stores made it imperative for those ships to carry a stated number, the practice would again become general.

Much is said about schools to educate boys for the sea service. I can only say that most of the boys I have had with me of late years have been better educated when they were bound apprentice than I was. It is not the school that is required before they go on board ship, it is the keeping up their education while they are serving their time. The boys should be obliged to work the ship's day's-work, with all observations, chronometers, lunars, amplitudes, &c., every day, and show it to the master; also keep a journal, that they may improve their writing as well as learn navigation.

To bring up boys properly they should have a berth aft, away from the men; and if in a large ship the third-mate should have charge of their mess; if in a small one, the second-mate and carpenter be with them. A small cabin abreast of the after hatchway, eight feet by eight, would be large enough for five boys and the third-mate. If the boys' berth was aft, the master could occasionally step in to see how they were occupied while below, what kind of books they were reading, what kind of pictures were pasted up in the berth, and whether their clothes and bedding were in order.

The elder boys would derive much benefit from being made to copy the cargo-book, placing all the packages of each mark together, for the convenience of the chief-mate in discharging. It teaches them how a cargo-book ought to be kept, and improves their writing.

All officers who have a certificate should be obliged to keep the ship's way, and to keep a journal of the voyage. If this were done, owners would not require characters with the officers, the journals would show the character.

It is said that the examination of officers and granting certificates has raised their character. I doubt it very much. The examination is no test of ability,-it is a sham: a few hours at a "grinder's" and any one can pass. I am acquainted with one of the best shipmasters out of London. He is a good practical navigator and a good observer of lunars, yet he could only obtain a third-class certificate, and was sent back once before he got that. I passed at the Trinity House before it was compulsory to have a certificate, and I have five apprentices now with me, all of whom, I am sure, could pass an examination and get first-class certificates, if they had a little grinding on stowage of holds, dunnage, lights, &c.

Some time ago a person required not only a good character, but a considerable amount of interest to obtain a chief mate's berth. Now, the only question asked is-"Have you a certificate?" One of my brothers commanded a ship in an employ where the owners had a rule (before the law made it compulsory) that all their officers should pass an examination. My brother had a man who had been two voyages with him as mate, and three years as second-mate, but he was afraid to try the examination (he was a good chief-mate of a West Indiaman, and as sober, steady, and careful a seaman as ever walked a deck), so he was discharged. The young man who succeeded him

had a certificate from some port in Wales. The ship sailed the day after he was shipped. When they were at sea it turned out that he was not a sailor, and had never been to sea. His father was owner of some coasters, and he had made a few passages to London and other places on the coast as the owner's son; and on the strength of this he passed his examination. The ship on that voyage fell in with a hurricane on the passage home, lost her rudder, and was very near foundering. The hardy seaman who was unshipped for that bit of parchment would have been worth his weight in gold when the ship was lying on her beam ends, with the lee sea battering in her hatches and skylights, if he could then have taken the place of the poor sea-sick young fellow that succeeded him.

In my opinion a chief-mate's log-book and cargo-book for a six months' voyage would give a practical man a better knowledge of his qualifications as an officer than half a dozen examinations, when fresh from the "grinder's" and just got up for the occasion. Times are very bad with the shipping interest, and there is a dearth of good officers and able seamen; and before the case will be altered there must be some common feeling between owners, masters, officers, and crews. Is such the case now? No, they are all pulling in different directions. As long as this system lasts the merchant service will not be better. They may get up Mercantile Marine Associations, and have a charter, and M.P.s to make long speeches, but they will do as much good to the service as Mr. Potter's Paviours' Arms' Committee does for the London journeymen on strike.

If shipowners want officers and seamen they must do as their grandfathers did, viz., carry apprentices in their ships, and work up the raw material to any shape they require it. It may not be pleasant perhaps to those who are in the habit of making a clear ship upon her return; nor to those who make young gentlemen sailors for a premium of £60 the first year and £30 for the two following. It would be much less profitable to the latter to carry apprentices and pay them than to have ten midshipmen at an average premium of £50 each. But both must come to it, nevertheless, if we are again to have officers and sailors. They will not spring up like mushrooms. The evils exist, and shipowners must look them in the face and find a remedy, unless they wish to be run out of the market altogether by Americans and foreigners.

The things that swell up a ship's disbursements, and prevent what ought to be a successful voyage from paying, are claims for damaged cargo; short delivery, through plunder or a bad check taking in or discharging; extra wages paid for substitutes for deserters or men left in jail, hospital, or discharged; lumpers and labourers taking in and discharging cargoes at home and abroad. To this put the loss of sails and spars through incompetent officers carrying sail too long, or not knowing how to take it in, and the loss of stores through carelessness of stewards and junior officers.

Most of these losses might be prevented if a staff of apprentices and officers were brought up in the employ and kept by the ships, as they

are now in a few employs. There are a few owners who have throughout kept up the old system, and there is a wonderful difference between those ships and others when you meet them in Australian ports. "Trident's" remarks in your magazine for December, 1858, are true. Underpaid officers, half-manned ships, and half-starved crews (of stokers and landsmen) are the causes of much of the insubordination and many of the accidents that are frequently occurring in the merchant service.

