The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1875-01-30 00:00:00

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THE STOURBRIDGE OBSERVER

out to help the crews of distressed vessels, but their
services were not eventually needed. The Lowestoft
No. 2. lifeboat saved four men from the schooner Lady
Bassett, of Brixham. The Newhaven lifeboat was
taken to the schooner Delight, of Rye, stranded in
Seaford Bay, and rescued her crew of five men. The
New Romney lifeboat saved ten men from the 1-arque
Alliance, of London, ashore at Dungeness Point, and
on the following day endeavoured to save the distressed
barque Mary A. Way, of Liverpool.
"December 12.—The Padstow lifeboat brought
ashore the crew of six men from the wrecked brig
Thomas, of Whitehaven.
December 13.—The Lizard lifeboat went off with the
view of helping the steamer Ousel, but her services
were not required. The Caistor No. 1 lifeboat saw a
foreign barque in distress near the Cross Sand, and put
a man on board who piloted her out of her dangerous
position. The Lydd (Dungeness) lifeboat put off to
the wrecked barque Duna, of Riga, but the shipwrecked
men were saved by shore boats.

"December 15.—The Holyhead lifeboat went out
and remained alongside the schooner City of Chester
some time, until it was found that the boat's services
were no longer needed.
"December 16. —The Ilfracombe lifeboat was enabled
to extricate the brig Annie Arb,y, of Dublin, and her
crew of seven men, from a position of great peril in
Morte Bay, after which she took the vessel safely to
harbour, having also on the same day rescued five men
from the boat of the wrecked brig Utility, of Working-
ton. The lifeboat at the adjoining station, Morte
Stone, was also launched.to help iii performing those
services, but was unsuccessful in discovering the
distressed brigs, owing to the darkness of the night.
The New Romney lifeboat went to the aid of the brig
.Regina, of Sunderland, in distress off Dungeness and
kept by her until she was got away in safety. The St.
Ives lifeboat saved the crew of five men of the schooner
Jasper, of that port, and afterwards helped to get the
vessel itself into harbour.

"December 17.—The Wexford No. 1 lifeboat saved
five men from the wrecked schooner Favourite, of
Dublin.

_
"December 19.—The Lytham lifeboat went out to
the brigantine Alfred, of Swansea, ashore on the
Horse Bank, but found the vessel abandoned.
" December 20.—The Caistor No. 2 lifeboat saved the
crew of five men from the schooner Victoria., of Blyth,
stranded on the Barber Sands, and six men from the
brig Sarah, of Whitby, wrecked on Corton Sands, to
which latter vessel the Lowestoft No. 1 lifeboat was
also launched.

"December 24.—The Ryde lifeboat saved four men
belonging to the schooner Celeste Howe, of Caen, in dis-
tress at Jury's Gap.
"December 29.—The Ramsgate lifeboat brought
ashore from the Southsand Head light-ship five of the
crew of the barque Consul Platrn, of Sunderland, which
had been in collision with another vessel.

"December 30.—The Abimouth and Filey lifeboats
helped ashore some fishing cobles which had been over •
taken by a sudden gale and ran great risk in making
the land.
"December 31.—The Berwick-on-Tweed lifeboat
was launched to the rescue of the crew of the sloop
Nil Desperandum, of Sunderland, who were lost, how-
ever, before the boat could possibly get to their
assistance.

"The foregoing noble list gives a total of 122 lives
and four vessels saved by the lifeboats of the National
Institution during the month, in addition to 35 other
lifeboat launches."

