THE WRECK

Evening Post, Volume CXXIII, Issue 55, 6 March 1937, Page 20

THE WRECK

' "She's struck!" cried the "I see her now; she shivers suddenly in all her timbers. * The' sea pours through the enormous hole in her side; its roar sounds like victorious laughter echoing from inside the hold. A lifeline has beeri.carried from the shore to the ship, and the passengers and crew arrive one by one on the shore, thera to watch the death of the gallant craft. ■She. is the least bit lower.in the water than she was- when they left her. The wind screams uproariously, and the blinding sheets of rain make it-difficult for anyone to see anything. The sullen grey sky is almost covered with equally sullen-looking clouds, which scud across the sky with amazing rapidity. Now and then searing flashes of jagged lightning pierce these clouds, and turn 'their greyness into blinding light, which is gone in a moment Great rolls of thunder sound from the inside of the great, luminous bowl, like some native tribe on the warpath, beating its drums in time to the frenzied dancing of the wily witch-doctor! As night draws migh,'the old ship sinks gradually lower, and the aged captain (who refused to.go to one of the cottages on the water-front) is seen to have tears, not only due to the keen wind, running down '.his old, weather-beaten face, for hie loved his old ship very dearly. All; through that stormy night he stands,-huddled-in his clothes, and watching, watching for his ship! \\': Suddenly she shivers and rolls over on her side! With a great roar the now victorious sea over-runs her shining, wet decks, and she sinks majestically under the waves.

The russet-red dawn shines peacefully over the galloping,1 white-crested waves, as if nothing could be so lovely as the- death ■of the gallant little ship." • ■ ;■■/ V "NANCY-PRETTY" (13).

Petone.