A HEROIC ACT AT SEA.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XX, Issue 6817, 22 September 1883, Page 2 (Supplement)

A HEROIC ACT AT SEA.

Thk LondoQ Daily Telegraph publishes the. narrative of a remarkable aqt Of heroism performed at sea. The. steamer Aurania, beb.ngi"g to the Canard Line, was on her way across cue Atlantic when Some serious injury beMl her crank shaft. A consequence of t'lia disaster was to convert a portion of the Khnft into a gigantic fliil of steel weighing many tons. This frightful whip of metal, wielded by the engines, revolvedat a tremendous spe-d, and the scena presented in the engine-room baffles description. The* result ol an, injured propeller or a broken shaft is to make the engines " ta.ee;" that; is: to pay, snding no further steadying resistance in the gyrations of the screw, they go at enormous speed, and furnish the surest indication to the engineers that something 13 wrong. The " racing" ot the engines of thie steamer communicated a furious movement to the arm of. just abaft the engine-room. " Iron and steel," we read, "were knocked to pieces. A supporting pillar of wrought iron,, a foot in tlj ckness,. was broken in two, and one piece, weighing a ton, was bitten out, so to speak." Right and left this terrific flail was dealing liestruction, filling the p.tmoaphere with sparks an'.l smoke from its crashing blows, aud raising a deafening uproar. It was very so m understood that if the fearful thrashing movement was not arrasted by the stoppage of tho engines the ship's plates in the neighbourhood of the whirling body of steel would be beaten out, and that she would sink like leid, It so happened, however, that the brake -which controlled the vast piece of Ti'cbaaism was situated Within two feet of the revolving miss. Clouds of Raiding steam hid it from view, and the sorm of parka which were thrown up threatened death, to any map who approached the spot, j The. second engineer, a Scotchman, named ! . iudrew Lambert, described as a "tall, Jirawny. man, of some three or four aud 'thirty,'"Svas,_>;:> duty in the engine-ropai. He >Vas t-taaiiiig at a. distanca'of aboat thirty fe&t frciri the broke when the crauk brok«, and instantly pqfeeived that if the ship was to be save.l the engines must be stopped. The bralrq was invisible; the rush o! t!ie stc-m was suffocating ; and the thunderous' cimraotion of the racing engines and the v ileiit crashing sound of the rotating mass it rne-'al produced a clamour sufficient to ■ taunt tire bravest heart. Nevertheless, this heroic man, dropping on his knees, fearlessly ,;rept through the blinking vapour and sparks, fi-eliiirr his way as he moved, until ho '.van so close to the whirling flail th-.t the wind of it was like a hurricane upon his face,, and then, still groping with his hand, he grasped iha brake and stopped the engines, ' "Ho wi3 badly scalded about the face and hands,", concludes the account, "but other'wise uninjured. He had risked his life to give the s!i?p/' It is not necessary to have much knowledge of the engine-room of a steatnvr to appreciate the marvellous heroiem implied in Mr. Andrew Lambert's devoted behaviour; but certainly those who best know what that interior is like will memt applaud this Scotchman's magnificent courage. The passenger standing on the deck of a s f eamer may, by peering below, ca'ch sight if the cylinders and moving arms of steol beneath them, illuminated now and a K aiu by a ruddy gush of light from a fur-, nice. He eeee platforms of iron, outlines of missive metal shapes grinding out the wondious power that ia driving the huge fabric of the falup swiftly through high seas and &t iroiing v. in Is, and in small screw vessels he may somet mes get a glimpse of the junction of the euginps with the shafting, and mark the ine\ur ble arm of steel rotating- those mas3ive bva to whose aftermost extremity the prop Her la affixed. But littleii to be guessed .13 to the leilityof that interior mechanism' mmo'iou by peering at it through a sky-light. It is necess'Kry to le scei:d below the cylinders, to l ia\o the champing and throbbing o\ rheid j, d iround, to be in close proximity to the thrust block, the engine-seating, the sin face con lensers. Th-.'n at a depth'of in 113 ft, with t i<j roar of the furnaces and t't. rhjthmic funding of tha engines, in o e eir ,ifm iy be possible to realise the c flitter < f Mr I Hubert's exploit by cou-. cru nj tin plica full of steam and sparks, tin n_,ii)cs ragi g like liberated giants, and a mas of steU weighing many tons fiirionblj revolving incl striking everything in its, iiLi hrtouriiQod ror-splittiug blows until the \cry stiucturc which imprisons the madd ncl st iin fi >nd seems riven and flying to pit t<. 