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Star (Christchurch), Issue 362, 12 July 1869, Page 2

Tun barque A. H. Badger arrived in harbour this morning, from Sydney. She brings a general cargo, and is consigned to Messrs Brownell and Co. This brigaatine Annie Brown arrived in harbour this morning, from Newcastle. She brings a cargo of coals, aud is consigned to . Mr C. W. Turner. flJ|Oiie of the most gallant instances o£ selfIraevotion, of which so many are on record in ■ the history of seamanship aud its dangers jl;u! sacrifices, was furnished recently by the commander of the passenger steamship Columbia, Captain Carnaghan, which^s told in an English newspaper as follo\^OT— But for tho uncommon seamanship andself-de-votion of Captain Cam »ghan we might have read to-day about another wholesale loss of lives and property to match that of the liibernia. Exactly the same accident befel both vpsscls^The propeller of the Columbia, like that of her ill-fated sister ship, broke Jooio in the shaft-pipe while in mid-ocea^ Nothing can be more perilous; for the shaip a:ul heavy metal blades, thus loosened, arc banged aud beaten about the stern post of the vessel, and the plates of the counter are sure to be stove in, or the stern post to be wrung awuy. The Columbia was in that fenrful danger, and the captain saved his sh'p by sheer skill and pluck. After reassuring his passengers and getting his boats clear, and ready against tha worst, he first tried to drop the (5;.t-2w by withdrawing the shaft. This plan only let the sea in, without getting rid of the propeller; so that the shaft had to be replaced and shoved in firmly. The next hope was to lash the broken screw somehow, so as ;:aep it from battering the stern of the Columbia. But how could it be done when a heavy aea was rolling, rarely leaving a moment to obtain a hold of the propeller, or even to see the restless blades ? Captain Carnaghan did it himself. He made the men lower him over the taff rail by a rope around his waist, while he directed and guided with his own hands the necessary operations. The object w:ts to have lashings made fast upon the blades on both sides; the difficulty was to get the bights of the chains over eacli upper blade. Thirteen times the crew had to snatch the good captaiu up from the horrible waves which rose to choke him or dash him lif ek*3.s against hi 3 own rudder. Fourteen times he bade them " lower him away " again, till, at the last, the cables were drawn n round the screw on both sides, "bowsed taut" with purchase blocks to ringbolts on the deck, and tiie Columbia was safe from any injury with which she had been threatened by her broken gear. The frightful noise of the blades thundering agninst her stern plates was no more heard during the three weeks' sailing ■which the Columbia had to accomplish — the Arork was done "shipshape and Bristol fashion;" but to finish it the first-rate sea t:aptain had to go through a feat whi'.h all the imagination of a landsman can hardly compass— working ut a most delicate trick of engineering in the pauses between wave and wave, a game of touch-and-go with death in tho fierce, cold billows of the North Atlantic at Christmas time. — New York Herald, February 16.