The Times, Wednesday, Jan 24, 1866; pg. 12; Issue 25403; col F THE LOSS OF THE LONDON. - The conviction gains ground among the maritime population of Plymouth that the loss of the ill-fated ship London is mainly to be attributed to her having been overweighted. As she lay in the Sound it was noticed by scores of seamen that she lay low in the water "like a collier," and, although no copy of her manifest can be procured in the port, it is generally believed that she had on board many hundred tons of iron - railway iron probably - which lay as dead weight, bringing her main deck almost to the level of the water. To her already heavy cargo 50 tons of coals, in bags, were added while she lay in the Sound, and these were placed round her funnel. When the ship rolled they broke adrift, and the coals being washed down the scupper holes interfered greatly with the working of the pumps. Had the London been out a month she might possibly have met with impunity a gale similar to that in which she foundered, for the daily consumption of coal, water, and stores would have lightened her materially, and she would have ridden over, instead of forcing herself through, the tremendous waves she encountered. But as she entered the Bay of Biscay the iron weighed her down with considerable force, and she plunged into rather than upon the mountains of water which came driving on. The excessive loading, with a cargo which would have involved a tremendous strain for the tightest and most buoyant of wooden ships, dragged down the iron-case to a common destruction. The practice of carrying such dangerous cargo in passenger ships is condemned by nautical men, and legislation to prevent it is required. The accusation made against Captain MARTIN that he did not use all possible exertions to save his crew, by cutting away the masts and forming rafts, is manifestly unjust. The London was fitted with telescopic iron masts from deck to truck, and these could not be cut away by any appliances on board. Supposing it to have been possible for a raft to have been constructed upon a deck incessantly swamped by heavy seas, to have launched and kept afloat so frail a craft and have kept passengers upon her, still there was this good excuse for the experiment not being tried - there was no wood aboard with which a raft could have been built. Her top gear was totally insufficient for the purpose, her spars on deck had been washed overboard, her spare spars were inaccessible below, and to have ripped off the deck timbers would have caused the ship instantly to go down. How far it was wise to place iron masts in an iron ship, and to have no material accessible for the construction of rafts, is a question bearing on the future rather than the past. A portable life-raft, such as has been often tested with success, would probably have saved many lives. Captain MARTIN has been blamed for putting to sea on the 6th of January, when forewarned by the barometer of the gale of the 11th. If he were unwise in so doing, how much more dangerous was the act of the captain of the Union Company's Cape mail steamer Norseman, which left the Sound with 59 passengers on the 10th in the very teeth of the storm! It is a serious matter for such a ship to be detained at a port; such detention would have involved in the case of the London a loss of some 60L. per day. - Western Morning News. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~