We notice the death this week of Sir George Barns
at the advanced age of ninety-five. He was a great person in his way, having been the real organiser of steam navigation between Britain and America, though Samuel Canard, of Halifax, suggested to him the idea. We all know how " Canards " grew under his management till it became the first steam- ship Company in the world, with a fleet as great as that of a second-class Maritime Power. It has been a joke against the Company for the last quarter of a century that it always replied to remonstrances by the remark," Cunards have never lost a passenger ; " but just reflect on the administrative faculty which secured such management as justified that boast. Even a traffic-manager has not to deal with men so completely beyond reach as a steam-king has, nor is he attacked by forces so unmanageable as storms. The great shipowners have to be statesmen in a way, and we do not quite know why they attract less attention than the great contractors and other captains of industry. Is it because the literary class, which gives fame to all but the greatest, so seldom understands the sea ?
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