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derelict, in order to have them restored to the rightful owners, such persons are denominated salvors. If the property of an individual on land be exposed to the greatest peril, and be saved by the voluntary exertions of any persons whatever; if valuable goods be rescued from a house in flames, at the imminent hazard of life by the salvor, no remuneration in the shape of salvage is allowed. The act is highly meritorious, and the service is as great as if rendered at sea. Yet the claim for salvage could not, perhaps, be supported. It is certainly not made. Let precisely the same service, at precisely the same hazard, be rendered at sea, and a very ample reward will be bestowed in the courts of justice. It has been held that the apparent prodigality in rewarding services rendered at sea, often much exceeding the mere risk encountered and labor employed, is intended as an inducement to render them, which it is for the public interests, and for the general interest of humanity, to hold forth to those who navigate the ocean. It is perhaps difficult, on any other principle, to account satisfactorily for the very great difference which is made between the reward allowed for services at sea and on land; neither will a fair calculation of the real hazard or labor be a foundation for such a difference; nor will the benefit received always account for it.1 Salvage services are (1) voluntary, wherein the compensation is dependent upon success; (2) rendered under a contract for a per diem or per horam wage, payable at all events; or (3) under a contract for a compensation payable only in case of success. When the property is brought to a port of safety, the salvage service is complete.

2. Subjects of Salvage Generally.-Irrespective of statutes, it seems to be uniformly held by judges and writers of authority that the jurisdiction as to salvage is exercised in respect of a ship, her apparel, and her cargo; of freight in danger, and saved by reason of the saving of the ship or cargo; and of flotsam, jetsam, or ligan, being each of them part of the cargo of a ship. The term "salvage" is used only in relation to ships and vessels and their cargoes, or those things which have been committed to, or lost in, the sea or its branches, or other public navigable waters, and have been found and rescued.8 The words "ships and vessels" are, however, used in a very broad sense to include all navigable structures intended for transportation, and the word "ship" is not used in connection with salvage service in the technical sense as denoting a vessel of a particular rig. In popu

3. Baker v. Hoag, 7 N. Y. 555, 59. Am. Dec. 431.

4. Mason v. Blaireau, 2 Cranch 240, 2 U. S. (L. ed.) 266; The Blackwall, 10 Wall. 1, 19 U. S. (L. ed.) 870. And see infra, par. 23.

5. The Elfrida, 172 U. S. 186, 19 S. Ct. 146, 43 U. S. (L. ed.) 413.

6. Post v. Jones, 19 How. 150, 15 U. S. (L. ed.) 618.

7. Note: 24 Eng. Rul. Cas. 524. 8. Cope v. Vallette Dry Dock Co., 119 U. S. 625, 7 S. Ct. 336, 30 U. S. (L. ed.) 501.

Note: 16 Eng. Rul. Cas. 111.

lar language, ships are of different kinds-barques, brigs, schooners, sloops, cutters. The word includes anything floating in or upon the water, built in a particular form, and used for a particular purpose. Barges are vessels in a certain sense; and as the word "ship" is not used in a strictly nautical meaning, but is used in a popular meaning, it has been held that a barge is a "ship" which may be an object of salvage service. A ship or vessel used for navigation and commerce, though lying at a wharf and temporarily made fast thereto, as well as her furniture and cargo, are maritime subjects, and are capable of receiving salvage service.10 So a ship laid up in dry dock may be the subject of salvage.11 But a fixed structure, such as a dry dock, not used for the purpose of navigation, is not a subject of salvage service, any more than is a wharf or a warehouse when projecting into or upon the water. The fact that it floats on the water does not make it a ship or vessel, and no structure that is not a ship or vessel is a subject of salvage. A ferry bridge is generally a floating structure, hinged or chained to a wharf. This might be the subject of salvage as well as a dry dock. A sailor's floating bethel or meeting house moored to a wharf, and kept in place by a paling of surrounding piles, is in the same category. It can hardly be contended that such a structure is susceptible of salvage service.12 There can be no material difference whether a vessel be saved from sinking or be raised after having sunk, and it has many times been held that a sunken vessel or cargo is the subject of salvage.13 Salvage services are not limited to the vessel and cargo, but extend to other property saved on navigable waters. Salvage may, therefore, be awarded for saving a passenger's trunks containing valuable property, such as silver coin.14

3. Saving Life as Supporting Claim for Salvage.-One element invariably required by the maritime law in order to found an action for salvage is that there must be something saved more than life, which will form a fund from which salvage may be paid; in other words, for the saving of life alone without the saving of ship, freight, or cargo salvage is not recoverable.15 However, the salvors' humanity

9. Cope v. Vallette Dry Dock Co., 119 U. S. 625, 7 S. Ct. 336, 30 U. S. (L. ed.) 501.

10. Cope v. Vallette Dry Dock Co., 119 U. S. 625, 7 S. Ct. 336, 30 U. S. (L. ed.) 501; The Jefferson, 215 U. S. 130, 30 S. Ct. 54, 54 U. S. (L. ed.) 125, 17 Ann. Cas. 907.

