THE SEAMEN'S STRIKE.

Evening Post, Volume XXI, Issue 13, 17 January 1881, Page 3

THE SEAMEN'S STRIKE.

TO THS EDITOR OF THS EVBNING POST. Sib — I wish to contradict a few of the statements (re seamen's strike) in a letter which appeared in your issue of the 15th instant. In the first place, the seamen on the Huia have never worked sixteen hours a day ; and another fact I wish to state is that the men were getting an extra ..pound a month for any extra work done until lately, and for losing it they have themselves to blame. Your correspondent goes on to state about the dangers of no look-out being kept through sheer weariness. I beg to state for his information, and any officer on the coast will bear me out in it, that it is almost an impossibility te make a man keep a look-out on the Bmall boats trading out of this port unless you keep the man alongside the office* of the watch, and then they will not keep their eyes open. I have in many oases— l may say hundreds — known a boat to leave at mid-day, and one watch goes below and has ten hours before 12 p.m., and then comes on deck for four hours. la one half-hour from relieving the watch, I have found the look-out asleep. Also, I most emphatically deny that any man on board the Huia has turned to at 5 a»m., as the man Brown states ; 8 o'clook is the hour when in harbor, and they have finished at 5 p.m. if possible. As for the steering of a great many seamen on the coast, the least said the better. Your informant says that the Manawatu beat the Huia three hours, whereas the latter used to beat the former two hours and a half. The Manawatu never could beat the Huia, and if Mr. Hendrey had made himself acquainted with the facts of the case, he would find I am right. The trip he refets to, the Huia commenced to burn Greymottth coals for the first time, and it is not every fireman can keep steam with them at first. I am sorry to trouble you, but I wish the truth of the case to be known, as I do not intend to refer to the matter again. I am, &c, Huia. 17th January.