SENSATION AT SEA.

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume XLII, Issue 13701, 3 June 1915, Page 7

SENSATION AT SEA.

SUICIDAL DIVE FROM STEAMER,

(Special to Herald.)

AUCKLAND, this day. A saloon passenger on the Island steamer Talune, which reached port yesterday, jumped overboard on Sunday last (western time), but was , rescued after being a quarter of an hour m the water. The man, whose name is J. W. D. Noble, was standing near the stern rail at about 2 p.m., when Dr. Norman^ another passenger; wqnt up to him. As he did so, Noble climbed over the- rail, | and jumped- feet foremost into the sea. The steamer's engines were immediately stopped, her helm put hard a port, and a- boat, under the. charge of the chief officer (Mr G. Gray) was lowered. The weather was calm, and Noble could be distinctly seen swimming about. About fifteen minutes elapsed before he was hauled into the boat. As he was pnlied m he remarked, "I wish you had left me to drown," but he gave no other explanation of his act. He was found to be m a very exhausted state, and after receiving attention was placed m confinement. On the Talune's arrival he was handed over to the police. Noble was until recently a planter at Aitutaki, Gook Islands, 'and had just sold his plantation with the object of going to England. He joined the Talune on Thursday. The ship's officers, consider that ho had a really wonderful escape from death, inasmuch as' he might easily have been suckgd under by t.ie screw or attacked by sharks, which aro plentiful m those* waters. If the weather had been rough the boat would almost certainly have failed to reach him m time. Noble grtyo no indication that he contemplated any desperate act, but the other passengers afterwards recalled that ho had seemed moody and unusually reserved,