The Sun.
London, England, 1866-12-08 00:00:00

Seamen for the Mei chant Service.

The deficiency of British sailors for the supply of
our mercantile marine is, month by month, assum-
ing a more serious aspect, and the causes which lead
to this deficiency are daily becoming more clearly
manifest. Few more emphatic examples of cause and
effect can probably be found, and it requires no nau-
tical or scientific knowledge to discover that the evils
existing are beyond the reach of cure by the estab-
lishment of training ships alone. A memorial from
170 seamen belonging to the north-east ports of the
United Kingdom has been forwarded to the Regis-
trar-General of Shipping for transmission to the
Board of Trade, containing an enumeration of griev-
ances appertaining specially to colliers and coasting
vessels. Among these grievances are found the un-
dermanning of ships, five hands being employed in
vessels of from 154 to 19G tons, whereas seven is the
recognized and proper number; that these veesels are
very commonly unseaworthy, being leaky iu the
hulls, and deficient in canvas and cordage, and that,
as a consequence, the pumps are constantly at work,
and the running gear continually in want of repair,
to the exhaustion of the scanty crew employed ; that
the boats are frequently worthless, and useless as a
means of saving life ; that the forecastles are defi-
cient in length, width, and height, so that in some
cases a man must go to the hatch for room to put on
his clothes. The memorial goes on to observe that
the various sections of the Merchant Shipping Act
of 1854 have remained to all intents and purposes a
dead letter, and that in consequence of the continued
existence of these evils, " we (skilled labourers as we
are, and valuable ones) gladly take any employment
on shore, where even the farm labourer, though he
runs little or no risk to life or limb, gets better
paid." So much for the coasting trade. Is the
tale better as to our ocean-going ships ? During
the past two years upwards of 200 accredited
cases of scurvy have been brought into this port
alone, in so bad a state as to require immediate
treatment in the hospital, this very inade-
quately representing the number of victims to
the disease, as the superintendents of Sailors'
Homes in London and elsewhere can attest. Seve-
ral inquests have been held during the present year
on the bodies of seament who have died from this
malady, at one of which it was proved that the
mixture served out at sea was not lemon-juice at
all, and useless as au anti-scorbutic ; and, in conse-
quence of the verdict pronounced at another, the
master of a vessel was convicted and fined at the
Thames Police-court for not having a sufficient sup-
ply of that article on board. During the past three
months no less than 20 ships have arrived in the
Thames bringing cases of scurvy, and, in some in-
stances, from 20 to 70 per cent. of the crew were
practically disabled by that disease from efficient
duty. The root of this increasing evil is mainly due
to the fact that it is the exception rather than the
rule to_ carry drinkable, far less pure, lime or lemon-
juice on long-voyage ships. No medical question
is involved in the matter, or anything about which
doctors can differ, inasmuch as no scientific argu-
ments, however sound, or theories, however plau-
sible, are required to establish a fact that has been
known for the last two centuries, and acted upon for
the last 70 years ; that fact being that, if good lime
or lemon-juice be regularly given to the crew of a
ship, that crew will remain free from scurvy for a
period of 12 or 18 months, a far longer term of
water-passage than is ever reached by any of our
seagoing ships (except whalers) in the present day.

RAILWAY INTELLIGENCE.

BOMBAY, BARODA, AND CENTRAL INDIA.

The directors in their report state that there had
been a considerable improvement (amounting to
£103,467) in the gross receipts for the half-year
ending the 30th June last as compared with the
corresponding half of last year. This increase had
chiefly arisen in the merchandise department. The
gross receipts fur the half-year amounted, on 306
miles, for goods and passengers to £233,629,
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