The Denison review. [volume] (Denison, Iowa) 1867-current, 1902-04-15

~ though he is to the dangers
of a life on the deep. The
name of Sable island carries with it
more than the customary danger.
Since the earliest days of European
exploration in American waters it has
been more greatly feared by mariners
whose journeyings brought them with
in range of possible encounter with
it's shifting sands and tangle of dam
gerous shoals.
Since that time, early in the six
teenth century, when the good English
ship Admiral went ashore on the bari
rem sands and it's hardy pioneer pas
sengers and fearless crew were lost,
to the present day scarcely a year has
passed that has not added one or more
ships to the list of wrecks for which
the island is accountable. So many
have there been that the large map
of the island in use by the English adj
miralty fails to provide room along
the shores to note them all. Through
out the centuries that have passed
since the first Europeans braved the
dangers of unknown seas to reach the
American continent it has stood as u
menace to navigation upon which hun
dreds of ships, great and small, have
found an untimely end. To-day the
waves of the Atlantic wash the sands
of the island over thousands of skele-
tons that represent lives lost on it's
shores, and bodies left to add to the
story of death told by this graveyard
of the Atlantic.''
And where is this Sable island? The
ordinary atlas scarcely shows it, but
no mariner would ask for it's location.
They know it; they know it's latitude
and longitude to the minute and sec
ond. For the lay mind it lies south of
Newfoundland, 145 miles from Halifax
and SIS miles east of Cape Canso, and
belongs to Nova Scotia, though to that
Canadian province it has been nothing
save an expense and a sorrow.
Boats travelling the northern route
from either New York or Boston to
Liverpool must pass within less than
100 miles of it, and 100 miles in bad
weather and thetreacherous waters of
that port of the Atlantic can scarcely
be said to be outside the danger line
1t lies, also, almost in the line of pas
sage for vessels plying between our
eastern ports and the Gulf of ST. Law
renee, and but little ways south of
the route taken by boats plying be-
tween Europe and Quebec or Montreal.
The history of Sable island goes back
to 1447, when it was discovered by
Cabot. At that time it was so miles
long by ten miles wide. But it has been
gradually drifting away, and in 1902,
when the first rescue station was es-
tablished upon its shores, it measured
but 40 miles in length. Even the wrecks
with which it has seemingly attempted
to fortify itself against the ravages
If the Atlantic has not diminished the
rate at which it is disappearing, for at
the present time it is scarcely 20 miles
in length by but one mile in width at
its widest point. Within the short
space of 2S years seven miles have been
swept from its western end. Gradu-
ally it is moving eastward, but that it
will ever pass beyond the edge of the
shoals and plunge over the submarine
bank into the deeper waters beyond
seems scarcely probable. Students of
the sea who have watched it's shifting
sands say that in time it will wear
away until nothing is left but sub
merged shoal that will be even more
dangerous to navigation than it is in
its present condition, when the sands
afford shelter for wrecke mariners
if they live to reach the shores, and
also as foundation upon which to
build lighthouses and rescue stations.
At the present time the shores of the
long, narrow island are formed by two
parallel ridges of sand. These inclose
valley of sand, and this holds a shall
low, salt water lake eight miles in
+! length. This lake shifts with the shift
ing sands, and at one time was consid-
erably larger than it is to-day. Now
it has but one shallow opening into
the ocean, while some few years ago
it was not only much larger than at
| the present time, but was deeper and
being connected by fair sized channel
| with the Atlantic afforded harbor for
small vessels. This channel was clos ed
during heavy storm in 1896, and the
closing imprisoned two vessels which
had entered the lake for shelter. They
were doomed to rot where they Law.
for it was not until 1881 that even the
small channel that exists to-day was
opened by another storm.
Two lighthouses and four rescue
stations are maintained on the island
by the Canadian government, and
these have rendered valuable assist.
aTice to the unfortunates cast upon it's
shores since they were first estab.
| lished. While in the earlier days some
effort was made topopulate the place,
and make it of some commercial im-
portance, theysare made no longer.
To-day there are less than so people
| living upon its sands. Of these 20 are
employed by the government in keep
ing the lights and in the work of res.
cue, and the remainder represent the
women and children of their families.
These are the regular inhabitants,
though at times the number is larger