STOWAWAYS.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XXIII, Issue XIX, 4 November 1899, Page 828

STOWAWAYS.

•‘I am not given to losing my temper,” said a captain to a writer in “t’assrll’s Magazine.” “but I confess that when on one voyage we found that no fewer than fourteen men had managed to stow themselves away below. I felt inclined to give them all a ducking, and said so.” This was the captain of an Atlantic liner, a man to whom the stowaway is a perpetual nuisance. Though t'he strictest watch is kept to prevent his getting on board, it is rare for a trip to be made without one or two specimens of the deadhead fraternity being carried, willynilly, free. Of course this is not done entirely without connivance on the part of somebody on board the ship. 'l'he stokers are not infrequently the guilty parties. With t’heir or others* aid the stowiw»v down into tbn hold and finds a dark corner in which to secrete himself until the vessel is at sea. Then if he is discovered and set to work, he does not mind. Tt is not work he is afraid of. but the being without work, and t’he bread that accompanies it. When it is considered what an enormous thing an Atlantic liner is. and how mnv»v dark there are in her vast interior, it is not

surprising to hear that scores of men during the course of a year get free passages across the “herring-pond” in one ship or another —and this, though a steamer never leaves |>ort without a search being made to see that no unauthorised person is on board. Many are discovered in bunkers and other such places, and, of course, carefully conducted on shore; but not a few manage to elude detection, and, of course, once away from land little is to be feared from discovery. There is a curious notion prevalent among some sailors; it is that a stowaway is a lueky passenger to carry. Asked once why it was, an old salt answered, that he never heard of a ship being lost that had a stowaway on board. Of course, he had an instance in point to relate. It was to the effect that a stowaway was discovered in hiding on an outgoing vessel at the last moment and ejected. Shaking 'his fist at the captain, the would-be voyager cried: “I’m glad yon turned me out of your rotten ship; neither she nor you will live to see Christmas Dav, while I shall.” The prophecy proved a true one. The vessel went down within a week of sailing, and only the second officer and a few men were saved. One wonders how such a superstition arose, if superstition it can be called.