The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, July 11, 1897, Page 19

THE SAN FRANCISCO CALL, SUNDAY, JULY 11, 1897, 19 MIRACULOUS ESCAPE OF THREE FISHERMEN FROM BEING DROWNED BY A WHALE THAT ON THEIR “That's the narrowesc escape I ever had lif2, and I have been through a ber of strange experien And Pll right now there’s no more ocean g for me—tbatis unless I am in a -sized boat.” The speaker was Tom Butwell, keeper of the Ano Nuevo fog signal, and he was engazed in helping two pale-iaced men out of a small skiff on to the wharf at the | GOT CHUGHT ANCHOR. island. The pale-faced men had little to say. Infact they were shak like the leaves of a pop!ar iree when the autumn winds blow, showing plainiy that they had been fri ntened. But they had a 1 | all good. been made fast. *'I kinder feel as though I would like a little of something to steady | me, myself. I guess a little would do us | | After the pale-faced men bad been made rght to be frightened. Any one would | more comfortable and Tom was feeline as nave who had passed through what they had on that morning a few weeks ago. “steady” as he could expect, he tilted his chair back against the wall and to.d the “*Come up to tne house and I'll tell you | story of how a whale had that morning all about it,” said Tom, after the boat Liad | gotten hold of the anchor of ti eir fishing- boat and started to China with them. The whale seemed to have a preference for a deep-water route, and would un- doubtedly have taken it had not the rope been cut just as the sea was coming over the 2unwale. **You sce,” began Tom, ‘'my assistant, Jim, here, and my friend, Mr. Jones, ail conciuded we would try our hands at deep-water fishing half a mile or so to the west of the island. The tide was just right this morning, and we had little work rowing out. The swell was magnificent and the day perfect for our sport. “I had been out to the same locality be near a reef where there was likely to be plenty of fish. We got fixed in short order. Ithrew out asmall anchor at the end of about forty feet of rope, and it held at once, so that in a moment we were riding the swell in grand style.” “Usually after we throw out our lines the fish beuin to bite as soon as the bait | touches bottom; but to-day something | was wrong. Half an hour passed with- out a nibble, and I was about making up | my mind to go to some other place. Sud- denly my line zave a series of jerks, and so did Jim’s and Mr. jones’, almost at the same moment. “When we pu'led up every hook had a fi<h omn it, and it was plain to me that a school of fish had come by, and we were gettinz the benefit of it commenced, but didn’t fast long. “It was all we could do to bait our lines and take off the fish. nad touched bottom there was a fish on each. We kept this up for a few minutes, and then something happened. before and knew where to anchor so as to | Then tue fun | Before the hooks | “I was sitting in the bow of the boat, | | Jim was sitting in the middle and Mr. | Jones was in the stern. Just as our sport | was at its height our boat seemed io give a jump anda bump. 1 thouszht at first that we must have gone adrift and struck on areef. I looked about to make sure and saw that the anchor line was taut. Then the boat gave another jump and we all looked at one another. ‘It was not until the real cause of our troubie came in front of me that I knew | what it was. I had considered a number of things such as getting caught in some current, becoming tangled in seaweed and afew others just as sensible. “Before I knew it we were going like lightning and foam was flying on both sides of us. I reached for the anchor rope, and just atthat moment a monster fluke | rose before me and came down with a| splash not three inches in front of the boat. If it had touched us it would have been all night with us and nobody would | ever huve known how we came to our un- timely ends. ‘‘Of course as soon as I saw the fluke I knew we were fastened to a whale, and a ] camein every few moments. Still the rope held. ‘It seemed to me e an age before I moment later 1 saw the fellow who had | managed to eventually cut through that us with an anchor sticking in one corner | of his mouth. Away he went in a series of leaps over the waves. “I tried to untie the anchor rope, but couldn’t. “Then I reached for my knife. but it bada been used for cutting bait, and was in the bottom of the boat somewhere. “The oars had been poked under the seats so as to be out of our way, and could not be exiricated. “Faster and faster the whale went over the water, churning it into foam all around. Iknew that aslongas he kept on top we were safe, but did not think this would last longz. Nor did it. The whale began to dive and sink our boat to the gucwale every few seconds. “Then he remained under the water, and I about concluded that our time had come. The boat was running close down, and Iknew that the first little wave we ran into would let in enough water to allow the whale to sink her. It was for- tunate for us that the whale was a small one. “Just as we were coming to a little bit choppy water, Jim found the knife and banded it to me. Itwzs awful dull. I cut and sawed, and little splashes of water | minutes. rope. But L did, just as the boat shipped about a tubful of water, and Mr. Whale took himself away and our anchor with him. But he was welcome to it. “It was some moments before we at- tempted to row back to land, but you can see that we got here. And, as I said be- fore, no more ocean fishing for me, unless Iam in a big boat. “Now that it is all over I can think of how it happened. I lay it ail to the school of fish that eave us such sport for a few You see, that whale was around there before we got there and chased all the fish away. Thau's the reason