Foreign News: Who's Who At Sea

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A lagging student at Salway College (now extinct), where he was a classmate of Britain's Air Secretary Sir Kingsley Wood, young McMurtrie was presented with a copy of the 1897 edition of Jane's on condition that he buckle down to college work. Immediately he began sending Jane letters pointing out mistakes in the handbook and before long Editor Jane had taken an interest in his critic, crediting him with hav-ing assisted in the book's compilation. Much of McMurtrie's information comes from thousands of unofficial correspondents who mail him their observations, but the bulk of Jane's material is contributed by admiralty offices themselves. Every summer McMurtrie sends out questionnaires to the naval departments of some 40 nations. He receives replies from every one except Russia. Most cooperative was China, which used to send information about its 56-vessel, 57,000-ton navy by return mail. This year China could reply only with the number of its ships that had been "lost."