The daily Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1873-1877, 1875-05-14
SIGNALS at Sea.

Dorrien Smith, of Tresco, in the Sicily Is
lands, makes statement concerning the
loss Of the Schiller which ought not to be
overlooked. Mr.. Smith says that more
persons might probably have been saved
from the Inflated ship had not the rockets |
which she sent up and the guns which she |
fred been mistaken on shore for mere
commercial signals. The steamer struck |
at 10 O'Clock in the evening, and the
captain, according to the best evidence we
yet have, was not swept overheard till 3
o'clock in the morning. The women and
children gathered in the deck-house re-
manned there suffering but in safety for
some four hours. They we're not carried
away with their place of refuge until 2
o'clock. It does not appear, indeed, that
the waves fairly broke over the ship at all
until an hour after she struck. About the
same time the fog, as we are told, lifted,
land the lights on land we're plainly
visible" By daybreak the tide had risen
twenty-five feet From all these circum-
stances it is but too sadly likely that Mr..
Smith is right when he attributes the
death Of many of these unfortunate peo-
pie to the simple fact that their dangerous
position was not known on shore. 1t APP
pears to be probable that the life boats
from st. Agnes which were unable to reach
the ship in the morning might have been
able to do so eight or nine hours earlier.
As it was, these life-boats saved the few
persons who were saved by picking them
up as they foated and struggled in the
water. Is it not a reproach then to our
civilization that no plan should yet have
been devised and enforced for distinguish
ing danger signals at sea from all other
signals at least as completely, for example;
as danger signals are distinguished
from all other signals on a railway
train? The resources of the pyrotechnlst
and the artillerist certainly should
be equal to devising some efnclent
system which will make it practically
impossible for watchers on shore to con-
found a mere notification that steamer
has reached certain point in her voyage
with an agonizing call for help. 1t is sim
ply horrible to think of those eight or nine
long hours of miserable, heart breaking
suspense through which the wretched PEG
pie on board of the Schiller chung in de-
SPAR to their shattered ship, actually with
in sound all the time of the help which
never reached them only because those
who would have gladly braved the winds
and waves to give it were in utter igno
rance of their dread extremity and need
Mr.. Dorrien Smiths letter adds new pa
thos to the melancholy story. 1t reveal
$40 koo rorp ooI raporollx, ,,Dcucpoot
ed peril of the seas, the outcome, strangel,
enough, of that very perfection OF our mod
ern commercial arrangements which i
commonly thought to be an unmixed bless
ing and a special glory of our times.
There were saved from the Schiller ION
ly one woman, but ffty-six mail bags.
Does not the simple statement seem t
show that if the help from the shore coul
have been sent to the ship by midnight in
stead of eight hours after midnight,
might have been possible to save at leas
as many women and children as mail
bags ?" Mail. bags certainly can neithe
n swim nor float any better, to put the thin
a mildly, than women and children and tn
boats which in the morning were able t
take off so many mail bags might probs
bly, have taken off as many women an
g children. But no one on shore knew wha
was happening until the dawn reveale
the spectral scene: and during the Ions
night the women and the children had bee
all swept into the rising and raging ocear
Need this have been so? Three hundre
persons cannot perish in one dreadtl
hour without causing desolation anon
more than hundreds of families in bot
is worlds. THERE'S mourning in two continent
1t because of the loss of the Schiller, and eve
in those who happily, had no friends, no re
,r atives on board the fated vessel symp;
K thize with those who have been so suddel
to ly bereaved. Civilization has profoun
interest in such calamities, and the hea
must be cold indeed that does not beat Il
faster when reading of this awful TRACED
e. There is no apparent reason for the wrec
j. The ship was not at the mercy of storms
a she was not disabled, nor was she mo-
- than one or two miles out of her appointe
a' course. She was steered direct for Pl
ne mouth, and was lost upon islands as We
a. known upon the maps as the harbor
"A New York. Captain Thomas, who peris
- ed, possibly a victim of his own mistak
I'd was an experienced sailor. We shou
like to see the orders he had received fro
the company. 1t is more than possib
that he was directed to make quick pa
r sage, irrespective Of the Retarriere Ledg
10 Certainly it il established that the graz
a mistake was made of urging the ship upt
~ path of uncertainty in the midst of
D. heavy fog It is again shown. and tn
at time with terrific emphasis, that the a
at tempt to reach port under such circur
- stances is a wanton risk and crime n
10 readily to be forgotten. The Schill
D should not have been lost 1t was mi
ne take. sin, violation of all proper car
I'd She might have lost day of the Atlant
y passage had her PROV been turned fro
" the Sicily islands in the fog but that 10
would have saved more than three hu
lg bred lives. 1t is disaster due to the rec
IS, lessness. the cupidity and the over-con
dence of man. The fog that hid the Zig
upon Bishops Rock cannot conceal fro
eS the public the awful mistake that som
body must have made.
~ Enamelled pipe is superior TO lead PHI
for water-tanks.