we couldn’t catch any at first. Then when the fish got back he was close behind. Of course, they got pretty thick around our bait and he charged into them. In some way he must have got a-nold of our anchor rope, and in attempting to get away lifted the anchoer from the bottom, so that it caught in the corner of his mouth. If he had only backed water for a moment it would have shaken loose, but instead he got friightened and went ahead, taking us with him. “It's all right now, but when I go whaling next time I want to be prepared forit.” A FOREST GIANT TO MAKE A BANQUET TABLE A superb specimen of California red- | wood isnow on its way to Lonion, Eng- | ,in the ship Maria Hackfeld, which | sailed from San Francisco on May 18. Through the press it has already become famous on two continents as the ‘“‘Astor table top,”’ from the fact that it was shipped to William Waldorf Astor, who seitas a table for a dinner to be, n by him at his residence in London. | a cross section of a redwood tree, red is 15 feet 2 inches in diam- inches thick, weighs 19,000 pounds, expected to seat forty people ts generous circumference. To obtain this specimen necessitated | the cutt down of a tree 250 feet tall and over 17 feet in diameter, the differ- | ence in diam between itand the fin- ished piece representing the thickness of | the bark on the tree. | It was cut in the very beart of a great | forest on the tract of the John Vance Mill | It and eter, and is around ter d Lumber Company in Humboldt | ity, a ‘ract noted for the size and | quality of its timber, and where the forest giants grow :o thickly ih woven foliage forms a lofty roof through | which neither rain nor ine can find | its way to the ground, a hundred feet or | av their inter- | more below. To successfully fell such a tres and under sach circumstances required con- siderable skill and labor. The conditions, however, were very little different from those existing throughcut the redwood belt, so that « description of the methods | employed in felling this vparticular tree | wiil apply to the work as carried on in the | redwoods generally. Owing to its great weight and height, the only serious problem in *“felling” a Then (the position in which the tree | should lie having been chosen)the next operation was ‘“putting in the undercut,” | which determines the general direction of the ““fall,”” and iscut on theside of the tree toward which it is intended it snall fall. | Standing on the platform and siripped | of all superfluous ciothing, two brawny | cioppers, the one working from the left | and tne other from the right with heavy | | double-edged, long, straigni-helved axes, | | commenced cutting into the tree, redwood tree is to determine the direction | of ‘“fall”—one that will not only prevent the shattering of the tree by contact with its neighbors, but will also afford the most advantageous position on the ground for | cutting it into logsand for their subse- quent removal. This probem is soon solved by the average “redwood logger,’’ who has become so expert in laying low these giants that he can ‘*fell"” one so ac- | curately that its top will drive home a stake previously placed in the ground as a bearing for a ‘“‘sight.” The first work was the erection of arude staging around the tree to enable the men to where the roots commence to spread about six or eight feet 2bove the ground. At last the *'sea serpent’ is given a| place in scientific books. But it is not called a sea serpent. It isdeclared to be en enormous seal of an uncaptured spe d the man who makes this statement to the world is Professor A. Labbie, the famous French doctor of sciences. In the book in question the writer has perhaps given more study to the creature in question than the subject would seem 1o warrant, but considering that thi me subject has been agitating the minds of | men forages it is only receiving the atten- tion that should have been bestowed upon it many years ago. The reason that the sea serpent has not in the past received the attention it deserved is because those who mieht have investigated it started out with the impression that it was all hum- bug; that it was at most the product of an | excited brain. Those who claimed to| have seen a sea serpent may have seen | only a good-sized shark or whale, and their imaginations did the rest. In his work on this highly interesting subject Professor Labbie states that he was led to investigate by the <imilarity of the stories that came from different locali- ties; and also the simiiarity of stories that came from differentages. The emi- nentscientist hasspentseveral years on his work, and it is sure to receive the indorse- ment of scientific men all over the world. The earliest stories of the sea serpent were told by the old Norse nayigators, but these yarns were wild in the extreme. At the came time it must now be admitted that there was some truth in them. | Considering the fact that the men saw | the terrible monsters of the deep while they themselves were in a small boat, it is no wonder that they were frightened out of all responsibility, The creature that they saw was probably not more than a work above the “bole,” or swelling | l AN EMINENT SCIENTIST SAYS T and at | the end of three or four hours they had | completed the “‘undercut,” a wide nolch! extending entirely across the tree and | about a quarter of the distance through it. | Discardisg the axes the men then went | to the opposite side of the tree and | with a crosscut saw proceeded to cut | through to meet the ‘“undercut,” deep | noiches having been previously chopped | in the sides of the tree to aliow the 12 | foot saw cutting-play acrcss the greater | diameter. As the saw cut its way into | the iree large iron wedges were driven in | behind it to keep the.