Evening star., 1900-01-27
THE OCEAN GRAVEYARD
Sable Island is Fringed With the Wrecks Of
Lost Vessels
Claimed More Than Two Hundred
Lives i'm One Tear-FiEhting for
Its Own Existence
Gustav Kobbe in Ainsley's Magazine.

Gustav Kobbe in Ainsley's Magazine.
Sable Island belongs to Nova Scotia, is
l45 miles from Halifax and IS miles
east of Cape Canso. 1t is a treeless.
shrubiess waste, scanned by wind and wave
and of ever-changing aspect A cone
shaped hill near the east end once a NOR,
undulation of sand, is now over hundred
feet high, and is still growing Other hill
locks are gradually being moved away by
storms The hillocks are liable to be un-
dermined so swiftly and swept out of ex-
iseence that they are carefully watched
from the various stations on the island
there being no certainty how far an
inroad of sea Will extend after each suc-
cessful attack. Even the coarse grass of
me island grows in a different manner
from that OF the mainland. Ii does NOT
Dear seed, but shoots up from roots which
run along under the sand. During the win
ter the sand is blown over the grass and
DurleS II sometimes three or four feet ,Iaan
% but tne hardy blades grow up next season,
as III tne Island sands had protected them
from the cold of winter in order 10 make
them all the stronger
Ihe island itself is fighting for self-pres-
efVatlon 1t seems as if it drew shins
into Its fatal embrace as rallying points for
ITS loose and shifting sand, thus to pro-
tect Itself by a bulwark of wrecks against
annlhllaton by the sea. Tradition saws
that when Sable Island was discovered nv
Cabot in 144I it was eighty miles long
and ten miles wide. In 1S0o when a racc,,o
station was established there, it was only
Iorty miles long. Since then it has shrunlx
10 put little more than twenty miles in
length, and in width il is only mile at its
widest Within twenty-eight years the
western end lost seven miles. Shoals over
which the ocean now surges are pointed
out as former sites of light houses One
OF these was SO swiftly undermined by the
sraats. sea tnat II nad TO be abandoned with the
greatest precipitation. The spot where
once stood the superintendent's house is
now under two fathoms of water.
me island, rapidly diminishing at its
western end. is slightly gaining at its
eastern Slowly, like a ship dragging its
ahchor, 1t is moving eastward. Will it
ever reach the edge of the shoals stand
totterlng on the brink of the abyss till it
receives its coup de grace and plunge over
the submarine bank forever into the
depths? Unfortunately, its end will prob
ably be less dramatic. There is good
ground for believing that this gray sand
bar Will slowly wear away until il becomes
another submerged shoal added to an am
buscade already some sixty miles in length
for a line of breakers extends sixteen
miles from one end of the island and
twenty-eight miles from the other
In the space of single year Sable Island
claimed more than two hundred lives. In
fact, so many wrecks line the shoals of
this ocean graveyard that the new pile
up on the old, like bodies heaped in one
ditch. The Crofton Hall, an iron sailing
ship wrecked two years ago on the north
east bar. broke in two about amidships.
The pieces have drifted together again. and
the islanders suppose that she struck cross
wise upon an old submerged wreck. and is
settling over it, which accounts for the two
parts coming together. Nor is the island
satisfied with the awful tribute which it
eNactS from the living. The same infurma-
ant who writes me about the Crofton Hall
adds that the barque John Mcleod. which
was wrecked off DEVILS Island at the en-
trance to Halifax harbor. has drifted
ashore on Sable Island bottom up-a wreck
of wreck!
The story of animal life on Sable Island
Is strange. Roaming the sandy wastes are
herds of wild ponies guarded by patri-
archal stations. These ponies resemble the
horses on the sculptures of Nineveh and
approach the beholder seemingly out of the
framework Of antiquity. They are stocky
and remarkable for their long names,
which in instances have been known TO
grow to the length of three yards These
ponies are the remnant of a stock thought
to have been left by some Portuguese fish
ermen - "Portingails'' the old records
quantity call them-who touched at the is
land on their fishing expeditions at even
an earlier date than the Marquis de la
Roche AT one time there We're from 400 to
800 wild ponies on the island, but their
number has been decreased by expectation,
the severity of the winters and. some peo-
pie think. by the importation of improved.
domeSticated stations, which have made
the stock less hardy and consequently more
susceptible to death from exposure There
are now between eighty and hundred wild
ponies and about thirty for domestic
Mounted on ponies the Hfe-savers gailop
over the dunes and among the hilocks
their long patrols. and the lfeboats are
drawn to the scenes of shipwreck by teams
of five ponies. three at the shaft and two
leaders. Some of the wild ponies are sent
to Halifax every year or two. and are sold
at auction at an average price Of from SD
to SIS.
The "Portingalls'' also stocked the island
with cattle, which increased so rapidly that
people from the mainland made expeditions
to the island and returned with enough
live stock to make their trips most profit
able. AT one time the island was quite
overrun with rabbits. Then two rat-infest-
ed Norwegian vessels Were wrecked there
and the rats. swimming ashore, began to
eXterminate the rabbits and to attack the
government stores. Cats We're then i'm
ported from Halifax to kill the rats. and
after while the cats increased so in num-
ber that dogs were imported to kill the
cats. Latterly the island was again over
run with rats from wrecked vessels, and
another cargo of cats was imported from
Halifax. Once there were pigs the is
land: but they have been exterminated be-
cause they had become ghouls, feasting on
the remains of castaways. Death in its
most horrid forms is always the burden Of
Sable Islands story.