TRAGEDIES OF THE BRIDGE.

Colonist, Volume LIV, Issue 13401, 26 April 1912, Page 6

TRAGEDIES OF THE BRIDGE.

«3> "The mistakes that doctors make aro buried in the ground. Those made by lawyers are paid by their clients. But the mistakes of sea captains are paid for by themselves, and bitter is the price." So says the writer of an article in "Munsey's" on tragedies of the bridge. He deals with the impulse that operates in many cases compelling a captain to go down with his ship without attempting to save himself, and sometimes even to take his own life. There was the case of the Prinzessin Victoria Luise, of the Hamburg-American lino, .which drove on to a coral reef at Jamaica. There was ho difficulty in getting the passengers aishore, but when that had been done, the captain went into his cabin and shot himself. And the pity of it was that he was not to blame. The earthquake had destroyed tho lighthouse guarding this particular spot." The captain of the. North Germantloyd steamer Ode, after losing his vessel on the island of; Socotra, took the same path out of life after he had seen every soul safe ashore. Captain Griffith, of the Mohegan, stood on the bridge of his fast sinking ship until the waters engulfed him-. Captain Deloncle, of the French liner Bourgoyne, sunk in midAtlantic by collision with the Cromartyshire, was last seen on the bridge, with his hand on the whistle cord, as the vessel went down. Captain yon Gossel, of the Elbe,' went down with his ship, standing with folded arms upon, the bridge as the vessel slowly sank. Happy is the captain who has had no history. The ivriter tells how years ago, when a novice in journalism, he approached an old trans-Atlantic captain for some information about shipwrecks. The old man looked as; if he might explode. "Shipwrecks," he roared. "What in thunder do I know: about shipwi-ecks ?" It'was certainly a tactless question. Ho could tell of no experience of shipwrecks, for if he had been able to do so, he would not have been in command of a ship* Thoro aro men who can tell, but as a rule they are not to be found on the bridges of liners. "Many of those who have- had histories you may now find ending their lives in obscure employment, or in cottages on Long Island, or in Bremen, Glasgow, or Laverpool—victims of the mistake of a moment or of an hour, which the record of years of skill and devotion could not. avail to r overcome." These cases are perhaps - more tragic than those of men who obey . the tradition that a, captain who'loses - his ship must not survive.