opposite Newcastle; opposite Sunderland
there is a regiment of forty, and there are
about as many near the shores of Hartlepool
and Seaton Carew. At Liverpool the
ominous marks are much less numerous, but then
each commonly represents a wreck of greater
magnitude, a much more terrible disaster.
It is not, however, only near great ports that
these calamities occur. Beginning with nineteen
wrecks (twelve of them total), on the
shores of Shetland and Orkney, and so passing
down to the main-land, a dotted line of
distress runs without break round the whole
country. Opposite Wick, opposite Golspie,
opposite Cromarty, on the way to Inverness;
opposite Port Gordon, opposite Banff, against
Rattray Head and Buchan Ness, on the coast
between Buchan Ness and Aberdeen; opposite
Aberdeen, between Stonehaven and
Montrose, opposite Arbroath and Dundee, at
the entrance to the Firth of Forth, opposite
North Berwick, Dunbar, Berwick, Holy
Island, with some thirty more between that
place and Newcastle; and in this way all
round the island lie the dots, of which every
one represents a dread calamity, and almost
every one a calamity that might have been
prevented. Upon the coasts, or near the
coasts of the small islands inhabited by a
great maritime people, who ought surely to
be cunning in the build and management of
ships, within thirteen of one thousand vessels
were wrecked in the year last expired, of
which four hundred and eighty-four were
totally lost, the rest stranded and damaged
seriously, so that it was necessary for them
to discharge their cargo. The waste of
treasure was attended with the greater loss
of one thousand five hundred and forty-nine
lives: which exceeds the sum of misery
produced by shipwreck on the coasts of
Britain in any previous year of which there
exists a record. In eighteen hundred and
fifty-three, the deaths by shipwreck on our
coasts were about one thousand, and the
number of the wrecks themselves about eight
hundred and thirty.

We do not mean it to be inferred that
this increase in the number of shipwrecks is
due to an increase of culpable neglect on the
part of shipowners and masters. Continued
gales of unusual severity prevailed last year
throughout the month of January, and that
month alone was fatal to upwards of two
hundred and fifty vessels and almost five
hundred lives. In the whole half year from
the first of April to the end of September,
during which the summer weather was
unusually calm, there were not so many wrecks,
by sixty, as in the one terrible month with
which the year began.  On the other hand, it
is to be said that although in January of the
year preceding there were fewer wrecks, there
was a greater sacrifice of life; that element
in the calculation being of course dependent
altogether on the nature of the vessels lost.

But, if the Wreck Chart of last year does
not prove increase of neglect, it surely
demonstrates that there is no increase of
carefulness. Rotten vessels, or vessels ill equipped
or improperly manned, are still sent to sea;
masters incompetent or wanting common
prudence still miss their bearings, shave the
coast to make short cuts, or run foul of other
vessels through neglect of sharp look-out, or
of the use of signals. Fifty-three vessels in
the course of the year were sunk, and forty-
one were shattered by collision. It is well
for us to say that the sea is a dangerous and
fickle element, and will always claim its
victims. If the element is fickle we know
all its moods, and build ships able to fight
through them; we know what is the law of
storms, and by knowledge can escape the fury
of the hurricane; we know how to guide our
sailing vessels and our steamers—they are not
sent out to drift before every wind that
blows; the seaman knows how to tell where
he is upon the ocean, and his chart tells him of
the rocks and shoals that are to be avoided.
If owners having insured their vessels at
Lloyd's did not become careless about insuring
them at the shipbuilder's by help of his art;
if vessels were sent out seaworthy, efficiently
manned, commanded by men competent and
watchful; we believe that a reduction of the
number of our wrecks by at least one-half
would immediately follow. Practically there
must always be a certain risk at sea, but
practically it need not be large; and
theoretically there need certainly be none, but
theory leaves out of sight the imperfections
of the human character. Owners of ships
will equip them economically, saving their
own money at the risk of sacrificing other
people's lives; seamen, especially when over-
tasked, will sometimes fail in the performance
of their duties; unskilful captains will
contrive to get ships entrusted to their charge;
and skilful captains will be found who put
imprudent faith in their own skill. Let any
shipowner or sailor speak thus of his class if
he please, but let him take good care that no
one shall have reason to reflect in the same
fashion on himself, as one of the class. Let
every man only take heed that he at any rate
is bound in honour to stand out as an exception,
and there ends the rule.

We don't believe in the general perfectibility
of man, within the next three or four
centuries at any rate, but we equally refuse
to believe that he is essentially wrong-headed
or wrong-hearted. There is much in the
annals of last year's shipwrecks to support a
different opinion. On the twenty-seventh of
April, the galliot Ariadne drove from her
anchorage near Thurso in stormy weather and
became a wreck: out started, in a common
fishing coble, a merchant of Thurso, Mr.
David Sinclair, with four fishermen, and
bravely brought ashore nine men, together
with the master's wife and child. A boat
laden with seaweed, shipped a heavy sea and
foundered on the coast of Donegal. Its crew