202 MASTER'S POWER TO CONTRACT FOR NECESSARIES.

necessity, he may sell either; from an intermediate port, he may tranship part or the whole of a cargo, in hired, chartered, freighting, seeking, or general ships. With this extensive, but delicate and dangerous implied power, all masters, under the maritime law, are, at the present day, legally invested. They are so invested with it at the home port, when selected to take charge. By the owner's appointment, without specific instructions, masters become constructively clothed with these implied powers, to be exercised abroad for the employment or preservation of the ship. Such exercise of them may be essential and indispensable for the ultimate successful prosecution of a voyage and possible security of the interests of all concerned in any projected commercial enterprise.

This power of a master is derivative, therefore, from the act of the owner. The owner's appointment of a person to take command of his ship, implies that he reposes personal confidence in such person for his presumed nautical skill, and his supposed judgment, ability, and integrity; and thereby commends him as an agent, fit to be trusted by others as well as by himself, in a foreign, as well as at the home port. Thus, the owner, by his voluntary act, gives the master commercial currency, to whatever port of destination or discharge, or intermediate harbor of refuge, distress, or call, the master may have occasion or be compelled to touch, stop, or stay, whether for instructions or repairs or other assist

ance.

Such, in law, being the effect of an appointment by the owner, it is plain that, after weighing anchor, getting outside of the headlands, and discharging his pilot, the master then becomes invested with an almost un

MASTER'S DUTY TO OWNERS.

203

restricted authority on ship-board. There, his word is law; from his judgment, in the ordinary navigation of a ship at sea, there is no appeal: and if he be a capable, prudent, intelligent, experienced, and skillful navigator, there would seldom, indeed, exist any occasion. for questioning either the propriety of his orders or correctness of his course of conduct. While thus uncontrolled he may be at sea; yet ashore, on arriving in port, the master finds himself in a new element, where his supreme power as navigator, as well as that of factor, agent, or disciplinarian, comes at once under the scrutiny and restrictions of the general maritime law and local legislation, to both of which he must, for the time, strictly conform.

It is not designed, in this chapter, to consider the authority of a master for enforcing discipline over and among the crew. The consideration of that particular branch of the subject had better be reserved for a future chapter, wherein it is intended to treat of the relative duties of the mariner and his right to wages.

On the part of the owner, he has a right to expect from the master, honesty, skill, fidelity, and dispatch. Moreover, it would be the duty of a master to employ all his expressly delegated authority with discretion and good judgment; and, meanwhile, to refrain from resorting to the exercise of any of his implied powers, except upon occasions when the actual occurrence of an emergency shall imperatively call upon him to exercise those implied powers. But, ever ready to conform to that part of his duty which requires him to obey orders, a master should never be remiss in acting with his presumed prudence, judgment, and skill, under any and every combination of unforeseen, unexpected, and

204

WHEN MASTER MAY ACT WITHOUT INSTRUCTIONS.

unanticipated circumstances, not previously provided for by any provisional instructions.

Should a master, therefore, be intercepted or detained on the high seas by a hostile cruiser of superior force; or pursued and in danger of being overhauled and captured by pirates or other enemies; or suddenly come in collision with a sailing or steam vessel in mid-ocean; or be driven ashore cum vi ventorum; or strike upon hidden rocks or unknown reefs, not designated upon nautical charts; or, in any way, suffer injury or damage to the hull, sails, rigging, or apparel of his vessel, and in consequence thereof, touch at an intermediate port of refuge, for repairs or assistance; or, by wreck, partial or total, be so damnified in fact, or disheartened in prospect, that without speedy relief, further prosecution or ultimate completion of the voyage should appear to be impracticable or hopeless, then, in any such contingency, the master must rely upon himself. No written instructions could avail him. He must necessarily fall back upon his presumed ability, energy, judgment, tact, and skill (the result of nautical experience), and call them into instant requisition: and these qualities, duly tested, must supply the want of preparation and absence of instructions. He is compelled to extemporize expedients; evoke his undeveloped professional talent; and summon to his aid and display those traits of character, which the owner, when putting him in charge, had a right to suppose he naturally possessed. The master must, in fine, do everything and omit nothing which, at the time, may be deemed to be useful or judicious for promoting the interest and subserving the enterprise of his owner.

On these various occasions, the good and great quali

MASTER'S COMPETENCY.

205

ties of an accomplished commander (whether called Navarchus, Exercitor, Nauclerus, navis magister, le Maître, or simply master), may be, and sometimes are conspicuously displayed: often successfully, though sometimes otherwise. If successful, the prestige a master may be likely to acquire, and the estimation in which he will be held, may equal the danger and difficulty he shall have encountered and escaped; and his remuneration should be proportionally adequate, and usually is so.

If, on the other hand, a master shall prove to be unfitted morally or incompetent physically for any surprising, trying, or perplexing exigency in which he may happen to be involved; then, loss or disaster "to himself, owners, and perhaps crew, will be the probable barren result of all his futile expedients and consequent fruitless efforts. Surprise may unnerve, panic may dishearten, and personal incompetency may utterly disqualify him.

Whatever may be the real source or occasion of a master's misfortune, charity requires that a large share of forbearance should be exercised, else great injustice may be done to a merely unfortunate master. If such charity be not extended toward him, it is possible that a not unworthy master may become the victim of groundless surmises, unjust censure, and ill-founded criticism; so that the unaverted disaster or bad luck attending him, might be attributed to the wrong cause; as to imaginary or conjectural incapacity, or, indeed, to any other than the real and true occasion of the failure.

It is an impossibility, from the very nature of things, that all men should be equal to every occasion. Hardly any two persons are endowed with the same capacity, self-possession, moral courage, or physical pluck; nor

206

MASTER'S GREAT RESPONSIBILITY.

have they that desirable presence of mind which knows not danger; nor that felicitous prudence, judgment and skill, which neither difficulty nor danger can baffle; nor that command of temper and control of passion, which permit men to remain unruffled in the midst of the greatest perplexities.

And as men, by nature, differ in form and mould, so do their minds vary. Man's mental activity is variable. The brain is occasionally dormant, sluggish, and cannot easily be aroused to perform its required office; and, at other times, it may be lively, quick, penetrating, readily performing its every function. But when, happily, it has once become thoroughly aroused, and the mind moves in those higher regions of invention, expedients, and performance; then, does its intense activity so display, develop, and manifest itself, in systematizing and organizing affairs, as to appear capable of crowding and concentrating an age of action into a moment of time. Its rapid and ready judgment, wide glance, unfailing perceptions, and quick intuitions, at once seize upon and grasp the surest mode for ready relief, cut the Gordian knot of surrounding difficulties; and, to extricate us from besetting obstacles, the mind rushes, as it were by logical processes, to wise and comprehensive views and sound conclusions, which lead directly to successful results.

Often, occasions make the man; and then the man continues equal to his situation. So may it be with the master of a vessel; the greater the necessity, the greater becomes his native vigor and inherent capacity. But, if a master has been unfortunate, charity should prompt all to suspend passionate judgment or hasty and precipitate condemnation, in regard to the man or his misfortune.