Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 2.djvu/797

 790 FBDEKAL EBPOKTER. �shown or suggested for the break in the timber, and the spring- ing of the timbers proved, except this. �The testimony of the libellant and his wife, which tend to show a very violent rocking and thumping of the canal-boat while in this position, is confirmed to some extent by the tes- timony of the pilot of the tug, who admits that while his en- gine was stopped and he was heading about N. E. which would have brought him about broadside to the wind and sea, and in the trough of what sea there was, the libellant, from his boat hailing him, complained of his stopping there and said something about his boat jumping. I do not think it controls the evidence on the part of the libellant, that the witnesses from the tug and the barge did not observe or do not now recollect any sueh thumping as would account for so serions an injury to libellant's boat. The tug and the barge were deep in the water, and had the canal-boat on the windward side of them. The tug and barge were much less liable to be affected by the motion of the water than the canal-boat, and those on them were much less likely to no- tice its effect on the canal-boat than those on her. �Great importance seems to have been attached in the trial and the argument to the question, how long the canal-boat was thus kept broadside to the sea and wind in rounding to. The libellant insists that they stopped there several minutes ; that they were held in that position much longer than was really necessary to effect the landing of the barge ; that by going down stream a little further before rounding to, and keeping the engine working constantly tiU they got headed up the river, they would have passed more quickly through this dangerous point of the navigation, giving the canal-boat less opportunity to pound against the tug; that by handling her in this way the slowing or stopping of the engine to deaden the headWay of the barge, which was necessary in order to bring her up to the pier without too violent contact, could have been avoided altogether, or, at any rate, might have been made after rounding to and while heading up the river, and not, as wasdone, while broadside to the wind and sea. �I think, upon the evidence, that the stopping of the engine ����