Cromer and Penlee.

THE new Cromer Motor Life-boat is the third of the Norfolk and Suffolk type to be constructed, the other two being the boats stationed at Walton-on-Naze and Lowestoft. The second of these two boats, the Agnes Gross, of Lowestoft, which so signally proved her worth in the service to the s.s. Hopelyn, in October last, is a sister boat to the new Cromer boat, their dimensions being 46 feet 6 inches by 12 feet 9 inches.

While, however, the Agnes Cross has a Tylor engine of 60 h.p., the Cromer boat has one of the Institution's new 90-h.p.

engines, so that, with the exception of the New Brighton Boat, she is, there- fore, the largest and most powerful Motor Life-boat on our coasts.

Now that it has a Motor Life-boat, Cromer has become one of the most im- portant Stations on the coast, and it was this fact which decided the Institution to make the experiment—for the first time with a Motor Boat—of placing the Boathouse and Slipway at the end of the pier. Here, at all states of the tide, the Boat can be launched well clear of all rocks and groynes. The pier itself runs out to 500 feet from the shore, and as the Boathouse is 60 feet long and the Slip- way 165 feet, the boat will enter the water nearly 250 yards from the shore.

Unfortunately, both the difficulty and the cost of constructing a Slipway in such a position have been very great.

The Boat herself, the Institution owes to the generosity of the late Mr. H. F.

Bailey, a London merchant who was born in Norfolk, and out of whose estate a sum of £10,000 was given to the Institu- tion, for the provision of a Life-boat on the coast of Norfolk, and this sum the Committee of Management decided to devote to providing a Motor Life-boat at Cromer.

The Inaugural Ceremony took place on Cromer Pier, on 26th July, in the presence of a large audience. Mr. D.

Davison, J.P., the Chairman of the Branch Committee, presided, and General Sir Charles Monro, Bt., G.C.M.G., G.C.B., G.S.C.I., was to have represented the Committee of Management. He was prevented from being present by a royal command, and in his absence, Mr.

George F. Shee, M.A., the Secretary of the Institution, presented the Boat to the County of Norfolk. She was re- ceived by the Earl of Leicester, G.C.V.O., the Lord-Lieutenant of the county, who formally transferred her to the President of the Branch, Lord Suffield, C.B., C.V.O.

In the course of his opening address, Mr. Davison read a letter from Mr. C. F.

Denny, the administrator of Mr. Bailey's estate, in which he wrote : " I remember that in the past, Mr.

Bailey was a merchant in the City of London, and the services of the Mercan- tile Marine in carrying goods in which he was interested reminded me of the splendid services rendered by our sailors during the war. I considered, therefore, that his wishes would be served by allotting a portion of his benefactions to the orphans of sailors, to hospitality to sailors when landing at our ports, and to the saving of lives, and in respect to the Matter I feel that his memory will be greatly honoured by a boat bearing his name and serving the coasts of the county in which he was born. May God's blessing be on the work of the boat and the crews which shall man her." Mr. Davison spoke of the fine record of the old Life-boat, the Louisa Heartwell, by which nearly 200 lives had been saved.

He recalled the services in 1917, to the Greek steamer Pyrin and the Swedish steamer Fernebo—services for which the Gold Medal of the Institution was! awarded to Coxswain Bloggs, and said that the Station was most fortunate in this, that, in its whole history of nearly a century, it had never had a more gallant Coxswain and Crew.

Mr. Shee, in presenting the Boat to the county, said that this was a redletter day in the history of the Cromer Station, for it had brought together a large and distinguished company of those on whom the life of the county rested.

He knew the wonderful record of Norfolk in peace and war. Norfolk names ran like a beacon through its history, but in all its record there was nothing more splendid than the achievements of its Life-boat crews. (Applause.) Along its coast, flanked by dangerous sandbanks, was a band of men unequalled for tenacity, courage, and seamanship, and ever since 1829 there had not been a single year in which one of Norfolk's thirteen Life-boats had not gone out to the rescue of those in peril on the sea.

They had saved a total of about 3,500 lives—a wonderful record. Of that total Cromer had saved 260 lives. Caister, Winterton and Palling, it was true, had a higher record of lives saved, but these were two-boat Stations. Coming immediately after them, among the thirteen Norfolk Stations, Cromer stood splen- didly among a splendid band of heroes, (Applause.) Lord Leicester, in accepting the Boat on behalf of the county, spoke of the cost of the Service, its need for increased funds, and the dangers which the crews! faced. It was not often that they met! with disaster, but he remembered the wreck of the Life-boat at Wells, when, in endeavouring to help three vessels which had been driven on the sands, she her- self was capsized, and eleven of her crew of thirteen were lost.

