688 FEDERAL REFOfiTEB. �The mate of the Scotia also testifies as follows: "The captain asked me if I thought we could get under the stern of the Thayer. I told him ifc looked as though there was room enough. He said: *I think we can get under there if the raft does not hook on to her.' I said I thought we cotild." Further, he says : "At the time the Scotia starboarded her wheel it looked as if the raft was going to strike the Thayer." The master of the Scotia further says: "I had made up my mind to go under the schooner's stern if the raft did not catch her ; but I was pretty sure she would catch her, and she probably had made 100 revohations, the port engine backing, and I then didn't stop the port engine, but rang to stop the starboard engine, the one that was going ahead, and rang to back as quick as I could between the bells so the engineer would understand it." �Thus it appears that after the Thayer was seen lying at anchor, and before the raft had struck her, but with the belief in tiie mind of the master of the Scotia that the raft and schooner would become entangled, he persisted in a maneuver by which he hoped to pass both the raft and vessel by going under the latter's stern ; and to this, I think, in the light of all the cireumstances, the collision must be fairly attributed. In other worda, if the Scotia, when the position of the schooner and the raft with reference to each other was discov- ered, had backed with both engines, or had stopped both engines so that her forward movement would have been entirely arrested, my judgment is there would not have been a collision. The Scotia was under control, and when the situation was clearly one where danger was apparent, it was the duty of her master to withdraw his vessel from the position she was then in rather than to attempt the execu- tion of a maneuver which brought the two vessels into even more dangerous proximity. �Decree for libellant. ��� �
