Page:History of merchant shipping and ancient commerce (Volume 3).djvu/654

 gradually developed into or rather led up to the establishment of Lloyd's Register. The earliest of them is supposed to date from 1760; whether the 1764 book is a rival which started immediately after it, or belonged to a Register Society which existed previously to 1760, is not known, but the latter is perhaps most probable. Its existence might, it is thought, have debarred the new Register Book from using the Roman capitals, and it is no great stretch to suppose that the old book had ceased before 1775, and left its successor free to adopt the designation or class A 1.

The book dated 1764-5 furnished the following particulars: Ship's name, master and owner's name, ports of trading, tonnage, when and where built, number and kind of guns, and number of men and the class of the ship. In the book dated 1775, the load-draught of water was given, but not the number of men. The Register Book was at this latter date published annually, and the corrections from time to time were posted or stamped in the books by means of type as at present. In the earlier books the revisions during the year, or rather two years—for the books were then biennial—had to be inserted with pen and ink. The following particulars have been for the most part obtained by an examination of old Register Books, but they are necessarily incomplete, as many of the early volumes were lost when the Royal Exchange was burnt down in 1838.

In the book for 1778 a list of ships of the Royal Navy is inserted, also a list of the ships in the East India Company's service. General meetings used in those old days to be held by the subscribers (then termed members), of whom there were, at the end of 1780, 164. The subscription which at first was twelve guineas was eventually, about 1810, reduced to eight guineas, the funded property of the Register Society having reached 12,000l. For twenty years, afterwards, however, the expenses exceeded the income by 500l. per annum, and the subscription was, in consequence, raised to ten guineas. The particulars in the book for 1788, a copy of which is extant, were much as formerly; but a few curious additions had come to be inserted, such as whether the vessel had deep waists or low counters, and whether American property: and a record was made of the description of timber of which the ships were built, the number of decks, and if the beams were kneed. In 1798, the number of subscribers amounted to 245, and the number of members on the committee, who served gratuitously, was eleven. In that year's book the Government