The Boy With the U. S. Life-Savers Part 33

"Six men scuttled down the rope ladders on the inside of the cylinder.

It chanced that there were four buckets on the iron drum and with this they organized a bucket brigade. The water was still three feet deep and swishing about like a whirlpool. Every man knew that one large wave would send them to Davy Jones' locker.

"Down in the bowels of that iron cylinder they toiled. Not a gleam of light was anywhere, the white shaft of the searchlight overhead only making the shadows denser. No man could see his fellow; only by feeling were the buckets pa.s.sed from hand to hand. But, between the bucket brigade and the pumps, little by little the water lessened, the load of the cylinder lightened and she rode higher in the water. Little choice was theirs, either to bail unceasingly or to drown like rats in a hole.

"Daybreak found them still at work, spent with exhaustion, hollow-eyed and suffering from the night of terrible strain. The wind had dropped a little with the dawn, but the sea still ran high. Seeing that the men were too thoroughly wearied out to be of any use, even though the weather should improve rapidly, Father gave the order for the fleet to run to the nearest shelter. We sought the lee of Smith's Island, off the Maryland Sh.o.r.e, and stayed there for a week.

"At last, with every one rested and eager for another tussle, the fleet crept out again. All the weather indications were favorable, and, so far as the experts could foretell, there wasn't a storm in sight for a week or more."

"Weather experts aren't much on guessing," commented Eric.

"Not in Chesapeake Bay, anyhow," the other rejoined.

"Not anywhere!"

"I wouldn't go so far as that," the other answered. "There'd be a lot more wrecks than there are if it weren't for the storm signals of the Weather Bureau. They can always warn ships of the coming of a big storm, one of these West Indian hurricanes, for instance. Squalls, of course, they can't foresee. Usually, that doesn't matter, because no seaworthy vessel is going to be worried by a squall. But that iron cylinder wasn't seaworthy. At least, you should have heard what the men called it who had been on board the night it nearly went down!"

"I can imagine," said Eric.

"Then you've a healthy imagination," his friend replied grimly. "As I was saying," he continued, "the fleet started out under sunny skies and a smooth sea. They reached the place where the buoy was moored and Father took very careful observations to make sure that the buoy had not shifted during the storm. Everything was all right, and the instant the cylinder was immediately over the precise spot, the valves were opened and the water began to pour in.

"The tugs at once brought up the two barges containing heavy blocks of stone, and the instant that the cylinder touched the bottom, the gangs of men started to heave the stones overboard."

"What in the wide world was that for?"

"To prevent the water from scouring away the sand. You see it's all sand there, that's why the caisson was made. As soon as the current would strike an obstruction like the cylinder, it would make a gyratory sweep around its base. With the strong tides of Chesapeake Bay, even an hour would be enough to scoop out the sand and plunge the whole structure edgewise into the sea. So overboard the stones went, all round the cylinder, making a rough protecting wall against the undermining force of the water. The swirl, instead of striking the smooth iron side of the cylinder, would be broken against the pile of rocks. Moreover, with the sand thus protected it could not be washed away so easily by the force of the current.

"At the same time, another gang of men was sent aboard the cylinder, and one of the smaller tugs brought up a barge loaded with concrete. The men tumbled into the compartments of the cylinder. From the barge two pipes were thrust. Down one of these poured a steady stream of cement, from the other a torrent of small grit, while an unceasing cataract of salt water rushed down from the pumps of the steamer.

"In this awful mess of cement, water, and small stones the men wallowed and struggled, mixing the concrete and packing it down hard into place.

Wet to the skin, covered with cement dust, it was all that they could do to keep from turning into concrete statues, and the foreman was continually advising the men to put hands and faces directly under the stream of water and not to give the cement dust a chance to harden on their faces. For two hours they slaved, working in a frenzy of haste.

"Then, when everything was proceeding so well and so rapidly, a black storm-cloud came up out of the sea to the southeast, and the waves began to roll in. The whistle for recall blew shrilly. Up from the cylinder poured the shovelers, covered with concrete and looking like gray images of men. There was a wild flight for the steamer. One of the barges snapped a hawser and it was only by the herculean efforts of the smaller tug that she was kept from collision with the cylinder. Had that tug, loaded down with building material, ever canted against the cylinder, the whole effort would have been in vain.

"One of the lifeboats, containing sixteen men, was picked up by a wave and thrown against the iron rim as a child throws a ball. The boat went into matchwood and every one of the sixteen men was thrown into the water. But Father had taken the precaution of not engaging any man who was not a good swimmer, and the other tug had received instructions to follow each boatload of workmen every trip they took. Accordingly, when the men were thrown into the sea, the tug was not twenty yards away and every one was picked up without injury.

"The next morning, to the horror of every man in the fleet, the cylinder was seen to be inclining four feet from the perpendicular. Although the waves were running high, a gang was sent on one of the stone barges and another two hundred tons of stone were thrown off on the side to which the cylinder was inclining."

"Why?" asked Eric. "I should have thought that it ought to be on the other side."

