The Topeka State Journal

London, May 14.—In the expectation that J. Bruce Ismay would be present, the hall and galleries were filled when the board of trade resumed the Titanic inquiry. Captain Stanley Lord of the Californian was the first witness.

Captain Lord said that both the apprentice and the second officer who were on the bridge during the night told him in the morning he had been called during the night and report made to him that a vessel nearby had been firing rockets and that he had answered the calls. He, however, could not remember doing so, and in the morning asked the second officer why he had not been called. That officer replied that he would have called the captain himself if he had thought the rockets were distress signals.

"While it would be dangerous to go through ice, if I had known the Titanic was sinking, I should certainly have done so, although I do not believe I could have reached her in time," said Captain Lord.

Gibson, an apprentice on the Californian, who was on the bridge during the night of the disaster, said he could not see the outlines of the steamer which was lying near by, but only the glare of her lights. He said that while watching the steamer which was firing rockets, the second officer remarked that the steamer was not firing rockets at sea for nothing and she appeared to have a heavy list to starboard. He did not think the vessel was exactly in distress but was in trouble of some sort. He thought she was a tramp steamer.

Lord Mersey: "Would you expect to see the glare of the light of a tramp steamer?"

"Yes."

Gibson told of his reporting the firing of the rockets to Captain Lord, a report which the captain had previously testified that he did not remember receiving. Gibson said that the captain was awake.

Witness further testified that at 3:40, long after the Titanic had sunk, he saw another rocket.