THEY SANG NO HYMNS

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 274, 16 May 1912, Page 8

THEY SANG NO HYMNS

MERRY CHORUS IN CALAMITY. Fremantle, May 5. There are some tough characters on the ships trading on the great northwest coast of Australia. And some of the toughest of them pounded into Fremantle a few days ago in the steamer Bullara, which got a terrible buffeting in the big storm that sank the Koombana. Most of the Bullara's crew are surprised at being alive to talk about the things that befel them in the course of the hurricane. "We thought we were goners pretty nearly every minute, for a long while," said one of the men to-day. "But"—and he spoke with cheerful unconcern—"we sang no hymns. We did have some singsong when she looked like going down, but it was not hymns—no fear. It was more cheerful. 1 forget what it was now, but it went all right." One of the other men did not forget anything of the terrible experiences of the hurricane. Immense seas towered over the ship, constantly threatening to engulf her. Any one of them would have smashed the vessel and sent her straight to the bottom—had it come down on her. It seemed for a long time altogether impossible that any ship could live through such fierce and terrible buffeting. And most of the crew made up their minds that their time had come, and set about preparing for the end} each according to his own individual ideas of what was proper or expedient. In the thickest of the hurricane, when a sudden and calamitous end to the desperate struggle of the ship for life seemed inevitable, some called for a hymn. But it appeared that none of them knew any hymns—none of those who had opportunity for singing, at any rate. Then, in the midst of the terrible anxiety, a fireman struck up, "I wonder Who's Kissing Her Now." : And, to the accompaniment of the roaring of the hurricane, the crew joined in most lustily, and howled the chorus in the vigor of men seeking distraction from desperate peril. And as they sang they j grew cheerful.

"But I never want to hear that tune any more," said the man who told about it. And he looked as though he meant it.