156 NEWFOUNDLAND 



" Last summer one of the German liners cut down a 

 trawler on the banks, but it was in the daytime, and the 

 crew fortunately escaped. The previous year two similar 

 occurrences took place with equally harmless results. The 

 freighter Endymion, however, bound to Montreal, crashed 

 into the smack Albatross off Cape Race last July, and of 

 the nineteen on the latter only one was saved. In September 

 1902 the collier Warspite sank the smack Bonavista on one 

 of the banks, three only surviving out of twenty-two on 

 board. In 1898 the City of Rome ripped the stem off the 

 smack Victor of St. Pierre Miquelon, but she kept afloat, 

 and a relief party from the liner got her safely to land after 

 three days of trying endeavour, as she was leaking badly 

 from the shock. This humane action on the liner's part is 

 agreeably remembered yet among the fishing fleets, for, if 

 the bankmen are to be believed, steamers usually keep on 

 as if nothing had happened, and tell the passengers who 

 may have felt the shock that it was caused by striking 

 loose ice or suddenly changing the course. It is, indeed, 

 alleged among the bankmen, that crews of foreign steamers 

 will beat off with belaying pins the wretches from the 

 foundering vessels who try to swarm on board, that the 

 name of the destroyer may not be known, and local com- 

 plications be thus avoided. 



" How many of the missing bankmen meet their end in 

 this way can only be conjectured, but certain it is that far 

 more are sunk than are reported to the world. Frequently 

 the steamer's people scarcely know what has happened when 

 such a catastrophe occurs to the accompaniment of a midnight 

 storm, so slight is the shock of impact on her huge hull, and 

 with spectators few at these times, and look-outs and watch- 

 officers having every reason to escape inquiry and possible 



