ver be expected to remove, should as
far as possible be obviated by legislative enactment--and that vessels
should not, after a given period, be permitted to clear out at the
ports from which they are to sail, until, according to their tonnage,
the number of their passengers and crews, and the nature of the voyage
on which they are bound, it shall have been ascertained that they have
been provided by the owners, and according to established regulations,
with those means of safety which shall be required.

These should consist of the most simple and effectual apparatus for
establishing a communication in case of wreck, between the vessel and
the shore--materials for the construction of rafts--lifebuoys--cork
jackets, or other buoyant means of safety to individuals; boats in a
reasonable proportion to the numbers on board, to some of which the
properties of life boats might immediately and easily be given--with
other measures which the great importance of the object demands, on a
scale consistent with that economy which should ever attend compulsatory
regulations.

The extent and nature of these precautionary measures require mature
consideration, and would best be ascertained by a committee of
experienced and scientific officers and individuals selected from the
navy, the Trinity House, Lloyd's, the Ship-owners' Society, and other
departments connected with maritime affairs, on whose reports, and after
minute and deliberate investigation, perhaps an enactment could alone be
founded to produce the much desired effect.--It is only by reducing
into a system those measures which are now left to chance, or to the
forethought or the caprice of thousands, that such effectual precautions
can be taken, as will insure that at all times the danger may be
promptly met by adequate means of rescue.

It has been allowed by those of much ability and experience, that it
would be very important, that seamen in the merchants service should be
examined, by some competent authority, to be established for the
purpose, as to their possessing that knowledge of their profession, on
which the safety of their vessels and the lives of their crews must
continually depend, before any one, who has not already filled that
office, should be allowed to take the command of a vessel, of such
tonnage and description, and with such exceptions as, on more full
investigation of the subject, might be deemed requisite.

We have only stedfastly and undeviatin