But this is a trivial matter compared with the ignorance of the great matters of life and death wrapped up in our Mercantile Marine. That lads eager to get out upon what has tacitly come to be regarded as our peculiar domain--the open sea--and there uphold the traditions of the race, should not know where to go for information concerning it that can be relied upon, seems strange to-day. Stranger still that, instead of all manner of facilities being given to our own youths who wish to become seamen, all manner of disheartening hindrances should be put in their way. And what shall we say in face of the almost universal manifestation of malevolence towards us by foreign powers in what they believe to be our hour of tribulation, of a British minister who from his high position declares he sees no cause for alarm in the prospect of our merchant ships being entirely manned by foreigners? It is only one more proof that the ignorance of our greatest industry is universal; that, from the highest class to the lowest, our people have grown to look upon this most important of our national assets, this indispensable bridging of the ocean for the supply of our daily food, as something no more needing our thoughtful attention than the recurrence of the seasons or the incidence of day and night. And yet books about the sea are usually popular. In spite of the technicalities involved (usually wrong, owing to the want of a first-hand acquaintance with the subject), almost any sea-fiction will sell. So long as the story be good, the plot workmanlike, the great mass of the reading public will not criticize the nautical technique from lack of ability; they take it for granted, and learn nothing from it. Exceptions may be gratefully remembered, especially Kipling, whose nautical stories, like his engineering ones, have no flaws. They might have been written by a man who had spent his life upon the sea, and had served in all grades. In like manner did R.L. Stevenson grasp detail in the "Wrecker" and the "Ebb-tide;" while to read Morley Roberts' work in this direction is to sit again in the dim fo'c'sle, with the reek of the slush-lamp mingled with most pungent tobacco-smoke and a dozen other unholy odours making your nostrils tingle, while outside the sea-voices murmur their accompaniment to the long yarn being spun within. There are others, but of them only one can be here mentioned--that brilliant, wayward man of splendid abilities and attainments, J.F. Keene. He has gone, and left no one to fill his place. Intolerant of civilized life, he fled from it to the freedom of the tramp or the fo'c'sle scallywag, and drank deep of the cup of life as he loved it. But his books do not make light reading. They are compounded of blood and iron, and bitter as the brine that stained his manuscript.