St. Paul daily globe., 1889-05-26
TRAGEDIES OF THE OCEAN,
Queer Adventures Of a Brig In the New
Zealand Sea.
CHARMING A GREAT SHARK.
The Solitary Sailor Left on Board a
Vessel and His Final Rescue---Un-
explainable Casualties.

Capt. Delano, of the brig Josephine, for
voyage from Sydney to Auckland and
return, says writer in the New York
Sun. She was an English craft and
was loaded with general cargo, and
had made many voyages across the
New Zealand sea. The crew consisted
of captain, mate, cook, and four men
before the mast, and every one but the
cook was white and spoke English. l
was then eighteen years old and Just
out of my apprenticeship. l should
have had a second mates berth, but the
Josephine carried no such officer. The
captain stood his own watch, and there
were occasions when the mate had to go
aloft with the men. Capt. DelanO was
a good sailor and gOOd-hearted man.
and there was nothing in the grub or
the discipline to find fault with. We
left Sydney one morning with a fair
wind for the l, ,500-mile voyage, and had
any one predicted the queer ad ventures
and the tragedies which were to befall
us he would have been looked upon as a
lunatic.
A portion of the story am going to
tralian papers twenty years ago. but
only portion, and that full of errors.
1t was only month ago that l was
asked to send my affidavit to certain
facts to a lawyer at Melbourne, and SO
the whole series of adventures is fresh
in my memory.
For the first three days out we had
fair winds and smooth sea, and the
brig made fine progress. At midnight
the third night the wind shifted,
blew up squall which lasted
half an hour, ana then died away as
fl at as you please. We were left rolling
on the waves for an hour or two, but
when daylight came the surface OF the
sea was without ripple, while there
was not the slightest breath of air NOV
ing above. The sun came up like a ball
Of fire, and the greenest hand aboard
knew that we were III calm. 1t was
terrible hot by mid-forenoon, and our
humane captain ordered all hands to
knock off and make themselves as COM
Portable as possible. By noon the brig
was like an oven. The decks were so
hot that even the cook, with his tough
feet, dared not walk them unshOd.
Down in the fo'castle it was sitting,
but as it was worse on deck we had to
stand it.
1t was about noon when the cook,
who had gone to the side to throw over
some slOps, called out to us to come and
see the largest shark which human eyes
ever beheld. 1 crawled up from the
fo'castle, always curious to see one of
the monsters close at hand, but expect
ing that the cook had greatly eXag-
gerated, and when I looked over the
rail | was astounded. There lay a
shovel-nosed shark of such dimensions
that l dare not credit my own eyesight.
He lay parallel and not over ten feet
away, and when, after few minutes.
captain and all hands. reused up to
look at the fellow we got his exact
length by a tape line along the
deck. He was 321s feet long, with
jaws capable of cutting bull
lock in two at one snap. The
only sign of life he gave was slight
movement of the eye now and then. He
lay with his great dOrsal fin baking in
the hot sun, and so near that we could
see every little detail. ALI agreed that
he was the largest shark any one had
ever seen. although all of us had sailed
in the warm seas, and some Of the men
had turned away when the cook climbed
upon the rail and said he would stop a
little for game with the big fellow.
He meant by that that he would have a
talk with him. l have met numbers of
ships cooks who claimed to have ''made
up'' with sharks and were not afraid of
being hurt by them. The cook sat just
opposite the sharks middle, and he had
begun sort of chant, when l
passed forward intending to find
a missile ana heave it over and
scare the monster away. l had
Just found an old bit of iron and got
back to the rail when there was splash
and yell. The cook was in the water
through some careless move of his. l
had my eye on the shark, and his move
ments were like lightning. With one
flirt of his tail he Slowed himself around,
his great jaws opened, and | was look
ing right down upon him as he took the
cook in clear to the middle and bit him
in two so slick and clean that the upper
part of the body rolled away from the
sharks nose and remained OH the Surfcae
directly below me. After half minute
it began slowly to sink. but was not yet
out of sight when saw the shark seize
it. AS he grabbed it he rushed away
and we saw him no more.
The tragedy upset us in more ways
than one. Here we were, left without
a cook at the beginning of the voyage,
and there was something in his taking
off which aroused the superstition of
the hands forward. l think the captain
felt it as much as we did, but, of course,
he concealed it as much aS'pOsSible. All
that day we lay roasting and notion
less, and as the sun went down and a
uttered a heartfelt ''Thank Heaven"
We crowed too soon, however. The
breeze did not push us over five miles
before it tired out, and we were left as
before, the sky full of stars and the sea
like mirror. l was in the mates
watch and came Oh duty at midnight.
Indeed, we were all on duty for that
matter, as there was nothing whatever
to do, and we were, sleeping OIL
deck. l was aroused, however,
to take the lookout, and
took my seat on the heel of the bow
spirit as matter of form. AS we we're
not moving, no other sailing craft
could move, and the few steamers
crossing our line could see our lights
and avoid us. Something happened,
however, before had been on duty all
hour. The Josephine was rising and
falling OH the CLASSY swells, and swing
ing her head to every point of the COM
pass by turns, and l was scanning
the sea and the heavens in the most
perfunctory way, when an object sud-
denly came into view. 1t was black
spot against the darkness, and after
rising to my feet and watching it for a
few minutes l made out, as l thought,
the dismasted hull of small vessel. 1t
was coming down toward us, and, when
sure of this. l hailed the mate. He
came forward with the glass, and after
long look. said:
swell, that beats my time. It is the
hull of dismasted schooner and stands
up high and dry. There's lot of rattle
around her bows. and believe whale
is tangled up in it and towing the
wreck!"
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