| Show TAILS OF captain of the steamer describes the terrible scenes through which he passed tale perhaps never had a parallel in stories of the sea first of all the ships that passed through the shower ol 01 ashes 0 mont belee pelee and reached the american main land to tell about it the british etona bound to new york from montevideo and st lucia has arrived at new york her captain john cantell and her passengers brought with them a thrilling story not only of their own experience in the second eruption of martinique s destroyer but of the and her heroic captain whom they visited in the st lucia hospital the etona reached st lucia on the evening of may 10 expecting to coal WHOLE SEA MUST BE changeat in levels of tl e found to be extensive As the work of the cables broken by the volcanic forces proceeds it Is gradually being recognized that the whole caribbean must be re charted the french cable repairing staff which is hard at work night an 1 day reports from time to time the changes revealed by its soundings la deep water the bottom ot the bean has altered to such an extent as to be unrecognizable the old charts are everywhere found useless the changes in sea lev els arr not confined to the ate center of volcanic activity but extend as lar north as porto rico and it Is even believed that the wave will be found to have altered the ocean be I 1 round jamaica p ying be tween st thomas martinique st lucia and the other islands aie finding it necessary to heave the lead while many miles out at sea very serious transformations are go ing on in the of st vincen where a considerable dart ot the north watch I 1 found that we had been about an hour reaching daylight our decks were covered two inches with this matter end the captain ex a box of volcanic dust which had been saved by his crew you can see the marks of it yet about the masts and our polished woodwork and I 1 don t think my passengers are yet over their fright no curiosity would ever take us again near that terrible place before leaving st lucia capt cantell said we visited the wreck of the which escaped from aaa IA BIRDS EYE OF PART OF THE WEST INDIES SHOWING SCENES OF VOLCANIC disturbance saxa SAX 1 zy a y aaa v jf fy nr oil 16 l 6 ri fc sym W C CW SER COULD 6 S sp 1 rf tl w sf and leave the same night in the harbor news was received of the st alerre disaster and lying at anchor was all that was left of the all st lucia was in mourning and the people were so distracted by the news from the neighboring island that it was not until may 11 that capt cantell could obtain coal and pass on his journey st pierre was passed at a distance ot about four miles and all on board studied the land with glasses the weather was clear and we had a alne view said the captain but the old lines of st pierre were not recognizable everything was a mass of rlue lava and the formation of the land itself seemed to have changed when we were about eight miles off the northern end of the Is land mont belee pelee began to belch a second time clouds of smoke and lava shot into the air and spread over all the sea darkening the sun our decks in a few minutes were cov ered with a substance that 1001 ed like sand dyed brown which smelled like phosphorous partial darkness came upon us and everybody on board the ship was badly frightened after the stones we had heard and the sights we bad seen at st lucia we did not now but that we ourselves were to be bur led under red hot lava or engulfed by another tidal wave though we were then ten miles from shore crowd on steam 1 whistled whist leu to chief engineer farrish and he need ed no urging slowly we drew a ay through a suffocating atmosphere toot by toot yard by yard and at last the sun began shining we had passed outside the hailstorm of dust and sand when I 1 looked at st pierre may 8 the watchman was engaged in gathering up fragments ot human bodies and putting them away in the locker he discontinued the work to show us around the presented an awful spectacle she looked as if she bad been into soft clinging mud and pulled out again the mud stuck to her like cement and was two feet deep on her deel s awnings stan chions and covers had been burned or swept away tarpaulins rails stays hatch covers and even her smokestacks were gone when the watchman dug into the lava he found here and there fragments of human remains all that was left oi the ship was her hull and that being iron had escaped destruction hearing that capt freeman was at the hotel we called on him I 1 wanted to get from his own lips he story of his escape 1 was unprepared for the terrible sight which greeted my eyes when I 1 entered the room capt freeman s face was burned to the color of teak wood and large patches of skin and flesh were burned from his bones here and there both his hands were swathed in bandages his hair and mustache were gone h s eyes were tied open and he was la great pain when I 1 told him who I 1 was he talked a great deal to relieve himself he said of his suffering he said the had been in st pierre only an hour when the arup alon occurred he was talking to an agent in a boat alongside when a big black squall approached the ship from the island it was like a bla k wall traveled fast and was accod danied by a tidal wave and a deabel ing roar the sun disappeared am mediately capt freeman said that he shouted ISLAND OF ST VINCENT end of the island has slid into the sea leaving a wide inlet in place of the tor mer flourishing estate ot ve sels that have endeavored to h st vincent toward the north that it Is impossible to get nearer than eight miles to the scene of the batas catas and that at that distance the ocean Is seriously perturbed as from a submarine volcano boiling and hissing continually the theory has been ad lanced that the st vincent volcano la Sout nere has to ind an outlet be neath the waves t is feared