IT is a commonly-received opinion, that if a line can only be thrown over a stranded vessel, the salvation of those on board her is almost secured. It seems to be presumed that those at either end of this slender com- munication, after getting over that chief difficulty, must be acquainted with the right means to avail themselves of it, and that the minor difficulty of using it as a viaduct through the raging surf is one then readily surmounted. Such, however, is a mistaken notion: apart from the possibility of a wrecked crew being numbed by cold, or otherwise unable to avail themselves of the aid placed in their hands, they may be ignorant of its proper use, and a mismanagement of it either by them or the parties using it from the land may, and indeed too often has, marred all, and left them to perish.

In No. 9 of the Life-Boat Journal, in an Article on the subject of effecting communication with shipwrecked vessels, we described the proper manner of using the rocket and mortar apparatus in each stage of the operation, from the projection of the shot or rocket, with line attached, to the safe conveyance to terra-firma of the shipwrecked persons. We also illustrated the ignorance of its proper use amongst merchant-seamen, by recounting the fact of a whole crew on one occasion tying a rocketline round them collectively, and all jumping in a body into the sea, when, as a matter of course, the greater number of them were drowned in the operation of dragging them to the land.

We have been led to these remarks by the circumstance of another crew having recently lamentably perished within a few yards of the shore, through the misuse of a line which had been thrown by hand from the shore to their vessel.

On the 26th of October last, the Enchantress, with a crew of 13 persons, was driven on shore, in a heavy gale, on the western side of Dungeness Point, on the coast of Kent. The shore being there very steep, she came close to the beach, and a line was thrown on board her by a coastguardman or other person on the spot: a stouter line had been previously fastened to it, which, if it had been hauled on board by the shipwrecked crew, might have been made the medium of saving them all; but, unhappily, the man who first caught hold of it, either from ignorance or from the selfish feeling of consulting his own safety alone, quickly secured it round his own arm, and then jumped overboard into the boiling surf, where becoming entangled in some of the floating wreck, he perished ere he could be drawn to the shore. All subsequent attempts to throw another line on board failed, and one man only was, by the great daring of a fisherman on the beach, rescued out of the surf, and his life saved. With such authenticated instances before us, we have a right to presume that there are many crews in our merchant-service who, amidst the terrors and anxieties of shipwreck, would be at a loss to know what to do with a line thrown over them from the shore. We feel called upon, therefore, even at the risk of being tedious, to again repeat what is the proper course to be adopted after a communication by a line has been effected between a wrecked ship and the shore.

In the first place, then, as the line thrown on board, whether by the mortar or rocketapparatus, or by hand, is necessarily of a small and light description, the greatest care should be taken, both on board the ship and on the shore, not to risk the breaking it by over-strain, lest the communication should be lost, which all subsequent efforts might fail to regain.

For a similar reason we should have supposed it scarcely necessary to warn any seaman not to jump overboard with the end of the line fast to him, had not this lamentable instance of the necessity of such a warning so recently occurred on board the Enchantress.

After communication has been effected by a single line, the most important point is to secure a connection by a double line, or whip, as it is termed by seamen, through the instrumentality of which a sling or seat, or floating buoy of some description, may be conveyed to and fro between the wreck and the shore, until all the living occupants of the latter have been safely conveyed to the land. To perform this effectually it is selfevident that the control of the lines, both the one freighted with its costless treasure of human life, and the other conveying the ark of mercy back, to be in like manner freighted again, should be, when possible, entirely in the hands of the persons on the land. For they will generally have more efficient material at command: being themselves in security they are more likely to preserve their presence of mind: they will probably also be present in greater numbers, be possessed of greater experience in that particular work, and they will be able to assist the last man from the wreck as readily as the first, which he could not do for himself.

The most perfect means by which to effect this object is to send off to the wreck by the line first thrown over it, a single block with a rope rove through, both ends of the rope being retained on shore. The block, which has a long tail fitted to it for the purpose, is then made fast to the rigging or mast, or other available part of the wreck, and the persons on shore having command of the ends, make them fast together, and so form an endless rope, by which they can themselves, without the aid of the shipwrecked men, either haul off to the wreck a hawser along which to convey them in succession to the shore, or may, if no hawser is on the spot, haul them through the water in a floating buoy by the whip itself. In either case all the .bodily exertion required of the shipwrecked men is to haul on board the block and whip by the line thrown over them in the first instance.

For a fuller description of the whole operation, we beg to refer to the article before alluded to, in the ninth Number of the Life-Boat Journal.

But we desire now emphatically to impress on the mind of every seaman into whose hands this may fall, that in every instance in which a line is thrown over his vessel from the shore, whether by hand or otherwise, he is to haul it on board, unless distinctly signalized to the contrary, and •never to let it go from the vessel, so as to break off the communication with the shore.

We think it a very desirable thing that the Board of Customs, who supply the mortar and rocket apparatus round the coasts of the United Kingdom, should, to secure its proper use, issue clear and concise instructions for its proper management and the use to be made of it. These might either be printed on a card, or in the form of a small book, and not only given to the Coastguard who have the management of the apparatus on shore, but be also issued to the master of every vessel by the Custom-house authorities at the different ports of the United Kingdom. Until some such arrangement is made we may still expect that lives will be lost through the misuse of the means which would otherwise be available to save them.