Page:History of merchant shipping and ancient commerce (Volume 3).djvu/385

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to be the case; for, when a temporary Transport Board was appointed, various vessels were discharged, and the rates of freight for sailing ships, which had averaged 1l. 7s. 7d. per ton, fell to 15s. 10d. per ton. Indeed, there can be no doubt that, had there been a well-organised board in operation when war was declared, the sea transport service, which cost this country 15,000,000l. sterling during that brief and unhappy war, would have been far more efficiently conducted for two-thirds that amount.

Woolwich, two gentlemen, when I stepped on board, were wrangling over the main hatchway. One was from the Ordnance, the other was evidently in charge of certain medical stores which, with piles of shot and shell, lay on the wharf ready for shipment. The shot and shell representative insisted on having his goods in the centre compartment of the vessel because they were heavy; the other gentleman was as determined to have his physic stored in the same division of the ship because it was perishable. Each would have his own way; and, as neither would give way, after an hour's altercation, they, to the amazement and horror of the mate of the ship, came to a compromise by ordering the stores of both departments to be stowed in this one favourite position! It is needless to state the result; I may just, however, say that when the ship arrived at the Crimea it was found that the shot and shell had played sad havoc with the medicine cases, and that the floor of her centre compartment was strewed with fragments of fragile cases, demolished physic bottles, and countless numbers of squashed pill-boxes.]*
 * [Footnote: One day, when I had occasion to visit a transport which lay at