The Sunday herald. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1866-1887, 1886-06-06

prayer Suddenly she looked up at me- and
whether or not she thought she could see in
my face the expression of some sinister re-
solveI cannot say, but, whatever her reason
was, she clutched me by the arm, and in
voice In which entreaty and sternness were
strangely blended, said to me, "No, sir, no
one has absolute right over his own life, you
no more than any one else. Whatever form
Of death dod sends to you, You must submit
to II. II is your duty. Else you will he
committing suicide, and will he punished for
it in the next world"
| had really no desire at all 10 commit
suicide; but from sort of spirit of bravado,
for which, considering the awful position
was in. | cannot at all account. made two
or three feigued attempts to carry ont the
purpose with which she credited ma, and
every time that | did so the poor old crea-
ture rushed at ma to try aud prevent my
accomplishing, as she thought, great crime.
AT last | felt ashamed and stopped. And
indeed with death before me- imminent aud
inevitable--why act Why spend my last
moments playing comedyi However, I
had no time either to analyze my own fan
tastic feelings or to admire the poor old
woman's want of egotism, Cher altruism, as
we should say nowadays,) for the roar of the
flames over our heads became suddenly mora
terrible, and simultaneously there rang out a
voice like q trumpet, the voice of our guar
dian angel: "You fool, what are you doing
there You will be killed. follow mel"
Immediately, though we did not know
who was calling to us or where We hal to go.
up jumped this dear old woman and myself
as If we had been shot from gun, and of we
rushed through the smoke after sailor In n
blue Jersey, whom we saw climbing n rope
ladder in front of us. without in the
slightest degree understanding why, |
climbed up the ladder after him, and verify
believe that at that moment fine had thrown
himself into the water or done anything ex
traordinary, no matter what, should have
blindly followed his example. After he had
clambcred up two or three rounds of the ladder
the sailor jumped heavily on to the top of a
travelling carriage, whose wheels, by the way
were already on fire. jumped after him. |
heard the old woman jump after me. Then
from the top OF the first carriage the sailor
jumped on to the top of a second, then on to
the top of third, keeping always behind
him, aud finally in this way wa reached tho
bow Of the ship. Nearly all the passengers
were assembled there. The sailors, under
the directions of the Captain, were launching
one of the life boats, fortunately ono of the
largest we had. Across the other side fthe
vessel | could see the long line of the Lubbock
Cliffs lit up by the glare of our fire. They
were n good deal more than mile oil.
did not know how TO swim, AMI though il
was probably not very deep where We had
gone aground, Oor We had struck without
any of Ms noticing 1t, still the waves were
terribly high. However, the moment I
caught sight of dry land telt quite sure
was safe, and to the amazement of every ono
who was standing near ms began to dance
III nd al Ia mi LII a n IN
join the crowd which was hustling around
tho steps that led up to the big life boat;
there were to many women, old men, and
children in 1t. Besdes, ever since had
caught sight of land did not care to hurry
myself, | felt so certain was saved. re-
member noticing with surprise that very few
of the children showed any signs of terror,
and that many of them were actually asleep
in their mothers arms. None of them were
lost.
remarked in the middle OF the crowd of
passengers tall, military looking man lean
ing against Il benoh which he had just
wrenched out of the deck and set athwart
ships. He stool there qnite mOtionless, his
clothes all dripping with ssa water. was
told that in an involuntary fit of terror he
had brutally elbOwed ont of his way woman
who had tried to get in front of him, 81 as to
jump into one of the first lifa. boats that had
fonnlered, and that on being collared by
one of tho stewards aud thrown roughly
down upon the deck, the old soldier, who,
by the way, was General, had felt so
ashamed of his momentary art of cowardice
that lie had sworn an oath that he would
not leave the steamer till after every one
else, including the Captain. He was mag
niicently built man, with curously pale
face. His forehead was still bleeding from
the blow he had received and rs he stood
there he looked about him with an air OF
deep humility, rs il he were asking psople
to forgive him.
In the meanwhile | had made my way
over to the larboari side, where | saw the
smaller of our two life-boats promoting on
the waves like toy boat. There were two
sailors in it, who were making signs to the
passenger to try and jump. This, however,
was not snoh an easy thing to do, as the
Nicholas |. stood very high out of the water,
and it required good deal of skill to Jump
into the boat without sinking it. At last,
however, made up my mind to have try,
and began by standing ON one of tha anchor
chains which We're hung over the ships side.
Bat just AZ was about letting myself go
| something very heavy and very soft fell on
top of me-. It was woman, who had thrown
her arms round my neck, and hung like a
log. | must acknowledge that my first i'm
pulse was to catch her by her two hands aud
to throw her right over my head bnt for
tnnately | resisted thu temptation. The
shock, however, very nearly threw rs both
| into the sea and in We must assnredly have
gona, if by piece of extraordinary good
lnci there had not been dangling right in
front of my nose a rope bslonging to some
| part of the rigging ! made frantic clutch
| at this with one hand, and, with this heavy
| lady still clinging to me, hung there for q
| moment, emitting my fingers to the bone
y then looked down and saw that
| the lifs-boat was right nndar ps, and putting
my trust in Providence, let mysslfgo. y =
Every timber in the life boat creaked.
''Hurrah |" cried the sailors.
| | left my companion in deal faint at the
bottom of the boat and turned round to look
at the steamer. 4 great mass of faces
women's faces chiefly, were anyioIsly peer.
ing at us over the side. 'Jnmpl |" ] cried
| holding ont my arms, Jump ' At this
particular moment the splendid success OF
my daring leap and the consciousness that
was we'll out of reach of the fire gavs me the
most extraordinary physical strength as well
as pluck the only three women who could
make up their minds to jump caught as
easily as one catches apples in an orchard.
! should note that every one of these ladies
gave u piercing shrek when she left the
steamer and tainted in mid air. One of the
hapless danes was very nearly killed
through gentleman throwing an enOr
mouslv heavy trunk into our boat. sup
pose he had gone out of his mind. The
trunk, by the way, was broken in the fall
and, seeing inside of 1t an extremely hand
some dressing case, at once solsMnly pre-.
scented it to the two sailors. without even
stopping to consider whether ! had any claim
to give away other peoples belongings
The sailors. with simiiar disregard for thu
rights of property, gratefully accepted my
gift. We then started at once for shore
rowing rs hard al We oonld, aud followed by
cries from the steamer of "Come back n
soon you can Send rs hack the boat =
And indeed as soon as there We're only twc
or three feet of water we felt 1. our duty to
get out. A cold drilling rain had bser
falling for abont an hour, and though it had
no effect at all on the Are il had succeeded
in wetting us to the skin.
At last We reached the shore, for which
We had 80 longsd. but it turned out to b'
little better than swamp of wet sticky mud
and We sank in it mp to our knees. On
boat went back at once, and, in compan,