that wrecks are not of far more frequent occurrence, and it will account for the otherwise alarming multiplication of the number of collisions. And not only are there more ships, but a greater proportion of them are propelled by steam. A parliamentary. paper not long since published shows that the number of steamers employed in the Home and Foreign trade has increased from 414 in 1849 to 899 in 1857; that is, the number of vessels most prone to come into collision has more than doubled within the last eight years, and while the sailing vessels have increased during this period only 3:49 per cent., the latter have increased 117.15 per cent., the proportion of steamers to sailing vessels having advanced from 2.22 per cent. in 1849 to 4.87 per cent. in 1857. Bearing in mind the speed at which steamers go, and the manner in which their powerful lights just introduced simulate those of lighthouses and lightships, the increase of collisions is not surprising. There can be no doubt that the introduction of coloured side lights, which all vessels, both sailing and steamers, must henceforward exhibit, will enable the direction in which another ship is standing to be distinguished, which was not the case heretofore.

The most important object after the prevention of shipwreck is that of rescuing the crew when the catastrophe takes place. All along the coast-grouped thicker together where the fatal black dots indicate dangerous spots-we find rude marks indicative of the presence of life-boats. Thus whenever the dangerous headland, or the hidden shoal, threatens destruction to the mariner, the means of preservation are close at hand. Of these boats, each manned by a fearless crew of twelve volunteers, there are 141 stationed along the coast; seventy being under the management of the National Life-Boat Institution, and seventy-one under the direction of various corporations and local authorities. To the princely conduct of the Duke of Northumberland, the President of the National Life-Boat Institution, we owe the present improved condition of the means of saving life in cases of shipwreck. As far back as the year 1790, two humble boatbuilders on the banks of the Tyne, Greathead and Wouldhave (who were encouraged and fostered by the then Duke of Northumberland), invented the broad, curved form of life-boat, with air-cases, which was chiefly in use around our coasts. This model was afterwards much departed from, and by degrees the most imperfect boats (provided they were lined with what were supposed to be air-tight cases) were dignified with the name of life-boats. The many casualties that happened

to

to these craft, which were built by rule of thumb rather than upon any scientific system, brought them into much disrepute. Too often, indeed, their hardy crews, instead of fulfilling their mission, were drowned on the way. In some instances, owing to their defective build, they turned end over end when struck by a heavy sea, and, from want of the power to right themselves when capsized, the unfortunate men were encaged beneath them. To prevent the recurrence of such disastrous accidents, the Duke of Northumberland offered a premium for the production of a model life-boat, and the result was the exhibition of several respectable contrivances. Not one of them, however, fulfilled all the prescribed conditions; nor was it until after several trials and many experiments that the present life-boat was completed. appears to be the production of a Committee and not of an individual, but the chief credit of it is due to Mr. Peake, of the Royal Dockyard, Woolwich, to Joseph Prowse, junior, foreman of the same yard, and to Messrs. Forrestt, the well-known boat-builders of Limehouse. It has been adopted by the LifeBoat Institution, and has stood the test of some years' experience without a single failure. In a trial lately made at Boulogne, the boat was twice purposely capsized by the help of a crane, and righted herself in two seconds, and in less than fifteen seconds the water with which she was filled disappeared through her self-acting valves. Of the entire number of 1668 seamen saved during the last year, 399 owed their lives to these boats, and we have no doubt that in future years they will prove still more effective, if only well handled and not rashly sailed by inexperienced men; for no life-boat can be devised that will not be liable to accidents if entrusted to careless or unskilful hands.

We

But there is another point almost equally important that seems to have been greatly overlooked, the worthlessness of the socalled life-boats that every emigrant ship, every transport, every passenger vessel, is by Act of Parliament required to carry. have no hesitation in pronouncing them to be in most cases a mockery, a delusion, and a snare. It is not long since that we heard from the lips of one of the most extensive boat-builders on the banks of the Thames, that, when a boat was condemned as unseaworthy for any other purpose, it was a common practice to patch it up, add a certain amount of air-case, and dispose of it as a life-boat. We know not with whom it rests to see the Act enforced, whether with the Board of Trade or the Life-boat Association, but the fact of its evasion is notorious, and a heavy responsibility rests somewhere. Even when the crazy thing is embarked,

embarked, it is often so stowed that it cannot be lowered in case of need without long delay, and is frequently deficient in sails, oars, thole-pins, plugs, and always without an efficient compass. Yet in this ill-equipped boat the lives of thirty, forty, perhaps fifty, of our too confiding countrymen are risked. It would be easy to see, before the vessel sailed, that the life-boat was efficient; that a certain supply of provisions and fresh water were placed in proper cases; that the mast, sails, oars, and thole-pins were secured into the boat, and that an efficient boatcompass was provided, instead of the ridiculous toy that by that name, the card of which spins round like a top at every stroke of the oars. The beautiful spirit or liquid boatcompass of Dent may be purchased for less than 51. Á life-boat thus furnished would give confidence to the passengers, would serve them well in time of need, and would be no more than the legislature is entitled to require under the provisions of the Act. Anything less is a gross imposition upon the simple emigrants, who embark in 'confidence, believing that everything has been done for their safety.

