Page:History of merchant shipping and ancient commerce (Volume 3).djvu/378

 ship, or at the office of the Shipowner or his agents. In either case, the crimps, most of whom were keepers of low lodging-houses or beer-shops, were in attendance upon the sailors, and he, who had to receive the largest amount of pay, was attended by the most numerous and obsequious of these vultures, each ready to prey upon him. Suspecting no wrong, Jack was too frequently induced, after he had received his wages, to partake, on the invitation of the crimps, of a glass of grog or a pint of beer at the nearest public-house, and this, apparently, friendly intercourse too often produced the most lamentable results.

To obviate, or rather to mitigate if possible, these evils, the Commissioners for the reduction of the National Debt were empowered, by the Merchant Shipping Act of 1854, to establish Savings-Banks for seamen; and, by the Seamen's Savings-Bank Act of 1856, these banks were placed under the control of the Board of Trade, which was authorized to open "a central office in London, together with branch savings-banks at such ports and places in the United Kingdom as they may think expedient," where "seamen, or the wives, widows and children of seamen," might make deposits, not exceeding at one time 200l.

Under this Act, the Board of Trade has opened at all the shipping offices throughout the United Kingdom a department where the sailor, on his discharge, may deposit the whole or any portion of his wages; or may, by means of a money-order office, since added, remit them to his relations or friends. The effect has been salutary, inasmuch as the sailor is thus, to some extent (less than I could wish), pre