ed THE ROYAL NATIONAL LIFEBOAT INSTITUTION--was
founded on the 24th of March 1824, and has gone on progressively, doing
its noble work of creating and maintaining a lifeboat fleet, rescuing
the shipwrecked, and rewarding the rescuers, from that day to this.
When life does not require to be saved, and when opportunity offers, the
Society allows its boats to save _property_, of which we shall have
something more to say presently.

At the founding of the Institution in 1824, the Archbishop of Canterbury
of the day filled the chair; the great Wilberforce, Lord John Russell,
and other magnates, were present; the Dukes of Kent, Sussex, and other
members of the Royal family, became vice-patrons; the Duke of
Northumberland its vice-president, and George the Fourth its patron. In
1850 the much-lamented Prince Albert--whose life was a continual going
about doing good--became its vice-patron, and Her Majesty the Queen
became, and still continues, a warm supporter and an annual contributor.

Now, this is a splendid array of names and titles; but it ought ever to
be borne in remembrance that the Institution is dependent for its
continued existence on the public--on you and me, good reader--for it is
supported almost entirely by voluntary contributions. That it will
always find warm hearts to pray for it, and open hands to give, as long
as its boats continue, year by year, to pluck men, women, and children
from the jaws of death, and give them back to gladdened hearts on shore,
is made very apparent from the records published quarterly in _The
Lifeboat Journal_ of the Society, a work full of interesting
information. Therein we find that the most exalted contributor is Queen
Victoria--the lowliest, a sailor's orphan child!

Here are a few of the gifts to the Institution selected very much at
random:--One gentleman leaves it a legacy of 10,000 pounds. Some time
ago a sum of 5000 pounds was sent anonymously by "a friend." There
comes 100 pounds as a second donation from a sailor's daughter, and 50
pounds from a British admiral. Five shillings are sent as "the savings
of a child"; 1 shilling, 6 pence from another little child, in
postage-stamps; 15 pounds from "three fellow-servants"; 10 pounds from
"a shipwrecked pilot," and 10 shillings 6 pence from "an old salt."
Indeed, we can speak from personal experience on this subject, because,
among others, we received a letter, one day, in a cramped and peculiar
hand, which we perused