SINGING AT SEA.

Marlborough Daily Times, Volume II, Issue 166, 22 October 1880, Page 1 (Supplement)

SINGING AT SEA.

Within the last live weeks no less than six steamers have been in collision with ice in the North Atlantic. Two of them were so badly injured that they were abandoned, and the other four reached port with their forward compartments full of water. It is evident that owing to a mild summer in the Arctic regions the ice had drifted down into the trackof our transatlantic steamers earlier and in greater quantities than usual. Fortunately, the large passenger steamers have so far, met with no accident, and, as a matter of course, unusual care will bo taken during the present season to guard against the danger of collision with ice. In these circumstances it would be a failure of duty not to call attention to an incident in connection with the disaster to the Arizona which at the time was overlooked or wilfully ignored by the press. At the very moment when the Arizano struck the iceberg the saloou passengers were singing ‘ A life ou the ocean wave.’ There is very little doubt that the restoration of the captain’s certificate, of which ho was at first sentenced to be deprived for six months, was resolved upon as soon as the knowledge of this fact came to the court of inquiry. The dauger which attends the singing of secular music by passengers at sea is perfect!'. well known to all seamen. Realms can be sung on Sunday in moderation, and iu connexion with religious services, with apparent impunity, and t'ic legitimate singing of sailors when working at the capstan, orhoistiug the topsail yards, or ‘ pumpin’ on her out,’ is not only harmless, but in many cases positively beneficial. When, however, the passengers undertake to have a concert in the saloon, or when several of them lift up their voices on deck and sing ‘ Home, .Sweet Home, ’or other purely land songs, danger and disaster are sure to follow. Worst of all is the singing of those so-called sea songs written by men who never put their feet on a vessel’s deck. It is estimated that thirtyseven British vessels, having an aggregate tonnage of 94,000 tons, weie lost last year by the singing of ‘Nancy Lee’ alone. The loss of life was, of course, large, and when we add to those thirty-seven vessels the numerous sail-boats, that during the same period, were capsized by that fatal song, we shall not be far out of the way if wc estimate that fully 800 people have been drowned because they or their companions insulted the sea by howling the idiotic refrain, ‘Yo ho, boys, ho ! A-cross thor sea !’ Still more fatal is the song, ‘ A life on the ocean wave. ’ A series of observations proves that within half an hour after this song is sung at sea either a gale of wind or a tog comes down, or the vessel is more or less injured by collision or fire. The very lost verse frequently sends down the barometer a quarter of an inch. In the old days of sailing ships, one of the most experienced of the Black Ball captains was accustomed to call all hands as soon ashe heard the first line of a song, and if it was sung by more than three passsengers he instantly put a reef in his topsails, setting the topgallant sails above them, ordered the carpenter to stand by the barometer and bring him word the moment it began to sink. By these timely measures he repeatedly saved his ship from being dismasted by a sudden cyclone. He often lamented that his owners did not give him authority to forbid all singing by passengers but they reprimanded him so unpleasantly on the one occasion when he put a passenger in irons for singing ‘ A life on the ocean wave’ —having previously warned him, with a belaying-pin over the head, not to sing—that he did not again resort to extreme measures. Why the ocean resents the singing of passengers, and especially their singii*'.g of sham sea songs, cannot be definitely decided. There is a certain degree of iupertinence in the feeble pipe of the passenger who lifts up an apparent challenge to the howl of the tempest, and it is only just that the challenge should be accepted. When, also, a passenger who has just recovered from his sea-sickness, loudly clamours for a life on the ocean wave, when what he really wants is a home in Oshkosh, it serves him right if the ocean wave promptly shows him what it is capable of doing. Nevertheless, these are not reasons which can be accepted in explanation of the dangerous consequence which follow singing at sea. The ocean is not a reasonable, being, capable of receiving and avenging insult, and we must assume that there is some hitherto undiscovered law of Nature which causes' the storm to follow' the song. No seafaring man needs any further explanation of the way in which the Arizona came to run into an iceberg than the fact that the passengers were singing, ‘A life on the ocean wave. ’ The only wonder is that the vessel did not go down the moment she struck. If this song is to be sung during the coming season, when ice is abundant, no care ou the part of officers can avert collisions. Wo shall have more than one terrible calamity to record, and the unthinking public will lay the blame on officers, ailors, and owners, without dreaming that the real cause was a vocal «o*cert in the saloon.