Classification' societies were empowered by the governments of their own countries, and in some cases, by the governments of most countries, to assign load lines in accordance with the International Convention of 1930, to vessels either classed or not classed by the particular society. Reference had been made to the Register Book and to characters assigned. The first Register Book, was, of course, Lloyd's and for many years it had been known all over the world as the shipping man's bible, and the speaker gave details of this particular...
The origin of the well known expression "Al" might be of interest. Originally the characters assigned for classification were denoted by the letter A.ELO. & U. and the equipment by G.M. & B., G. stood for good, M. for middling and B. for bad. Thus a vessel classed OG. had a first class hull and good equipment. Later the figure 1 was substituted for G. and in the year 1775 the new familiar term "Al at Lloyd's" first came into use. "A" representing a ship's hull of the first class, and the figure "1" a first class outfit.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.