1 It % i, in ict of heroism in keeping with the timtj 1 his is the age of steam, a ill i+ is. light that steam should have its hero s As jit the engine-room has not been tletheitio of many valorous and great expl )itb Tin. atin in » acts appear to stick to theif old ground above dee!* ; though that 'may be perhaps because wo can see what j;oes "on there. . Courage lias space for demonstration., sunshine or starlight is over all, and the launched boat, the swimmer battling with the seas.to save s> shipmate, the quiet and of death may he watched w-ith [•'aasionate eyes and with hearts pveting *S) yield applause. . The conduce of Mr, Aαf<s,rVwsLa'uibart, however, might well:,remind fus of inuck secret hsrei3ro, of which many a . ■'foiinflered ship's engine-mom could furnish ;.tb>iUing..stories, and chiefly of engineers who 'Mviy'eiistuek. unswervingly to their duties rbeloW'.wheii they have felt the ship sinking -Snder t'leir feet, and when the engine-rooin has been half full of water. Many such tales are on record—of engineers perishing at their poats aud going to t!ie bottom coffined in the interior, sooner than seek such safety as the decks m-ay offer bef >re the captain summons .theni to quit their hopeless but noMe struggle in'the , engine-room. Toere probably never ,\v.is a time jn the history of our Mercantile Marine when exami>l.-a of manly conduct like that which Mr, Amlrew Lambert offered were so desirable as now. The tendency of the age, it is t" be feared, is to accept without much questioning the assurances which may be often heard and read that the merchant sailor has greatly deteriorated from ■ the . old standard, and that it is difficult to find anything commendable to-day in our engineers and firemen. Yet those who still have faita in the English sailor, ! and whi> dispute much of the evidence that is brought to bear against the valuable body of men who man the engine-rooms of Our vast floets of steamers, have good reason to proud of acd grateful for the unanswerable testimony on their behalf that is supplied by such acts as Mr. Lambert's. At all events it is certain that there is but little retrogression is to be found when the call of duty is made, the establishment of the lifoboat, no doubt, considerably modified the views which used to be entt-rtained respecting the apparently idlo class of " long shoremen" who hang about the piers and 1 yards of watering-places. It was discovered that tho instant the opportunity was offered them tor greatly and unselSahly acting in the interests of humanity they eagerly seized it, and virtues of a wholly unsuspected kind, courage of a most exalted nature, were remarked among a community who had heretofore beep regarded S3 little better than " loafers." Mr, Andrew Lambert is also but a type of his class. Give them the chance, and they are seldom fonnd wanting. It is right to believe this, for it ia constantly being proved. It might be even politic to aasume it, for no class can b/! the better fora, persistant and illiberal refusal to recognise possibilities of excellent devotion of courage, and of loyalty among them. We read of firemen imperilling their lives by swimming ashore through a heavy surf that they may be the means of rescuing their comrades; of hiates boarding sinking ships at the risk of their lives, and safely bringing off men and women and children ; of boats' crews daring terrific neas for humapity's sake only, and perishing martyrs to their glorious resolution; of men springing into the waves after drowning messmates ; arid of seamen and firemen, of captains and officers, securing the safety of women and helpless foreigners—as in the case of the Keomure Castie—and then, with folded arms, going to that death which loses half its terror to great and manly hearts. If the action of the heroic Mi*. Lambert does not remind us how much courage, how much dutifulness there may be found among all Glasses of feafarera, it almost fails as a lesson. On the other hand, no higher end could be reached by euch conduct than the poeitive assurance it conveys that we have no occasion yet- to lower our pride in the vast majority of the crewa who man our merchant vessels.