The Sun.
London, England, 1863-05-19 00:00:00

Manning Ships at Liverpool.

A committee of the Ballast-office in Dublin, who
have lately, by desire of the Board of Trade, in-
quired into the lighting or marking of the south-
east coast of Ireland, have made so lie remarkable
statements in their report relating to the system of
shipping crews at Liverpool, which they declare to
be the principal cause of the casualties that occur
to outward bound ships off this Irish coast. They
state that when a ship is ready for sea notice is sent
to the Sailors' Home two or three days before that
a crew is wanted. At the time appointed the cap-
tain attends, and the number of men required are
turned aver to him, and agreements entered into.
A month's wages are then advanced to each man to
enable him to get his outfit, but it is generally spent
in profligacy and debauchery. Pimps are always
on the watch to pick up and secrete away any ap-
parently good sailor found among these men, and
in lieu they:send down to the pier from which the
vessel is about to depart any of the worst descrip-
tion of persons they can pick up, and the vessel,
being all ready to sail, often with the steamtug at-
tached to her, must either take these substitutes, as
they are termed, or go to sea half manned; but
same captains, rather than take men from the
Sailors' Home, prefer to arrange with the parties
who have secreted the men before referred to, and
give a certain sum per head for every man they
supply. The men thus described go on board all
strangers to the captain ; most frequently they are
in a state of intoxication ; they are often so diseased
as to render them not only useless in the naviga
tion of the ship, but so reckless and refractory
that they will neither work themselves nor allow
others to do so, and the ship is not manage-
able for some days. She is usually towed out as far
as Great Ormes Head or the Skerries. If the wind
be from the southward or south and west, sail is
made on the port tack. The direct course from the
Sherries to the Tuskar, making no allowance for the
flood tide running full twoknots an hour, and setting
two points on the port bow, would be certain of
throwing the ship in on the Blackwater Bank, and
there cannot be a doubt that many a ship has been
lost from the reluctance of the captain to put his
ship about, from the disorganised state of his crew.
The committee are clearly of opinion that the losses
sustained by the outward bound ships from Liver-
pool are more decidedly traceable to the causes they
have thus stated than to the insufficient lighting
and marking of the coast, and they make these
statements that the Board of Trade may take such
steps as they m .y consider necessary to bring the
subject under consideration of the proper authori-
ties, with the view to a closer inquiry to this jai_
portant subject. The committee consider that,
although it is much in the power of the owner and
adoptedmoralwitlyt hdtehmelvnideswthoef
of the underwriters to remedy these abuses,
gmtihgehmt notand bepu
bc
is well deserving of consideration
adoption of a vigorous and close a
raecmtnedenytisn
may tend to remove evils whichupervision which
verely deplored by those who appear to be se-
compelled to submit to are
hum necessit3
them.

PLYMOUTII, Monday --(By Electric and Inter-
national Telegraph.) H.Jretdshire, ,50
tons, Captain Walker, belongin to Mr.r Marshall,l from
Bombay, January 17, with seeds and general cargo, for
London, passed up Channel this morning. Sne touched at
St. Helena, March 22, and spoke, April 12, the Lady
Clarendon, on the 26th the Golden Age, and on the 17th,
off the Lizard, the Prince of Wales, from Plymouth for
Melbourne.

The Correctional Tribunal of Setif (Algeria), con-
demned, in February last, MM. Mongin and Mercier,
editor and printer of the Echo de Self, to six days' impri-
sonment and 250 fr. fine, for the publication of false news
relating to certain robberies committvd in that locality.
Against this sentence the defendants appealed, on the
ground that the ac,ount published was substantially true,w
and altogether im,ffensive. The court took the same vie
of the case, and accordingly quashed the first judgment,'
ae contrary to &no Acta Qi ale caw,