Only Four to Man the Pumps.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 5322, 29 July 1895, Page 4

Only Four to Man the Pumps.

Dear, dear ! Whea you come to think of it how closely related things are ; how one thing brings up another. Ideas are like a lot of beads on a string, aren't they ? A letter I have just been reading makes me remember what happened to. me one winter abont twenty years ago. The story is too long to tell here, so I'll merely give you the tail end of it. I was superoargo on a barque bound from London to Rio. A tremendous gale, lasting five days, wrecked us. Forty-eight hours after it ceased there wore four men and no more left on the vessel. The captain had been killed by «& falling spar, three of the crew washed overboard, and the rest of the ship's company (savo ub four) went away in the long boat with the firßt and second mates. We were taking in water through a leak at the rate of six incheß an hoar. Working with all our might the four of us could pump that out in forty minutes, but we muat do it every hoar. It was awful work. For two days we kept it np, without sleep. Then we stopped, took to the quarter boat and shoved off. The sea waß quiet — lio wind. While we lay to within a mile of ber the Bbip threw up her noße and went down stern first. We were picked up the -next day by a Danish brig. Now tbe odd thing is that the letter which reminded me of tbat experience baa nothing whatever to say about ships. Please help me to find out the association. The lady who writes the letter says that in July, 1881, she got a bad fright. Exactly what it was she doesn't tell, I wish she did. Anyway it bo .upset her that she didn't get -over the effeots of it for nine years. After tbat ber appetite fell off; ahe lost all real relish for food, and what she did eat enly made trouble instead of nourishing her. It gave her pain in the pit of the stomach, and (curiously enough) between the shoulders. She says her eyes and skin presently turned yellow as a buttercup. Her face and abdomen swelled, and her feet the came, the latter sa much so that Bhe was obliged to have her Bhoes. made larger. " "I got little sleep at night," ehe says, "and was in so muoh pain I had to be propped up with pillows. For weeks together I could not lie down in bed. 1 had a dry, hollow cough, and bad night sweats. Then diarrhoea set in, and my bowels became ulcerated. I was often in dreadful agony for forty-eight hours at a time. Then I' would have a chill aa though a bucket of cold water were poured down my back. I got bo low I could no longer sew, knit or do any housework or look after my children. My sister had to come and help in the house. " Everbody said I was in a decline and mußt die. What I suffered for eight years tongue cannot tell. The doctor could do nothing for me. He Baid my complaint was complicated and bad to deal with. In 1886 I went as an outdoor patient to the Shrewsbury Infirmary, but only got transient relief." The writer is in good health now, but why did her case remind me of the shipwreck ? Let's settle that first. The association is easy and natural. Jast see. The ship sank because we four men hadn't the strength to pump out the water au fast as it came in. Twenty men men might have got her into *oort. It is the laat straw that breaks the camel's back; the last unsupplied need that makes poverty abject and desperate. Theße bocnes of ours cirry the seeds of disease with them all the time— chiefly the poisons created by imperfect digestion.made worse by careless habits. But as long aa nothing extraordinary happens we manage to ecrape along in a half-and-half sort of fashion. Yet we're got in our blood tbe stuff that any of a dozen diseases is made of, only waiting for something to set it afire. While the liver, kidneys, lungs and skin keep us fairly free— that is, don't let the load get too heavy— we Bay, "Oh, yes, I'm tolerably well, thank you." ' Little painß and unpleasant symptoms bother ua now and then, but we don't fancy they mean anything. By-and-by something happens. A cold, too hearty a meal, a night of dissipation, an pftV.ctfon through death or los 9 of proparty, a fright, aa in Mrs BunQv's Oftse, &o, Orer we go. The liwfc StfftW has crushed us. One loose spark has blown up the barrel of powder. The crew is too small to save the ship. The kidneyp, liver, skin, : and Btomaoh strike work, and we mnst ! hava help right away or perish. All of which meansjthe explosion of latent indigestion and dyspopeia poisons ia the blood. There ! isn't it plain why I thought of theabipP Now for the conclusion of the lad j'h story. She sayß: "In 1889 I first heard of Mother Seigel's Curative Syrup* Half a bottle made me feel bet'er, and by keeping on taking ii I was Boon strong and well as ever. (Signed) Mra Ann Bunoe, The Park. Worthen, near Shrewsbury, February 22nd, 1893." If there wero only a way to save sinking ships bs certain and trustworthy aa Mother Seigel's medicine is in the case of sinking human bodies, what a blessing it would be to poor sailors.