(To THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR. "' Sin,—I read the letter
signed John A. Higginson under the above title in your• issue of the 14th inst. with a feeling of surprise, in fact amazement. That any one claiming to be a practical man and a sailor should not know that a ship's " official measurement" is an arbitrary cubical measurement of her internal capacity, having no relation whatever to her actual carrying powers (which sailors specify as a vessel's " lift "), seems extraordinary in these days, when amateurs so easily acquire a considerable amount of professional, or at any rate technical, information. As a matter of fact, three thousand two hundred tons of cargo is just about what a modern steel ship of two thousand and ten tons register could actually carry,—i.e., more than half as much again as the official measurement. As far as the rest of the letter is con- cerned, it would be tedious and unprofitable to go fully into and examine its crudities and divergences in argument. Speaking in a general way, Mr. F. T. Bullen, the writer of the original article which Mr. Higginson criticises, is a skilled writer, having a knowledge of the seaman's life and duties which appeals to men in the profession. The same evidently does not hold good of Mr.. Higginson, and it is therefore very surprising that he should have aired his views in the columns of the Spectator.—I am, Sir, &c., E. W. J. B.
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