entire fleet. Sixteen ships were broken up for their massive copper fastenings and other valuable material, while forty-six were sold, and no finer tribute can be offered to the excellent construction of these vessels than the figures which they realized at what may justly be called a forced sale.
Naturally these ships were not all sold at the some moment, as some of them were on their way to China and India when the crash came; in fact, it required about three years to close them all out; still, it was well known that the Court of Directors had decreed that they must all be sold, and this gave bargain hunters a chance to practise their wiles. At first two or three of the ships were put up at public auction; the bids were few and meagre, indicating an assumed and perhaps preconcerted apathy. Negotiations of a less public nature ensued, which resulted as follows: The Buckinghamshire, of 1369 tons, then eighteen years old, was sold to Thacker & Mangels for £10,550. The Canning, 1326 tons, seventeen years old, sold for breaking up to Joseph Somes at £5750. The Minerva, 976 tons, eighteen years old, ready for sea, to Henry Templer, at £11,800; this ship, after thirty-seven years of service in the India trade was wrecked off the Cape of Good Hope in 1850. The Earl of Balcarras, 1417 tons, nineteen years old, to Thomas A. Shuter for £15,700; this ship after fifty-two years' service, became a receiving hulk on the west coast of Africa. The Bombay, 1246 tons, twenty-two years old, sold to Duncan Dunbar for £11,000, was wrecked after fifty-nine years of service. The Lowther Castle, 1408 tons, nineteen years old, went
