But even when the good man passed from theory to practice, and succeeded at Bamborough in getting a boat converted into a life-boat on the above principles, and when this boat proved a success, and saved many lives, even then he could obtain no support from the authorities in carrying out his grand object. The story is told of a general who blamed a soldier for ducking at the sound of a cannon ball, saying that he had no business to be a soldier if he had the faintest objection to being shot. On the same principle, the first lord of the Admiralty, in his stern rejections of Luken's many efforts, may have considered that life-boats would interfere with a sailor's prerogative for being drowned; and drowned indeed many of the poor fellows were--swept to destruction in sight of land, for winds were cruel, and rocks were hard, and seas wild, and ships frail, while benevolence slept, and the cries of the drowning did not reach official ears, and Luken's loud appeals on behalf of humanity were disregarded, and he, brave man, who had so long struggled, hoping against hope, became utterly disappointed that the movement, the importance of which he so realized, and for which he had so long laboured, did not become general. Still he had the satisfaction of seeing his plan adopted in one or two places, in Shields especially, as we shall show; and he had the great happiness of knowing that, time after time, lives were saved by the boats which were built after his model. He had done all that he could, and went on building coaches, not, we may presume, on life-boat principles; and he tried somewhat to content himself, as he looked forward with hope for a time of greater enlightenment and sympathy, when he trusted that the seed he sowed, almost with tears, would bring its harvest of sheaves, and full of this faith, the good man devised an inscription for the stone which should mark his resting-place in a quiet country churchyard, simply stating, "That he was the Inventor of the first life-boat." Honoured be the memory of Lionel Luken! CHAPTER IV. THE GROWTH OF THE LIFE-BOAT MOVEMENT. "What is noble? 'tis the finer Portion of our mind and heart, Linked to something still diviner Than mere language can impart; Ever prompting--ever seeing Some improvement yet to plan; To uplift our fellow-being, And, like man, to feel for Man." _C. Swain._ If the ear were only as powerful to enable the mind to realize things heard, as the eye is powerful in enabling the mind to realize things seen, many reforms would have been worked out promptly, instead of having to wait year after year, sometimes almost generation after generation, while the mind of the public has had its sympathies but slowly awakened by the constant statement of some evil, and the unceasing demand for its remedy.