in the sum of 2,000l. or (where neither the owners nor the charterers reside in the United Kingdom) in the sum of 5,000l., conditioned, inter alia, for the seaworthiness of the vessel (x). The Act contains also a great many provisions for limiting the number and ensuring the safety and accommodation, health and welfare, of the passengers (y), and for regulating colonial voyages, as defined in sect. 366 of the Act; but, with regard to vessels plying between ports in Australasia, the Governor of the colony from which the vessel proceeds is also authorized to make the proper regulations. Further, it may be observed that, although any British subject who commits an offence on any British ship may be tried in a British court in whose jurisdiction he is found, the laws of the Australian Commonwealth are in force "on all British

66

ships, the king's ships of war excepted, whose first port "of clearance and whose port of destination are in the "Commonwealth" (2). The Act of 1894 further provides, that the master of every ship bringing steerage passengers into the United Kingdom, from any place out of Europe, and not within the Mediterranean Sea, shall, within twenty-four hours after arrival, deliver to the proper authority a correct list, under his signature, specifying the names, ages, and callings of all the steerage passengers embarked, and the ports from whence they came; and which of them (if any) have died, with the supposed cause of death, or have been born, during the voyage. And if the master shall fail to deliver such list, or it be wilfully false, he incurs a penalty not exceeding 501. (a); and if any ship bringing steerage passengers into the United Kingdom from any place out of Europe, and not within the Mediterranean Sea, has on board a

(x) Act of 1894, s. 309.

(y) Ibid. ss. 291–308.

(2) Commonwealth of Australia

Constitution Act, 1900 (63 & 64 Vict. c. 12).

(a) Merchant Shipping Act, 1894, s. 336.

greater number of steerage passengers than is allowed by the Act for passengers from the United Kingdom, the master is liable to a fine not exceeding 101. for every "statute adult" constituting such excess (b). In 1899 an Act (62 & 63 Vict. c. 23) was passed "to simplify and "amend the law relating to the testing and sale of anchors " and chain cables," under which all persons are prohibited from selling chain cables or anchors weighing more than 168 lbs., unless they have been previously tested by testers duly licensed under the Act.

(b) Merchant Shipping Act, 1894, s. 337.

CHAPTER XI.

OF THE LAWS RELATING TO NAVIGATION, AND TO THE MERCANTILE MARINE.

IN attempting to make a concise statement of the laws. relating to Navigation and Merchant Shipping, we shall distribute our statement under the following heads :—

(I.) The Laws relating to Navigation; (II.) The Laws relating to the Ownership, Registration, and Transfer of Merchant Ships; (III.) The Laws relating to Merchant Seamen; (IV.) The Laws relating to Pilotage; (V.) The Laws relating to Lighthouses, Beacons, and Seamarks; (VI.) The Laws relating to the Liability of Shipowners for loss or damage; and (VII.) The Laws relating to Fishing Boats and to Fisheries.

I. The Laws relating to Navigation.-Until the year 1825, this subject was in the main regulated by [the Navigation Act of 12 Charles II. (1660), c. 18, an Act the provisions of which in a more rudimentary form had been first framed in 1650 (a), in the time of the Long Parliament. These provisions (it is said) were framed, with the object of dealing a blow at our own sugar islands, which were disaffected to the Parliament, and still held out for Charles II., by stopping or crippling their trade with the Dutch (); and with the object also of clipping the wings of those our opulent and enterprising neighbours. With these objects in view, this law prohibited all ships of foreign nations from trading with any English plantation without a licence from the council of state. In 1651, the

(a) Scobell, 132.

(b) Mod. Univ. Hist. xii. 289.

[prohibition was extended also to ships trading with the mother country; consequently, no goods were suffered to be imported into England, or into any English dependency, in any other than English bottoms, or in the ships of that European nation, of which the merchandize imported was the genuine growth or manufacture. At the Restoration, these baleful provisions were continued, by the Navigation Act just mentioned, with, however, this beneficial provision added thereto, namely, that the master and three-fourths of the seamen should be English; the object being to encourage, by the exclusion of foreign competitors, the ships, seamen, and commerce of Great Britain.]

In the reign of King George the Fourth, both the Navigation Act of 1660, and all other navigation Acts then in force, were repealed, and a new system of regulations was established (c); and the new system was afterwards. amended by various statutes passed in the reign of King William the Fourth (d), and in the earlier part of the reign of Queen Victoria (e). But the new system, or any of the amendments thereof, did not involve any material departure from the policy of encouraging our own mercantile marine and commerce, by prohibitions of the like nature in general to those above described. More recently, however, under the influence of the doctrines. commonly designated as those of "free trade" (ƒ), a new course of legislation (commencing with the 12 & 13 Vict.

(c) 6 Geo. 4 (1825), c. 105.

(d) 3 & 4 Will. 4 (1833), cc. 54, 55, 59.

(e) 8 & 9 Vict. (1845), cc. 88, 89, 93.

(f) In his Wealth of Nations, vol. ii. p. 194, Adam Smith (who may be called the father of "free trade") considered, that the Act of Navigation "was not favourable "to the growth of that opulence

(1849), c. 29) was entered upon, and has been since consistently pursued; until at length the old system of prohibition, which latterly had come to be confined only to the coasting trade of the United Kingdom and of the Channel Islands (g), has been relinquished altogether, except only as regards the trade from one part of any British possession in Asia, Africa, and America, to another part of the same possession. As to this latter trade, the law still is, that it shall not be carried on except in British ships (h), though, upon an address from the legislature of any such possession, praying that the conveyance of goods or passengers may take place, as far as they are concerned, free from such restrictions, his Majesty is empowered to authorize the same by Order in Council, on such terms as he may think fit (i). In all other respects, foreign vessels are now generally allowed a free commercial intercourse with this country and its dependencies, upon terms of perfect equality with our own vessels-a concession qualified, however, in the first instance, by some very important provisions, tending to confine such intercourse to such nations as consented, on their part, to concede to us a reciprocal and equal freedom. For, by the Customs Consolidation Act, 1853, ss. 324-326, it was enacted, that if British vessels were subjected, in any foreign country, to any prohibitions or restrictions, as to the voyages in which they might engage or the articles which they might import or export, her Majesty might, by Order in Council, impose corresponding prohibitions and restrictions upon the ships of such foreign country; and further, that if British ships were directly or indirectly subjected, in any foreign country, to duties or charges from which the national vessels of such country were exempt, or if any duties were imposed there upon articles imported or

(g) 12 & 13 Vict. c. 29; 17 & 18 Vict. (1854), c. 5; Supplemental Customs Consolidation Acts, 1855.

(h) Customs Consolidation Act, 1853, s. 163.

(i) Sect. 328.