HAULING-OFF WAKPS TO LIFE-BOATS.

To the Editor of the Life-Boat Journal.

SIR, THE Committee of the Southwold Branch of the NATIONAL LIFE-BOAT INSTI- TUTION have requested me to seek, through the medium of your useful Journal, infor- mation as to some plan for rendering more efficient the use of a warp, laid out to sea for the purpose of assisting to launch the life-boat through the shore-surf.

The beach here is steep, probably felling 1 ft. in 10 or 15, and the waves break hea- vily, there being (except at low water) little broken water 20 fathoms beyond the shore- line.

A warp has been generally stretched from a mast on shore to an anchor at sea. The difficulties in the use of this warp are—that, being single, it can only be worked by the crew of the boat, and is then most useless when most wanted, viz., at the time of passing through the surf; that the boat being chiefly used under sail, and going afloat with masts stepped, the rope cannot conveniently be then brought inside the boat; that the anchor laid out is generally lost, becoming buried in shingle; that the stretched warp is inconvenient to the fisher- men using drift-nets.

The desideratum is an efficient plan for getting out, at the time when wanted, an anchor and block, attached to a double warp, by which persons on Shore may haul the boat through the surf; or, should a fixed anchor and block be used, some means to prevent its being buried in the shingle.

Concluding that such plan would be use- ful to other life-boat stations, the insertion of this, and the favour of replies, through your Journal, would greatly oblige Your most obedient servant, WM. C. SIMMONS, Lieut. K.N., Hon. Secretary.

[We shall be glad to receive any informa- tion or suggestions on the subject of Lieut.

SIMMONS'S communication. The employ- ment of a double warp, rove through a swivel-block at the warp-anchor, would doubtless afford increased hauling-off power if a sufficient number of hands could be always obtainable to man it on the shore.

The only objection we have ever heard made to that plan has been by the boatmen themselves, who have stated that they would rather have the hauling-off power left in their own hands, to be used at their own discretion, as the persons on the land _, might sometimes increase the danger of warping through the surf by not hauling at the most favourable moments.

We are not acquainted with any mode by which an anchor and warp could be carried out at the moment when required for use, except in the cases of Capt. JERNINGHAM'S anchor-shot and Mr. OFFORD'S grapnel-shot, which are fired, with warp attached, from an ordinary MANBY'S 24-lb. mortar; these could only be made available at places where the mortar-apparatus might be stationed.

We fear also that a single shot-anchor or grapnel would be of insufficient weight to haul off so large a boat as that at Southwold. • We are, however, without sufficient expe- rience of the use of either of those ingenious implements to speak with certainty respect- ing them.—EDS. L. B. J.].