Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 9.djvu/186

 THE HABBISBUBaH. ���171 ���because they are not subject to review. It is enough to state them, aud apply the law to them. That'is simple and well settled. It gave the right of way to the schooner, and required her to keep her course, which she did ; it imposed upon the steamer the duty of slowing up, stopping, or ehanging her course, neither of which she did. The adoption of either of these precautions would have averted the dis- aster. The circumstances were such as to make this duty imperative upon the steamer. She sighted the schooner at a distance of four miles, again at a distance pf two miles, and observed that the schooner ■was sailing on the wind and bo south-easterly. She ought to have presumed that the schooner would pursue the customary track, at that point, of vessels bound eastward, and a proper observation of the actual direction of the schooner's course ought to have wamed her seasonably that they were approaching each other on intersecting Unes, and that she was bound to regulate her movements in such an emergency to avoid all danger of collision. A timely reduction of her speed, or a slight change in her course, would have accomplished this, but she directed her course, with undiminished speed, to pass between the light-ship and the schooner, and so brought herself in contact with the latter. This was her avoidable mistake, and so she must be held solely accountable for the consequent loss. �The theory propounded by the respondents' counsel does not fumish a satisfactory solution of the problem. It rests upon the hypothesis tbat the vesseis were sailing upon parallel Unes, sufficiently far apart not to involve any danger of collision, and that, when they were within three or four hundred feet of each other, the schooner suddenly lufifed across the stearaer's bow, and thus brought them in contact ; but it is unsupported by sufficieut evidence, is against the decided weight of evidence in the case, is inherently improbable, and, in the judgment of experienced seamen, is perhaps entirely impracticable. �There must be a deeree for the libellants, and a reference to a commissioner to ascertain and report the damages. ��� �