11. The Jefferson, 215 U. S. 130, 30 S. Ct. 54, 54 U. S. (L. ed.) 125, 17 Ann. Cas. 907.

12. Cope v. Vallette Dry Dock Co.,

119 U. S. 625, 7 S. Ct. 336, 30 U. S. (L. ed.) 501.

13. Baker v. Hoag, 7 N. Y. 555, 59 Am. Dec. 431.

Note: 134 A. S. R. 711.

14. Note: 24 Eng. Rul. Cas. 527. 15. The Renpor, 8 P. D. 115, 52 L. J. P. 48, 48 L. T. N. S. 887, 31 W. R. 640, 5 Asp. M. Cas. 98, 24 Eng. Rul. Cas. 529.

Note: 24 Eng. Rul. Cas. 539, 541.

in saving life, although it cannot be the object of a direct reward in the way of salvage, is not to be forgotten in determining the rate of salvage upon property, and the general principles of humanity. and of enlarged policy require that the circumstance of the preservation of life ought not to be wholly kept out of sight in measuring the reward. When a vessel is saved at sea, the danger to the lives of those on board is considered an element of the salvage.16 According to some authorities where one set of salvors exclusively saves life and another wholly distinct set saves the ship and cargo, the salvors of life cannot render the property amenable to their claims.17 Other decisions, however, lay down the rule that in such case cach set of salvors will be compensated out of the property saved according to the merit of their respective services.18 As the foundation of salvage is the imminent danger, a claim in the nature of life salvage cannot be entertained where life has been in no danger. 19 In England the power of the admiralty court to take cognizance of life salvage has only gradually and within comparatively recent years been introduced by statute, but the recovery of life salvage is now expressly authorized in certain cases. In effect the English act provides that where services are rendered wholly or in part within British waters in saving life from any British or foreign vessel, or elsewhere in saving life from any British vessel, there shall be payable to the salvor by the owner of the vessel, cargo, or apparel saved a reasonable amount of salvage. Where the vessel, cargo, and apparel are destroyed, or the value thereof is insufficient, after payment of the actual expenses incurred, to pay the amount of salvage payable in respect of the preservation of life, the Board of Trade may, in their discretion, award to the salvor, out of the mercantile marine. fund, such sum as they think fit in whole or part satisfaction of any amount of salvage so left unpaid. The words "wholly or in part within British waters" have received a liberal interpretation and have been construed to apply where the rescue was effected outside of the territorial waters, but those rescued were brought to and landed at a British port.20

4. Elements Necessary to Valid Salvage Claims.-Three elements are necessary to a valid salvage claim: (1) A marine peril. (2) Service voluntarily rendered when not required as an existing duty or from a special contract.1 (3) Success in whole or in part, or that

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the service rendered contributed to such success. However meritorious the exertion of alleged salvors may be, if they are not attended with benefit to the owners they cannot be compensated. So if the property is not saved, or if it perishes, or, in case of capture, if it is not retaken, no compensation will be allowed. In this last respect there is a broad distinction between salvors who volunteer to go out and salvors who are employed by a ship in distress. Salvors who volunteer go out at their own risk for the chance of earning reward, and if not successful they are entitled to nothing, the rule being that it is success that gives them a title to salvage remuneration. But if men are engaged to go out to the assistance of a ship in distress they are to be paid according to their efforts, even though the labor and service may not prove beneficial to the vessel or cargo, unless they contracted that their right to compensation should depend upon their success, as in the ordinary case of salvage service, without being antecedently employed. In order to found a claim for salvage, it is absolutely essential that the ship should be in imminent danger of being lost, and should, by the service, be saved from such danger," but, the danger being real and imminent, it is not necessary, in order to make out a salvage service, that escape by other means should be impossible. The fact that no serious risk was incurred on the part of the salvors does not change the nature of the service," although an important element in estimating its merit and the amount of the reward.10 Nor does the shortness of the time occupied in res

2. The Blackwall, 10 Wall. 1, 19 U. S. (L. ed.) 870; The Clarita & The Clara, 23 Wall. 1, 23 U. S. (L. ed.) 150; The Sabine, 101 U. S. 384, 25 U. S. (L. ed.) 982; The Connemara, 108 U. S. 352, 2 S. Ct. 754, 27 U. S. (L. ed.) 751; Merrill v. Fisher, 204 Mass. 600, 91 N. E. 132, 134 A. S. R. 706, 17 Ann. Cas. 937; Hartfort v. Jones, 1 Ld. Raym. 393, Salk. 654, pl. 2, 3 Salk. 366, 24 Eng. Rul. Cas. 517.

Note: 24 Eng. Rul. Cas. 527.

