The Boy With the U. S. Life-Savers Part 41

"Heaps of them, sir," answered the lad. "I was on the Bering Sea patrol last year."

"That's right. But you'll find the Atlantic bergs are different. There's a lot of ice in the North Pacific but it's mostly in small pans. No big stuff comes through Bering Strait. It would strand. And then the Aleutian and Kuril Islands make a sort of breakwater to head off big bergs. But in the North Atlantic there's nothing to keep the big Greenland glacier breaks from floating south right into the very path of the steamers. In fact that's what they do. You'll see some real ones this summer."

As the lieutenant had pointed out to him, the whole ice question a.s.sumed great importance, viewed in the light of the Atlantic Ice Patrol. The _Miami_, on orders from the department, steamed north and relieved the _Seneca_ on duty. She picked up the bergs which the _Seneca_ had found and plotted their positions on the chart. Every day at eight bells of the middle watch (4 A.M.) the wireless operator on the _Miami_ sent to the Hydrographic office a statement as to the exact position of all bergs that had been sighted and the amount of their probable daily drift. This information was sent out again as a daily ice warning to merchant vessels by the Hydrographic Bureau.

[Ill.u.s.tration: ICEBERG WITH _MIAMI_ IN THE BACKGROUND.

Courtesy of U.S. Coast Guard.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE GHOSTLY ALLY OF DISASTER.

Berg in the lane of Atlantic travel, continuously watched by Coast Guard Cutter, safeguarding thousands of human lives.

Courtesy of U.S. Coast Guard.]

The experiment of trying to demolish the larger bergs by gunnery was tried, and a six-pound shot was fired full at close range at one of the bergs. But it had no other result than to shake down a barrelful of snow-like dust. Following up the various bergs kept the _Miami_ busy. At the same time she sent and received messages from pa.s.sing steamers along the line of travel.

Only one large berg really got into a dangerous position, and this one was as carefully plotted and its position as thoroughly made known to vessels navigating the Atlantic as though it were a fixture. The course of the large Atlantic greyhound _La France_ lay directly in the path of the berg and, had it not been for the warnings of the _Miami_, there might have been another ocean disaster to record. As the summer months approached, the cruising was delightful but not particularly interesting, and Eric, who craved excitement, was glad when, at the end of June, the _Miami_ was ordered to resume her old station at Key West.

Two months pa.s.sed before an emergency arose, but when it did come, it proved to be one to tax the Coast Guard cutter to the full. Toward the end of September a storm warning of a hurricane was issued, and the _Miami_, which was searching for a derelict reported two hundred miles west of Daytona, Florida, decided to run for Matanzas Inlet. About daylight the next morning, the first actual warning of the hurricane, aside from the notice sent out by the Weather Bureau, began to show itself in short gusty puffs. The barometer fell low, finally touching 28, lower than Eric had ever seen before.

The sky clouded gradually, and by breakfast time, the wind was freshening from the southeast. By ten o'clock, the wind had risen to half a gale, and before noon it was blowing not less than forty to fifty miles an hour. The _Miami_ made good weather, but in the afternoon the hurricane reached such a pitch of violence that it was decided to run before the storm and try for the lee of Cape Fear, possibly finding a safe anchorage in Masonboro Inlet.

As evening drew on the seas became appalling. The _Miami_ pitched her nose down in the water, shipping it green with almost every dive, while her propeller raced ten feet clear of water; next instant her stern would settle as though she would never rise, while the bow climbed up and up as the trough rolled underneath her. Eric, who was absolutely free of any fear of the sea, enjoyed the storm extremely. It was tiring, however, for, every second of the time, one had to hang on to something for fear either of being washed overboard, or hurled around like a catapult from a sling. When, therefore, the gaunt figure of Cape Fear light was pa.s.sed and the _Miami_ slipped in behind the lee of Smith Island, every one felt a relief from the mad tossing.

They had not known this relief for more than about four minutes when the spluttering of the wireless began.

"I'll bet that's some one in trouble," said Eric.

"Probably," his friend, the second lieutenant said, overhearing him.

"Haven't you been expecting it?"

"Hadn't thought of it, sir," said the boy. "We'd plenty to do to get in here ourselves. Yes, there goes Mr. Keelson down to the captain. Could we find out what's up, sir?"

The two young officers sauntered to the wireless operator's cabin.

"Somebody in trouble, I suppose, Wilson," the lieutenant said.

"Yes, sir," the operator answered, "two-masted steamer _Union_ reported in distress, partly dismasted and with her engines disabled, anch.o.r.ed in deep water off the Lookout Shoal."

"Probably dragging, sir?" queried Eric, knowing that his companion knew the coast well.

"Most likely," the lieutenant answered. "If she's off Lookout, and the wind veers round to the south'ard--which it's doing--that'll send her to Cape Hatteras and Davy Jones' locker in a hurry. We may get there in time, but there's not much we can do while this weather lasts."

"Hatteras is called the 'graveyard of ships,' isn't it?"

"There are a good many places in the world thus honored," said the lieutenant, "and, so far as America is concerned, there are two, Cape Cod and Cape Hatteras. There are five times as many wrecks between Barnegat Point and Seguin Island as there are in all the other coasts of the United States put together, but in proportion to the amount of shipping that pa.s.ses, Hatteras is the worst point in the world."

"Worse than the Horn?"

