WOULD NOT WAIT FOR THE PILOT.

Patea Mail, Volume XI, Issue 109, 26 September 1898, Page 2

WOULD NOT WAIT FOR THE PILOT.

A good story is told by the London 1 Syren ’ of a British tramp steamer that was ready to leave Baltimore one lark and dirty night, bu: the pilot engaged refused to take her out before daylight. The skipper refused to lose tea hours, and started along himself, dhe got out aud across all right, and the pilot was suspended for three months in consequence. But after her cargo had been discharged in London, aud part of a new cargo had been taken in, enough to stiffen her, the engineer proceeded to pump out her ballast tanks to see that they were perfectly dry. He pumped for about three hours, and found the tanks still full. He continued to pump all dny, aud still found the tanks all full. Then the steamer was put iu dry dock to solve the mystery, and the astonishing discovery was made that she had seve-* ral holes in her bottom, and had been simply floating on her tank tops. The skipper then had a faint recollection that she did ‘ scratch gravel ’ in Hamp« den Eoads on the night that he took her out without a pilot, but nothing was said of it in her log, and the urn* derwriters allowed that instead of gravel she must have scratched bricks, md about three acres of them at that to say the least.