Many letters have been written to the Press on the subject of collisions.  I have seen some.  They contain many suggestions, valuable and otherwise; but there is only one which hits the nail on the head.  It is a letter to the Times from a retired Captain of the Royal Navy.  It is printed in small type, but it deserved to be printed in letters of gold and crimson.  The writer suggests that all steamers should be obliged by law to carry hung over their stern what we at sea call a “pudding.”

This solution of the problem is as wonderful in its simplicity as the celebrated trick of Columbus’s egg, and infinitely more useful to mankind.  A “pudding” is a thing something like a bolster of stout rope-net stuffed with old junk, but thicker in the middle than at the ends.  It can be seen on almost every tug working in our docks.  It is, in fact, a fixed rope-fender always in a position where presumably it would do most good.  Had the Storstad carried such a “pudding” proportionate to her size (say, two feet diameter in the thickest part) across her stern, and hung above the level of her hawse-pipes, there would have been an accident certainly, and some repair-work for the nearest ship-yard, but there would have been no loss of life to deplore.

It seems almost too simple to be true, but I assure you that the statement is as true as anything can be.  We shall see whether the lesson will be taken to heart.  We shall see.  There is a Commission of learned men sitting to consider the subject of saving life at sea.  They are discussing bulkheads, boats, davits, manning, navigation, but I am willing to bet that not one of them has thought of the humble “pudding.”  They can make what rules they like.  We shall see if, with that disaster calling aloud to them, they will make the rule that every steamship should carry a permanent fender across her stern, from two to four feet in diameter in its thickest part in proportion to the size of the ship.  But perhaps they may think the thing too rough and unsightly for this scientific and aesthetic age.  It certainly won’t look very pretty but I make bold to say it will save more lives at sea than any amount of the Marconi installations which are being forced on the shipowners on that very ground—­the safety of lives at sea.

We shall see!

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To the Editor of the Daily Express.

SIR,

As I fully expected, this morning’s post brought me not a few letters on the subject of that article of mine in the Illustrated London News.  And they are very much what I expected them to be.

I shall address my reply to Captain Littlehales, since obviously he can speak with authority, and speaks in his own name, not under a pseudonym.  And also for the reason that it is no use talking to men who tell you to shut your head for a confounded fool.  They are not likely to listen to you.