THE RECENT GALE,
Referring to the recent gale, and also to the valuab
vices of the Royal National Life-boat Institution, the D tl
News of Wednesday, in a leader, writes :

_
The best thing that can be said for the violent storms
of wind and rain which have visited most parts of
England during the last eight-and-forty hours is that
they flush the sewers, cleanse the thoroughfares, and
stir the stagnant atmosphere of our towns and cities. . .
All congratulation on this head has to be abandoned
when we turn our thoughts from the land to the sea.
There are no compensations. A gale such as we have
experienced, by fits and starts, during the past forty-
eight hours, inevitably brings ruin on the frailer
vessels that are continually coasting round the island,
and generally includes in the widespread devastation
one or more of the larger and stronger ships and
steamers that are making for our ports or leaving
them. Not for days and weeks—sometimes not for
months—is the full tale of destruction told.
Here and there a heavily-laden schooner, or a
hapless fishing-boat, is driven in on the sharp
rocks; and when her spars are carried ashore by
the waves, the people on shore know what has hap-
pened. Silt no one can tell for months after a heavy
gale what huge ships have gone down before the storm,
in their endeavour to keep away from the land which
they know will prove fatal to them. That is the reflec-
tion which, during such gales as have just visited us,
makes the most thoughtless turn to those methods of
saving life at sea, and of rescuing shipwrecked sailors,
which do not always gain sufficient attention in times
of calm. There was a certain opportuneness, there-
fore, in the letter which was published on Monday
from the Secretary of the Royal National Lifeboat
Institution calling attention to the remarkable
services of the lifeboats round our shores within
the month of December last. The story which
Mr. Lewis has to tell, though it does not profess
to be exceptional, is one that may well awaken our
pride in the brave fellows who man these boats, and
it may help to remind the public of the duty which
it owes to the institution which employs them.
Scarcely a day passed of that whole December in
which some lifeboat was not summoned to give aid
to a vessel in distress. The list furnished by Mr.
Lewis shows that during the month the crews of the
lifeboats saved 122 men and four vessels, in addi-
tion to which there were 35 launches of lifeboats,
which were found unnecessary. But when we use the
word "unnecessary," we must guard against a mis-
conception. Those who are wise after the fact
must not detract from the heroism of a lifeboat's
crew who, seeing a vessel driven into a perilous
position by the violence of a gale, adventure out to
her to offer her an aid which, as it happens, she does
not need. The men who man the lifeboat cannot tell
but that the vessel out beyond the bar has exhausted
her means of signalling, that she is in distress, and
that, unless they put off to her rescue, she will in-
evitably drift on to the rocks. That they themselves
may be in greater danger than the vessel they
descry is surely nothing to their discredit.
There is a popular belief that the lifeboat men are
secure from danger; that they are strapped to
their seats; that the boat is bound to right itself,
supposing it to be capsized; that it bales itself;
and that, so long as they are bound to the thwarts,
the crew cannot perish. But the people who
cherish this doubtless amiable delusion have probably
never experienced the sensation of being half-choked
and half-diOwned by repeated immersions in salt
water, especially when long-continued exertion and
consequent exhaustion have produced a half-delirous
indifference. Fortunately, Mr. Lewis has nothing
to report, as far as December is concerned, in
the way of accident to the lifeboat crews but that
these get into very serious danger in running out
in a storm to approach an unmanageable ship that
is lurching heavily in a landward-swinging sea,
any one who has Been a wreck driven ashore by
a gale knows full welL "In one case," says Mr.
Lewis, "a boat had hardly landed with her
living freight from the very jaws of death when she
was summoned again to launch, her crew vieing with
each other once more to face the storm and the crush-
ing surf, whilst others were as eager to displace them
and share their glorious work. In another case the
brave fellows, in their anxiety that valuable time
should not be lost, seized their life-belts, rushed into
the boat, some insufficiently clad, and after several
hours of exposure to the cold, alternately drenched
by salt water and by fresh, and without food or
drink, landed in an equal or greater state of exhaus-
tion than the rescued men they had brought safely to
land."
The human race is, perhaps as yet only in the in-
fancy of its occupation of the globe. We are only now
discovering the conditions which hem us round; and
endeavouring to meet them, and grapple with those
which are dangerous to us. When one of these is sur-
mounted, its defeat is straightway relegated to the in-
creasing list of facts that ought always to have been
obvious. Perhaps. therefore, fifty years or a hundred
years hence our descendants will be regarding with
horror the vast lose of life at sea which every year at
present has to chronicle; and they will wonder how,
among all the nations, such a maritime people as.
the English had not thought of methods of
securing the safety of sailors, which, to them, will
appear simple enough. We have got lightning-
conductors to guard our buildings against violent
electrical disturbances ; but we have done next to
nothing to ensure human life on shipboard from the
possible effects of a furious gale. What are our pre-
sent life-belts, life-rafts, and ship-boats in view of the
vast slaughter wrought by our annual quota of ship-
wrecks ? But while, as yet, the sailor or voyager is
not in a position to defy the Prince of the power of the
air, that is all the greater reason why we should foster
the methods by which we, at least, diminish the sacri-
fice of life at sea; and one of the foremost of these is
the establishment all round our coasts of lifeboats
which at the shortest notice can put off to the
succour of vessels in distress. 'lf this is to be re-
garded as a charity rather than as a duty, it is
surely one of the most necessary and praiseworthy of
charities. The list of the services rendered by our
lifeboats during the month of December offers an ad-
ditional reason, if any were required, why subscrip-
tions should be abundantly tendered to the noble in-
stitution to which these boats belong. There is but
one more point to be noted. Certain charities are sus-
pected of encouraging the very evil against which
they were instituted to guard. We may take it for
granted that no captain will be careless of his ship
merely because he knows there is a chance of a lifeboat
coming to his aid.

