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This is the sort of thing Lord Brassey referred to when saying "They stuck to their work, but suffered all the same"! We, in our experience of the last ten years constantly going up or down the Red Sea with Lascar crews, have never yet had a case of heat apoplexy to attend to, either in the Red Sea or out of that hot shop, which is not by any means the most suitable place for a white man to earn his living under such conditions. Mr. Frank T. Bullen, in his Men of the Merchant Service, in the chapter he devotes to the person we are now discussing, the marine fireman, writes: "I hope my countrymen will be able to find some employment more suitable." We not only hope as that lucid writer hopes, but we boldly declare that, in the Red Sea, it is not a white man's job! A well known critic and writer on matters maritime has lately and repeatedly said:
"Shipmasters and chief engineers are a greater power for good or evil on the manning question than either conscription or subsidy. England requires of her shipmasters and engineers that they shall prefer British seamen and firemen whenever possible, and fortunately there are still many of her shipmasters who are on the side of their race. Liverpool has more specially proved hostile to British-born seamen; then to Liverpool let us go for a refutation of the calumny,"
and quotes the opinion of two well-known masters of Atlantic liners, both of the White Star, one of whom had said:
"An English seaman may be troublesome, and so may a Scandinavian, and if the Scandinavian is troublesome, he is generally very troublesome.' The other says 'In fine weather the Englishman may growl a little, but in bad weather you never have any trouble with an English sailor; and to have him as a stand-by at such times I am willing to put up with a little difficulty now and then; besides, half the trouble that is experienced with Jack comes from a lack of fair play in treating him.'"
London is of the same opinion, according to Captain Tuke:
If you want discipline, he says, get British-born seamen and treat them well. There are plenty of them if you are prepared to pay the price. Charges of insubordination and insobriety will probably be found more especially prevalent in lines of sailing vessels and steamers where the man before the mast is regarded as less worthy of consideration than any item in the inventory."
Captain Tuke, we believe, is—or was when these words first appeared—connected with the Orient line of steamers to
