The Sun.
London, England, 1868-10-17 00:00:00

TUE SUN, LONDON, SATURDAY EVENING;_ OCTOBER 17, 1868.

have said, the greater number of preventible dis-
asters occur on onr own east coast in the small
carrying trade. A Flanders paper, in writing of a
shipwreck which occurred at Ostend, where an
English collier striking a rock went to pieces in
two hours, observes that it is incomprehensible how
the English Government, so careful of the lives of
its subjects ordinarily, " should allow certain ship-
owners, from motives of avarice, to send vessels to
sea almost with the certainty of being lost." Mr. Hall,
the gentleman we have referred to declares that the
underwriters are powerless to remedy the evil. They
keep on raising the premiums, but the burden falls
upon the substantial and careful shipowner, not on
the speculator, who buys a ship at the rate of four
or five shillings a ton, sends her to sea, and gets his
insurance when she goes to pieces. He therefore
proposes a regular system of Government inspec-
tion, the appointment of a legal functionary to
assist the local Marine Boards in official inquiries
into cases of loss and misconduct in ship captains,
and an extension of examination necessary to a
master before he can take command of a foreign-
going or passenger ship to the home-carrying
trade. These practical methods would no
doubt do much to abate the evil, and we cannot
but hope that they will be incorporated in the new
Shipping Act. There are other points which de-
mand notice, more especially the system of over-
loading, so fatal in the case of the London, and
more stringent rules with regard to the frequent
collisions now occurring. Here is room for our
professing reformers to show their zeal in regard to
a matter involving the safety of thousands of brave
lives and millions worth of property.

sailors throwing overboard cargoes in a stcrmr
abandoning first one cherished conviction and then
another, putting the end before the means, untie 1
all landmarks and safeguards are shattered and",
crumble away. Each speech of Mr. GLADSTONE': ;
seems more bitter than the last, and when we re -
member that these are the shadows only of comic:
events, we may well be dismayed at the prospec
of the substance.

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Trill TitACM DIEH
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at ation house a constable came in with an
u rnbrella and a hat, and the prisoner said, " That
smy hat." He gave an address at Hornsey, but
on inquiry it was found that no person of the name
of Charles vein was known there ; but a young,
man anal*, ering his description had lived there un-
der the •name of Charles Reeves. When taken the
prison' er had no hat on.

Pc-lice-constable Parker, 87 F, said he was on
duty in the Strand, and heard cries of "Stop
thief" in Southampton-street. He went there and
tb en to Burleigh-street, where he found the prisoner
ix t custody. Helsdon said she had left her umbrella
it t Southampton-street. He went back to look for
it, and found it and a hat lying on the footway toge-
ther. He took them to the station-house where the
prisoner claimed it. Witness received the bag from
W ard. There was no purse in it, nor could he find
any along the route the prisoner had followed in his
flight.

Inspector Harnost said that information bad been
received Of a similar attack in Peckham the same
evening, be a person answering the prisoner's de-
scrintion

?dr. -Flower said in that case it would be best to
re,ma-nd the prisoner, though the evidence was
'4uitt: sufficient to commit him for trial on the pre-
sent, charge.