The daily morning journal and courier., 1906-07-19

her bowspirit gone and her hull leaky. On February F, 1896, her crew were taken off by the British steamer snow flake near the Irish coast and for four months she drifted to and fro across the tracks of the Atlantic passenger liners. She was sighted no less than twenty-tWo times and the British Ad- miraIty sent out a warshIp, Whlch found her and lowed her toland. Ihls process was also adopted by the French Admiralty with regard to the British brig Hvaline which had travelled $500 miles and been adrift All days, being sighted nineteen times before she got near enough to the coast of France to enable warship to secure her, She had been several times set fire but re- fused to burn, and she was merely bulk when secured.
 These cases refer to crafts which are tenantless on the ocean, but there are as many instances on record of waifs which retain their crews. Perhaps the most remarkable of all these was the sky sail clipper T. F. Oakes, the first American iron square rigger ever launched. She enjoys the distinction of being one of the very few vessels ever posted at Lloyd's as missing and sub- sequently showing up, She left Hong Kong on July 4, 1896, for New York, for which voyage her usual time was about 120 days She was out more than 250 days, and not reinsurable, her agents having given her up as lost, and the relatives of her master, Capt E. w. Reed and his wife, who was on board with him, had gone into mourning. Then on the 260th day, March P, 1897, she brought up In New York, having been lowed in by the oil tank steamer Kasbek, which came upon her 300 miles east of Sandy Hook, the steamer being outward bound from Philadelphia.
 In trying to take her in tow the haw- ser caught in the steamers screw and jammed it, rendering her helpless. The Oakes was equally helpless, her crew being stricken down by scurvy, and the two ships barely escaped a collision, there being only boats length be- tween them when the wind drove them apart. The steamer was helpless for eight hours, during which period the Oakes was driven out of sight by storm. The Kasbek's engineers had to force out her shaft by means of wood- en plugs. The hawser was worked clear of the propeller and then the steamer started off in quest of the Oakes, sighting her again some hours later in worse storm, which lasted for two days, during which time 1t was impossible to send a boat to her, but the steamer lay by he'd till the wealth CT abated and then took effective steps to succor the crew and get the craft un- der control.
 It was found that everybody on board the Oaks was afflicted with scurvy, of which five seamen had died, save the captains wife, upon whom, through sheer pressure of necessity, much of the labor of working the ship fell, The second and third mates were unable to go aloft. The Chinese steward was also incapable of sailor tasks Twelve sea- men lay in their berths helpless. The captain had been stricken with paraly- sis. Tn the China Sea two typhoons drove the ship out of her course, and though intending to round the Cape of Good Hope, she had to make for Cape Horn.
 Another remarkable case was that of the steamer Perthshire off the Austra- Han coast in 1899, which drifted about for forty-five days helplessly, covering 1,400 miles before being rescued. On April 26 she left Sydney for Bluff Head, a four days voyage. On May 26 8 schooner put into Sydney reporting that she had sighted the missing steamer two weeks previously, when the Perthshire had been adrift ten days without sighting a sail, her propeller being broken clean off in the tailshaft and her spread of canvas being too limited to give her even steering way.
 As she had seventy persons aboard and was drifting north toward some evil reefs, every available craft was sent in quest of her, including two war ships, several liners and a fotilla of tugs. Eventually the steamer Tolune came upon her before daylight on June IS. some 750 miles off her course, the Petrhshire being deserted just an hour before the Tohune's captain had deter mined to abandon the search. A tow- line was passed and for thirtysix hour the Tolune got her along. Then a heavy sea tore them apart and to get them coupled again rockets with lines attached, had to be fired from one ship to the other.
 Another almost incredible story of derelict is that of the wooden bark Sid- dartha, which left Jacksonville on January 16, 1S99 lumber laden, for Liverpool, and became dismasted in gale, a heavy sea then drenching her from stem to stern, destroying all the provisions and carrying away the gal ley. For twenty days her crew of twelve subsited on raw potatoes. The captain had his forehead laid open and one eye blinded by blow from a stanchion; the boatwain had an arm broken; the chief mate and two sea- men were stricken with serious illness due to their weakened condition, and as day succeeded day without prospect of rescue despair settled upon all.
 Two steamers passed without sight her, and then the Norwegian bark Ver- dande came by and took them off. For nearly five months this the derelict drifted helplessly about the ocean, covering more than 1900 miles and be- ing reported no fewer than forty-one 1 times The captain of the seanler Oak