Virginian-pilot. (Norfolk, Va.) 1898-1911, 1900-04-14
TIE OCEAN GRAVEYARD
Sable Island is Fringed With the
Wrecks Of Lost Vessels.
Claimed Moro Than Two Hundred Lives
in One Year Fighting Foe Its own
Existence.


east of Cape canso. 1t Is treeless
shrubless waste, scanned by wind and
wave and of ever-changing aspect. A
cone-shaped hill near the cast end,
once a mere undulation of sand. is
now over hundred feet high, and is
still growing. Other hillocks are gra-
dually being moved away by storms.
The hillocks are liable to be under
mined SO swiftly and swept out of ex-
istence that they ire CAREFUL watched
from the various stations on the is
land, there being no certainty how far
an inroad of sea will extend after
each successful attack Oven the
coarse grass of the island grows in
different manner from that OF the
mainland. 1t does not bear seed, but
shoots up from roots which run along
under the sand. During the winter the
sand Is blown over the grass, and
buries 1t sometimes three or four feet
deep. But the hardy blades grow up
next season, as if the island sands had
protected them from the cold of WIN
ter in order to make them all the
stronger
The island itself is fighting for self
preservation. 1t seems as IL it drew
ships into its fatal embrace rs rallying
points for its loose and shifting sands,
thus to protect itself by bulwark of
wrecks against humiliation by the
sea. Tradition. says that when Sable
Island was discovered by Cabot. in 1447
st was eighty miles long and ten miles
wide. In 1902. when a rescue station
was established there. it was forty
miles long. Since then 1t has
C m mn q
twenty miles in length. and in
width 1t Is only II mile at it's widest
Within twenty eight years the western
end lost seven miles. Shoals over
which the ocean now surges are point
ed out as former sites of lighthouses.
One of these was SO swiftly under
mined by the sea that 1t had TO be
abandoned with the greatest precipita-
ton. The spot where once stood the
superintendent house is now under
two fathoms of water.
The island. rapidly diminishing at its
western end, is slightly gaining at its
eastern. Slowly, like a ship dragging
Its anchor, 1t is moving eastward.
VIII 1t ever reach the edge of the
shoals stand tottering on the brink of
the abyss till it receives its coup de
grace and plunge over the submarine
bank forever into the depths? I'm
fortunately. its end will probably be
less dramatic. There is good ground
for believing that this gray sand bar
Will slowly wear away until it becomes
another submerged shoal added to an
ambuscade already some sixty miles
In length-for q mile OF breakers ex-
tends 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 upon the old like bodies; heap
cd In one ditch. The Crofton Hall. an
iron sailing ship wrecked two vars
ago on the northeast bar, broke in two
about anlidships. The pieces have
drlfted together again. and the island
ers suppose that she. struck crosswise
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 living.
The same informant who writes me
about the Crofton Hall adds that the
bark John Mcleod, which was wrecked
off Devils island at the entrance to
Halifax harbor has drifted ashore on
Sable island bottom up-a wreck of n
wreck!
The story of animal life on Sable Is
land is strange. Roaming the sandy
wastes are herds of wild ponies guard
ed by patriarchal stations. These nc
mes resemble the horses on the sculp-
lures OF Nineveh, and approach the
Deholder seemingly out of the frame
work of antiquity. They are stocly and
remarkable for their long names. which
In instances have heen known to grow
to the length of three yards. These
ponies ire the remnant Of n stock
thought to have been left by some Por-
tuguese fishermen-"Portingall the
old records quantity call them-who
touched at the island IN fbnir UohIpor
expeditions at even an earlier date than
the Marquis de la Roche. AT one time
there were from four to five hundred
wild ponies on the island. but their
number has been decreased by exporta-
ton, the severity OF the winters. and,
some people think. by the importation
of improved, domesticated stations,
which have made the stock less hardy
and consequently more susceptible 10
death from exposure. There nre now
Between eighty and n hundred wild DO
MES and about thirty for domestic use.
Mounted on ponies the life-savers gall
Top over the dunes and among the nil
locks on their long patrols, and the
llfeboats 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
cold at auction at an average price of
from sis 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 re-
turned with enough live stock to make
their trips profitable. AT one time the
island was quite overrun with rabbits
Then two rat-infcsted Norwegian YES
sells were wrecked there, and the rats.
swimming ashore. began to eXtermi-