The Sun.
London, England, 1864-03-26 00:00:00

Royal National Lifeboat Institution.

From the annual report of this institution, it appears
that during the past year the entire cost of 12 lifeboats had
been presented to it by philanthropic persons. The Lords of
tho Admiralty were taking steps to provide every ship of
war with an efficient lifeboat—their lordships having paid
the institution the compliment to consult it on that impor-
tant subject. The committee of the institution proposed to
build, and place at some of the principal 1:1 shing stations,
model or standard insubmergible fishing boats, from which,
after sufficient trial, others might be built in the several
localities, and thus a permanent impt ovement be established,
which might lead to the saving of many lives on occasions
of such boats being overtakes by gales of wind when at long
distances from land, The last remaining county association
—viz., that of Lincolnshire—had decided on coming into
union with the Lifeboat Society, and the renovation of the
four Lincolnshire lifeboat establishments would cost
about £2,000. During the past year the institution had
been enabled to send no less than 15 new lifeboats to
the coast, and numerous others were in course of con-
struction. Its lifeboats numbered 132, and some of them
were the means of saving no less than 417 lives and
17 vessels daring the past year. nearly the whole of them
under dangerous circumstances, amidst high surfs, when
no other description of boats could have been launched
with safety. For these services—and for saving 297 ship-
wrecked persons by fishing and shore boats or other means
the institution had granted rewards amounting to £1,361.
On occasions of service, and on those of quarterly exercise
of the lifeboats, about 6,000 persons were afloat in them,
yet not a single life had been lost. Transporting carriages
and boat-houses had been provided for most of the said new
lifeboats. The committee regretted to report that the num-
ber of wrecks during the past year was, as usual, large, and
that the gales in October and December were perhaps the
most destructive that ever visited the shores and seas of the
British isles. It was, however, most gratifying to be able to
report that, curing the time that these storms lasted the
lifeboats were providentially the means of rescuing no less
than 335 shipwrecked persons. With a shipping represent-
ing about 60,000,000 tons and 400,000 vessels which cleared
outwards and entered inwards from British ports during the
past year a largo number of shipwrecks had become almost
a natural sequence. Accordingly, it was found that 1,602
casualties took place last year on the shores and in the seas
of the British Isles, accompanied with the loss of 558
valuable lives—lives of the:utmost consequence:to the com-
merce and defence of the country. The total number of
lives saved during the forty years from the establishment
of the institution in 1824, to the end of the year 1863,
either by its lifeboats, or by special exertions for which
it had granted rewards, was 13,568. During the
past year, 15 silver medals, 26 votes of thanks in-
scribed on parchment, and £1,297 in cash, had been granted
for saving the lives of 714 persons by lifeboats, shore and
fishing boats, and other means, on the coast and out-lying
banks of the United Kingdom. Since the formation of
the institution it had expended on lifeboat establish-
ments nearly £lOO,OOO, and had voted 82 gold and 738
silver medals for saving life, besides pecuniary awards,
amounting together to £17,830. The committee referred
to the cordial co-operation of the local branch committees,
the Board of Trade, the Coast-guard, and the railway and
steam packet companies. The expenditure of the institu-
tion in the year 1863, on its lifeboat establishments, was
£11,377 4s Id ; £1135 6s 4d in rewards for services to ship-
wrecked crews ; and £2441 9s Id for coxswains' salaries
and the quarterly practice of the boats' crews. The insti-
tution had received £lOO from a sailor's daughter per Messrs.
Drummond; £lOO as a thauk-offering for, preservation at
sea during the storm on the 31st of October last; £1 68 93,
being the amount of a collection at St. John's Sunday-
school, Manchester ; £3 18s 83, collected in Mochrum parish
church as a new year's offering to the institution, per the
Rev. R. Craig; £lOO from a"A Friend, in gratitude to
God for the preservation of his wife for another year;" and
£2O from a seaman's daughter (C. T.), the produce of her
needlework. The following legacies had been bequeathed
to the institution since the last report :—Tames Miller, Esq,
of Glasgow, £loo—William Currie, Esq., of Cornhill, Lon-
don, £2oo—John Farnell, Eeq., of Isleworth, £l,OOO (free
of duty)—Milborne Williams, Esq., of Whitchurch, £so—
Emma Keate, of Kensington, £3oo—and Richard
Spencer, Esq., of Gower-street, London, £2OO. The items
of receipt and expenditure are detailed in . the clear annual
financial statement attached to the report, audited as usual
by a public accountant. Considering the magnitude and
unavoidable costliness of the operations of the National
Lifeboat Institution, embracing the whole of the coasts of
the British isles, a large permanent annual income was in-
dispensable to enable it to maintain in an effective state its
132 lifeboats, and to increase their number should circum-
stances render it desirable to do so. The committee ap-
peal to the British public with fresh confidence for support
to an institution whose mission of mercy must come home
to every one and plead for sympathy and support.

A telegraphic despatch from Rome announces the
death in that city of M. Hippolyte Flandrin, the
eminent painter, well known for the fine frescoes (all of
which are not yet finished) with which he has decorated the
church of St. Germain-des-Pres. M. Flandrin had gone to
Rome for the benefit of his health, but he unfortunately
caught the small-pox. The day before the arrival of the
despatch his friends received a letter announcing his illness,
but stating that the disease was of a mild form, and pre-
sented no danger. Within 21 hours, however, after the
letter was written, brain fever supervened and terminated
fatally. The deceased was a pupil of Ingres, and aged 55.
DYCE MEMORIAL,---A vestry meeting was held
at Streatham on Wednesday, the rector of Streat-
ham in the chair, when the following resolution was unani-
mously passed :—" That, regard being had net only to the
great abilities of the late William Dyce, R.A., as an artist,
musician, and author, but also to the services rendered by
him t 3 this parish (in which he passed the last years of his
life) in his position as churchwarden, and otherwise, a
monumental brass be erected to his memory in the
parish church,"