Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1891-06-18
ON OCEAN STEAMERS.
The Kind of Men That Command Great


Tho Kind of Men That Command Great
Ships.
Clearheadcd, brainy. driving men are
these master mariners, and bearing pa
tiently q responsibility that needs an
iron will and a courage faltering at
nothing. There is no royal road to
their station, nor can willing hands
make them what they must be- They
can not crawl through cabin windows,
nor, for that matter, come flying in a
pier-head jump through the gangway
with one leg forward and the other aft.
They have to fight their way over the
bows and struggle cut of the ruclS and
smother in the fo'lls'le by sturdy buff
feting and hard knocks, by the persist
ent edging of stout shoulders backed
by strong hearts and steady brains II
it is in them they will make their way
in the end surely, and may set the
course and stump to windward as they
please, while others haul the weather
earrings and drink their grog protest.
ingly.
No; master mariners are made. not
born, and unlike many of their broth
ers in the government service. have to
y
enumerate them?-by a hundred quail
In the stoke-hole, however, one leaves
behind the formal and matthew atical
and sees the picturesque with all its
dirt unvarnished, with all its din and
clangor unsubdued. Under the splint-
ering silver of the electric lamps cones
of light illuminate great spaces garish-
ly and leave others in unbroken masses
of Shadaw.
When the furnace doors are opened
thirsty tongues of fire gush out, blue
spirals of gas spin and reel over the
bubbling mass of fuel, and great sheets
of flame suck half-burnt carbon over
the quivering fire wall into the fues.
With averted heads and smoking bodies
the stokers shoot their slice bars
through the melting hillocks, and twist
and turn them until they undulate like
serpents.
Through bulkhead doors the red and
gold of the furnaces checker the reek-
ing floor, and the tremulous roar of the
Gagged fires dominates the sibilant splut-
ter of the steam. Figures nearly naked,
gritty and black with coal, and pasty
with ashes and soaked with sweat, come
and go in the blazing light and in the
half gloom, and seem like Nightmares
from fantastic tales of demonology.
Facing the furnaces, the hollow up
scooping of the stol1er's shovel echoes
stridently on the iron floor, and these
speed pile coal on coal until the
fire fairly riots, and, half blinded, they
stagger backward for a cooling respite.
But it is only moment at the best, for
their taskmasters watch and drive them,
and the tale of furnaces does it's stint.
The iron tools blister their hands,
the roaring furnaces scar their bodies;
their chests heave like those of spent
swimmers, their eyes tingle in parched
sockets-but work they must, there is
no escape, no holiday in this madden
ing limbo. Steam must be kept up, or
perhaps a cruel record must be lowered.
The noise and uproar are deafening;
coal -trimmers trundle their barrows
increasingly from bunker to stoke hole,
or if the ships motion be too great for
the wheels, carry it in baskets, and
during the four long hours there is no
rest for those who labor here.
First-class ships muster from twelve
to fifteen men in each watch, and all
of these are shipped as seamen. Of
course the majority are such only in
name, though there is always a definite
number of sailors among them In
deed, to fly the blue flag at least ten of
the crew, in addition to the captain,
must be enrolled in the naval reserve,
and to be an A B there one must hand,
reef and steer deity.
These are the people who in port
stand by the ship; that is, those who
take, as required by law, their dis
charges in Liverpool on the return voy-
age and continue to work on board at
fixed wages per day while the ship re-
fits and loads. All hands, from the
skipper to the scullion's mate, must
ship at the beginning of each run
must ''sign articles" as it is called-be-
fore a board of trade shipping master.
AS the law has always regarded Jack
as particularly in need of its protec-
ton, because he is particularly exposed
to the wiles of sharpers," great stress
is laid in these articles upon his treat
ment, and therefore they exhibit in de-
tail the character of the voyage. the
wages, the quantity and quality of the
food, and a dozen other particulars
which evidence the safeguards thrown
about these wards of the admiralty"
by quasi-paternal government.
Jack knows all this, and be sure he
stands up most boldly and assertively,
at times with great deal of unneces-
sary swagger and bounce, for all the ar
ticles-''his articles him.
The boatswain selects the ships COM
pany, and the sea-birds hutter on
board. usually few hours before the
vessel hauls into the stream. They fly
light, these western ocean sailors, and
their kits are such as beggars would
laugh at, even in Radcliffe highway.
Generally they are in debt to the
Sailors Home-they pay seventeen bob
a week for their grub and lodging-and
many of them just touch their advance
money, as a guarantee of receipt, and
then see most of it disappear. for goods
fairly furnished, into the superintepd-
ent's monl-bag.
But they are philosophers in their
sad way, and are apt, if they find them
selves safely on board with couple of
shillings in their 'baccy pounches. with
pan, an extra shirt, a pannikin, box
of matches and bar of soap, to feel
that the anchor can not be tripped too
soon as they are equipped for an adj
venture anywhere, even to the Hin
lies, beast or west" as their doleful
ditty announces.
Leaving out of question the response