Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1904-08-27
LONELY SEA SPOTS
soLITUDEs OF THE OCEAN THAT
ARE SELDOM TRAvERsED.
Ships Go on Established Routes From
Port to Port as the
Crow Flies.
From the Chicago Chronicle.

From the Chicago Chronicle.
There are deserts on the ocean as weil
as on the dry land-vast wastes upon which
the eye of man has never rested and which
have seldom. II ever. been crossed by the
ships of commerce. The waves on these
wastes have never been parted by the Prov
OF a sailing vessel or dashed by the pro-
peller of a steamer: immense solitudes
where the flap of sail is never heard nor
the strident cry of siren; veritabe des-
erts. whose silence is broken only by the
bowling Of the wind and the ros of the
waves which have been vainly pursuing
one another since the day of creation.
These deserts lie unforgotten betwixt the
narrow ocean highways Travelled by vessels.
In such waste places OF the sea a disabled
ship, driven out of its course by a hurri-
cane. may drift for months. tossed by the
ceaseless ground swell, without being able
cape is the possibility that some ocean cur
rent may drag her into more freQuented
region.
More Of a Desert Than Ever.
1t is generally supposed that BY reason
Of the universal increase OF maritime traf-
nc the sea Is everywhere furrowed by yes
sells. This is mistake. Ocean commerce
has grown enormously during the last half
century, but that development Is due to
the substitution OF steam navigation for
the old-fashioned employment of sailing
vessels When the first steamer began to
churn the water with its paddle wheels the
sailing fleets ceased to increase. With the
advent of the screw propeller they began
to decrease. The gradual but constant dis
appearance Of sailing ships made the ocean
more of desert than before. Sailing
vessels had their established routes in ac-
cordance with winds. currents and seasons.
The gaps between the routes taken by the
outward bound and homeward bound ships
were often considerable. Moreover the ca
PRECIOUS elements not infreauently played
the mischief with nautical Instruments. and
as result the field of operation for ocean
shipping was vastly expanded.
This is no longer true today. The liner
goes straight ahead, In defiance Of wind
and wave, the ports between which sne
plies are great industrial commercial
centers, whittier come numberless rail-
ways, serving as prolongations of the lines
of navigation. Freight cars carry their
loads of merchandise to the lesser ports and
the cities of the interior. The railway has
killed coastwtse navigation.
The ocean highways are, therefore. any
thing but numerous. The most frequented
of oceans is the Atlantic. Apart from the
polar seas, we see that in its northern part
there is only one desert zone-a dreary
waste Of waters between the routes from
Europe to the United States or Canada.
and those from Europe to the Antilles. In
the south, between the routes from South
America or the western American coast
and the routes from South Africa. extends q
desert occasionally traversed by the steam
ers of the lines from Cape Town and Mo-
Zambique, which, when the coffee season Is
at its height in Brazil, cross the Atlantic
for cargoes at Rio Janeiro and Santos.
Pacific the Sahara of Oceans.
The Indian ocean Is freQuented only in
the north by lines out of India and Indo-
China. and a little In the west by liners
from Oceania. which call at Colombia, and
then make straight for Australia. Two
lines, each with a steamship a month. fol-
low a slender lane from Australia to Cape
Town. The Pacific is the Sahara OF the
great seas. Saving only the steamships
from the far east to California and British
Columbia. a line from Sydney to San Fran
cisco. and one-horse line with sailings
four or Ave times a year, between Tahiti
and the United States-save for these mere
rfbbon-like streaks the Pacific Is a desert
Only a few native canoes ply daringly from
island to island in archipelagoes grit round
with coral reefs-veritable ocean grave
yards, the terror of seafaring men.
How many ships of which we have re-
ceived no tidings, and of which not so much
a drifting spar has ever been picked up.
have been dragged by irresistible winds
into those soltudes OF the south Pacific no
one will ever know, for the ocean guards
its prey full we'll.