DANGEROUS PROFESSIONS

Otago Daily Times, Issue 16120, 8 July 1914, Page 5

DANGEROUS PROFESSIONS

There is, .and there always has been, a type of man who, if a spice of danger is not ready to hand to flavour his life, deliberately seeks t<3 do something risky, anil consequently chooses a career that fascinates him, not because it is lucrative, but .simply and solely because, with him, ''to live dangerously" is to enjoy life, and to be faced by peril is to experience an exhilaration that makes existence all the more worth having. There have always been professions to suit such men, their exploits are recorded in the history books for everybody of a less venturesome nature to wonder over, and to-day jbhere is a tempting variety of pursuits for daring spirits to choose from, and to try to set the world marvelling at their deeds of courage.

— Tho Most Precarious Profession. — Which is the most prominent profession, from the point of view of considering the danger entailed through following it? If this problem was put to the vote, a majority would probably decide in favour of the vocation of an air pilot; for if a man is an indefatigable aviator he takes risks daily, or almost so. The history of the human endeavour to navigate the aerial ocean is as full of thrills as the best sensational novel. Even to go back to the days when ballooning was considered very progressive and startling, is to have Tovealed doings in mid air that were fascinating experiences only to those who love being venturesome.

— Ballooning Sensations.— Those who have gone in for ballooning for a profession, in the interests of military strategy, scientific research, or popular demonstration, have had many exciting experiences. Moreover, a first ascent, even if it is a normally uneventful one, is' full of excitement for the novice—for it brings to him the most unexpected sensations. For instance, no matter how the balloon sways and heaves prior to its detachment from the ground, the moment its hold upon the solid earth is given up, a strange and impressive stillness makes itself evident. The creaking of the car, the rasp of the ropes, the characteristic rustle of the silk, all cease immediately the ascent commences, so the stillness .just mentioned is most startling. And while this is being acutely noticed, another faculty sends home to the mind a start ling impression. The novice is amazed by what his eyes behold—or, rather, what they appear to see. What happens is just this. The car of the balloon is so steady that it appears to be quite motionless, and the queer illusion of the novice arises on account of this. It seems to him, not that he is leaving the old familiar earth, but that the earth is leaving him. As one highly capable writer puts it, "Everything, in fact, except himself seems to have been suddenly endowed with motion." The world seems to be "in the act of slipping away beneath his feet into some unfathomable abyss below." And yet, he is likely to be so fascinated bv the new kind of motion that all idea of being afraid is crowded out of his mind !

