El Paso daily herald. (El Paso, Tex.) 1881-1901, 1900-07-14

People who write about other mems feel
ings when death is beginning to paw them
on the shoulder write mostly from the
imagination, and so far as we seen they
all do it wrong. I've been there. I've
felt that bony touch more than once, and
SO know. A man isn't of necessity ter
rified. Phal.tasms of his past deeds do
not invariV bly flash before him, nor does
he always lose his nerve and move as a
hayward automaton. 1 can't speak for
others, but what 1 personally have felt
has been dull carelessnesS for what IS
going to happen and a curiosity about
what will come afterward. 1t seems to
me that a thinking man with the ambi-
ton of a mouse should never fear death,
because, once dead, he becomes wiser than
all the living remnant of the human race.
There are men 1 know whom physical
danger turns into a helpless mass of pal
pitating nerves. Shelf, for instance, is
one of those BY Jove!''-he smiled grim
ly-'by Jove, I'd give a finger to have
Theodore Shelf in my shoes just now and
force him to couple these wires and spring
believe-yes, 1 verify believe-the expe-
rience would turn him honest. All, there
goes one bell. Times up"
Through lull in the wind the tenor
clang of the ships bell came down to him,
and on its heels, more dimly, the look
outs dissyllabic assurance in the dismal
minor key that he was awake and had
nothing to report
Then Patrick Cambel made connection
and sent through the green, silk covered
wires a current direct from the steamers
dynamo, and on that moment was thrown
against the iron roof of the stateroom as
though the internal machine had exploded
beneath his very feet.
The campstool was Kicked into the air,
the wet canvas dodgers shed water in
streams, and Captain Owen Kettle fell
spread eagled on the planking of the bridge.
From the hatch in the foredeck before
him had sprung a volcano of rudy flame,
spouting through vast pillows of smoke.
The iron plating round it buckled and
split, and the whole steamer gave trem-
bling, frightened leap. Presently from
the black, windy night above there fell
an avalanche of debris which smote the
steamer and the water round like canister
shot from a distant cannonade.
Then came a humping jar from the en-
CINE room, repeated twice over, and then
the engines stopped. MY God!'' thought
Kettle. He's overshot the mark. If she's
broken down, we're done for. - But for
all that he did not lose for an instant his
presence of mind or instinct of command,
but picking himself up clapped stumpy
shrilly.
At first no one answered his summons.
From the forecastle from the stokehold.
from aft, came the ships company, max
ing by instinct for the high land of the
bridge deck, and from his eminence the
little captain scowled down upon them
and swore. 1t is not a wholesome sight to
see grown men screaming through sheer
terror, and the sooner they are ASSOCIATED
either by words or blows from this frame
of mind the more they will be able subse-
quently to respect themselves. By dint OF
a vinegar tongue and suggestive move
ments toward pair of implements which
bulged his jacket pockets Kettle drove n
gang of five to set the miZzen trysail to
keep the steamer head to sea- She was
rapidly losing her way, and if she preached
to beam on, with that heavy sea running
the lower decks would be filled with green
water continuously, and that with such a
gaping rent where the hatch had been
meant simply a rapid swapping.
Then the captain looked round him
seemingly for a messenger. The mate of
the watch hung to the handle of the
engine room telegraph, which still pointed
to full speed ahead looking daZed and
helpless. The quartermaster's hands were
mechanically saving at the spokes of the
wheel, but it was equally evident that he
then Cambel raced up the bridge ladder
three steps at time.
All, cried Kettle, now, you are a
man who can keep his head in a bit of a
huster, and, by James, you re the only
one on board. just tumble forward, will
you, and get down into that hold and
see what's wrong"
Cambel nodded and turned to go with
out word. From two or three of the
men a thin cheer rose as he passed them,
and before he had gained the bottom of
the ladder on to the iron lower deck half a
dozen were on the top rungS after him.
Sailors will seldom refuse to follow when
superior shows the way, and besides
these fellows were getting over their first
panic and were beginning to be ashamed
of themselves for giving way to it.
The mizzen trysail was not then SET and
because the steamers way had left her she
was falling off into the trough and rolling
bulwarkS under to every sea- She was
shipping water fast The Dreaming, solid
masses sluicing across the deckplates
smote the men breeoh high with the
weight of rams, and he who, when the
waters were upon him. left his hold would
have been swept like cork to leeward.
But by the hatch coamings, the winches
and odd wet streamers of rope they claw
ed their way forward and covered round
the great hole made by the explosion,
holding there by the edge of the twisted
riven plates. The seas creamed over their
heads, falling in noisy cascades into the
blackness below, and from out of that
darkness, above all the believing of wind
and the changing of iron and the other
din, came sodden whistling of water
which seemed to confirm the worst fears.
"Poh,' said some one, trying to be
oheery, that's only the small sup she's
shipped since the matches were blown off
The bilge pumps'll soon kick that drop
overheard. -