We have gone into this question with reference to this class of vessels very fully, and have visited many of them, and we think that the boats required by act should be increased 100 per cent., and in addition to them that the owners should be induced to carry sufficient collapsible boats and approved rafts, so that each ship shall have sufficient life-saving gear for all on board at any one time, provided, as said before, that no ship need carry more boat accommodation than is sufficient for all on board at that time. In 1887 a select committee of the House of Commons, of which Lord Charles Beresford was the chairman, was appointed to report on saving life at sea, and they found in their report-- That many passenger ships could not, without great inconvenience, carry so many of the ordinary wooden boats as would suffice to carry the whole of the passengers and crew with safety in bad weather. Under such circumstances the crew would not be sufficient to man so many boats; nor could they all be got into the water in sufficient time in the event of very rapid foundering. Having regard, however, to the fact that accidents occur probably as often in moderate weather as in bad, and having regard also to the fact that the very cause of the accident frequently incapacitates many of the boats, and to the further fact that an insufficiency of boats undoubtedly tends to cause panic, we are of opinion that all sea-going passenger ships should be compelled by law to carry such boats, and other life-saving apparatus, as would in the aggregate best provide for the safety of all on board in moderate weather. As a result of these reports, the merchant shipping (life-saving appliances) act, 1888, appears to have been passed, under which rules were made by the board of trade at different dates. The merchant shipping act, 1894, repealed the act of 1888, and substituted therefor sections 427 to 431 and the seventeenth schedule of the new act. Under this act (1894) a table showing the minimum number of boats to be placed under davits and their minimum cubic contents was issued by the board. It was dated March 9, 1894, and came into operation on June 1 of that year. This table was based on the gross tonnage of the vessels to which it was to apply, and not upon the numbers carried, and it provided that the number of boats and their capacity should increase as the tonnage increased. The table, however, stopped short at the point where the gross tonnage of the vessels reached "10,000 and upwards." As to all such vessels, whatever their size might be, the minimum number of boats under davits was fixed by the table at 16, with a total minimum capacity of 5,500 cubic feet.