The midland journal. (Rising Sun, Md.) 1885-1947, 1901-12-06
THE HERMIT OF CAPE MALEA.
Pathetic story of an English Sea Cap.
tain Among Grecinn
GOatherds.

About 25 years ago there was a
young sailor who by dint of hard work,
integrity of character and firmness of
will reached, at the age of 26, the sum-
NIT of his notwithstanding mas
ter of what then would be called a
good-sized steamship, some 900 tons
| register. Upon this accession to good
fortune he married the girl of his
| choice, who had patiently waited for
him since as boy and girl sweethearts
they parted on his first going to sea.
And with rare complacency his owners
gave him the inestimable privilege of
carrying his young bride to sea with
him, writes +. I. Bullen, in London
! Spectator.
How happy he was! How deep and
all-embracing his pride, as steaming
down the grimy Thames he explained
to the light of his eyes all the wonders
that she was now witnessing for the
first time, but which he had made IA
miliar to her mind by his oft-repeated
sea stories during the few bright days
between voyages that it had been able
to develop to courtship. The ship was
bound to several Mediterranean ports,
the time being late autumn, and con-
sequently the most ideal season for
honeymoon that could possibly be
imagined. Cadiz, Genoa, Naples, Ven
ice, delightful tour with not one
| weary moment wherein to wish for
something else. Even a flying visit to
old Rome from Naples had been pos
sible, for the two officers, rejoicing in
their happy young shippers joy, saw
to it that no unnecessary cares should
trouble him, and bore willing testi-
mony in order that he should get as
much delight out of those halcyon days
as possible, that the entire crew were
as docile as could be wished, devoted
to their bright commander and his
beautiful wife. Then at Venice came
orders TO proceed to Galatz and load
wheat for home. Great was the glee
of the girl-wife. She would see Com
stantinople and the Danube. Life
would hardly be long enough to re-
count all the wonders of this most
wonderful of wedding trips. And they
sailed, with hearts overbrimming with
Joy as the blue sky above them
seemed yelling over with sunlight,
! Wind and weather favored them,
nothing occurred to cast a shadow over
their happiness until nearing Cape
Ma1ea at that fatal hour of the MORN
ing, just before the dawn, when more
collisions occur than at any other
time. they were run into by a blum
dering Greek steamer coming the 9TH
er way and cut down amidships to the
waters edge. To their peaceful sleep
or quiet appreciation of the nights
silvern splendor succeeded the over
whelming food, the hiss and roar of
escaping steam, the suffocating en-
brace Of death. In that dread fight for
| life all persisted but one, he so lately
the happiest of men, the skipper. In
stinctively clinging to a fragment of
wreckage, he had been washed ashore
under Cape Malea at the ebbing of the
scanty tide, and his strong physique re-
asserting itself enabled him to reach
! The plateau. Here he was found gaz-
,ng seward by some boat-herds, who,
in search of their nimble=footed f1ocks,
uau "uHuSfSu uoHH the PfeclpluOuS
side of the mountain. They endeay=
pred to persuade him to come with
them back to the world, but in vain
He would live, gratefully accepting
some of their poor provision, but from
that watching place he would not go.
And those rude peasants, understand
ing something of his depth of woe,
sympa thized with him so deeply that
without payment, OF hope of any, they
helped him to build his hut and kept
him supplied with such poor morsels of
| food and drink as sufficed for his stunt-
ed needs.
And there, with his gaze fixed during
all his waking hours upon that in
scrutable depth wherein all his bright
hopes had suddenly been quenched, he
lived until quite recent years, "the
world forgetting, by the world for
got" a living monument of constancy
and patient, accomplishing grief BY
his hunble friends, whose language
he never learned, he was Regarded as
a saint, and when one day they GANG
upon his iifeless body fallen forward
upon his knees at the little ungiazed
window through which he was wont to
look out upon the sea where his dear
one lay, they felt confirmed in their
opinion of the sanctity of the hermit
Of Cape Malea.