Where would the ROYAL NATIONAL LIFE-BOAT INSTITUTION be without its Branches, of which there are nearly 400 spread over England, Scotland and Ireland! The Committee of Management of the Institution, as stated by them in their annual reports over and over again, could not possibly carry on the great work of life-saving entrusted to them under Royal Charter, were it not for the splendid work done by the Local Branches, not only in raising much-needed funds to help to maintain the Life-boat service, but also, which is most important (we are now speaking of the Branches on the coast), in personally superintending, by means of their Committees and Honorary Secretaries, the Life-boat stations and the Lifeboat crews. Notwithstanding that the stations are periodically visited and inspected by an efficient staff of officers employed by the Committee of Management, their work would we fear be practically useless unless backed up and supplemented by the day-by-day supervision exercised by those much-valued friends on the spot, who are officially appointed by the local annual subscribers to the cause. In these days when there is such a multiplicity of calls on the generosity of the public for financial aid and hearty support, and when everybody is so busy and pressed, it will readily be understood that the difficulties in the way of raising funds or of getting a hearing for any one object are not to be underestimated, for they are great and in some instances very great. All praise is therefore due to those who with self-denying care and earnest endeavour work on week by week and year in and year out to promote the interests and efficiency of the ROYAL NATIONAL LIFE-BOAT INSTITUTION, an Institution which for upwards of eighty years has done so much to minimise the horrors and sorrows of shipwreck on the dangerous but hospitable shores of our " right little, tight little Island."