General observations do not give so clear an idea of things as a statement of facts. I will give an instance of one of a class of ships that do very much more injury to the merchant service and to the respectable firms of shipowners than all the competition of foreigners complained of. There are other ships where the masters are worse paid and the crews are smaller in comparison to the cargo carried. Three or four years ago I became acquainted with the master of a ship loading in an Indian port at £4 10s. per ton. She had discharged 660 tons of coals at Aden, her outward freight having been £3 per ton. She took in 650 tons of homeward cargo; which she landed in London in less than eleven months from the time of signing articles. She was manned with fifteen hands, all told, viz. :

The master was not allowed one shilling to find the cabin, nor had he any other remuneration besides his wages. His allowance of food was the same as the crew, viz., the scale, as published by authority of the Shipowners' Society. The master told me that his crew were suffering from diarrhoea. I found that their daily ration was 1lb. of meat per man (and as they could not eat the beef they had pork), and one shilling's worth daily (among all hands) of the trash that in that port are called vegetables, for soup. They had not had while in harbour either flour, yams, potatoes, rice, or anything, save meat and biscuit. I advised the master to give his crew the same daily allowance that I served out to mine, and which was the same that two ships, belonging to two other respectable London firms, were giving to their crews. He said that he dare not,-that he had already expended 70lbs. more flour than ought to have been issued as per scale on the articles; and that as to grog, it was impossible to give any, as his owner was very much against giving spirits to sailors: it had a demoralizing effect, he said. What would Lord Nelson have said of such a fellow? I have since heard that the owner of that ship is a most ostentatiously pious man.

I ask you, Mr. Editor, is it possible for shipowners who are liberal in storing their ships, in manning them, and in paying their officers, to compete with such vampires as the above. The monthly expenses of a London ship of the same carrying capacity would be more than double that of the one I have mentioned.

I find that my letter is much too long, and the subject is very disagreeable, or I could give you some details of a different class of vessels that are now found navigating the eastern seas, and the way the officers of them are paid; which would show you that your correspondent was not far wrong in saying that the shipmaster was not better off than the London cabman.

The scale of provisions, as published by authority of the Shipowners' Society, is not sufficient to keep men in health. They can exist on it to the nearest port. I should like much to put the chairman of the Shipowners' Society on an allowance of oz. of tea per day, and not give him any other drink except water, for a month, and I am sure he would then agree with me that oz. of coffee and łoz. tea was not too much for breakfast and tea.

I ask why a man-of-war's-man requires 1oz. of cocoa and oz. of tea per day, and the merchant sailor, who is more exposed, is only to have the oz. tea? It is very well to put the said scale on the articles, to pay short allowance money on, but not to stint the crew to the bare allowance. It is a very poor answer to a man who complains to the master that he has had no breakfast, to tell him that if he had kept half his dinner the previous day, instead of eating it, he would have had some.

If the apprenticeship system again became general, and lumpers, riggers, and long-shore men were kept out of the ships as much as possible, and the officers and crews took in and stowed the ships' cargoes, so that they were kept by their ships, and made two or three voyages with the same masters and officers, there would soon be a vast difference in the merchant service. I can speak from experience, having tried it, that a ship's company and their officers can do the work cheaper and better than the long-shore men do.

If the apprenticeship system again existed, both services would benefit much if the lads could be induced to serve the last year of their time in a frigate or sloop of war. Twelve or eighteen months in a ship of war would do much good to every young man who is to be an officer in the merchant service. He would there see the value of method and discipline, also of a division of labour, and how easy it is to have stores and provisions stowed in such a manner as to have some of each sort constantly handy. In short, they would learn many things that cannot be learned in a merchant ship. I speak from experience on this subject also, for I have served a considerable time in the royal navy, in ships of nearly every rate, as well as thirty years in the merchant service.

I will merely add that I have now sailing with me two men who have been constantly sailing with me since 1852; two more who have been with me since 1855; three more who have made three Indian or

Australian voyages, besides the officers and apprentices. I mention this to show that it is not impossible to keep men together in a ship even now, if people are disposed to do so, and to employ them instead of long-shore men when the ship is at home.

To the Editor of the Nautical Magazine.

I am, &c.,

A MASTER.

P.S.-I do not say that an examination of officers is not required; but I assert that the present examination is not a test of ability, and many incompetent persons do pass.

WATERS OF THE AMAZONS.

According to information obtained at Para from mariners who have ascended the Amazons as far as the Rio Negro, and from my own observations, says M. Lartigue, it would appear that the waters of this river rise for six months, and that having attained their maximum height, they fall during the other six months.

November is the time when they commence rising, and the inundations take place in January, February, March, April, and May. The people of the country attribute these to the heavy rains which fall during this season in the country through which the river flows. It appears, however, that these rains are not the only cause: the N.E. winds which prevail then and blow strong into the mouth of the river, arrest the current and contribute much to these inundations. In fact, very little rain fell in 1824 and 1825, and yet the same inundations took place but certainly the waters were not so high as in previous years.

From our observations on the tides it has been ascertained to a certainty that a difference of level does take place; for during the rainy season when the ebb ought to be the stronger, on the contrary the flood was the most violent. This is what takes place. The flood tide from the mouth to thirty or forty leagues from it up the river, in December was stronger than the ebb. In the months of January, February, March, and April, the flood stream to the North Cape, Cabo do Norte, runs eight miles an hour at springs; but the strength of the ebb is about two to four miles. It is in the month of May that the stream of ebb is as strong as that of flood; but after that month the ebb begins to gain strength and that of the flood becomes weaker.

In the months of August and September the stream of flood is weak while that of the ebb runs five or six miles the hour; but in October it gradually becomes weaker, and in November, when the N.E. Trade wind commences to blow, its strength is the same as that of the flood, which, as before observed, in December becomes the