The Dangerous Hulks

Abandonen vossels or otñer lloatmg obstaclcs aro the cause oí many disasters at sea. These obstacles are especially dangerous because they givo no warnings of their presence until too late to avoid a collision. Besidcs the abandoned wrecks, which are apt to become water-logged and sink just below the surface, there aro other floating obstados whieh are liable to prove dangerous to tho vessels whieh run into theni. Ships have been crippled and even sunk, owing to their having come into forciblo contract with portions of wrcekage, logs, pieces of timber, whales or other sea monsters, icebergs, and drifting ice fieldg. Doubtless some of the vessels which left }ort in an apparently sea worthy condition, but were never afterward heard f rom, went down with all on board, after coming into collision with water-logged wrecks which had not been observed by the men on look-out. Such obstacles are not as apt to sink a larga iron steamship, but with small craft it proves very different. "The water-logged wreek is the most dangerous of these floating obstacles," said an oíd sea captain. "Many a vessel has been lost owing to those abandoned hulks. And the worst of itseems to be that it is almost impossible to get rid of them. They are mostly the wrecks of timber laclen vessels. Almost any other cargo wonld sink a ship when she became full of water. The longer such a wreek drifts about the more dangerous t becomes for itgradually sinks below tho surface, but remains just high enough to knock a hole in tho bottom of the first ship that comes along. A great many sailors are altogether too apt lo give np a ship bcfore thero is anv real rcason for such a conrse. And Ihen they leave a dangerous obstaele i floating abont which may sink half a I dozen othnr vessels before it goes to the ' bottom itself. I remember the case of a three-mastfid lnmber-Iadcn schooner named Lonisa Birdsall, which was abandoncd about fire jears ago. Her crew were taken oO' the wreek by a passiug rcoodj oJ wflre landcd at some port along the cast. Inc cbi-ninne({ vessel drifted about oft' Hatteras, whcre I once passed close to her and where she was sighled by a nnmber of vessels. You couldn't piek p a paper printed in any large American, British or continental port without reading that some ship which had just arrived had passed tho wreek of the Lonisa Birdsall. Quito a nnmber of craft ran fonl of her and were more or less crippled in consequence. For OTer a year that water-logged huik drifted about in the track of snipping. Scarcely a dark night passed without some yessel running into her. It got so that whennver a ship would be towed into one of the porte álong tho coast with her bows wcll store in the captains in that harbor would say, 'Well, that Louisa Birdsall has been prowling about oft' Hatteras again.' At last, after long watehing aim waiting, the insurance underwriters received a cablè dispatch from Bermuda, by way of Halifax, which announced that the Louisa Birdsall had at last drifted into shallow water and had sunk, leaving her masts stieking out of water. The whole maritime world rejoieed at this intelligence. A good many captains made it a rule to set iire to erery water-logged wreek which they carne across, hut even then the chances are that the hnlk will meroly burn to the water's edge. It is now almost as dangerous as an obstaele to run against as it was before, uut as long as it is burning there is little danger that it will be run into. No one can say positively how the ill-fated City of Boston, with her hundreds of lives, was lost some years ago. But the disaster was probably eaused by some floating obstaele. It may have been thal shc ran into an iceberg or that she ran oyer some huik which was floating just beneath the surface of tho water.