Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 9.djvu/796

NEW HAVEN STEAM SAW-MILL CO. ». SECURITY INS. 00. I81 �lost, Juicl o£ any place or locality referred to in said policy or proof of loss, That proper proofs of loss were flled with the Insurance company in due sea- son, and that the libellant is entitled to recover upon said policy the amount iusured thereby, (less the note o£ $301, given for the premium on said policy) �with interest from the day of , unless the law is so that upon �the facts set forth in this finding said libellant is not entitled to recover, in which case ludament is to be entered for said respondent." �The protest states that the vessel left Eockland on May 17th, with a cargo of ice, bound for the port of Morgan City, Louisiana ; that for two days before June llth they had not been able to take an observation, on account of cloudy and hazy weather ; that during the evening of the llth they sighted a light which they took for Ship Shoal light, and kept on their course accordingly, but at 10:30 o'clock p. M. the vessel suddenly took the groand; that they imme- diately let go an anchor, but the vessel soon began to leak, and the ice to melt from contact with the gulf water, and in a short time she had filled and rolled over, so that pumping was useless; that the next day they discovered that the light they saw the evening before was not Ship Shoal light, but the light on Timbalier island, and that the vessel was ashore on a reef about two miles from Vine island, and about 15 miles from Timbalier island; and that the vessel ia a total loss. �The district court dismissed the libel. It appears from the decis- ion of that court that the libellant there contended that "the coasting trade on the United States Atlantic coast" meant trade from Maine to Texas ; that the written permission to use ports in the Gulf of Mexico not west of New Orleans, meant, in view of the printed re- striction against using foreign ports in that gulf, a permission to use foreign ports in that gulf not west of New Orleans ; that if the vessel was prohibited from using any gulf ports west of New Orleans, she was not using any such port at the time of the disaster ; and that an intent to use a prohibited port did not avoid the policy. The court held that the meaning of the two written clauses in the policy was that the vessel was to be employed on the United States Atlantic coast, which was the coast of the Atlantic ocean and not the coast of the Gulf of Mexico, but that if necessity or occasion required she was to be permitted to go into the Gulf of Mexico and use the ports not west of New Orleans; but not that her coasting trade was to be thereby extended through the gulf; and that when she was engaged in transporting a cargo from Maine to Morgan City she was not in ��� �