ON READING AN EMINENT FRENCHMAN'S VIEWS
OF ENGLISH LITERATURE.
Our English elides their dull wits keep straining;
When "Enter Taine !"—and all is entertaining !—Punch.

dressed them as nearly as I could make as follows. In
order they approached the lattice, and kneeling before
it the Bishop said to each in French :-
- - --

"My child, what do you wish ?"
"To become an Ursuline nun."
"Are you willing and ready to take the vows of
poverty, chastity, and obedience to the rule of the
convent and the Mother Superior ?"
After answering that they were, these vows, which
were signed by them, were presented by them to the
Mother Superior. Then followed what to me was the
most touching and impressive part of the ceremony.
From the depths of the inner chapel came the sweet,
low music of the convent choir, which, as the anthem
proceeded, grew stronger and fuller; then, as it ended,
the sisters—nearer us—began to sing the same dirge-
like strain, and as they ceased the five novices, rising,
took it. up, and in their tremulous voices sang it
through to the end. While they sang a light
accompaniment was played upon the organ, which,
while it scarcely supported their voices, added
unspeakably to the pathetic effect. When the
music was over Pere Le Moine took from their
places by the altar the five black veils, which had pre-
viously been blessed, and presented them to the
Bishop, and he, approaching the grille, called upon
the first of the novices to come forward and receive
this last insignia of her retirement from the world.
She left her place, after delivering her lighted candle
to one of the sisters, and after bowing to the ground
knelt before him, while he laid upon her bowed head
the veil. Then arising she turned to the Mother
Superior, who took from beneath it the white one
she was renouncing, and handed it to one of eleven
little girls who were there to receive it. And the
nun prostrated herself upon the ground, and with
her arms extended in the form of a cross, allowed
herself to be covered by the folds of her veil, which
sombre pall was significant of her death to the
world. Each novice followed until the veils had all
been received, when the ceremony closed by their being
received into the community. This was done by each
nun taking the new sisters by turns into her arms and
giving them the "nun's kiss of peace," that is, kissing
them on either cheek. I find it very difficult to put
all this upon paper, and convey any just idea of the
solemnity of the ceremony. I can describe it, but my
words will not make you understand the beauty of
Mozart's "Mater Admirabilis," Lambelletti's " Quam
Dilecta," the triumph of the anthems, or the pathos of
the dirges, nor the effect of the breaking daylight as it
stole in through the long, narrow windows dimming
the pale candle-light which shone upon the white-
faced novices, nor the strange ecstasy with which they,
when all was over, threw themselves into the arms of
their sisters, the only human arms which should ever
receive them lovingly.—Pictorial World.