Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 9.djvu/232

Rh wheel and ordered the mate to go forward. His first impulse was, he testifies, to port and make the shortest possible line across the bows of the other vessel, and with that view he sung out, "Let go the fore-boom guy;" but in an instant he observed, as he thought, that the bark was keeping off, and that this movement was impossible. Accordingly, he determined to starboard his wheel and go the other way. Before his order to let go the fore-boom guy was executed, he sung out, "No, no; let go the main-boom guy and the main-peak halliards," and turned the wheel to starboard. The order was executed. The main-boom swung in, and just then, as it was going over his head, he looked up and saw the jib-boom of the bark above him. He left the wheel and ran forward, and immediately the bark struck the schooner, cutting the boat which hung on the davits about in halves, and penetrating the stern a little to port of the stern post, breaking the rudder, crowding the stern post and wheel one side, and breaking up the deck nearly to the house and upsetting the compass. The angle at which the bark struck is fixed with an approximation to certainty by the fact that her jib-boom went inside of the schooner's main rigging. The courses of the vessels at the instant of collision diverged about two or two and a half points. The conceded course of the schooner being N. E., it is evident that if the course claimed for the bark, N. W. by N., is correct, and she kept her course, the schooner must have changed four and a half to five points before the collision, and not two points only, as stated in the libel.

The testimony from the bark shows that the lookout reported a light on the port or weather bow; that the master, who was aft, was unable to see it, and went forward on the top-gallant forecastle, where the lookout pointed it out to him, and he saw it with his glass. It was seen by the man at the wheel, and by others of the men on deck. It was a dim light as they saw it, and at first they did not make out its color, but presently it was seen to be green. There is the usual diversity in the testimony as to the number of points on the bow that it bore. The libel says it was about four points. The learned counsel for the schooner has pointed out that if it was four points on the port bow, and the respective courses and rates of speed of the vessels were as claimed by the parties respectively, a collision could not have happened, since the bark would have passed the point of intersection of their courses before the schooner could have reached it, even if she had kept her course. This is a sufficient reason for the conclusion that the statement of about four points in the answer as the angle at which the light was seen, and the estimate of some of