THE "NORTHFLEET" AND " MURILLO." 263 



that we should do all that is possible to reduce that annual list of ships whose only 

 record is " Not since heard of." 



A successful mail-steamer passage or quick run, the first clipper from China with the 

 season's tea, make not only a certain stir in a pretty wide circle, but represent a con- 

 siderable increase of actual wealth.. The despairing cry of those few poor seamen who, 

 in their sinking craft, or who, perishing from hunger or thirst, see fading away on 

 the distant horizon the white royals of some lofty ship which they had watched with 

 such agonising alternation of hope and despair is heard by God alone. 



The wreck of the Northjleet, and loss of life to over 300 souls, on January 22nd, 1873, 

 will illustrate some of the above remarks.* The NortJifleet was a fine old ship of 940 tons, 

 built at Northfleet, near Gravesend, and so named. After various vicissitudes in the service 

 of Dent's China and other lines, she had become the property of Messrs. John Patton and 

 Co., of Liverpool and London, and was at the time of which we are about to speak chartered 

 by the contractors of the Tasmanian Line Railway to convey 350 labourers and a few women 

 and children to Hobart Town. The vessel left the East India Docks on Friday, the 17th 

 December, 1872, with a living freight of about 400 persons. The cargo consisted prin- 

 cipally of railway material. At the very last moment of leaving the docks, her com- 

 mander for the previous five years, Captain Gates, was subpcenaed by a Treasury 

 warrant to attend the Tichborne trial, and the command was given to his chief officer, 

 Mr. Knowles. He was allowed to take on board the lady to whom he had been married 

 about a month. 



After leaving Gravesend the Northfleet encountered very stormy weather, and Captain 

 Knowles felt it prudent to anchor under the North Foreland, where the vessel remained 

 until the following Tuesday, when, the weather having moderated, she sailed down Channel, 

 and was reported at Lloyd's as having passed Deal, " All well " being the signal. On the 

 Wednesday, at sunset, she came to an anchor off Dungeness, about two miles from shore, 

 in eleven fathoms of water. She was then almost opposite the coastguard station. About 

 ten o'clock the ship was taut and comfortable for the night ; almost all the passengers 

 had turned in, and none but the usual officers and men of the watch were on deck. Just 

 as the bells were striking the half-hour past ten the watch observed a large steamer, out- 

 ward-bound, coming directly towards them. She appeared to be going at full speed, and 

 the shouts of the men on watch who called upon her to alter her course roused Captain 

 Knowles, who was on the after deck. But in another moment the steamer came on to the. 

 NortJifleet, striking her broadside almost amidships, making a breach in her timbers beneath 

 the water-line, and crushing the massive timbers traversing the main deck. 



" 'Midst the thick darkness, Death, 



The dread, inexorable monarch, stalked ; 

 And, lo ! his icy breath 



Encircled the devoted barque, where talked, 

 Or laughed, or watched, or slept, 



The doomed three hundred of her living freight, 



* The following account is based mainly on the reports published in the Times. 



