was a terrible panic I can tell you, amongst the strong, rough
men, when it became apparent that the vessel was sinking. To tell the
truth, there was that much confusion on board that I really did not
know what was going to be done. By this time about a dozen women had
got on to the deck. I could hear the captain's voice, now and then,
above the praying and crying, but I don't know that any one was paying
any attention to him. In the midst of the din and confusion the
captain's wife was being lowered into the boat on the starboard side.
She had been aroused by her husband, who assisted her to dress, and as
a precaution against sinking she put on a cork belt. As she was
descending, the Captain waved his hands, and said, 'Good-bye, my dear,
good-bye;' and his wife replied, 'Good-bye, my love; I don't expect to
see you any more.' One poor fellow who jumped with me on to the tops
of the pile of boats, said, 'My last minute's come; if you should live
to get ashore tell mother I was thinking of her when I went down.'
'All right, old chap,' I said, 'I will; it I should go and you should
get ashore, tell my mother likewise that my last thought was of her.'

"In another minute I saw the sea come up to the level of the poop, and
the crowd, which stood shrieking there, seemed to mingle with it, and
all go away into white foam. Then I myself was struggling in the
water, and was just thinking to myself what a long time I was being
drowned, when I came up, and feeling out with my hands, got hold of
some rigging. I stuck to it; to my surprise I found it did not sink;
and presently others came and got hold of it. Eventually a pilot boat
came alongside and took us all off."

The "Murillo," a Spanish screw steamer, was adjudged to have been the
offender in the case; but, as it could not be legally proved, the
captain escaped punishment.

Very shortly after the sinking of the "Northfleet," news came of
another calamity, which stirred the heart of the country with pity. On
the 1st of April, 1873, the "Atlantic" foundered off the coast of Nova
Scotia, burying with her under the waves four hundred and eighty-one
people.

Sailing from Liverpool on the 20th of March, she was bound for America
with a burden of nine hundred and thirty-one souls, principally
emigrants. The equinoctial gales were blowing, and Captain Williams
thought it wise to make for the Harbour of Halifax, Nova Scotia.
Arrived off Lake Prospect on the 31st, the