"Not at all," his friend rejoined. "The reason that the cylinder had listed was because there had been some scouring away of the sand in spite of the stones. If, therefore, the stones were put on the side from which the sand had already been cut away, the action of the water on the other side would undermine the sand there and gradually straighten up the cylinder. At least, that was the idea."

"And did it work?"

"Perfectly. Two days pa.s.sed before the cylinder was absolutely level, and in the meantime the tug had taken one of the barges for more stone.

Another hundred tons was dumped down as soon as the cylinder was straight again, and it was thereby kept from further scouring. The weather had become good again, and the concrete work was continued. On April 21st the entire gang began work. Barge hands, cooks, everybody that could handle a shovel at all, was sent aboard the cylinder."

"Did you go?"

"You bet I did, and I worked as hard as any of the men--for a while. Two or three hours of it did me up, though. I was only twelve years old, remember, but most of the men kept on the job for forty-eight hours straight with only fifteen minutes allowed for meals. By that time the foundation was secure with thirty feet of solid concrete twenty-two feet thick."

"That ought to hold it," said Eric.

"That was only the beginning," said his friend. "What would hold it, resting on the top of the sand?"

"I'd thought of that," admitted the boy, "but I supposed the weight would be enough to drive it in."

"Never," the other said. "The next step was to drive it down into the hard sand at the bottom of the bay. Father had made borings and found a true sea-bottom sand fifteen feet and a half below the level of the shoal. It was to that depth that the whole caisson had to be sunk.

"You remember that I told you there was an air-shaft in the middle of the caisson?"

"Yes."

"Well, on the top of this air-shaft an air-lock was built. The water in the air-shaft was forced out by compressed air and the men entered the caisson."

"Into the compressed air?"

"Yes. It takes a special kind of worker for the job. In the air-lock, you know, the men have to stay for a while before they enter the chamber, so as to get used to the compressed air gradually. Lots of people can't stand it."

"Did you try it?"

"Yes. I asked Father and he wouldn't let me. But I slipped into the air-lock once and tried it, anyhow."

"Well?"

"Not for me!" said his friend. "I got out in less than five minutes. My head seemed bursting, and I was bleeding from the ears as well as the nose. But some of them, especially an old chap called Griffin, the foreman, didn't seem to mind it at all.

"As soon as the caisson was clear of water and the men were ready, they entered the caisson, crawled down the long ladder and began to dig away the sand. A large four-inch pipe led up the air-shaft and over the sea.

The sand and small stones were shoveled into a chamber from which a valve opened into the pipe and the compressed air drove up the sand and stones like a volcano into the sea. The work proceeded rapidly and without a hitch until the caisson had been sunk thirteen feet and a half. Then, when only two feet from the total desired depth, an unexpected and terrible thing happened.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "THE BOAT WENT INTO MATCHWOOD."

A sudden tempest breaking upon Smith's Point Lighthouse in the early stages of its construction.

Courtesy of McClure's Magazine.]

"At three o'clock in the afternoon a low hissing was heard in the caisson, and with a quick flicker the candles first burned low, then flamed anew, the color of the flame a lambent green. For a few moments none of the men realized what had happened, and stood there, stupefied and staggering. An acrid burning sensation gripped the men by the throat and they were stricken blind. Suffering terrible agony, every man managed to climb the long ladder, each step of which seemed an eternity, and entered the air-lock. Ten hale and hearty men had entered the caisson, ten wrecks emerged, the flesh of the inside of their throats raw and their eyes swollen and reddened beyond recognition.

"A telegram was sent to the Lighthouse Inspector of the district, and the doctor attached to the building party sent for medical help. Next day the inspector came down, with a.s.sistants, and accompanied by another physician and a nurse. They found that the caisson workers had tapped a vein of sulphuretted hydrogen, probably due to the decay of some deep beds of vegetable matter, such as sea-weed. One of the a.s.sistants to the inspector, who was a clever young scientist, suggested that after a day or two it might be possible to enter the caisson again, but that it would be necessary to proceed with extreme care, as another pocket might be tapped, with a recurrence of the danger.

"Although before them, in their bunks, lay their ten comrades, when Father called for volunteers, fourteen men came forward. They knew, they could not help knowing, that they were not only going into possible danger, but into absolutely certain torture. Their comrades lay there--it was not certain that some of them would ever see again, it was not certain that some of them would recover. Absolute agony of the most horrible kind awaited them. But the lighthouse had to be built. It is easy to make a problematic sacrifice of life, it is hard to walk without shrinking into a chamber of awful pain. From this ordeal these fourteen men did not shrink.

"They were headed by Griffin, the old caisson foreman, who had a record of having withstood the greatest pressure possible, a pressure of eight and a half atmospheres. They went down at nine o'clock in the morning.

The pain must have been fearful, but they stuck to it to the end. One man went through the air-lock and got food, returning to his comrades.

He had been down four hours, and his condition was so terrible that the doctor ordered him to stay out of the lock.

"'I'm not that breed,' he said in a horrid whisper over his raw and swollen throat, 'I'm goin' to see it through.'