BRAVE DEEDS THAT HAVE NO RECOMPENSE.

Marlborough Express, Volume XLI, Issue 175, 26 July 1907, Page 7

BRAVE DEEDS THAT HAVE NO RECOMPENSE.

How gloriously some men rise to the occasion when confronted by danger, or when the spectral form or death is hovering in the near vicinity !In sea- j faring life opportunities for this nign courage are of almost daily occurrence, and, happily, the occasion rarely arrives without the man. _ nnia i nn Take, for example ■ .that < occasion back and lay in two portions. The captain and crew took to the rigging, of the mizzenmast, and there they clung hour after hour for the whole night and until next evening. Although the lighthouse was less than six miles away, it was impossible to attract its keeper's attention, for the rockets were in the fore part of the ship. At last the captain—Charles Samuels—deliberately dropped out of the rigging into the seething whirlpool of foam below; and struck out for tli© bow half of the broken vessel. The others, watching breathlessly, saw him, after a fearful struggle, emerge in safety and climb into the heart of the pile of shattered timber. - Very soon he appeared again, with a bundle tied upon his back. He secured ■this to the topmost point of the wreck, put a match to it, and a few minutes later a flare-up was blazing to the skies. Then the brave man swam back to rejoin his crew. It was many hours bef 6re the lighthouse keepers managed to get alongside; but eventually all hands were saved. -■- _ For one man to do the srork of 20 with his own hands for three days and nights, and with 40 lives under his charge, is a feat that takes some beating. It was done by Captain Moreli, who brought the steamship Scindhia home by himself, although .the crew needed to wort her was 125, including engineers. ,'~ . With £7000 worth of cargo and ntteen passengers on board, she broke down in the Atlantic, and was driven hundreds of miles north *rat of her course. An accident spoiled the fresh Water, and distilled water gave the crew dysentery, which together ( with mishaps, left the captain without an officer or a man capable of work. The first officer and five of the crew were . washed overboard, the two chief engineers were killed in the mishap, and the third only managed to make the damage good before lie was laid up. The captain, when the storm subsided, actually started one of the fires himself, got one of the engines to work at slow speed, and, by superhuman efforts, he managed to navigate -the snip and keep her going, backed by great good luck. . ; < 'He brought the Scmdhia homeward round the North of Ireland, getting no - wink of sleep for three days and nights; as he.was out of the line of traffic, nobody saw his distress signals. He brought his ship to within 20 miles - of the Mersey, and there a pilot boat jnet him. Once boarded, he collapsed, .-and slept solidly for 24 hours; but lie lad.the biggest ovation any merchant <captain ever received when he got ashore. , A heroic Chinaman price performed a ~- somewhat similar'feat. 'The story was recently told by Mr Granville Sharp, of Kong Kong. Mr Sharp was on a French steamer on its way from (Hong Kong to Touron <m the Chinese coast." The steamer ran on a rock, and was beached to save her. Her captain hired two Chinese 3imks to take the crew and passengers back to Hong Kong, and Mr Sharp went with the captain in the smaller one. A. typhoon swept down upon them. Masts, bulwarks and rudder were'swept away m an instant. The Chinese captain, be"lieving all was over, went below and -drugged himself with opium. Three Chinese fishermen, who had been nremen on the steamer, were aboard, and -these knew the coast. They managed to repair the .rudder, but only one could steer well enough to save it from fceihg again broken.. He had to watch . every wave and be ready to ease off tor each sea. With no one to relieve him, -this man stood at his post in torrents of rain, in wind and darkness, and endured the awful strain for 36 hours on end. He never once let go his hoitl. A boy stood by him "and put food between his lips at intervals to give him strength for his all but hopeless task. He saved the junk and all aboard her. There are few more terrible tales of the sea than that of the" Norwegian barque Aurora's voyage from Yucatan to Liverpool with a load of logwood, j When at last she reached Queenstown, after being obliged at one part of her voyage to take refuge at Newfoundland, every single one of her crew except the chief officer was down with . beri-beri, or sleeping sickness. It was he who navigated the ship practically single handed all the way from the American side of the Atlantic. Mr Bryant, second officer of the Crown Point, brought the Hamburg barque Planet out of even more desperate straits. The Crown Point found the Planet drifting in mid-At-lantic with her whole crew stricken with scurvy, her mate dead, her second officer dying, and her captain unconscious. She was 107 days out. An attempt made to tow her failed, and Mr Bryant went aboard to navigate her. Never, surely, was human being confronted with a more revolting sight than that which met the eyes of the young officer—in fact, it beggared description. The odor itself was appalling. Scorpions infecte d the hold and forecastle, and a dog which was on board had gone mad and attempted to bite Mr Bryant. The mcdi- • cines, too, were all labelled in German, a language the officer did not understand. The captain died three days later, but within a week from that time land was sighted; at last Queenstown was reached. Mr Bryant was handsomely rewarded by the owners. What threatened to be one of the worst disasters in the history of shipping was the burning of the Ocean Monarch. Fire was discovered in her forehold an hour or two after she had left the Mersey. There was a- strong breeze, and she was headed for ths Welsh Coast. By some unlucky ac- i cident an anchor was dropped, and thv big ship was brought up all standing i head to wind. The flames came roaring aft, where 600 passengers and crev - were huddled in panic. A Brazilian '■ frigate ,a yacht, and a pilot boat wen near, but they only attempted to piclup those who jumped and swam. Sud • denly up came the American clipperNew World, and rounded into the wind barely 200 yards away. In her first boat was Frederick Jerome, an able seaman, and one of the bravest -men that ever sailed the seas. Every movement of that boat spelt action— and rescue. In a flash it was alongside the burning ship and a moment later Jerome was on deck amid thr scorch and smother. There he stayed until the last soul of all the 600

scorched almost beyond recognition, t It was simply impossible to atiequatexy ; recognise, the magnificent services o this great, lion-hearted hero, but all he received was the medal ot an American Human© Society, fortunately a higher impulss is the real incentive to heroic deeds like these.