At Sea In Open Boat Twenty-three Days

There arrived on the ship Cochin Tuesday seven survivors of the ship i Milton, burned at sea on December 23 and abandoned by the crew. The Milton was a Nova Scotia ship, bound Ifrom Newcastle to this port, loaded with coal. She had twenty-three persons on board. Fire was discovered in latitude two degrees nortli and longitude 110 degrees west. The crew workI ed hard for two days and nights at the pumps to put the iire out, but without success. Ole Oleson, a Norwegian sailor, who took charge of tl ie boat-loaJ which was picked up, tells the toiiowi ing graphic story of the wreek: "We weie divided intothreeboat loads. The captain commanded one and had with him his wife and two cbMren. The flrst mate had another, and the second mate. was put in charge of the gig wiui six men. We liovered about the burning boat f or several days. It Airas on the day before Christmas that we abandoned the Milton, and when Christmas ! morning dawned upon us there, we were twenty-one of us in three small boats 1,200 miles from land. We managed to take along with us a pretty good supply of bread, water and canned meats. "A storm parted us on January and after that we drifted for twentythree days. Before those terrible twenty-three days were over we had all gone to head andíeet. Both s weiled up and our waists only lookcJ like a connecting link between tlie two. About the twentieth day thiugs began to look desperate. Our bread, and, what wa3 worse, our water had run out. All we had lef t were three small cans of pressed meat, wlüch we had been hoarding up for the lasttight pinch. Ourlegs were swollen, our tongues and lipa parcbed and swollen also, and this we only made worse by drinking salt water. Oh, my God! lt is terrible to die witli thirst and see water all around you. I don't wonder that sailors go mad when they drink it, for it is maddening to see it and know tliat to drink it is death. "We were still on the twenty-thiid day how far we didn't know, and soit of us began to tlünk and look as if we didn't care. But we were saved. It was January 15, about 11:30 onSunday night, that we saw suddenly loom up in the distance what pioved to be the headliahts of a vessel. One of our lows had a fog-horn, whicb, in a fit ot desperation, he blew with all his might, in the vain hope of making them hear on board of her, but, blessyou, thepoor fellow hadn't blow enuugli lef t in Mm to puff out a farthing glim. Williams struck a match and lit a bit of lampwiek, which he had earef ully preserved dry in his breast for such purpose should occasion arise. The signal was seen by those on board of the ship, the captain hove to and with all the strength left in us we hauled and