goes

In addition to the life-boat system we have located in most of the coast-guard stations rocket and mortar apparatus to enable a connection to be established with stranded vessels by firing a rope over them. This method was effectual in 243 cases during the last year, and is well worked under the auspices of the Board of Trade. The drawback to the use of the mortar apparatus is its weight, which prevents its being easily transported along the rocky shores where it is chiefly needed, but we understand that Mr. Brown, of the General Register and Record Office of Seamen, has invented a portable apparatus, which is at present under trial, and which if found to succeed will greatly facilitate our means of communicating with stranded vessels, and tend in no small measure to still further lessen the dismal list of seamen who annually perish on our weatherbeaten coast.

ART.

ART. VII.-1. Report from the Select Committee on the British Museum; together with the Minutes of Evidence. London. 1835, 1836. Fol.

2. Report of the Commissioners appointed to inquire into the Constitution and Management of the British Museum, with Minutes of Evidence. London. 1850. Fol.

3. Acts and Votes of Parliament relating to the British Museum. 4. Synopsis and Contents of the British Museum.

5. Copy of all Communications made by the Architect and Officers of the British Museum to the Trustees respecting the Enlargement of the Building of that Institution, &c. Ordered by the House of Commons to be printed, 30 June, 1852.

6. Copies of all Communications made by the Officers and Architect of the British Museum to the Trustees respecting the want of space for exhibiting the Collections in that Institution, &c. Ordered by the House of Commons to be printed, 1 July,

1858.

THE

THE British Museum is insufficient to accommodate a vast portion of its treasures. Either this great national establishment must become a gigantic warehouse of unpacked goods, or it must be enormously enlarged, or there must be some division of its multifarious contents, and a single building be no longer made the receptacle for almost everything which man has executed and nature produced from generation to generation and from one end of the earth to the other. Literature, art, and science are each interested in the solution which may be given to the problem, and as all persons are agreed upon the necessity of an immediate remedy, and as there is a difference of opinion as to what that remedy should be, we shall endeavour to assist the public in arriving at a decision.

The British Museum has not been formed upon any wellmatured plan. It has become what it is because the collection of Sir Hans Sloane, which, in conjunction with the Cottonian and Harleian libraries, constituted its basis, happened to be of an exceedingly miscellaneous character, and that the casual bequests of its numerous benefactors were equally various. All the curiosities which were brought to the door of the building in Great Russell Street found a home there, and its contents have been regulated in a great degree by the chance fancy of the contributors, and not from a previous consideration of what objects were proper to be grouped together. An account of the manner in which the Museum has grown up will best explain how things have been brought into juxtaposition in this country which in every other capital in Europe are kept distinct.

In the year 1753 the Act of Parliament was passed by which the museum of Sir Hans Sloane was ordered to be purchased and placed, together with the Cottonian and Harleian Libraries, in one General Repository.' The books and manuscripts of Sir Hans Sloane were estimated at 50,000 volumes, which was, no doubt, a great exaggeration; but the number must have been large, and, combined with the Cottonian and Harleian collections, they constituted the principal feature of the Museum. In consequence, the framers of the Act gave to the person in whom the care and custody' of the General Repository was vested, the title of Principal Librarian, while all other employés are styled 'officers and servants.' The preponderance, however, of the book department caused the whole of the subordinates to be technically termed under and assistant librarians. From the recital of the will of Sir Hans Sloane in the Act of Incorporation, it appears that in addition to books, drawings, and manuscripts, he had gathered together 'prints, medals, and coins, ancient and modern, seals, cameos and intaglios, precious stones, agates, jaspers, vessels of agate and jasper, crystals, mathematical instruments, drawings, and pictures;' and it might have been added, stuffed birds, beasts, and fishes, together with anatomical preparations, and divers reptiles, monsters, and abortions, very fit for the museum of a learned physician, but rather offensive than pleasing to the general public. It is evident, from the silence with which the natural history department is passed over, that it was then thought of subordinate importance, and, in truth, science had seldom much share in those days in the formation of collections from the animal kingdom, which were generally regarded by educated men with contempt. Sir Hans Sloane expressed a desire that his medley of curiosities might be kept together, if it were possible. As it bore about the same proportion to the present establishment that a Thames wherry does to the Leviathan, there was then no difficulty in complying with this request, and Parliament acceded to it without foreseeing the result.

It was the wish of Sir Hans Sloane that his collection should remain at his manor-house at Chelsea, and therefore rather at a distance from town than close to the metropolis; but as this was incompatible with the formation of a General Repository, Montague House was purchased. Thither the whole was removed in the year 1757, and opened to the public in 1759. Large additions were contemplated by the Act of Incorporation; but it never appears to have occurred to the Trustees that either their Institution embraced too wide a field, or Montague House must soon become too narrow for the purpose. No prophetic eye foresaw what treasures from every quarter of the globe would be rapidly accumu

lated,