Lord Suffield, President of the Branch, in accepting the Boat on behalfof the Branch, recalled that, twenty-one years before, his father and mother had taken a similar part in the inaugural ceremony of the Louisa Heartwell to that which he and Lady Suffield were taking I that day. In the name of the Branch he thanked the Institution for giving it so fine a Boat.

The Boat was dedicated by the Bishop of Norwich, who said : " For all our admiration for the splendid craft we are dedicating to-day, we are aware that her real usefulness in the gales we know so well on this coast will come from the fearless men who, leaving behind them all whom they love best, in agony of anxiety as to their safe return, quietly and bravely shall put out to save others who but for their efforts would be devoured by the sea." Lady Suffield then named the Boat H. F. Bailey, and she was launched down the Slipway in the presence of thousands ol spectators who crowded the pier and the shores. The collection which was made on behalf of the Service realized £50.

Penlee.

The Penlee (Penzance) Boat is of the Watson type, 45 feet by 12 feet 6 inches, and, like the Cromer Life-boat, has one of the Institution's new six-cylinder 90 b.h.p. engines. She was, in fact, the first Life-boat to be fitted with one of these engines, and went to her station in December of last year.

The Boat is the gift of the Misses Eddy, of Torquay, in memory of two nephews, the sons of the late Mr. J. Eay Eddy, who were drowned at Cambridge many years ago. After them, the Boat has been named The Brothers. The ! Misses Eddy have also generously defrayed the expense of the alterations j to the Boathouse and Slipway which j were necessary in order to make them suitable for launching a Motor Life-boat, The inaugural ceremony took place on 25th August. Miss Amy Eddy and Miss Charlotte Eddy were both present, but Miss Eddy was prevented by illness, ] The Institution was represented by j Mr. J. A. Hawke, K.C., the Member of j Parliament for St. Ives, and the Penlee I Branch by its President, the Mayor of Penzance (the Rev. C. Stuchbery).Among those present were Mr. George Poole (Chairman of the Branch), Mr.

Barrie B. Bennetts (Honorary Secre- tary), Mr. G. C. L. Poole (Honorary Treasurer), Mr. C. J. A. French and Mr.

Claude Hart (the Honorary Secretaries of the stations at St. Ives and The Lizard respectively), Canon H. Holroyd Mills (rector of St. Stephen's-in-Brannell), who was at Cambridge when the two nephews of the Misses Eddy were drowned, and Captain Harold G. Innes, R.N., Inspec- tor of Life-boats for the Western District.

The ceremony opened with1 the1 launch- ing of the Boat at Penlee, Miss" Amy Eddy naming her The Brothers, and the remainder of the ceremony then took place on the promenade at Pen- zance. In his opening address the Mayor said that there had been a Station at Penzance for nearly a century. The first Boat was placed there in 1826, and the Penzance Boats altogether had rescued from shipwreck nearly 300 lives.

Miss Amy Eddy then formally pre- sented the Boat, the gift of herself and her two sisters, to the Institution, and, in accepting her and handing her to the Branch, Mr. Hawke said :— " I feel convinced that I am handing this Boat to worthy men and a worthy Branch. You (the Misses Eddy) may be sure that when your beautiful Boat goes to sea there will be in it men who, for skill, steadfastness, and courage, will do whatever can be done to relieve human suffering. When j m sit at home and storm and tempest are beating over West Cornwall, you may be sure that the crew who go to sea in your Boat will be carrying to many a suffering mariner a message of relief and sisterly love from you. I trust the thought of what this Boat may do will be some consolation to you in the private sorrow which has prompted the gift." The Mayor accepted the Boat in the name of the Branch, and she was then dedicated by Canon Trevor Lewis, Sub- Dean of Truro Cathedral, representing the Bishop of Truro, who said :— " There is no power, I think, known to men that has the power to make men noble like the power of the sea. Some- times we get pessimistic about the state of the race; sometimes in our own people we Wonder if the spirit of chivalry is dying out. We wonder if the heart of mankind is being shrivelled up in the hustle and push of the great industrial competition of the big cities.

But let any man once see on a stormy night these lion-hearted fellows leaving home, wife and children, with nothing to gain and everything to lose, that they might bring back other men to the land again, and you can never be pessimistic about the human race. . . . The sorrow of the sea has a peculiar power of binding men together in sympathy—all of us, whether we live in the city or by the seashore. . . . The sorrow of the sea is the brotherhood of man. Perhaps that is one of God's wonderful ways of bring- ing men together. How beautifully, then, has this Boat been named The Brothers. Those who are happy on land should never forget their kinship with those in sorrow on the sea. Make it practical and make it real.".