here that sc enlists are right when they say that the worst Is not over and that further outbreaks may occur at any moment involving those islands which have hitherto es it has nov been ascertained that at least thirty americans perished in the st pierre disaster and twenty two in the island of st vincent the bodies of the family of mr prentis the amer lean consul have been identified the body of capt feggo of the british cable repair ship grappler was washed ashore and has been burled margaret stores who was so severely burned i k to everybody to stand clear an in slant later the air was filled with flama and falling batches of fire the sh p was immediately ablaze from end to end and the crew and laborers abcar 1 began to rush about frantic with pain capt freeman ran into the chart room but was driven out again by flames that came in at the port hol then he rushed to the engine room telephone and signaled the engineer to put on full steam some one 1 and the ship began to move but th steering gear was jammed and would not work he kept the engines going ahead and astern alternately hoping to tree the paddles and in so doing nearly struck the quebec line steamer rozalma from which clouds of steam and flame were rising men on the rozalma were wring ing their hands and rushing about frantically some of them jumped in to the where they must have ald instantly capt freeman said tor the water was boiling like a caldron it was like a mass of boiling mud many of the rhodam s crew bad disappeared probably swept overboard and the reit went one by one until only six left every one of them must have died a terrible death after a time the captain got the steering gear working the ship ans her helm and he headed her out to sea slowly the sky cleared and it was possible tor him to see about him men in the red hot lava lay dying all along bis track he him self though he stayed at the wheel was unable to lift hs burned arms blood from his forehead kept running into his eyes obscuring his vision he likened his escape to the passage from hell into heaven at last he reached the open sea and with the help of two sailors two engineers and the boat swain succeeded in taking his boat to st lucia during the run out of the harbor the chief engineer died a horrible death he escaped the first shock started the engines and not finding his men below went on deck to look to them aa he thrust his head out of the hatch a mass of lava tell upon him burning one side of his face corn plemely off capt freeman s performance per haps never had a parallel in stories of the sea continued capt cantell when the arrived at st lucia the brave man refused all cal treatment until the others were cared for he will live the doctors tell me BEAUTIFUL ISLE OF ST VINCENT tas an barth detore the becent awful dinae er st vincent which has suffered from the eruption ot its own vol cano Is one of the most beautiful and picturesque islands in the british west indian group it has an area of square miles and has been described as one of the flashing jewels that lie like around the caribbean sea the last british cen sus credited it with a population of 50 of whom a large majority are negroes engaged in the cultivation of sugar cane which the principal crop two hundred years ago it was the home of the indians who were induced by the french to join in a revolution against england they were crushed and thousands were transported hundreds rather than submit threw themselves into the sea A few descendants ot these inal owners of the island still exist on lands granted to them by the brit ish government st vincent like all the islands in the group Is ot volcanic origin and culminates in the vast crater of morne I 1 y agarou which in 1812 was the scene of a tremendous eruption billions of tons ot rock and earth were hurled high into the air part as molten lava flowed down into the sea part shivered into thin dust was carried high up into the clouds for three days the awful convulsions of nature continued the dust from the crater so obscured the rays of the sun and brought on a darkness so terrifying that the few survivors believed that the world bad come to an end the impalpable dust was carried by the trade winds to the islands of barba dos and st lucia and turned day into night the inhabitants became panic stricken with fear and abandoned their ordinary vocations and devoted themselves to prayer and fasting this was the closing period of a series of volcanic eruptions which had lasted two years and the diorec alon of the seismic wave was not un like that which devastated martinique the disturbance in 1812 seemed to pass under the bed of the ocean to venezuela caracas the capital of that country was partly destroyed by an earthquake and 10 persons per dished with the exception of the great lisbon earthquake the eruption of the mighty mountain waa the most frightful cata known to the world up to that time the whole configuration of the island waa changed the eastern end sank into the sea and where it stood there la now a great depth of water the vol canic forces remained quiescent until 1882 and then the warning bumbia was heard again but it was a false alarm and the terrible scenes of the early part of the century were not r heated the island of st vincent lies miles west of barbados and between st lucia and the grenadines froin north to south stretches a ridge ot high wooded hills extending to the on board the rozalma Is recovering and strong hopes are also entertained of the ultimate recovery of a canadian lady who was a passenger on the same ship the Is being repaired at st lucia sea on either side the which Is now in eruption is in the northwest it towers 3 feet above the sea its crater Is three miles in circumference and feet deep from the summit the view on all sides was superb borrowers must not be choosers IV THAT 1119 |
