 which have both mortars and rockets.
This, the committer remark in their reisert, seems a
fair proportion ; hut •"in some instanms the rockets
wen• old. in others badly made, and the lines in the
same stair." and •• at 21 stations rockets have burst,
and at 12 stations lines have broken." There are 22
stations in Ireland at which there are either rockets
or mortars, but their condition is as indifferent as in
England. In Scotland there are mortars at nine
stations and rockets at WWII. -•

This is a most beggarly array of provisions for the
warning of shipwnicked mariners. And this is the
more disgraceful that the efficacy of the means
above-enumerated has been tested and fully estab-
lishes'. " The number of lives saved from ship-
wreck," say the committee in their report, "through
the instrumentality of life-boats,mortars, and rockets,
(even in their present imperfect, and. on many parts
of the coast, ill-organised state), affords undoubted
prod of the value of such means of preserving life.
'Wherever the boats have been looked after, and the
crews well trained, as at Liverpool, Shields, and on
the ekno.l% of Norfolk and Suffolk, the most signal
success has rewarded their exertions." The promp-
titude with which our bravo fishermen and sea-
men peril their lives to save those of otheni is
above all praise. The very women are animated by
the stoic daring and devoted spirit, as witness
Ca WE 1/satist:. And the result of' the competi-
tion for the Northumberland premium (of which we
willow to speak on a future occasion) shows that
our shipbuilders need only fair and reasonable en-
couragement to play their part honourably in the
humane cause of the preservation of lives in ship-
wreck.

The unprovhkd state of our coasts is disgraceful
alike to the Admiralty and the Trinity-house. Upon
these boards devolves in an especial manner the care
of the lives of our seamen. How this duty is dis-
charged in so for as lighting and beaconage arc con-
cerned we shall inquire on an early occasion: in
regard to the provision of life-boats, mortars, and
rockets, it is little better than utterly neglected. But
the Admiralty and the'frmity-house are not the only
parties to bLirac. The general public has been apa-
thetic. mid parliament C but that's of course") per-
fectly useless.
The noble example of the Duke of NOBTIIUMBER-
-1.4111) will, it is to be hoped. shame all parties into
efficient action. Not only has be offered anti paid a
handsome premium to the constructor of the best
model life-boat ; he has, we learn from the report.
"undertaken a well-built life-boat at each of
the must ex points of the coast of Northum-
berland, and rockets and mortars at all the interme-
diate stations." No words of panegyric could add to
the admiration which such princely and well-directed
liberality is fitted to awaken.
If there is a real spirit of humanity in the
land—if the old svmpathies of England for her
seamen are not dCad within us—the truly noble
Duke of Notirtit'ainktmaNfi will surely find many
imitators. They who hare wealth and influence can
do as he has done ; they who have neither can urge
on government and the parliament to do their duty.
The time has come to bestir themselves. The season
is on us—the dark and stormy season—when the
mariner is most in need of aid. Of the G'3l ship-
wrecks which are known to have occurred on the
coasts of the United Kingdom in Itt:10, only 155 took
place from April to September (inclusive); 523 took
place during the remiunin.g six months of the year.
"Itis no uncommon ease, say the committee, " for a
single gale of wind to strew the coast with wrecks."
And the great majority of these gales occur during
the months of winter, late autumn, and early spring.

ACCOUNTS from 01111001 repteseut a note from Lord
PALMEIPITON, addressed to the court of Athens, as
having had the effect of a bomb shell, throwing the
palace into consternation, and the ministry into dis-
solution. Ire are not vet informed of the contents
of the note, but in order to its having the effect
mentioned, that document must have contained a
peremptory demand of money, or payment of the

interest of the loan. No reproaches to the
Kis° about his tyrannical and foolish admi-
nistration, would have had the least cf-
feet upon his MvrEsrr or his case-hardened
councillors. But touch them in the pocket, threaten
to deprive them of the source of their peculations,
and then indeed disorder is thrown into their camp,
and alarm into their bosoms.
Lord PALMERSTON has certainly very fair grounds
for demanding payment of the interest due
upon the loan. or the grand proposal and
debated question of last session was an act
of the finance minister, adding some large
sum to the expenses of his department, and, in fact,
largely increasing the salaries of all officers under
him. Lord PALMERSTO:4, on reading this proposal,
land the debates thereon, might very fairly say, if
the Greek minister can find some hundreds of thou-
sands of pounds to increase the salaries of his sub-
ordinates, surely he can find money to pay at least
the interest on the just debts of Greece.
The arguments of the Greek finance minister
were, that corruption was universal in his depart-
ment, that all his employe's cheated the state, and
that half the amount of taxes and duties levied
never reached the Treasury. In order to remedy
this, he proposed increasing all their salaries, in the
hope, that when better paid they would be
more honest, a species of reform quite illusory
in the present state of Greece. Who does not
know that the palace and the ministerial
offices are but so many shops for the sale of places ?
And who must not feel, that such corruption in high
places is the sanction of corruption in low ones ? The
l'alicar faction are in possession of the government,
and feed on the revenues and public employ. To
increase both of them is their only thought. It is
robbery, robbery, robbery, which is the sole principle
of government, of every act done, and of every man
employed under it.
Those who speak of dissension in the cabinet of
Greece on the subject of the answer to be given to
Lord l'aimritsros, make a strange mistake. 'fhe
present Greek ministers are mere valets of the sove-
reign; —clerks,and nothing more ; given place, patron-
age, and provend, but with no control over public
affairs. The KINO and the QUEEN keep these to
themselves. The KtNU and the QUEEN may be
puzzled as to the best mode of meeting Lord PAL-
MERSTON'S demands, but as to ministers, we may be
sure that they are perfectly ready to countersign
whatever his MaiEsry might dictate.
It is said that, in its perplexity, the court has
determined to call on M. METAXA and entrust him
with the formation of a ministry. We should be
very glad to learn that this were true. For M.
METAXA, though he is inclined to Russia, and is said
to lean upon that power, is still an able and
independent statesman, one who feels the advantages
of constitutional government, and who knows the
value both of public and of parliamentary opinion as
a support against the dictation of a sovereign, and
the intrigues of a court. M. M ETAXA would not, like
the present ministers, consent that either he himself
or his colleagues should be mere valets of the King
and Queen. Ile would demand power, and exercise
it. Ile would ask, and he would receive, the support
of parliament; for there is not a liberal inan in
Greece who does not feel that any government, at
all parliamentary , would be preferable to an aris-
tocracy exercised by such a person as King Onto.
' '!'hat monarch is managing Greece precisely as
he might a private estate, of which he had the en-
joyment for life, and which, ho having no heirs,
parsed away at his death. The government of
Greece is, to use the emphatic words of Mr. MuNTz,
a money-grubbing bestiality," and nothing else.
And the only way to put an cud to this,
is for honest and rightful creditors to intervene,
as Lord l'aimEnsros has done in the name of Eng-
land. Were the revenues of Greece spent for the
• good or the amelioration of Greece, or were they
spent in fostering trade, agriculture, learning, or for
any one thing of political or social worth, one might
have some consideration for Greece. When these
revenues are the mere plunder of King Onto, and
of such favourites as the GRIVASES, it is really too
hard to make JOHN BULL pay the interest of the
Greek loan, in order that those people of infamous
character that frequent the palace of Athens, and
fatten on its patronage, should waste what is due to
the pockets of the English taxpayer.