“kerf” or cut open, and later to serve the purpose ot toppling | the tree and giving it the proper direction n failing. The sawing process occupied another two or three hours and was discontinued when the cut was within a foot or so of the notch. Then with huge mallets or mauls, the loggers commenced methodically to drive in the wedges, a heavy blow on this one and a light tap on that one, according to the direction to be given the fa With its fall came the ‘“ringers” and tpeelers,” the former with their axes cut- ting notches or rings around the tree through the bark at convenient distances apart, ing the trunk for the log-sawyers to cut up into portable lengths. In this instance the first length was comparatively short, yet it repre- sented a day’s work for one man, who, in “squaring up’’ the rough and cutting off the section, was compelied to saw around and around the circumference in order to use his tweive-foot saw to advantage. The crating of the section, to prevent | breakage, was the next operation, and 1t was then ready to be dragged by the cable logging engine to the raiiroad, over which it would be carried to the shipping point. W. H. GALLAGHER. hundred feet long, but at the same time it weas capable of smashing their boat to splinters. To them this creature looked several times its real length, and its efforts to escape churned the water tfo foam so that the small vessel was pitched about like a chip. The men saw something the like of which they had never seen before, and at once became filled with fear. At a glance it may have looked something like a snake, and they went home and told stories that have never been proved or disproved to this day. Of later years, with large ships that even the most enormous creature could not in- jure, men have been able to watch this strange creature and get a few facts that may ultimately lead to the capture of one of them. The similarities of the different stories about the sea serpent lay in the fact that they all agreed thzt the creature emitted clouds of vapor from its mouth. All agreed that it had long whiskers and a smooth coat of fur, except in a couple of instances there was said to be a mane. None of the sea serpents seen ever showed fight. The most authentic stories all agreed that it had enormous flippers or tins. Instead of running away with the idea that this creature was an entirely new animal as far as science knew, Professor Labbie conducted his invesiigations to find out what this description fitted as far as regards everything except size. In the first place the emitting of clouds of vapor from the nostrils is enough to prove con- clusively that it is a warm-blooded animal and not a reptile. 8o the question of iis being a serpent is settled right there. The fact that it had long whiskers and a smooth coat of fur marked 1t a seal of some kind. All those ing tree. | and the latter with long chisel- | pointed steel bars peeling or rather prying | off the sections of thick bark, thus prepar- | 3 \ The Only Published Photograph of the Califoraia Big Tree Section Which William Waldorf Astor Is Going to Use for a Table at a Famous Dinner Party in London. seen had fins and were timid in disposi- tion, both of which answer the description of the seal. Occasionally seals are seen that have manes, so even thisdiscrepancy isno very great discovery. The two most authentic accounts of a sea serpent being met with are on the log- books of the French cruiser Daedalus and the English cruiser Osborn. Both of these descriptions agree with the facts tending to show that the creature is a seal. In fact the drawing made by one of the officers of the Daedalus is distinctly that | ot a seal. | To still further bear out his theory Pro- fessor Lubbie points to the fact that seals | are of a variety of sizes, much as dogs are, | and for there to be one species larger than | any that have been caught is easily possi- ble. Itisalsoknown that the larger the seals the more timid they are. Of course we are accustomed to seeing seals on land as well as in the water and so are able to form an idea of their shape. But had we never seen them on land there is no deny- | ing the fact that we would think them much longer than they really are. In fact in the world of science there 1s noth- ing else the sea serpent could be except a seal, and surely it is much more rational to think it this than to think it something entirely new. Asa clincher to his theory Professor Labbie shows that all of the bones sup- posed to belong to sea serpents that had been found in different sections are not reptiles’ bones at all but those of some amphibious sort of mammal. All that is necessary to make a seal into one of the fabled sea serpents is to extend its vertebra and make its neck consiger- ably longer. The accompanying drawing 1s made from Professor Labbie’s book and shows the creature reconstructed irom all HE “SEA SERPENT” IS A SEAL of the descriptions that could be found. The resemblance to a seal is undeniable, although, of course, it is different from ike seals we know. As for size, the measurements taken by the two cruisers give it something over a hundred feet in both cases. If the pro- portions are right the tail wouid certainly have somewhat the appearance of a snake, particularly as it was swimming. Whether or not one of these creatures will ever be caught and so set at rest all controversy is extremely doubtful. If it is, as Professor Luabbie claim+, a scal, then the chances are indeed slim, for every mariner knows how “:carey’’ these ani- mals are. It is d:fficult to get within gun- shot of them, except during the breeding seasor. Krom all stories tlie “'seaserpent” is more scarey than those known. so it will be likely to keep away from those who have designs on its life,