foundering; and even in event of this, the “ark” was only to be so in name until the good ship should “go under,” and leave the saloon serenely floating—presumably with all souls inside. The difficulty in Mr Gadd’s proposal, of at once making the bulwarks easily floatable and structurally efficient for the resistance of heavy seas, seriously detracted from its feasibility. It would be a somewhat heavy task to make adequate note of all the varied proposals and patented inventions for the preservation of life at sea. Some of these, as in the foregoing instances, are proposals affecting structural features; but others, and by far the most numerous, are simply adjuncts to the vessel. Ingenuity has been specially directed of late towards bringing into efficient requisition, in event of impending shipwreck, the commonest items of a ship’s outfit. This has been abundantly evidenced in the several naval exhibitions held within the past three years in various parts of the country. Firms whose work lies in cork and Indiarubber manufactures have there exhibited in great profusion various forms of life-belts, life-buoys, life-saving mattresses and pillows, and life-saving dresses. Others, availing themselves of larger items, have shown life-saving adaptations of deck-seats, deck-houses, and bulwarks made into the form of life-rafts. Not a few of these devices have received adoption in our passenger-carrying steamships, and their more general use—especially if accompanied by proper knowledge of how they may best be taken advantage of—would materially help to rob shipwreck of some of its terrors at least, if not of its dire fatalities. It has been urged in this connection—and the plea is eminently reasonable—that Parliament should invest the Board of Trade with proper powers—if that Body is not already vested with all that is requisite—to take the matter of life-saving appliances thoroughly and practically in hand, and by means of experiments in all kinds of weather to determine which are the best means of saving life under different conditions. Having done this, also to draw up rules for the proper stowage and use of such appliances on board ship, and to see that such rules are strictly observed, and that no vessel be permitted to go to sea which is not so equipped. * * * * *