It would strike you and me and our little boys (who are not engineers
yet) that to approach--I won't say attain--somewhere near absolute
safety, the divisions to keep out water should extend from the bottom
right up to the uppermost deck of _the hull_. I repeat, the _hull_,
because there are above the hull the decks of the superstructures of
which we need not take account. And further, as a provision of the
commonest humanity, that each of these compartments should have a
perfectly independent and free access to that uppermost deck: that is,
into the open. Nothing less will do. Division by bulkheads that really
divide, and free access to the deck from every water-tight compartment.
Then the responsible man in the moment of danger and in the exercise of
his judgment could close all the doors of these water-tight bulkheads by
whatever clever contrivance has been invented for the purpose, without a
qualm at the awful thought that he may be shutting up some of his fellow
creatures in a death-trap; that he may be sacrificing the lives of men
who, down there, are sticking to the posts of duty as the engine-room
staffs of the Merchant Service have never failed to do.
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