Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 8.djvu/861

 THE GBOEOE A. HOTT. 847 �eehobner beating up against the wind. The river at that place ie narrow and the flood-tide strong, setting over towards the west bank.. The usual and proper course of a tow going up on a flood-tide is, after passing the point close to the west bank, to head across for Magazine point, on the other sida, and this course the Ceres was taking. The Syracuse, notwithstanding that the George A. Hoyt and her tow and the two schooners were in the river, and might interfere with her accom- plishing her purpose suecessfully, undertook to pass the Ceres and her tow to the west, or on their port hand. Instead of heading up for the Magazine point, on the east side of the river, she took a course more westerly than the Ceres and about the middle of the river, and was coming up to and lapping the tow of the Ceres, when it became evident to her pilot that the schooner beating up the river was in her way. This schooner was tacking on the west side in order to stand over to the eastward, and, from losing the wind, or for sonie other reason, was longer in making the manoeuver than the pilot of the Syracuse calculated upon, and he was compelled, first, to sheer still further to the westward, and then to stop, in order to avoid the schooner and pass to the westward of her, and give her time to get eut of the way on her eastward tack. This brought the Syracuse and her tow in dangerous proximity to the George A. Hoyt and her tow. When the schooner finally stood to the eastward the Syracuse passed her, the forward barge in her tow on the starboard side just grazing against the schooner. �As the Syracuse passed the schooner she sheered again sharply to the eastward, for the purpose, it may be presumed, of drawing her tow out of the way of that of the George A. Hoyt; but her tow had already taken a swing to the westward, the effect of her stopping and of the tide. When the pilot of the George A. Hoyt saw the Syracuse change her course he stopped his boat and slacked his starboard hawser, thus letting the boats in his tow swing into the bank,- and they had no headway at the time of the collision. The end of the tow of the Syracuse, however, kept on with this swing to the, west- ward, and the Tompkins, Washington, and St. Nicholas came in con- tact with the schooner Jane L. Newton, which was on the port side of the first tier in the tow of the George A. Hoyt. Several witnesses from the Syracuse and her tow testified that the George A. Hoyt was in motion at the time of the collision, and took a sudden sheer under the stem of the St. Nicholas after passing her, thus bringing the schooner down on the port side of the tow of the Syracuse, as alleged in the libel, but the weight of the testimony clearly is that the George ��� �