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Another bit of wreck over there is all that is left of the Westbourne, of Chichester, coal-laden. She was running for Ness Point at night, and, getting too far in, struck where she lay, and all the crew save one were drowned.

Captain Red was the largest owner of the Pittsburg mines, and the pioneer in the business of carrying coal-laden barges in acres and scores of acres down the river, pushing them with stern-wheel steamers of large power, but still of a power insufficient for the accomplishment of the best results. Captain Red's fleet was unable to control the trade.

At thirty-five clusters of cottages began to shoot by. Jawn's arm began to straighten the roar diminished a trifle. Thirty-seven they passed rows of coal-laden flat cars; thirty-nine, they slackened through a tangle of tracks; forty-one, the big engine rolled under the train shed and stopped in a cloud of steam. Jim stepped down and stretched himself.

He bided his time.... One black night Moussa Isa sat on the stern of his barge holding to a rope beneath the high wall of the side of the P. & O. liner, Persia, in shadow and darkness undispelled by the flickering flare of a brazier of burning fuel, designed to illuminate the path of panting, sweating, coal-laden coolies up and down narrow bending planks, laid from the lighter to the gloomy hole in the ship's side.

Just behind the great hissing locomotive, with its parabolic headlight and its coal-laden tender, came the baggage, mail, and express cars; then the passenger coaches, in which the social condition of the occupants seemed to be in inverse ratio to their distance from the engine.

A small torpedo-boat was seen to emerge from the shore near the arsenal, making for the coal-laden steamers at a high rate of speed. The secondary batteries on the ships nearest were brought to bear upon her; it was a veritable shower of shot and shell which fell ahead, astern, and either side of her.

The big coastwise tug Hydrographer slid stern-ward into a slip cluttered with driftwood and bituminous dust, stopping within heaving distance of three coal-laden barges which in their day had reared "royal s'ls" to the wayward winds of the seven seas. Near-by lay Horace Howland's ocean-going steam yacht, Veiled Ladye, which had put into Norfolk from Caribbean ports, to replenish her bunkers.

Just behind the great hissing locomotive, with its parabolic headlight and its coal-laden tender, came the baggage, mail, and express cars; then the passenger coaches, in which the social condition of the occupants seemed to be in inverse ratio to their distance from the engine.

The vessel was bound for Poole, coal-laden; they left Shoreham at seven a.m. under easy sail; and at five, being off the Isle of Wight, with the wind north, she stood over to France, and returned to Poole, no one discovering that they had been out of their course. A letter recently discovered among the archives of the Society of Friends at Devonshire House solves every difficulty.

He learned that one of the great coal-towing steamers from Pittsburg was expected within a few hours, pushing acres of coal-laden barges before her, and he was encouraged by the information, volunteered on every hand, that the work of "firing up" under the boilers of these coal-towing boats was so severe that a goodly number of the stokers always abandoned their employment in disgust of it, and deserted the boat if she made a landing at Wheeling, as this approaching one must do for the reason that a number of coal-laden barges had been left there for her to take in tow.