Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1903-12-19

ters. who almost always have exciting
stories to tell about what happened to them
when the festive season caught them in
Chinese Tartary or the wtlds of New
Guinea.
A Christmas at Sea on a Raft
Christmas day, 1897. found one English
man facing death by hunger and thirst on
board a life raft 300 miles southeast of
MAZDA gascar.
His ship had foundered seven days be-
fore I'm a hurricane. The boats Were smash
ed by the fury of the waves, and some OF
the crew washed overheard. The rest made
a raft out of planks and spars, but during
the night high seas swept over the frail
structure and carried away most of the
water and provisions.
"All we had left" said the man who went
through this terrible experience were a
few tins of potted meat a small barrel of
biscuit. and the smallest of the water casks
That was all we had to keep life in twenty
five hungry men.
I'VE made it last long as we could, but
in four days everything was gone. Some
of the men fell into despair. and talked
about throwing themselves overheard. Per
hAps they would have done so, but during
the night of the fourth day half a dozen
big sharks SWAN around the raft in circles.
The sea was phosphorescent, and we could
see them plainly in the waves of livtd fire
which they stirred up they swan around
Even the half-crazed men who had talked
about drowning themselves shrank from
death In a sharks NAV. and stayed upon
the raft.
Next morning I saw by a pocket diary
which carried that the day was December
%. To keep up the mems spirits I told
them / had dreamed we were going to be
rescued on Christmas day. That appealed
20 the superstition inherent more or less in
all sailors, so / kept on telling them a ship
would come along and pick up that
day sure, until I began to believe it my
self. We even discussed gravely whether
the sail would heave in sight In the morning
or the afternoon, and one man who said he
guessed il would be toward evening be-
came quite unpopular.
Christmas morning broke with a dead
calm on the oily, bhstering and a blaz-
ing sky that aggravated our thirst tenfold
There was not ship In sight all morning
nothing except that CLASSY sheet of water
and that cruel. cloudless sky above us. 1t
was the same in the afternoon. and our
hopes fell as the sun sank slowly toward the
western horizon.
Just as we were beginning to depsair
one of the men screamed Historically and
pointed to a thin trail of smoke on the sky
line. 1t was a New Zealand liner headed
straight for our raft. In couple of hours
her doctor was giving a Christmas din
ner OF Stops and weak brandy and water"
An Albatross Christmas Dinner
This same man spent another Christmas
day off Cape Horn. He sailed from Valpa
riso in a British "windjammer." expecting
to reach his Scottish home in time to spend
his first Christmas there for many years.
But Gains delayed her for weeks in the
South Pacific ocean. and when she got off
Cape Horn she ran into tearing gale,
which brought her mizZen topmast down on
deck and ripped out all her sails. For days
she drifted helplessly. exposed to the full
fury of the western gale
The crew labored industriously at rigging
nd handing aa{ta
task OF tremendous difficulty, for giant COM
bers rolled over the forecastie head con-
tInually. filing the vessel amidships with
green seas
Suddenly. in the midst of this TOLL an ap-
prentice boy piped out:
81 say. fellers. this is Christmas day. Have
you all forgotten it7''
They had. In the fury of the tempest,
even the thought OF Christmas, usually so
relIgiously observed on British ships, had
slipped their reckoning.
Delay your tongue, retorted the grun
old mate. There won't be any Christmas
dinner today. except you usual whack OF
Iops scouse.
The skipper was experimenting the work
from the poop rail. and heard the eonversa-
ton.
Cook he bawled out. Lay aft here!'
The cook came out of his galley. and the
captain asked what he could give them for
a Christmas dinner.
s'Nothin' but split pears, sir. an salt horse
an marmalade There amt no turkeys In
my storeroom. sir" he said. sarcastically.
Lets catch one o them birds. suggested
an old tar pointing to several aloatrosses
which were circling about the wake of the
ship Wen stretch point this day, and
be forgiven for II. ] guess.
After several attempts. an albatross was
captured with a big fshhoolS baited with
salt pork, and dragged aboard triumph
antly. Served up nice and brown ana
swimming IN gravy. 1t looked so much Ike
real turkey that II warmed up the men $
hearts and made them think of the Christ
masses they had spent at home. But when
they tasted 1t, the resemblance ceased. 1t
was fEhy and tough. the meat was like
knotted rope yarn. and the gravy sug-
gestsd tar However, 1t Christmas
dinner all the same. and 1t was enjoyed as
keenly as the finest feast ashore that day.
An Americans Christmas Peril.
An American traveller who is well-known
cen mercially In the West Indies, was
MIXED up in one of the perennial revolu-
tons of Hayti In his hot and foolish youth.
Unhappily. he allied himself with the weak
or side. and on Christmas eve found him
self one of a small band of desperadoes
defending the stockaded town of Miragoane
against government army. which out
numbered them by more than a hundred to
onA
During the night the government soldiers