Page:The Blight of Insubordination.djvu/45

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Now to the dwellers in these islands who are not familiar with the conditions under which the maritime affairs of their sea-girt country are conducted, and who do not realise the importance of the immediate dependence of their beloved country on the merchant fleets, without which they would all be starving in a couple of weeks, it may seem strange, more than passing strange, that things are managed in the way they are.

We are not aware of the powers vested in Local Marine Boards or what their real and intended functions are; it is, however, quite clear by sections 244, 245, M.S.A., 1894, that the Board of Trade keep the control. As before stated, the chief feature of their usefulness appears in the unlimited production of masters, mates and engineers. There are times, too, when the Boards meet to award the hardy mariner such medals, pieces of plate, binoculars, or votes of thanks that occasionally come to this class of toilers of the deep for hard wrought services to their fellow man in times of dire distress or worse disaster. There is a time too, occasionally, when the seamy side appears, and the Boards meet to sit in judgment on a certificated offender who has not had the power, or self will, to be wise in time when "partaking of the cup that cheers," and is thus brought to book to answer for it before the tribunal that licensed him to do his business. From the time of the abolition of the Navigation Laws until quite lately when the Shipping Federation adopted a scheme referred to by Lord Dudley in the House of Lords, on July 12, 1901, for the purpose of amending the matter, there has been no special