"Overboard."

Star (Christchurch), Issue 5549, 22 February 1886, Page 3

" Overboard."

+ AN EVERY-DAY SKETCH. The bank of clouds creeping np from the west makes the night blacker, and the rising wind sweeps through the rigging in a way to produce the Btrangest sounds. A landsman would be frightened at the rattle and clatter and sighs nnd groans heard aloft. The creaking and moaning as the vessel lifts herself over a sea, and rushes down the slope of a second, would make a coward of him. He would believe that every plank in her hull was drawing away from the frame to let in torrents of water. He would be unnerved at the thought of a struggle with those angry, white- topped waters. The sailor in bis bunk in-the forecastle ia lulled to sleep by the roar of the storm. The groans and shrieks are familiar sounds to his ears. The mad pitching of the Btorm-tossed vessel may not even bring him strange dreams. Off to the west the clouds keep banking up, and one by one the stars are blotted out. The farmer, safe on dry land, would look out into the night from his door, and whisper, " Heaven help those abroad on the waters this night ! " On board the Echooner racing down the angry lake — the great lake of Michigan — the waves follow faster each moment, and the hiss seems changing to an angry roar. The summer gale is growing into a howling, raving, crashing storm, and the hand of man must meet and thwart it. "Below there! On deck all to shorten sail." The voice fell upon the ears of men sound asleep, but the words had scarcely been uttered when men, wide awake and full of anxiety, were rushing on deck. " Reef topsail ! " Stand on tbe wharf some day and look up at the yards of a topsail schooner. Note the dizzy height at which they stretch their long arms acrosß the mast. Think of climbing to that height and "laying out "-.over deck and river with only a swinging foot rope to rest your body on. A chill creeps over you at the thought. Then think of a howling gale at sea — the mad rush of waters — the wild pitch of tho storm-chased vessel — the swaying masts, and the black night ! " Reef topsail ! " With sleep still heavy on their eyelids — with minds only half awake to the situation of affairs, three or four men Bpring into the shrouds and go creeping up. Every foot above the rail addß to the pitch of the schooner, and at the cross-trees the clinging sailor seems to describe a half circle aa the bows sinks down and are thrown up. It is a ladder from the rail to the cross-trees. From the cross-trees to the groaning, creaking, swaying guard each man must grit his teeth and breathe a prayer as he pulls up the ropes. At the slings of the yard the men must wait for a moment to catch breath. Up here the gale screams like a mad animal, and the roar of the sen. seems like a conflict in which a thousand wolves are rending each other. Tho heavy sail must be gathered up, and the gaskets passed over the yard and knotted firmly. One man must pass out to the extreme point of the yard to the earring. Astride of the yard, the roll of the ship causing him to describe a fearful half circle, he must forget the death below and use all his muscle. A screaming, Bhrieking gust of wind catche3 the half-rolled sail and tears it from the fingers of the sailor. It iB so sudden that the man at the earring fails to let go his grip, and the next instant a wild cry of fear echoes above the shriek of the gale, and a black mass is pitched from that dizzy height far out into the boiling waters. What use to cry — "Man overboard!" A thousand brave-hearted, willing-handed men on the deck below could not save him. Down into the seething, boiling, hissing waters — down past crest and foam — down until it seems as if his feet must touch the bottom of the lake, and then comes the turn and ho ascends. Up—up— vp — hia lungs burning, his eara roaring, and at last ho springs above the foam and is saved. Saved ! What mockery ! Ho thanks Heaven as he drawß in a long breath. What sarcasm ! Ho makes ready to battle for his life. How utterly hopeless ! The schooner is already half a mile away, and the nearest shore ia twenty miles distant. On the gravelly beach, with the still halfangry waters at times running over it, lies the body of a sailor. There is a look of hopeless deßpair on the ghastly face, and the fingers are clutched as if to strike a return blow at death. He waß homeless, houseless, friendless. Nobody will inquire for him. Nobody will miss him. At the first port of call the vessel will report his loss, and the daily journals will briefly say :— " Drowned. — On her trip up last week the Durand lost a man overboard off Lexington." That is all. You see the noticts every day. ' There is a burial on the sandy shore — this is the eulogy — tho epitaph.

Mr G. F. Fodor, tho well-known animal painter, has transferred the now famous racehorse Nelson to canvas, to tho order of his owner, Major George. The painting is pronounced by all who have seen it an an excellent likeness, and, without doubt, it reflects the greatest credit on the artist.