Robert Bennet Forbes

Lifeboats, Projectiles and Other Means for Saving Life Robert Bennet Forbes

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1872 edition. Excerpt: ... may be expected to draw up regulations which would meet every evil. "Why," say they, " does the Board always move so slowly? and why, when it does move, is there always so much left to futurity?" But, it must be remembered that the Board of Trade is what the nation has made it, and what at present, it wills it to remain. It is, in fact, composed of two distinct parts, which must of necessity be frequently as widely as the poles, in thought and opinion on every conceivable point of public duty. These two parts we may divide into the permanent or working staff, and the parliamentary leaders. Now, as the political head changes with the ministry, it cannot be expected that the views of any president will exactly coincide with those of his predecessor or-successor; and so we can easily conceive, that the elaborate scheme of reform, prepared mdjr the auspices of a whig leader, and prepared, too, with infinite care and wisdom by the permanent officials, may yet be so opposed to the views of a tory successor, or vice versa, that it may never see the light at all, or be so mutilated as to be robbed of half its power and meaning. Again, one president may, as a Member of Parliament, have for his constituents the men of some great northern seaport, and influenced by their views of some point of sorely-needed reform, he may give certain bias to the laws he is preparing for the approval of Parliament; but while the proposed measure is still not law--lo, the ministry changes! Well, the in-coming president has for his constituents the leading men of the port of London, who are pretty certain to regard the question from a totally different point of view; and so, whatever may be his own views, the new man has to choose between the favor of his electors,...