XI

GRACE DARLING

the 24th of

RACE DARLING was born on the

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November, 1815, at a small town upon the northeastern coast of England. She was the seventh child of her parents. Her grandfather, Robert Darling, had been keeper of the coal-light on the outmost of the Farne Islands, and her father, William, succeeded him in that post. In 1826, however, when Grace was eleven years old, William Darling took his family to Longstone, another island of the same group.

These Farne Islands are about twenty-five in number at low tide, and, as a visitor has pointed out, are desolate to an uncommon degree, although they are at no great distance from the Northumberland coast. The sea rushes with great force through the channels between the islands. Longstone, upon which Grace dwelt was, says another visitor, of dark whinstone, cracked in every direction and worn with the action of winds, waves and tempests, since the world began. Over the greater part of it was not a blade of grass nor a grain of earth; it was hard and iron-like stone, crusted round all the coast as far as high water-mark with limpet and still smaller shells. We ascended wrinkled hills of black stone, and descended into worn and dismal dells of the same, into some of which, where the tide got entrance, it came pouring and roaring in raging whiteness, and churning the

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loose fragments of whinstone into round pebbles, and piling them up in deep crevices, with seaweed. Over our heads screamed hundreds of hovering birds, the gull mingling its hideous laughter most wildly.

Fancy a lone lighthouse standing upon this pile of stone, dropped seemingly, in the midst of the water, five miles from the mainland. The sea tosses, and swells, and beats the rocks unceasingly. In fine weather it is blue and more kindly; in storms the waters are black and furious and fearful. It was known as a most desolate and dangerous lighthouse, and its service could be only a man and family of courage, endurance, large human feeling and strong sense of duty.

In such an abode grew the little girl, almost alone so far as school friends go. Her father taught her to read and write together with the seven of her brothers and sisters, and their schoolroom was the lantern of the lighthouse. Her instructors were in other ways the sky and the breaking surf; her comrades the sea birds and the simple shell fish and floating grasses of the salt water and all the strange and curious growths the sea brings wherever it is free.

Like her brothers and sisters, Grace was schooled after the simpler fashion. But when such days were passed she kept to her home rather than go out into the world or marry. The lighthouse sheltered a united and happy family. Grace loved the seclusion of that life and assisted her mother with the work of the household. Others of the daughters had gone to homes of their own upon the mainland.

If our surroundings help to form our characters, here in this lighthouse Grace must have grown into a strong self-control and a spirit of helpfulness toward hapless

people and those wrecks upon the Farne Islands, of which many a legend has been told.

About thirty years before she was born a fine merchantman from America had struck the ledges near the lighthouse, and it is said that to the recital of this shipwreck, of how the brave sailors fought for life and how one by one they fell or were swept into the fierce waters, the little girl would listen weeping, and then go pitifully to her bed. This tale, and the story of other sea mishaps, had a special attraction for the child, and the strength of her interest and compassion for the shipwrecked were noticed by her family as they sat round the family table of an evening, knitting, talking of the sea and watching the bright beacon above.

So it was that Grace Darling grew to womanhood. She was twenty-two years old when the disaster came that made evident what sort of a girl had come to woman's years upon the solitary island.

In the fall of the year, 1838, one fifth of September, a steamer, called the Forfarshire, a vessel of small size, but laden with a considerable cargo, sailed for Dundee, Scotland, from the port of Hull, England. There were forty-one passengers and twenty-two of the crew sixty-three in all. The ship was but two years old, but her boilers were in bad order, although they had had some overhauling before she cleared her port.

She sailed in the early evening and for a part of her way seemed to be steaming safely. But as the vessel neared Flamborough Head the captain and crew became disturbed by many anxieties. Word passed from mouth to mouth among the passengers that the leak of the boiler was growing rapidly and the firemen could with difficulty keep up the fires. So much did this delay the

passage of the steamer that toward the evening of the following day she had only made the channel between the coast and the Farne Islands. The wind was blowing from the north. It is reported that the engines became utterly useless. There being great danger of drifting ashore, the sails were hoisted fore and aft, and the vessel got about in order to get her before the wind and keep her off the land. It rained heavily during the entire time, and the fog was so dense that it became impossible to tell the situation of the vessel. At length breakers were discovered close to leeward, and the Farne Light, which about the same period became visible, left no doubt as to the peril of all on board.

Passengers crowded the deck and as rain beat upon them and the fog shut out all but the sad scene on board, friends and strangers pressed hands for support and sought hopeful words from one another's lips. The sails hoisted for a defence became useless for the purpose, the wind was rising to tempest strength, and all control over the vessel seemed gone. The sea was master and was tossing the helpless steamer in its waves, and, as the summer wind drives thistledown in its course, was driving her toward the light. The billows beat upon the frail timbers and every lurch and swell took the vessel nearer the island where the wild waters were breaking in foam.

At length appeared in an opening of the fog a great rock, frightfully rugged, deadly to a ship weakened and in the power of the sea. Passengers and crew alike knew the spot, and they knew that unless some miracle prevailed the ship must go to pieces. There was a moment's delay, the sea seemed putting off its final victory, and then it brought the vessel with her bow foremost upon the rocks.

A panic followed. All who had been below rushed to the deck and sought in the companionship of wretchedness an escape from threatening destruction. Some of the crew, determined to save themselves, lowered the larboard quarter boat, and left the ship. The boiling sea now swept over the decks.

Very soon after the first shock a powerful wave struck the vessel on the quarter, and raising her off the rocks allowed her immediately after to fall violently upon it, the sharp edge striking her amidships. She was by this fairty broken in two pieces, and the after part, containing the cabin with many passengers was instantly carried off through a tremendous current, called the Piper Gut. The captain and his wife were among those who perished. The forepart still remained crushed upon the rocks. Upon its deck were eight unfortunate creatures five sailors and three of the passengers. In the cabin below lay a woman huddling two children in her arms, a girl of eleven and a boy of eight. The waves washed through the cabin tearing off the clothing of the children and half freezing them with cold. The hideous noise of the tempest drowned their melancholy cries and at last they lay quiet and dead.

At the Longstone Lighthouse the morning of the seventh of September broke mistily. The dwellers there were but three-the keeper and his wife and daughter. They were used to raging seas and driving winds, but this night had been one of anxiety. Grace, it is said, had been unable to sleep, and as she dozed toward

morning had started up with a wail for help echoing in her ears. She roused her father and taking his fieldglass sought the wreck which she felt must be near. The remains of the shattered vessel lying about a mile