"A great deal," was the reply. "Shipmasters know the dangers of Cape Horn and give it a wide berth--though steamers nowadays generally use the Straits of Magellan--but Cape Hatteras is different. It juts right out in the path of vessels running down the coast so that a ship makes almost a right angle at that point."

"It's a wonder they don't build a lighthouse out on the shoals."

"It can't be done," said the other, shaking his head. "The contract was awarded once, but the project fell through. The builder found it impossible to carry it out. There's a New York firm that has been after the Lighthouse Department for a long time to get a contract for the building of a lighthouse on the shoals of Hatteras, but it wants four million dollars, and the government thinks that a bit steep. A first-cla.s.s lightship can be kept in commission on the station for a fraction of that sum."

"But is a lightship just as good?"

"N-no," the other answered dubiously, "a lightship, as such, is not as good as a lighthouse, supposing both were at the same point. But a lightship can always be placed in a more advantageous position than a lighthouse, and in places where a lighthouse is impossible, a lightship is invaluable. I should be inclined to say that the Diamond Shoals Lightship off Cape Hatteras, the Frying Pan Shoals Lightship off Cape Fear and the Nantucket Shoals Lightship off Montauk Point would take rank as three of the most important lightships in the world."

"But I should think they would get blown off their stations every once in a while," suggested Eric.

"They do," said the other; "not very often, but they do."

"Then what happens?"

"They steam back to their station and lie to as near it as possible. At one time lightships used to be without any kind of propelling machinery, and sometimes they were driven ash.o.r.e. That happened to a German lightship at the mouth of the Elbe, not so long ago, and all the crew were lost."

"The Columbia River lightship went adrift, too, I remember," said the boy; "they had to haul her back through the woods in order to get her floated again and taken to her station."

"Exactly," said his friend, "that was another case of a lightship not having her own steam. It's not only to enable a lightship keeping to her station, or running to safety in the event of being blown off her moorings, but you can see that in a severe storm, if a lightship can steam ahead into the eye of the wind, she can take a lot of the strain off her anchors. To tell you the truth, it's my private opinion that the Diamond Shoals Lightship will need to-night every pound of steam she can get. Look for'ard!"

The lieutenant pointed with his finger. The _Miami_, starting off to help the disabled steamer in trouble, had turned her stern to the easy anchorage and safe haven not more than two miles away, and was headed for the open sea. Still under the lee of Cape Fear, the force of the wind was greatly moderated and the sea was not more than ordinarily rough. But where the lieutenant pointed, it was easy to see that the storm was raging in its full fury. The waves were running high, their crests whipped into spray by the gusts.

"You're right, sir," Eric agreed, "we're in for it! And, what's more, here it comes now!"

Almost with the word the _Miami_ got into the full reach of the storm, halted, gave a convulsive stagger, than plunged into the smother. For a minute or two no one on deck could have told what had happened. The shriek of the hurricane through her cordage, the harsh roaring of the tempest-whipped sea, and the vengeful boom of the waves as they threw their tons of water on the deck of the st.u.r.dy vessel made the senses reel.

But the engines of the _Miami_ throbbed on steadily in defiance of the tempest's fury. The Coast Guard cutter, like every member of her crew, was picked for service, for stern and exalted service. Hurricanes might hurl their monstrous strength upon her, eager billows might s.n.a.t.c.h at her with their crushing gripe, shoals and reefs might hunger greedily with foam-flecked fangs, still the _Miami_ plowed on through the storm.

From realms unknown where the elements hold council of discord, the forces of destruction launched themselves upon her, but the white ship of rescue steadily steamed on, with her lights quietly burning and her officers and crew going about their duties in calm and perfect confidence.

Morning broke with that blue-gray veiling of the world in a covering of storm that sailors know so well. It was one of those mornings when the best of ships looks worn and drazzled. The _Miami_ showed scars from her night's battle with the tempest. One of the starboard boats had been stove in, and the davits twisted with the force of a wave that had come aboard. Even the most rigid discipline and the most perfect order failed to make the little vessel trim. There was an "out all night" appearance to the cutter which told--more than great actual damage could have done--the dogged endurance of the vessel against the fury of wind and sea.

But, down in the engine-room, the unceasing metal fingers that are the children of men's brains throbbed steadily, and the screw of the little vessel drove her on to her work of rescue. On deck, the Coast Guard men, clear-eyed and determined, handled their day's routine with a sublime disregard of the dangers of the sea. Other vessels might scurry to safe harbors, but the _Miami_, flying the colors of Uncle Sam, set out on her mission to save, with never a moment's halting.

On the _Miami_ drove. Presently, the crow's-nest lookout reported a steamer. She was one of the big West Indian liners, and she came reeling towards the cutter with lurchings that were alarming to behold. Only a certain quick jauntiness of recovery told the tale that she, too, was confident of her powers to weather the storm. She called by wireless that she had pa.s.sed the disabled steamer _Union_ two hours before, that the vessel was dragging her anchors and was in too shoal water for the liner to attempt a rescue.

"She's going to strike, sure," said Eric to his friend Homer, as the news of the message was received.

"And going right over the Diamond Shoals. How would you like to have charge of the _Miami_ now, Eric?"

The boy looked thoughtful.

"A year or two ago," he answered, "when I was in the Academy, I'd have been tickled to death at the chance. Right now, when I think I know a bit more, I'm quite satisfied to have Keelson on the bridge. I notice the captain's been around a good bit, too."

"Our chief has been on the job below nearly all night, as well," Homer replied. "I'm thinking, Eric, that this is about as bad weather as any vessel can live through!"