3. Talbot v. Seeman, 1 Cranch 1, 2 U. S. (L. ed.) 15; The Alerta v. Moran, 9 Cranch 359, 3 U. S. (L. ed.) 758; The India, 1 W. Rob. 406, 24 Eng. Rul. Cas. 518; The City of Chester, 9 P. D. 182, 53 L. J. P. 90, 51 L. T. (N. S.) 485, 33 W. R. 104, 5 Asp. M. Cas. 311, 24 Eng. Rul. Cas. 547.

Note: 24 Eng. Rul. Cas. 543, 582. 4. The Sabine, 101 U. S. 384, 25 U. S. (L. ed.) 982; The India, 1 W.

Rob. 406, 24 Eng. Rul. Cas. 518.

5. The Sabine, 101 U. S. 384, 25 U. S. (L. ed.) 982; The Medina, 1 P. D. 272, 45 L. J. P. 81, 24 Eng. Rul. Cas. 576; The Benlarig, 14 P. D. 3, 58 L. J. P. 24, 60 L. T. N. S. 238, 6 Asp. M. Cas. 360, 24 Eng. Rul. Cas. 582 and note.

Note: 24 Eng. Rul. Cas. 527. 6. The Sabine, 101 U. S. 384, 25 U. S. (L. ed.) 982.

7. The Connemara, 108 U. S. 352, 2 S. Ct. 754, 27 U. S. (L. ed.) 751; Akerblom v. Price, 7 Q. B. D. 129, 50 L. J. Q. B. 629, 44 L. T. N. S. 837, 29 W. R. 797, 21 Eng. Rul. Cas. 292 and note.

8. Talbot v. Seeman, 1 Cranch 1, 2 U. S. (L. ed.) 15; The Connemara, 108 U. S. 352, 2 S. Ct. 754. 27 U. S. (L. ed.) 751. And see The Laura, 14 Wall. 336, 21 U. S. (L. ed.) 813.

9. The Connemara, 109 U. S. 352, 2 S. Ct. 754, 27 U. S. (L. ed.) 751. 10. Talbot v. Seeman, 1 Cranch 1, 2

cuing the ship from danger lessen the merit of the service.11 It has been said that to give title to salvage, the means used must not only have produced the benefit, but must have been used with that sole view. This principle as applied to the jettison of a cargo is unquestionably correct, but in the case of a recapture it is as unquestionably incorrect. The recaptor is seldom actuated by the sole view of saving the vessel, and in no case of the sort has the inquiry ever been made.19 5. Perils Constituting Basis of Salvage; Place of Salvage.-- In the nature of things it is manifest, and indeed it is settled, that because of the broad scope of the admiralty jurisdiction in this country, the perils out of which a salvage service may arise are all of such perils as may encompass a vessel when upon waters which are within the admiralty jurisdiction of the United States, from which it follows that the right to recover for salvage services is not limited to services concerning a peril occurring on the high seas or within the ebb and flow of the tide. And although in defining salvage the expression. "peril of the sea" has sometimes been used as equivalent to peril on the sea, it is settled that the distress or danger from which a vessel has been saved need not, in order to justify a recovery of salvage compensation, have arisen solely by reason of a peril of the sea in the strict legal acceptation of those words.18 To constitute a salvage service it is not necessary that it be rendered upon the high seas; it is enough, in respect to locality, that it be within the admiralty and maritime jurisdiction; and that comprehends as well the high seas as the sea coast and navigable rivers as high as where the tide ebbs and flows, although it should be within the body of a county.14

6. Acts Constituting Salvage Services Generally.-The varied character of services upon which a claim to salvage may be based is pointed out in the definition of salvage heretofore given.15 Generally speaking, useful services of any kind rendered to a vessel or her cargo, exposed to any impending danger and imminent peril of loss or damage, may entitle those who render such services to salvage reward.16 Accordingly the authorities hold uniformly that services rendered in the extinguishment of fire on a vessel, or in aiding in the extinguishment of such fire, whether from the land or from another vessel, or from the burning vessel itself, are salvage services for which compensation may be claimed and awarded.17 Likewise

U. S. (L. ed.) 15. See infra, par. 31. 11. The Connemara, 108 U. S. 352, 2 S. Ct. 754, 27 U. S. (L. ed.) 751. 12. Talbot v. Seeman, 1 Cranch 1, 2 U. S. (L. ed.) 15.

13. The Jefferson, 215 U. S. 130, 30 S. Ct. 54, 54 U. S. (L. ed.) 125, 17 Ann. Cas. 907.

14. Baker v. Hoag, 7 N. Y. 555, 59

Am. Dec. 431.

15. See supra, par. 1.

16. The Blackwall, 10 Wall. 1, 19 U. S. (L. ed.) 870; The Jefferson, 215 U. S. 130, 30 S. Ct. 54, 54 U. S. (L. ed.) 125, 17 Ann. Cas. 907.

17. The Blackwall, 10 Wall. 1, 19 U. S. (L. ed.) 870; The Clarita & The Clara, 23 Wall. 1, 23 U. S. (L. ed.)

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