SINCE 1924 Mr. Timothy Healy, the Governor-General of the Irish Free State, has been the Patron of the Irish Free State District of the Institution, and when he accepted the Patronship he issued an earnest appeal to the people of the Free State to increase their support of the Service. Mr. Healy, who came to the end of his term of office a short time ago, has been succeeded by Mr. J. McNeil], the High Commissioner in London, and Mr. McNeill has accepted the Institution's invitation to become Patron of the Irish Free State District.

At the time of the Institution's Centenary, Mr. McNeill sent the Institution a very cordial message—published in the Centenary number of The Lifeboat, with messages from the High Commissioners of the Dominions—in which he said, " We in Ireland have reaped ample benefits from your work. . . . I know that in the last quarter of a century the Life-boats saved 548 lives, while apparently less than one-fourth of the total cost of maintenance was locally sub- scribed." In accepting the Pationship, Mr. McNeill has followed his predecessor's example, and made an urgent appeal to the people of the Free State to contribute more generously to the Service. He writes :— " I am glad to accept your invitation to become Patron of the Free State District of the Royal National Life-boat Institution, and thereby express my keen appreciation of the heroic work of the Life-boat Service carried on by our brave Irish Crews round the coasts of the Irish Free State.

" I sincerely hope that the response to the appeal which is being issued will be sufficiently generous to ensure that the total cost of maintaining the Fleet of Motor and Sailing Life-boats round the Irish coasts, which amounts to £8,000 a year, will be entirely contributed in Ireland. The capital cost of those boats, their Houses and Slipways, provided by the Institution, is over £125,000, and it is right that the Irish people should make every effort to provide at least the cost of maintenance.

" It should only be necessary to point out to the people of the Free State that the amount required each year to maintain the Irish Stations and compensate the Irish Crews for their services is nearly £4,000 more than the amount contributed by Ireland, for the Irish people at once to make up this deficiency.

I wish your work every success." At the beginning of 1925, the Governor of Northern Ireland, the Duke of Abercorn, became Patron of the Northern Ireland District, and issued an appeal on behalf of the Institution.

Last November, the Duchess of Abercorn accepted the Institution's invitation to become Patron of all the Ladies' Life-boat Guilds in the North of Ireland, where an effort is now being made to form a Guild in every town and village..