The Colfax chronicle. [volume] (Colfax, Grant Parish, La.) 1877-1981, 1886-06-12
A FEARFUL VOYAGE.
An Old Lady Blown Across the
North Sea in q Boat.

Elizabeth Mouat, the heroine OF the
almost miraculous trip of the Column
bine from the coast of the Shetlands to
Norway, arrived in Edinburgh lately
and has been interviewed. She lived
on one of the Shetland Isles for sixty
years. She was the daughter of a poor
shoemaker. Her first husband was a
sailor engaged in the Greenland whale
fishery. The last ship on which he was
employed was never again heard of
after it sailed from port. Her second
husband was fisherman. For thirty
years she led the simple life of toilsome
industry which is the lot of SO many Shet-
land women, working among stock and
with the peat-gatherers by day and at
the famous hosiery in the evenings. She
has long been regarded as bearing a
charmed life in the district of Scatness,
where she lived. Eighteen years ago
she was accidentally shot in the crown
of the head by a sportsman who had
not observed her being in. range of his
game. Ten years later, while driving
a peat-cart, the pony became FESTIVE
and she was thrown out. One of the
wheels crushed her foot, injuring also
her hip. She has never been fully well
since-hence her trip to Lerwick to see
doctor there. She was intrusted
with forty knitted shawls by her neigh
bors to sell. These she returns with,
thus keeping her trust sacred. The
skipper of the Columbine, fishing
craft of twenty-one tons, offered her a
passage. The Columbine had left Ler-
wick and the trip should have extend
ed to Dunrossness and Fair Isle, to
which places it carried the sample mail
bag, but the rough weather compelled
it to return to Lerwick when twas only
twenty-four miles away. Proceeding
to sea with the usual complement of
three men, the little vessel had not long
been under way before the weather be-
came boisterous.
Elizabeth Mouat was below seasick,
and was seated near the foot of the
cabin steps. She heard the skipper
cry out: sThe mainsheets are broken!'
Looking up through the open hatchway
she saw him run to the fore part of the
boat, and the next moment heard another
voice cry: "Clear away the boatr'
Fearing something alarming had oc-
Cured, she endeavored to climb up the
steps to look out. In doing so she fell
back on the floor. In about ten min
utes she rallied, and on again ascend
ing the steps, to her amazement she
discovered the crew had left. She felt
no doubt that when the skipper went
forward the swinging boom had
knocked him overheard, and that with
in ten minutes of her fall the two men
had put out in the boat to rescue him.
The sad fate of the Captain and the
dismay with which the men discovered
the Columbine again under way and
found it impossible to overtake her are
already known, as also the exhausted
condition in which the men reached
land; the alarm spread as the Column
bine was seen from shore driving sea-
ward with solitary invalid woman on
board; the starting in pursuit of the
steam trawlers Gypsy and the Earl of
Zetland, and their return without find
ing any traces of the Inflated craft.
The vessel was. rolling at the mercy
OF the waves in the stormy North Sea,
and as the well-known outlines of the
islands were quickly left behind, the
truth of the terrible situation in which
she was placed presented itself to the
old woman. Being under no sort of
control, the helm shifted at every lurch.
The waves washed over the deck first
from one side and then from the other.
Heavy showers of spray were blown
down the hatchway. The loosened sail
Topping with the wind, was gradually
being reduced to tatters. The boom
was swinging, and the ropes, with the
blocks attached, were flying danger
ousIy about from the rigging.
II could only maintain a sitting pos
ture, said the woman, ''by keeping a
firm hold of rope fastened to the roof,
and was in danger erymoment of be-
ing thrown violently on the floor. The
idea of being alone in little craft on
stormy sea, with darkness of night
coming on, Mortified me. A feeling of
terror came over me and commenced
to scream. Then / became calm,
knowing my voice could reach no hu-
man ear, and then there came to me
the thought of the impossibility of peo-
pie on shore ever being aware of my
fate. This was one Saturday night"
She then told how the long hours till
were passed in tiresome efforts
to maintain her sitting position, now
with one hand and then with the other
holding on to the rope until each be-
came benumbed; how a lurch of the
vessel overturned the table, and the
drawers of the locker slid out with a
crash, and for the rest of the night
rolled noisily about; how by the light
If a match she succeeded in fixing her
|eet upon the heaviest articles on the