278 THE SEA. 



CHAPTER XXI. 



A CONTRAST THE SHIP ON FIRE ! SWAMPED AT SEA. 



The Loss of the Amazon A. Noble Vessel Description of her Engine-rooms Her Boats Heating of the Machinery The 

 Ship on Fire Communication Cut off The Ominous Fire-bell The Vessel put before the Wind A Headlong Course- 

 Impossibility of Launching the Boats "Every Man for Himself !" The Boats on Fire Horrible Cases of Roasting 

 Boats Stove in and Upset The Remnant of Survivors" Passing by on the Other Side "Loss of a distinguished Author 

 A Clergyman's Experiences A Graphic Description Without Food, Water, Oars, Helm, or Com pass- -Bio wing-up of 

 the Amazon " A Sail!" Saved on the Dutch Galliot Back from the Dead Review of the Catastrophe A Contrast 

 Loss of the London Anxiety to get Berths on her The First Disaster Terrible Weather Swamped by the Seas 

 The Furnaces Drowned out Efforts to Replace a Hatchway Fourteen Feet of Water in the Hold "Boys, you may 

 say your Prayers ! "Scene in the Saloon The Last Prayer Meeting Worthy Draper Incidents Loss of an Eminent 

 Tragedian His Last Efforts The Bottle Washed Ashore Nineteen Saved out of Two Hundred and Sixty-three Souls 

 on Board -Noble Captain Martin The London's Last Plunge The Survivors picked up by an Italian Barque. 



No greater horror can occur at sea than for the good ship to be on fire. At first sight, 

 indeed, it might appear that in the midst of an unbounded waste of waters nothing could 

 be easier than to extinguish a conflagration on board a vessel, but examples already cited 

 in this work have shown the difficulties in the way. Steam-ships have special facilities 

 for pumping water into almost any part of their hulls, yet one of the saddest examples of 

 a ship on fire is afforded in the loss of the Amazon, a steam-ship of the first-class. 



The Amazon was one of a fleet of new vessels placed by the Royal Mail Steam-ship 

 Company on the West India service, and was stated to be, at the time of her launching, 

 the largest timber-built steam-ship ever constructed in England. She was of 2,256 tons 

 burden, and fitted with every improvement known at the time; her entire cost was stated 

 at over 100,000. When, on the 16th of December, 1851, she arrived at Southampton, 

 she was regarded as the perfect model of a passenger vessel. In due time she was ready 

 for sea, and having received her crew and engineers aboard, and a little later her passengers 

 and the Admiralty agent with mails, she left Southampton on Friday, January 2nd, 

 1852. The officers were all tried men, and her commander, Captain Symons, was one of 

 those seamen whom large steam-ship companies are only too glad to employ and retain. 

 He was not merely an officer of thoroughly competent skill, but a man of unbending reso- 

 lution, a man fitted to be a ruler among men, as should be every commander of a great 

 vessel. Only a few weeks before he had received the thanks of the American Government, 

 accompanied by a present of a silver speaking-trumpet, for interposing, at the risk of his 

 own life, in an affair at Chagres between the Americans and the natives. On this occasion 

 he not only was the means of saving much valuable property, but by his energetic conduct 

 arrested a conflict, which, but for his intervention, might probably have been attended 

 with much bloodshed and slaughter. The Amazon, a pioneer of the service she was to 

 inaugurate, left Southampton amidst a considerable amount of eclat, and commenced her 

 voyage. 



" And so," says the work* from which much of the following account is compiled, 

 "the gallant ship sped on. The wind was right ahead, but her engines were powerful, 



* " The Loss of the Amazon." By the Rev. C. A. Johns, B.A., F.L.S., &c. 



