Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 3.djvu/585

 678 FEDERAL EBPOBTEB. �merchant shipping act, (17 and 18 Vict. c. 104,) which pro- vides that when the master or owner, without suf&cient cause, refuses or neglects to pay the wages of the seamen within the time fixed by the statute, which, as applicable to thia vessel, was within five days after their discharge, he shall pay them a sum not exceeding the amount of two days' pay for each of the days, not exceeding 10 days, during which pay- ment is so delayed. The vessel bas been sold under a decree of the court, and the proceeds, amounting to $2,075, have been paid into the registry of the court. Various parties bave appeared, claiming liens on the vessel for materials and supplies. The amounts due them have not been adjusted» but the fund in court is insufficient to pay in f uU the seamen, the master, and these other parties, if their claims shall be established. A mortgagee bas also appeared as claimant of the surplus proceeds of the vessel. The amount due the sea- men for wages and extra pay is not contested, but it is objected, on behalf of the mortgagee and the other parties who bave presented their claims, that the seamen have no lien for their extra pay, and that the master bas no lien for bis wages ; or, at any rate, that he has not a prior lien to that of those who bave furnisbed materials and supplies. �I think the extra pay due to the seamen is to be treated as wages, for which they bave a prior lien on the vessel. The statute provides that it shall be recovered as wages. Tbis clearly means by the same methods or modes of procedure. The customary mode of recovering wages is by libelling the ship. The language, therefore, necessarily implied that the ship is bolden for tbis extra pay. And, aside from this par- ticular language of the statute, I think that, from the nature of the provision, and the purposes it was intended to sub- serve, the extra pay may be properly regarded as an addition or increase of wages in the event of the neglect of the master or owner to provide for their prompt payment. We bave a similar provision in our own act. These statutes are designed for the protection of seamen ; to prevent the abuse of with- holding their pay, and thereby keeping them in port at expense and out of employment while waiting for a settlement. It ����