The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1888-01-29

bottom. For this reason it is very ant to
deceive amateurs and novices. Outside
there is not So much. OFF Coney Island
you now and then see some,
while off Rockaway You see more.
At the last place you begin to see
great trunks and roots OF the swampv forest
that once ran along the whole south side of
Long Island but IS now completely buried
by the Atlantic In the North River, beside
the natural supply, you have the far greater
artificial supply of the great city and its
suburbs. This immense amount of wood
water-logs very slowly but finally gets
soaked through and through and then sinks
to the bottom.
"rhere is another thing the diver sees
under the Hudson and that is that the river
is being filled up through the folly or ignor-
ance of human beings. The great sewers
never stop throwing their vile contents into
the slips Every steamer, from tug to ocean
greyhound, drops its ashes overheard. Every
vessel does the same with its sweeplngs and
refuse Then the ScOWS which ought to
carry the ashes and garbage of this city far
away, save time and trouble by dumping
them in dark nights into the Hudson. or
course, it is merely question of time before
the government is called upon to clean and
dredge the North river. When that
happens the Legislature will doubtless try
to stOn the entire business. 1t won't before.
Legislatures never lock stable doors until
not only the horse but also the wagon and
harness have been stolen.
'There are not very many fishes in the
North river. There may be, but we divers
don't see much of them. Probably they
see us first and give us a wide berth. Those
| meet most are eelS and little sinners, or
minnowS.
IF, however, we carry one of those new
fashioned incandescent lamps it acts like n
jack lantern in eel Spearing and brings
shoals of fish around. They are horribly
unintelligent, and after studying fellow
five minutes and swimming off they will
Immediately return and begin cycling him
again, as if they had never seen him before.
We never mind them, as they are harmless,
and couldn't be caught by us even if we
desired to get a good mess of them when at
work
''The shark is an overestimated creature.
We divers hold him i'll disgust rather than
anything else. He is dangerous chiefly
through his size, clumsiness and stupidity.
He may strike your life line and so give the
signal to pull you up when you don't want
to go or when you are in position in which
it is hard and even painful to be suddenly
jerked up toward your boat. Or he is
capable of biting your air hose or OF nip
ping your arm or leg if he is very hungry
and you are very quiet. The heavy knife
we carry in our belt and which the ilnagna-
tive small boy believes our only hope against
the tiger of the ocean, is scarcely ever
used for such purpose, but is employed for
cutting ropes, prying open packages, and
in short, for about the same things as an
ordinary household chisel. In my profeS-
sional career | or my friends in the business
have run across at least a thousand sharks,
and not one of us was ever attacked
mot far in the North river from one OF
the telegraph crossing, is the line of the
great tunnel that some day in the next
century will take trains directly from New
York city under the Hudson to New Jersey
and far beyond You can easily see and
feel the trouble the engineers of that enter
prise have had. Every here and there is a
pit where at some time there was caving
of the roof and an thrush of the river mud
into the tunnel head or the tunnel itself
| The largest is where the great accident oc-
! Cured four wears ago and forms large
conical depression seventy feet in diameter.
! Another feature are blow holes as they
might be termed, produced by the com
pressed air used in driving the tunnel escap-
| ing through the head and forcing its way
inward to the water. | was down one day
when they were at work and could hear the
| men and machinery just the same as if they
| had been in some other room in tho same
! house with me.