Remember the Stranger-Brave, Gallant, Seamen
"On our way back we came across some spars...These spars told tales of the loss of some gallant ships and men, probably off Cape Horn, drifted here before the nor'west gales. Sir Ernest picked up a pathetic little toy-a child's ship, one foot long. It may have told of tragedy, but at the least it was the minor tragedy of some child's lost treasure....
Just east of us was a marvellous pile of driftwood, covering half an acre, and piled from four to eight feet high in places. This was a graveyard of ships-woeful flotsam and jetsam-sport of the sea: lower masts, topmasts, a great mainyard, ships' timbers, bones of brave ships, and bones of brave men. Most of it had drifted a thousand miles from Cape Horn, some of it two thousand miles or more.
Swept before the westerly gales on to this wild South Georgian coast, the easterly current, by some strange freak of eddies, threw it up in this one spot-a sad tale of wasted human endeavour, of gallant seamen beaten by the remorseless sea. Piled in utter confusion lay beautifully carved figureheads, well-turned teak stanchions with brass caps, handrails clothed in canvas "coachwhipping" finished off with "Turks' heads"-the proud work of some natty, clever AB; cabin doors, broken skylights, teak scuttles, binnacle stands, boats' skids, gratings, headboards, barricoes, oars, and "harness casks." There the mighty roaring Southern Ocean, tiring of its sport, had cast them up contemptuously to rot, in grievous memory of proud, tall ships with lofty spars, of swift clippers, barques, barquentines, possibly even an old East Indiaman. Wreckage from schooners, sealers, whalers, poachers, pirates, and maybe even bits of a man-o'war, lay around, for some of it may even have drifted there when Drake first battled round the Horn. "Some day, Skipper," said "Shacks," "you and I will come and dig here for old treasure, or perhaps sleep quietly with the other old seamen."" "Shackleton's Boat Journey," F. A. Worsley, Captain of H M S Endurance, The Shackleton Expedition, 1914-1916.
Dear Lord grant the brave, gallant, old seamen grace at the moment of their "awful overtaking." in the great Southern Ocean and in their battle to round Cape Horn. Thank you Lord.
"...for God time is infinitely malleable and he will have heard what the poet (and the reader) asks even now a month or a century on:
The prayer thou hearst me making
have, at the awful overtaking,
heard; have heard and granted
grace that day grace was wanted.
It is all one can do...only God can be in at the end, only the Father can help there."
Father Gerard Manley Hopkins-Jesuit priest and poet, "A Life," Paul Mariano
Posted by Captain Bill Schweizer, U. S. M. M.; missionary.
"On our way back we came across some spars...These spars told tales of the loss of some gallant ships and men, probably off Cape Horn, drifted here before the nor'west gales. Sir Ernest picked up a pathetic little toy-a child's ship, one foot long. It may have told of tragedy, but at the least it was the minor tragedy of some child's lost treasure....
Just east of us was a marvellous pile of driftwood, covering half an acre, and piled from four to eight feet high in places. This was a graveyard of ships-woeful flotsam and jetsam-sport of the sea: lower masts, topmasts, a great mainyard, ships' timbers, bones of brave ships, and bones of brave men. Most of it had drifted a thousand miles from Cape Horn, some of it two thousand miles or more.
Swept before the westerly gales on to this wild South Georgian coast, the easterly current, by some strange freak of eddies, threw it up in this one spot-a sad tale of wasted human endeavour, of gallant seamen beaten by the remorseless sea. Piled in utter confusion lay beautifully carved figureheads, well-turned teak stanchions with brass caps, handrails clothed in canvas "coachwhipping" finished off with "Turks' heads"-the proud work of some natty, clever AB; cabin doors, broken skylights, teak scuttles, binnacle stands, boats' skids, gratings, headboards, barricoes, oars, and "harness casks." There the mighty roaring Southern Ocean, tiring of its sport, had cast them up contemptuously to rot, in grievous memory of proud, tall ships with lofty spars, of swift clippers, barques, barquentines, possibly even an old East Indiaman. Wreckage from schooners, sealers, whalers, poachers, pirates, and maybe even bits of a man-o'war, lay around, for some of it may even have drifted there when Drake first battled round the Horn. "Some day, Skipper," said "Shacks," "you and I will come and dig here for old treasure, or perhaps sleep quietly with the other old seamen."" "Shackleton's Boat Journey," F. A. Worsley, Captain of H M S Endurance, The Shackleton Expedition, 1914-1916.
Dear Lord grant the brave, gallant, old seamen grace at the moment of their "awful overtaking." in the great Southern Ocean and in their battle to round Cape Horn. Thank you Lord.
"...for God time is infinitely malleable and he will have heard what the poet (and the reader) asks even now a month or a century on:
The prayer thou hearst me making
have, at the awful overtaking,
heard; have heard and granted
grace that day grace was wanted.
It is all one can do...only God can be in at the end, only the Father can help there."
Father Gerard Manley Hopkins-Jesuit priest and poet, "A Life," Paul Mariano
Posted by Captain Bill Schweizer, U. S. M. M.; missionary.
posted by mtntop sea ministries | 10:20 AM
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