SEA MESSENGERS.
[To THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR."]
• SIR,—When in St. Kilda, in the winter of 1876-7, in a season .of distress, I fell upon the plan of making small ships and send- ing them off before the wind, with letters in their holds, in the hope that they would reach some place where there was a post- office, which they all did. By this plan I was the means of bringing a gunboat to the island, which took off a party of mine shipwrecked Austrians and myself. The Austrians had been detained for five weeks in St. Kilda. In. return for this service, the Admiralty, a year afterwards, sent me a bill amount- ing to £2 5s. for my entertainment during the four days I was in the gunboat. As the account was accompanied with an insult, politely expressed, I refused to pay this claim.
The first ship I sent off carried a red sail and a white, that she might catch the eye ; and had a lead keel. She arrived at Norway, and the letters in her hold were forwarded to Edin- burgh uninjared. I had another and larger vessel ready to launch when the shipwrecked crew arrived, and at the re- quest of the captain, I wrote a note to the Austrian Consul in Liverpool, and enclosed it with my own letters. This vessel reached Poolewe, in Ross-shire, after a passage of three weeks. I will describe her. She was cut by me from a log that lay on the beach. She was about four feet long, and a foot square. In the centre, I cut a hole about two feet long to give her buoyancy, and to hold the letters. I covered this neatly with a deck. I printed, "Open this," with a hot poker on the .deck. I put a bar of iron on her for a keel. I left the bow and stern solid, so that she might stand a good deal of beating upon rocks without suffering vital injury. I placed the mast in the solid part of the bow, with a rake aft. The shipwrecked Greeks and Slays believed that she would answer the purpose; but the natives were evidently incredulous, and the minister chuckled openly at the attempt. The sailors made an improved sail for her, and put her old bolts into the hold for ballast. She carried a red flag.
I notice in the newspapers that a machine called "Vanden- berg's Sea Messenger," was dropped from the flagship of the Reserve Squadron during the late cruise in the German Ocean. Excepting that this new messenger is constructed of iron, she seems essentially the same as those despatched by me. Although I did not feel any great pride in the invention, still I think it is shabby to borrow my idea without acknowledgment, even although it be improved on. Knowing, from experience, that you are a lover of fair-play, I believe you will find room for this.—I am, Sir, &c.,
Bank/wad, Tranent, N.B., August 25th. J. SANDS.
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