A REVIEW OF THE PAST AND PRESENT METHODS OF MANNING, THE FORMATION OF MORE RELIABLE AND PERMANENT RESERVES: ALSO AN INQUIRY INTO THE OPERATION OF THE DECLARATION ITS INJURIOUS EFFECTS ON BRITISH MARITIME COMMERCE. BY W. S. LINDSAY. London: PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY PEWTRESS & CO., 15, Great QUEEN STREET, W.C. 1877. e.] PREFACE. DISABLED by infirmity of body from the active participation in public affairs or private business relating to maritime commerce, in which I was formerly engaged, both as a Member of Parliament and a shipowner, I have occupied myself, in my enforced retirement, with an examination of some important questions affecting the maritime interests of the country. The opinions I have thus formed have been published in a series of articles in the Nautical Magazine, in order that they might receive the consideration of its readers who are professionally qualified to form a sound judgment, on the subject, and, finding, from the suggestions with which I have been favoured, that the articles have excited considerable interest amongst a portion of the seafaring community, I am encouraged to re-publish them in a revised, and, I hope, materially improved form, for the consideration of the public in general. In the brief historical outline of the efforts of statesmen and others during the last two centuries, to establish an efficient system for Manning the Navy in times of peace and war, I have deemed it superfluous to re-open, in any way, the discussions respecting navigation laws or others having for their object protection for shipping, which, during the early part of my political career, engaged so |