r you
approach safety. But instead of admitting the expediency of the
suggestion, this witness at once raised an objection as to the
possibility of closing tightly the door of a bunker on account of the
slope of coal. This with the true expert's attitude of "My dear man, you
don't know what you are talking about."

Now would you believe that the objection put forward was absolutely
futile? I don't know whether the distinguished President of the Court
perceived this. Very likely he did, though I don't suppose he was ever
on terms of familiarity with a ship's bunker. But I have. I have been
inside; and you may take it that what I say of them is correct. I don't
wish to be wearisome to the benevolent reader, but I want to put his
finger, so to speak, on the inanity of the objection raised by the
expert. A bunker is an enclosed space for holding coals, generally
located against the ship's side, and having an opening, a doorway in
fact, into the stokehold. Men called trimmers go in there, and by means
of implements called slices make the coal run through that opening on to
the floor of the stokehold, where it is within reach of the stokers'
(firemen's) shovels. This being so, you will easily understand that
there is constantly a more or less thick layer of coal generally shaped
in a slope lying in that doorway. And the objection of the expert was:
that because of this obstruction it would be impossible to close the
water-tight door, and therefore that the thing could not be done. And
that objection was inane. A water-tight door in a bulkhead may be
defined as a metal plate which is made to close a given opening by some
mechanical means. And if there were a law of Medes and Persians that a
water-tight door should always slide downwards and never otherwise, the
objection would be to a great extent valid. But what is there to prevent
those doors to be fitted so as to move upwards, or horizontally, or
slantwise? In which case they would go through the obstructing layer of
coal as easily as a knife goes through butter. Anyone may convince
himself of it by experimenting with a light piece of board and a heap of
stones anywhere along our roads. Probably the joint of such a door would
weep a little--and there is no necessity for its being hermetically
tight--but the object of converting bunkers into spaces of safety would
be attained. You may take my word for it that this could be done without
any great effort of