This book is not an exhaustive treatise or a compendium of authorities. It is designed to be an outline of the subject primarily for the student, more especially the student layman who desires to inform himself of the general principles of admiralty law.

It is impracticable in a work of this sort to reprint the statutes relating to the various subjects of admiralty jurisprudence, since the federal statutes alone would constitute a volume more extensive than this. The salient features of the statutes have been noticed and references given to all of them. They are to be found in the Revised Statutes, the Compiled Statutes, the Statutes at large, and in the compilation of Navigation Laws published by the Bureau of Navigation, U.S. Department of Commerce.

The subject of marine insurance is treated in another volume of this series and is, therefore, omitted here.

In the chapter on Collision, we have not discussed the fixing of liability under particular circumstances of navigation, such as collision between vessels meeting, vessels passing, etc. While these matters are treated in most text-books, their discussion belongs largely to navigation and is useful only in a legal treatise for the purpose of determining liability after an accident has occurred. It could not guide the reader to avoid collision liability, and is therefore omitted in a work intended rather as a guide for the avoidance of trouble than as a dictionary of remedies.

For the same reason, only the most cursory sketch of admiralty procedure has been given. That is the province of the proctor, who must be consulted when litigation has become necessary.

The reader will find that a few subjects treated in the body of the work are also covered in Appendix I (Summary of the Navigation Laws). This is due to the fact that the appendix was prepared for independent publication. The repetitions are not numerous and, as the treatment is different in form, it will be found advantageous to the student rather than otherwise.

Acknowledgment is made to Miss Florence A. Colford of the District of Columbia bar, for valuable and painstaking aid.