Wheeling Sunday register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1882-1934, 1888-05-06


ths n;rate flag. opened it on the deck "a
wide as the space would permit, and SAT
down TO contemplate the hideous insignia
embroidered on it. My mind hiied with
a hundred fsncies as my gaze went from
tbe skull on the black field to the deaths
head nine that had fallen from the grasp
Of Tassard and lay on the deck; and l was
sitting lost in deep CT am like contem-
platiop, when was startled aud shocked
into instantaneous activity by blast OF
noise, louder than any thunder clap that
ever / heard, Iipging and booming through
the schooner. This was followed by q
second and then third, at intervals dur
ing which you might have counted ten,
and / became sensible Of strange, sicken-
ing motion, which lasted about twenty or
thirty moments, such as might be exper-
fenced by one swiftly descending In a
balloon, or in falling from height while
pent up in coach.
For a little while the schooner heeled
over so violently that the benches aud all
things movable in the cook room slid as
far as they could 60, and heard great
CHATTER and commotion among the freight
in the hold. She then came upright again,
and simultaneously with this vast mass
of water tumbled on to the deck and wash
ed over nv head, and then fell another
and then another, all in such way as to
make me know that the ice had broken
and slipped the schooner close to the ocean,
where she lay exposed to its surges-but
not free of the ice, for she did not toss OF
roll.
/ seized the lantern and spraDg to the
cabin, where hung it up, and mounted
the companion steps. But as l put my
hand to the door to thrust it open sea
broke over the side and filled the decks,
bubbliug and laundering past the compan'
ion hatch in such a way as to advise me
that need but open tho door to drown
the cabin. / waited, my heart beating
yery hard, mad to see what had happened,
but not daring to trust myself on deck lest
/ should be Immediately swept into the
sea-
Half an hour must have passed, during
which time the decks were necessarily
swept by the seas, insomuch that / never
once burst opon the door, even to look out
But nothing having happened to increase
nv CONSERVATION in this half hour, though
the movement in the schooner was that oil
yery ponderous and majestical rolling
and hesving, showing her bed to be atioat
| began to find my spirits, and to listen
and wait with some buildings OF hope and
confidence. At the expiration Of this time
the seas began to fall less heavily and
regularly on the DICK, and presently
could only hear them breaking forward,
but without a quarter of their former
weight, and nothing worse came ait than
large, brisk showers of spray.
armed myself with additional clothing
for the encounter of the wet, cold and
wind, and then pushed open the door and
stepped forth. The sky WAS dark with
rolling clouds, but the ice put its own Eght
into the air, and could see as plain as ii
the fl rst of the dawn had broken. 1t was
as had supposed; the mass of the valley
in which the schooner had been sepulchreG
for eight and forty years had come away
from the main, and lay floating within {
cables length of the coast. A stranger,
more wonderful picture human eye nevel
beheld. The island shore ran q rampant o
faintness along the darkness to where i
died ont in liquid dust TO right and left
The schooner sat upon bed OF ice tina
showed surface of about haitian acre; he
stern was close to the sea, and about sii
feet above it. On her larboard quarter tn,
slope or shoulder OF the ACTIVITY had beer
broken by the rupture, and you looked
over the side into tho clear sea beyond thu
limit of the ice there; bat abreast OF the
foreshrouds the ice rose In kind OF wall
a great splinter it looked of what was he
fore a small broad browed hill, and thu
wind or the sea having caused the body OF
which the schooner lay to veer, this wal
stood as a shield betwixt the vessel ant
the surges, and was now receiving thcs
blows which had heretofore struck he
starboad side amidships and filled he
decks.
The wind blew from the southwest, bn
the trend of the island coast was northeast
and rs the mass of ice was upon, in pat
ing from the main, had floated TIA cables
length from the cliffs the w was not much
dance, while the wind and sea held, OF
the berg (if may so termit) being thrown
upon the island. That the ice under the
schooner was moving, and If so at what
rate, it was too dark to enable me to know
By observing the marks on the coast.
There was to be no sleep for me that night,
and, knowing this, | stepped below and
built up good fire, and then went with
the lantern to sec how Tassard did, and to
give him the news; bpt he was in so deep
a sleep that after pulling him a little with
out awakening him let him lie, nothing
but the sound of his breathing persradipg
me that he had not lapsed into his old
frozen state again.
OF all long nights this was the longest
ever past throug. / did truly believe that
the day was never to break again over the
ocean.
All night kept the fire going, and on
several occasions visited the Frenchman,
but found him motiOnless in sleep.
At last the day broke, l went on deck
and found the dawn Frightening into
morning The wind had fallen, aud with
it the sea; but there still ran middling
strong surge, and tie breeze was such as,
in sailors language, you would have
shown your topgallantsails to. / could
now take measure Of our situation, and
was not little astonished and delighted
to observe the island to be at least mile
distant from us, snd the northeast end
lying very plain, the ocean showing beyond
it though in the southwest the ice died out
upon the SEA line. That we had been Get
away from the main by some current was
very certain. There was westerly ten
dency in the all the bergs which broke
from the island, the small ones moving
more quickly than the large, for the sea in
the north and west was dotted with at
least fifty of these white masses, great and
little. On the other hand, the wind and
seas were answerable for the progress we
had made to the north.
The wall Of ice, as l call it, that had
stood over sgainst the lsrboard bow, was
gone, and the sens tumbled, with much
heayiness of froth and much noise, over
the ice, past the bows, and washed past
the bends on either side in froth, rising as
high as the channels ] noticed great
quantity Of broken lee sinking and rising
in the dark green curls of the pillows. and
big blocks would be hurled on to the
schooner's bed and then be swept of,
sometimes fetching the bilge such
a thump as seemed to swing bel
low through her frame. It was only at