LLOYD'S BOND. 365 LOAD-LIKE MABKS OF VESSELS. duced by jIr. John Horatio Lloyd, an Kiiglish barrister, is a sealed aelciiowledgiiient of indebt- edness and can be issued by companies in n'turn for materials or services rendered, but cannot be sold for money. They have been licld by the courts to be a valid claim upon the property of a company, and to give the holder preference over ordinary creditors, although they possess no i)ri- ority over debenture or mortgage bonds issued in acconlance with the provisions of a ciimpany's charter. They constitute a preferred part of a company's floating indebtedness. English rail- ways now have abundant borrowing power under the statutes, and are no longer issuing Lloyd's bonds. LOACH, loch, or Groundling (Fr. loclw, Sp. loclia, loja, loach). A fish of the family Cobi- tida', closely related to the carp family, which has an elongated body, covered with small scales, and a small head with four to ten bar- bules around the mouth. The common species (Nemacheihis harhatulus) of the rivers and brooks of Great Britain seldom exceeds four inches in length, and is highly esteemed by an- glers and for food. The lake loach { Misyurnus fossilis) of the Continent is sometimes a foot long, and inhabits the mud of stagnant waters, which gives its flesh a bad flavor. See Plate of Carp . d Their Europea.n Allies. LOADING, Density of. See Ballistics. LOADING-TRAY. A contrivance designed to facilitate the placing of projectiles in the bore of a lieavy breech-loading gun without injuring the threads in the screw-box or seat of the breech- plug. It consists of soft metal or of wood with a lining of thin metal on its vipper surface and covers the tlireads at the bottom of the screw- box. The ordinary loading-traj' must be placed in the breech after it is opened, and removed before it is closed. This takes several seconds, and, to avoid the loss of time thus entailed, some recent designs of breech-mechanism ])rovide a loading-tray which is automatically placed in position. LOAD-LINE MARKS OF VESSELS. The lo.'ul-linc or load water-line of vessels is the line in which the plane of the water surface cuts the hull of a ship when the latter is loaded. Many vessels are lost from overloading, and this fact led Samuel Plimsoll (q.v.), a member of the ]?ritish Parliament, to prepare his jNIerchant Ship]iing Act, which became a law in ISTfi. Tliis act was amended liy the Merchant Shipping .cts of 18!)0 and 1804.' and the marks provided fnr in those acts and the rules of the British Board of Trade are shown in the accompanying sketches. ■ The al)breviations used have significance as fol- lows: FW, fresh water (i.e. the load-line when in fresh water); IS, Indian summer (summer load-line in the Indian Ocean) : S, summer; W, winter: WNA, winter. North Atlantic: F, fresh water (in the case of sailing ships). These marks are painted on the sides of iron ships, white or yellow on a dark ground, or black on a light ground, and the position of the disk and of each of the lines must be permanently marked on irim and steel by centre punch marks, and on wooden vessels the disk and lines are to be cut into the wood to a depth of not less than a quarter of an inch for the full width (1 inch) of the line. The upper edge of the line which crosses the disk passes through the centre of it and is the permitted freeboard in salt water during sununer. The upper edges of the other lines are the permitted freeboard under the vari- ous conditions. After the load-line markings have been placed upon a vessel in accordance with the tables for assigning freeboard, their positions WNA FREEBOARO MARKING FOR SAILING VEBSELS. must be verified and approved by the Board of Trade, which issues a certificate of approval. This certificate may cease to be in cfl'ect after a survey which reduces the vessel in classifica- tion; in this case a new certificate must be issued (with po.ssiblj' a new placii»g of the marks). hen the markings are duly placed, newly or originally, their positions and accuracy are veri- fied bj' Lloyd's Register surveyors, and upon this being reported to the committee, a freelioard cer- tificate is forthwith issued. Without such a free- board certificate a British vessel cannot clear (the British expression is 'enter outwards') from any jiort in Great Britain. Although the Load- Line Act applies only to British vessels, the Com- mittee of Lloyd's Register assigns freeboard for X°9 ^fl^tatutoo -eiin. yi'-i FW |fr..9in,-^ FREEUOARD MARKING FOR STEAMERS. foreign vessels in accordance with the tables, if the owners make application for the assigiinicnt : and it issues, with the concurrence of the Board of Trade, certificates similar to those given British vessels. The position of the 'statutory deck-line' from which the load-lines are measured, is defined in the Merchant Sliipping Act of 187f> as follows: "Every British ship (except ships under 80 tons register employed solely in the coasting trade, ships employed solely in fishing, and pleaa-
