Page:History of merchant shipping and ancient commerce (Volume 3).djvu/526

 *brous than those now existing, should be applied and more direct penalties inflicted.

As most of my readers are aware, a system of compulsory apprenticeship was established in the year 1844, but was abolished by the repeal of the Navigation Laws in 1849, and, though some Shipowners, subsequently, desired to restore this system, the Government could not, with any regard to principle, meet their views. The object of training boys for the sea service having been to secure a supply of seamen for the Royal Navy as well as for the Merchant Service, it would have been unjust to compel Shipowners to train boys for the public service after they had been deprived of the special privileges, supposed to be advantageous, conferred on them by the Navigation Laws. But, as an impression prevailed that our seamen had deteriorated, both in number and quality, since the Compulsory Apprenticeship Act was abolished—though I think this is to be attributed to other and different causes—the Commissioners suggested a scheme to meet the existing evil. They proposed that every vessel above 100 tons register, whether propelled by sail or steam, should be required to carry a certain number of apprentices in proportion to her tonnage, or to pay a small contribution annually (such as 6d. per ton), to be applied towards the maintenance of training ships in all the principal ports in the kingdom. They recommended that the apprentices should be indentured at or about the age of fourteen to the master of the training ship for five years; that, after serving in this ship for one or two years, the indenture should be transferred to any Shipowner who would be willing to take the