Show f r IT WAS MERELY WIND But it Broke with Baleful Havoc On the Seas THE ORIGIN OF GREAT STORMS The nes that Come From the West inuies The Enormous Height of Waves During Storms Tho sudden and awful destruction of the German and American fleets at Samoa bas called forth a mass of testimonies as to experience 1 perienco in ocean storms ana confirmed tho painful fact that no science of man can give long warning of their approach Tho barometer ba-rometer however usually gives a few hours warning so all sails may bo taken in and vessels near the coast make out for sea room In this case however that was not possible The islands lie about 14 dogs south I = htl I x r 1 PAY CLERK ECCHE roM JaiJJlN OF MP1C PA1SIASTFH AIULS UEUT 6tLTAX FOUR OF THOSE LOST AT SAMOA of the equator and therefore barely out of tho dead latitudes so all captains agree that thero is no owing l in what year a cyclone may bo expected As many as five rears at a time have passed without one worthy of notice and thenwith appalling suddennesscomes the great whirling wind and brings destruction 1 The cyclone best known to Americans is that which originates in tho West Indies moves northwest to the coast and then appearing ap-pearing to rebound from the land turns to the northeastward and whirls away till it is dissipated somewhere in the ocean between latitude 40 and 50 degs South of tho equator equa-tor the storms whirl in a different direction direc-tion On tho eastern continent they are called typhoons and have usually been most terrible in the Indian ocean They form along the border between the belt of calms and tho southern limit of tho trade winds and tie experienced navigator can tell as soon as ono strikes him on which side of him the center is and his plan is to get away from that to the outer part of the circle and out of it if he can In the center there is a dead calm the outer current of wind moving around it in a circle but ns the cyclone cy-clone itself is moving rapidly forward tho f real course of tho wind is a great parabolic curve and so tho ship master caught in the center of one can never form an idea on what tack it will strike him On tho outside of the circle too tho blow may como on gradually grad-ually the wind tending to spread but on tho inside tho border between tho dead calm and the fiercest wind may not be ten rods wide and so the shock is instantaneous Many columns like this might be filled with 1 I a bare list of tho vessels lost in cyclones in this century Ship after ship in splendid condition and well manned freighted with vast wealth and directed in bright hope has sailed from port in tho finest weather and never again been heard from In many cases not a plank or spar has ever shown up in others a mero fragment was found drifting on the ocean months and even years afterward after-ward Tho facts were plain caught in the deadly wind whirl the vessel was torn to pieces by tho battle of wind and wave Not long ago a large British vessel was sailing in tho South Pacific the ocean being almost as smooth ns a null pond Suddenly in the darkness dark-ness of night camo a great billow supposed to be fifty feet high the highest waves known are south west of South Vmenca heaving her high in tho air She sank in the trough was again heaved on tho crest of a billow once more this was repeated and soon the whole sea was calm again Reaching port her captain cap-tain learned of the great volcanic and earthquake 1 earth-quake movement along tho Vudes at tho very hour of his adventure Ho had met the rare but dreaded volcanic wave The vast ocean bottom had heaved beneath him or near enough for the resulting billows to raise his ship Only a few days ago tho firm and well built Conserva which bad been libeled by tho Haytian consul in New York on the ground that she was taking supplies to Hyppolito c tho rebel was released by tho courts and sailed for San Domingo a week later an incoming in-coming steamer picked up a life boat bearing tho namo Conserve And that is all the owners can know Tho fate of tho crew Is left to conjecture And this is tho story of hundreds Such room is given for the fancy of novelists that many of tho most thrilling j descriptions in romance picture disasters at sea And it has always been so Virgil opens his iEneid with a description of tho wreck of the fugitivo Trojans fleet and Homer puts Ulysses through an experience of shipwreck and life on an island which has been repeated with thousands of variations in all subsequent literature down to Sinbad and Enoch Arden No ono really knows how strong tho wind blows in a cyclone or how high the waves rise above the level in the North Atlantic scientific measurement puts tho highest wave at thirtyseven feet but many captains are positive they have seen waves sixty feet high south of Capo Horn A year ago the American Ameri-can schooner W L White was struck without with-out an instants warning near the Atlantic coast and literally jerked to pieces leaving the crew barely timo to get into their boats Tills was one of the unusual cases where a hurricane came from the northeast and in cool weather A few days later tho schooner James Ford when off Barnegat was struck on the 12th of March by a hurricane which literally buried her under the high waves Everything on deck was dashed loose and swept overboard but fortunately the hatches were closed and so the vessel did not swamp For two days and nights the pumps were kept going incessantly when they were rescued res-cued by a passing vessel These are but sample cases of the ruin wrought by the storm of March ISIS |