The Occidental

HARFORD, District Judge.

This is a suit to collect seamen’s wages which the libelants claim to have earned by services on the ship Occidental, on a run from San Francisco to Seattle. The owner of the ship appears as claimant, and has filed an answer in which he resists the demand of the libelants on the ground that they be-: came bound, by signing articles for a definite period of time, to continue in the service of the vessel to the end of the specified period* and until the return of the vessel to San Francisco, the port of discharge, and that, being so bound to- service, they were guilty of…