Page:History of merchant shipping and ancient commerce (Volume 3).djvu/514

 the law as it then stood. In their reports they express an opinion, that much misapprehension appears to exist about what is meant by unseaworthiness, so, before offering any recommendation with the view of preserving human life at sea, they prefaced their observations with a few practical and sensible remarks on what constitutes unseaworthiness.

The safety of a ship at sea, they remark, with great force, cannot be secured by any one precaution or set of precautions, but requires the unceasing application of skill, care, and vigilance, from her first design to her unloading at the port of destination. To be seaworthy, she must be well designed, well constructed, well equipped, well stowed, and, above all, well manned and well navigated; otherwise, "all precautions as to her construction and her stowage will be unavailing." While public opinion had been abundantly directed to these precautions, they considered that other sources of danger had been altogether unnoticed, and they showed, from a summary of official inquiries, that from the year 1856 to 1872, inclusive, while only 60 ships were known to have been lost from defects in the vessels or their stowage, no less than 711 were lost from neglect and bad navigation.

As these returns too clearly showed, that by far the largest proportion of losses and other casualties were due to preventible causes, other than faulty construction, insufficient repair, or overloading, the Commissioners directed their attention to a rigid