Fiction
Many Waters
Tales of S.O.S. and T.T.T. By Bennet Copplestone. (Black.
wood. is. 6d.) •
THESE three books, each remarkably good in its own way, will grip all readers who love or hate the sea. For stark realism, shot through with occasional gleams of beauty, it would be difficult to surpass The Ship Sails On. The story describes the voyage of a Norwegian cargo steamer from Christiania, via South Shields, to the Cape. The plot centres around Benjamin Hall, a youngster of middle-class family, who begins his seafaring career with pure instincts and a heart full of love for the Eva to Whom he has just become engaged. Throughout the voyage his sensitive nature recoils from the coarsening influences around him. On reaching the Cape, however, and not finding the expected letter from Eva, he yields to temptation ashore ; and the letter, accidentally delayed, reaches him on the day that the doctor confirms his suspicion that he has contracted a horrible disease. But the distinction of this powerful novel lies in its general picture of life afloat. The sea, in all its moods, lives in its pages ; the ' Mignon's' crew, with their various idiosyncrasies and their mingled brutality and tenderness, are drawn with haunting vividness ; and always in the background—sinister reflection of the larger world of which it is a microcosm—there is the ship itself, which must sail on, no, matter what happens to those who serve it.
Mr. Morley Roberts, who has collected eight previously published short stories dealing with the merchant service, is a realist only in his details. He knows seafaring life well enough, but he prefers to use it rather as a setting for fanciful adventures. Sometimes, as when he describes how a dis- gruntled crew take their revenge on the four stingy partners of the owning company, who are travelling as passengers, he gives us good comedy. At other times, as in "The Lofty-Minded Mariner," in which an old deep-sea sailor tells an eerie yarn to a • group of awe-struck longshoremen, he is fantastic. But all his tales make delightful reading, and their breezy quality is a good antidote to the grimness of The Ship Sails On.
Mr. Copplestone, in terse, vivid prose, describes six notable shipwrecks of recent times. A particularly interesting chapter deals with the Lusitania: Captain Turner, we are told, was faced with " a conflict of risks." Should he study safe navigation first, or should he subordinate that to an attempt to dodge the German submarines ? A true son of the mercantile school, he chose to eliminate the sea risk and accept the war risk. Mr. Copplestone defends Captain Turner against Mr. Churchill's criticism. But he shows how the Lusitania ' catastrophe changed the policy of merchant
seamen during the remaining period of the War. Dealing with the ` Titanic' disaster, Air. Copplestone _ tells how fifteen hundred lives were lost by a margin of ten minutes. - The ' Titanic,' as is well known, carried insufficient boats. But near by—the only vessel within easy hail—was the ` Californian,' with enough supplementary boats to save, in that millpond of a sea, all the Titanic's ' passengers. But the ' Californian ' had only one wireless operator, who worked by day and had gone to bed when the `. Titanic ' crashed. He was awakened at last ; but it was " a Matter of minutes " too late. In the case of the ' Volturno,' a year later, the ship itself was amply provided with boats, and was able to summon by wireless a whole fleet of rescuing vessels. This time there was plenty of ready aid. But it was. rendered ineffective by reason of the heavy sea running
. Such is the irony of the sea, which, in spite of our ever- growing mastery of it, " still has the last word." Yet not quite the last word, after all. For there is yet one thing which many waters cannot quench, and that, as Mr. Copplestone's book brings so poignantly home to us, is the dauntless
Previous page
