The Auckland Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News and The Echo. SATURDAY, JUNE 3, 1922. SNATCHED FROM DEATH.

Auckland Star, Volume LIII, Issue 130, 3 June 1922, Page 6

The Auckland Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News and The Echo.

SATURDAY, JUNE 3, 1922. SNATCHED FROM DEATH.

For the cause that lochs assistance, For the wrong thai needs resistance, For the future in the distance, And the good that toe can do.

There will be a universal feeling of profound relief at the news that every man on the Wiltshire has been rescued. Never in the history of wrecks on the New Zealand coast has there been a period of such suspense involving the fate of so many lives. The people of Xcw Zealand, to say nothing of the outside world, were able to follow the fight with death from the very first. The almost despairing reports and appeals sent on Thursday pictured the crew in a desperate plight. It was clear that there was a grave danger that these men, clinging to a battered wreck in a terrible sea on an iron-bound coast,

might at any moment be swept away to take their chance in a hand-to-hand

grapple with death under dreadful conditions. To those who watched the struggle from afar it seemed pitiful and ironic that the audience should he watching the drama in such safety and the actors be playing their involuntary parbs in such peril. Fortunately, science, skill, determination, and devotion won the day. By means of wireless help was summoned the moment the disaster happened, and relief immediately sped on its way to the scene. If the arrangements for providing means of succour were not as complete as they might have been, there was not only no shadow of reflection on the way in which the human element responded to the appeaj, but all who took part in the rescue are to be most warmly congratulated on their devotion and the complete success of their splendid efforts.

Shipwreck brings out the best in men, whether they are victims or rescuers, and the rare exceptions serve to throw into clearer relief the patience, heroism, and self-sacrifice that are so frequently exhibited. British mercantile annals are rich in splendid records of endurance, duty and bravery. "Women and children first," is as much a tradition as that the captain shall be the last to leave the ship. The "Now then Smith!" of the merchant e-aptain who landed a rescue party at Messina during the great earthquake is typical of the spirit of this great service. Grace Darling is a national, and indeed an intcrnationl, heroine, standing for all the initiative and courage tliat in countless instances and in every sea have challenged death in the rescue of the sea's victims. It was not for want of trying that the men on the Wiltshire took so long to get a precious line ashore to men who were prepared to risk their own lives to help them. The imperilled men on the ship passed through a long period of acute anxiety. Clinging "just an inch from death's 'black fingers," exposed for weary hours to wet. cold, hunger, and thirst, thej' must have reached almost the limit of endurance when the means of rescue was established. I.f the rescuers were in less danger, they were exposed to exceedingly trying conditions. Nature seemed determined that there should be no mitigation of the fury in which the struggle was set: everybody, rescued and rescuer, was to be tested. The story of the rescue is moving and inspiring, and the public will mingle with its thankfulness for the safety of the ship's company, gratitude towards the men of tne sea and the land who fought with death and the elements and prevailed. Both parties lived up to the best traditions of the sea services and the race of seamen to

which they belong. They would not ask for more praise than this.