The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1889-05-26


That wave struck the forecastle with a
report like the bursting of siege gun,
stove through the oaken planks, and
dashed hundred tons of water through
the opening. All therein were drowned
and crushed to pieces, and the bodies of
several were whirled out again and car
ried like rags off into the waste of the
tornado. Heavily the ship rose from the
blow: it seemed as if she could never
rise again. But up she came, and the
weight of water went booming aft,
breaking down partitions and deluging
cabins and state rooms. More than fifty
men were killed or disabled by that sin
gle buffet, and the survivors believed
that the end Of all of them could be not
many minutes distant.
But it SO happened that no catastrophe
Of equal terror followed. The ship drove
on, sometimes threatening to breach to,
yet maintaining her steerage way beyond
all expectation, on the whole; and when
some time had passed-how long, no one
ever knew-the hurricane fell faint, and
in q breath or two, as it seemed. died
quite away. The darkness hghtened,
and straight overhead appeared a patch
of sky half yelled by wheeling shreds of
mist. They were in the center of the
tornado; and now the waves leaped up
with rebound so breakneck and astound-
ing that all sense of vertical and hori-
zontal was lost, and the vessel reared and
pitched liked a maddened bronco. This
phase of the battle between ship and
storm babe fair to be more dangerous
than the opening experience; but, how
ever that might be, it did not last long.
The inlzy cloud shut down again; again
rose the shrek of rushing winds, coming
now from the opposite point of the CON-
pass, and once more the dismantled and
bruised hulk sprang forward on her fear
full race, galvanized, as it were, into pre-
ternatural activity by force not her
own. Stripped bare as she was, and
weighted by the water she had taken on
board, she moved more steadily than at
first. Nor could the nerves of those
who still manned her continue to re-
spond as before to the call of hor-
ror. The worst was past for them, even
should death itself be in store. None
knew at that time who were living and
who were dead; each held on to what
ever support was nearest him and waited
in darkness and uncertainty for what
might come. The engine fires had been
put out, and all the men available were
taking turns at the wheel, in desperate
and unequal struggle to keep her before
the wind. Some felt that it would be a
relief if the ship would founder and go
down. But she swept on, outstripping
death itself. Suddenly one of the pas
sengers, who had been alternately pray
ing and disappearing in the cabin, broke
out in q yell of mad laughter, and rushed
up the companion way and out on the
deck. The hurricane caught him and
hurled him forward: ne was jammed be-
tween the stump of the mainmast and
the shaft of one of the anchors, which
had somehow been carried there; the
wind turned his coat over his head and
whipped it into ribbons in moment; in
another moment he was naked to the
waist; then he was twisted and beaten
and dashed about until he was shapeless
mass of bloody flesh and shattered bones.
At length a sudden pitch of the vessel
loosened the anchor, and it and the
corpse went overheard together, and the
ship swept on.
1t was perhaps an hour after this, and
long after the most sanguine had yielded
dumbly to despair, that the steamer rose
on a monstrous wave, which mounted
and mounted beneath her until it seemed
as if it would end by carrying her through
the sky; then, with last furious effort,
flung her forward, and slipped back
under her keel. The great vessel was
carried on by the impetus of the onset,
and fell with an appalling crash, not on
the sea again, but on the solid earth.
Hervoyage was over, and she was in port
at last.
Her iron ribs were crushed by the fall,
but her frame still held together, and all
motion ceased. The wind still shrieked
and the sea beloved and Numbered, but
no waves struck the ship. She seemed
to have been lifted beyond their reach;
but where they were no one knew, nor
could have guessed within a hundred
miles. After an interval, the quarter
master, who had been the last man at
the wheel, crept to the compaIsonway,
and, securing himself by rope passed
round his waist and made fast to the
railing below, looked out.
At first he could distinguish nothing,
and the rush of the wind stifed him; he
himself back and waited. He
had not waited long before it appeared
to him that the noise Of the hurricane
was abating, and the darkness was less
intense. At length he ventured forth
again. Moment by moment the wind
was decreasing; the change was not so
sudden as it had been when the center of
the tornado passed over them, and occa-
sionally there was return of rage and
fury. But these became less and less
and there were great cleavages
upwards through the clouds, revealing
the remote sparkle of stars. for the sun
had gone down long since One by one
those of the ships company and passen-
gers who remained came on deck and
stared about them. Were they on
desert island?
A number of square objects, curiously
symmetrical in shape, and distributed
with an appearance of regularity, be-
came visible in the immediate neighbor-
hood of the steamer. They were all of
nearly the same height, though in their
other dimensions they varied consider