Morgan Robertson

“ When a man talks to himself he's beyond all reason, and nothing I could say to him would drive him aloft to clear out his brain. He stayed on the bridge, seeing things and telling us about them until the end, then we sewed him up in canvas for burial; but we never buried him. By this time the whole working force of the ship was more or less crazy, wandering around the deck, unable to understand an order, and finally, to a man, they dropped, though a few managed to climb to the bridge before giving up. ”

“ Somewhere, out among the islands, she had filled up with a cargo of jute—she didn't get it in New Zealand, for it doesn't grow there—and this cargo was battened tight under hatches to keep the water away from it. But she was an iron ship, with a rotten wooden deck, and I always had a theory that with a cargo of jute or cotton, liable to spontaneous combustion, hatches should be open in fine weather to let air down, particularly in iron ships, which sweat. But I was only second mate, and, being an American among Englishmen, not supposed to know anything. ”

“ Only this much more had come to me: somewhere in the world, about twenty-three years before, there had been a debarkation from a craft in good condition, in fine weather, and on a smooth sea—possibly in the landlocked Magellan Strait. ”

“ There was mutiny and insurrection at once; and had things been normal I would have fought that frenzied handful of passengers and made them hold on until something came along to help us. But, under the circumstances, I yielded; so, holding our breaths, and holding one another together, we lowered the starboard-quarter boat, and they all tumbled down, the last to go being Bennie, lowered by myself in a bowline. Then I thought of food and water, and, telling them to wait, I went below for a supply. But on coming up I found them a hundred feet away, pulling like farmers, each man in his turn. ”

“ The third mate was a passed apprentice, a gentleman's son in the way of a second mate's berth, and a fine young fellow. We had a big crew: there were four apprentices serving their time, a steward, cook, and cabin-boy, a carpenter, sailmaker, two bo'suns, donkey-man, and a butcher—for we carried about a dozen passengers, all men, except one small baby—and then we had sixteen in the forecastle—thirty-three of a crew. ”

“ The Marlowe became just another of the thousand mysteries of the sea.
"A day or two ago another British sailing-ship arrived in Lyttleton with the story that she had found the Marlowe and the skeletons of twenty of her crew in one of the rocky coves near Punta Arenas (Sandy Point) , in the Magellan Strait. The captain is quoted as telling the story in the following words:
"'We were off the rocky coves near Punta Arenas, keeping near the land for shelter. The coves are deep and silent, the sailing difficult and dangerous. We rounded a rocky point into a deep-cleft cove. ”

“ But one spot on the deck seemed fairly safe—aft near the wheel there seemed to be immunity, so that a man could steer for a while and find sanity to climb. There were no sailors left now, but I made the passengers take their turn at it, and, as the wind was fair and the yards square, they managed to keep the bark fairly on the course I gave them. ”