One of the most hazardous ballooning adventures that ever happened occurred in 1862. Two aeronauts, named Glaisher and Coxwell, made an ascent, rose steadilv for a .distance of 29,000 ft, and continued mounting. Then the symptoms that occur to the human system "at a ereat altitude began to show themselves. Glaisher, after laving his hand on the table possessed of its full vigour, fcmnd ; when he wanted-! to use it again, that his whole arm .was powerless: he tried to accomplish what he wished with his other arm, but that was limp and useless, too. He describes his sensations thus: —"I then tried to shake myself, and succeeded in shaking my body. I seemed to have no limbs. I then looked at the barometer, and whilst doing so my head fell on my left shoulder." Swiftly he lost all muscular power, and then he fell, with his back resting against the side of the car. The last organ to be paralysed was the optic nerve, and. that came about in a moment of time— an intense black darkneess coming upon him. -Yet he says, " I -was still conscious, with as active a brain as at the present moment when writing this." His thoughts must have' been terrible ones. How he survived to write his exciting narrative happened because his companion, though ho lost the use of his arms, had the presence of mind to pull the valve cord with his teeth! — Aviation Sensations. — A good many people wonder what the sensations are of a person making a flight for the first time in an aeroplane. They are so unanimous in declaring how safe they felt on such occasions that what they put on record is unexpectedly tame reading. As one says, " Although we were rushing along at something like 40 miles an hour, the prevailing sensation was one of absolute security." But this is only when the ascent is made with a skilled pilot, and those pioneers who first adopted aviation as a profession have something exhilarating to declare about their first attempts to master the most unstable of the elements. It was to them like venturing into an unknown ocean, vast '' currente " and " waves " of arr had to be encountered, and they had no foreknowledge of what they were likely to experience. In the most literal sense of the word, they " took their lives in their hands," because an error in steering, a mere movement of the hand, might send them crashing to earth. On account of the tremendous risks that were encountered the descriptions g'iven by venturesome aviators are most racy reading. Farman, for instance, when he describes his first long trip, quite "carries the reader with him," for he enables those who study the account to understand what a.man's feelings are on such an occasion. At first, he admits, he was a little nervous, because, as he argues, " if you are suddenly told to get into an aeroplane and start away over every obstacle —whether prepared by Nature or the hand of man—it is quite natural to hesitate." Of course, in his flight he did things which are accomplished, as a, matter of course, every day of the year now. but which he, as a pioneer, felt greatly excited about. Suddenly, he took, for instance, a bold decision that' he would fly over the tree-tops; and he did it, though he had a very anxious moment lest he should graze the topmost branches. The fact that he did mot made him even more daring. He approached a village and determined to fly over it. He said to himself, "I can only die once," and steered right over the houses. These words, " I can only die once," how signincamt they are! It is to be wondered how many times they have occurred to airmen when attempting some specially risky thing. If flying were not one of the supreme exhilarations*Jof life it is scarcely likely that rapid progress would have been made. But the feeling that "there is nothing to be compared to the joy of soaring high above the heads of people" has tempted airmen from feat to feat. — The Terrors of War.— The terrors of naval warfare grow more and more formidable as time goes on, and those who entef the fine profession of guarding our coasts doubtless realise their great responsibility, and possible peril. Study of more or less recent naval conflicts shows how desperate are the chances of life and death for those involved in such. For, not only has the cunning of the inventor devised improvement as regards guns, but hundreds of men may be killed in a moment by a "mine." In the Russo-Japanese, war the havoc done by mines was tremendous, and, to the nations concerned, heartrending. Both sides suffered. One Russian ship accidentally blew herself up while laying mines. On another occasion the Russian flagship was blown up, with fearful loss of life, the "best officer in the Russian navy," the admiral, sharing' the fate of his less distinguished comrades. Then on the Japanese side theTe were grim disasters from mines. One morning, within a few minutes, three splendid battleships were utterly destroyed by this agency. It is possible to underrate the perils of modern naval warfare; they cannot be overrated, so terrible are they. — High Courage Required.— The element of peril is by no means absent,in naval affairs in time of peace. One branch of this great national profession calls for both highly-skilled work and much pluck. Those who volunteer for service in a submarine need to be bold men, with plenty of nerve, determination, and patriotic devotion to duty. The fate of the A 7 submarine should make the public realise what nerils are undergone

from patriotic motives. Certainly the sailors who man these odd-looking craft feel the fascination of adventure, and love this branch of the service for its novelty and the bxcitement it brings; but they doubtless at the same time realise that their marvellous little vessels may, in case of war, materially assist in deciding the issuo of the struggle. What future history will have to say of the submarine, who can tell? But the submarines are certainly typical of the age we live in. For one thing they show the full significance of machinery in modern affairs; also they reveal the fact that our prestige at sea depends nowadays, not on one profession, but two-, the engineer being almost as important as the sailor. Perhaps some day the nation will realise what it owes to the brave men who went down in the | first imperfect submarines, and also to those who, by perilous experience and much thought, secured improvement in the vessels and gained skill in working them. — Danger in Many Professions.— There are two professions—the army and the navy—that are typically dangerous; but there are many others in which men are sometimes called upon to face perils. Those employed in taking kinema pictures sometimes run great risks to secure thrilling films for the patrons of picture houses. When one great Roman romance was being filmed, in a representation of the gladiatorial arena, a lion got loose for a moment. What did the operator do? Hβ simply went on turning the handle of his camera, and secured a striking eifect. Then there is a great profession that copes with fearsome creatures that cannot bo seen. The medical man wages war against the microbe. Perils have been undergone to discover the origin of terrible diseases like malaria; this has entailed much self-sacrifice, which ought to be widely appreciated, because it has been undertaken " in the cause of humanity." Undoubtedly the professions that may be described as the most admirably dangerous are those of the doctor and the nurse, for whenever there are perils, as in war time, there they are, if need be, succumbing themselves while endeavouring to save others.