THE DEEPEST DEPTH. BY VICE-ADMIRAL BOYLE SOMERVILLE, C.M.G. THAT great bowl of the Earth which contains the Pacific Ocean lies somewhat tilted over on its side between America and Asia. Its eastern lip, high in air, is firmly outlined by the chain of the Rocky Mountains and the Andes lifted up from 3000 to 4000 fathoms above sea-level on that side, while the opposite lip of the bowl, curving between Japan and New Zealand, is correspondingly though invisibly tilted downwards, and lies at the bottom of a series of narrow and abysmal gullies, which are something under or over 5000 fathoms deep. If instead of considering the Pacific Ocean as lying in a bowl, we vary the simile, and see it contained in an immense open mouth, we may say that all the teeth are remaining in the American jaw, but that all have been extracted from the Asian, leaving deep recesses in the ancient gums on that side. At the southern end of the Asian jaw is New Zealand, now but a remnant of its former self. In its early prime it possessed a northwestern arm, which reached nearly to New Guinea, without touching Australia; and there was also a balancing horn to the north-eastward, rather narrower, but equally long, which at the present time exists in the form of a series of banks, almost entirely submerged, whose crests are raised from 6000 to 10,000 feet above the adjacent ocean floor. Closely skirting the eastern side of these banks are two great submarine depressions in the ancient gums above mentioned. They lie in a north and south direction, and are each of them of about 10° of latitude in length, and 1° in width. The northern of the two lies abreast the chain of the Tonga Islands, and causes, no doubt, their volcanic instability, while the southern lies closely off the equally volcanic group of islets and rocks called the Kermadec Islands. It was in this southern "Deep," known as the "Kermadec Deep," that we were ordered to get the deepest soundings we could find when, in the old Penguin, we were on our way from Auckland, in the North Island of New Zealand, to Tongatabu. Certain hydrographic surveys in the Tongan Group had been ordained, and these Deeps lay exactly on our course between the two places. Our skipper was a man of an iron determination as regards Deep Sea Sounding. By heredity he was a Scotsman and a son of Science, while by upbringing he had served in the famous Challenger expedition through the deep seas in the On the evening before we were to sail he was dining ashore with friends, and had ordered his galley, with its crew of five men, to be in for him at the landing steps of the town at a certain hour to take him back to the ship. Approaching this point at the time named he saw that the boat was there, as ordered, but that all the crew were out of her, and in the next instant he perceived that they were standing on the jetty, abreast of the steps, agreeably engaged in sweet converse with no less than seven young ladies, all of them perfectly respectable. Two of them even were there presumably as chaperons to the remainder, though they did not seem to be actually, as they certainly were numerically de trop. '70's, and had assisted in found- of the Scotsman, he had his ing all the knowledge that exists sentimental side, as the followconcerning the ocean depths ing story will show. and of all that dwells therein. At that time he had been a mere cypher of a sub-lieutenant, and he felt that now, as a Commander in command of his own ship, his chance of immortality as an Oceanographer at length had come. As for us others, his assistants, "dry-bobs "to a man, we were rather less keen. We were pleased that the sea should be of such a good safe depth as five miles, but only that we might without undue concern sail over it to Tonga, it to Tonga, the long and hopefully anticipated Friendly Islands. It was in these happy isles that we were really interested; while the contemplation of the cold "wet-bob" job that lay between us and Nukualofa, The Island of Love"-obviously the home of a people something more than Friendly,-plunged our spirits in a depression only equalled in depth by that of the very Kermadec Deep itself. We looked forward with gloom to sounding in its profundities, whilst tossing about on its surface, sea-soaked, in wind and in rain, for many tedious days. Andrew, our skipper, felt otherwise. There was about eighteen stone of him, and all of it was The Complete Sailor-sturdy, fearless, saltpickled, and immensely interested in the Sea in all its aspects. Yet, quite properly to the traditional character of the Shipman, and perhaps also Andrew approached, all the Commanding Officer in him thoroughly scandalised, but the large human being within that external casing had an unrestrainable twinkle in its sentimental eye. On the shock of discovery the boat's crew instantly broke away from the fair ones, and by the time that Andrew was ready to step down into the boat they were all on their respective thwarts, torn 'twixt Love and Duty, and wondering, no doubt, how much the Old Man had seen in the dark. Andrew, inwardly chuckling, but outwardly with a face like a sea-boot (as the saying is) for severity, was about to go down the steps into the boat when the Coxwain's girl, who as such was functioning as Leading Hand of the shore party, advanced on him. "Oh, Captain," says she, "won't you let us have ten minutes to say good-bye to our loves ? "No, no, nonsense," says the (officially) outraged Andrew. "Couldn't think of it"; and was just stepping into the boat when another of the ladies"a very nice-looking girl," he told us later, "in a smart tailor-made dress "-ran quickly down the steps, and laying her hand on his expansive chest said, with tears in the voice, "Oh, Captain, dear, haven't you ever been in love yourself?" This was too much for Andrew. He hesitated for a moment, perhaps wondering if some soft payment in advance was to be offered for his consent, which it would be worth "hesitating" for. Whether this actually resulted we never heard, but anyway the day was lost for discipline and won for sentiment. Andrew walked, shame-faced, up the steps again, saying, Very well, I'll give you just ten minutes," and therewith went back to the Club, about half a mile away. He waited there for a decent though probably still insufficient interval, and then walked back again to the boat, descended firmly into it, as firmly ordered "Shove off," and left amid a chorus of thanks and a barrage of blown kisses (though not all 66 were for him). Next morning, in the dawn of a wintry July day, we sailed. The Naval Surveying Service has ever had foisted upon it for its work any old castaway ship that has become useless for other branches of the Navy. No one knows except those who have suffered from them how much more difficult that work-and no more essential work for the safety of the Navy can be conceived-is made for us by the aged hoodleums that are handed out for our use. But of all the old clumbungies with which the Surveying Service has been saddled, the Penguin would be hard to beat for clumbunginess. She was everything she should not have been for her special work, and the sole respect in which she was at all suitable as a surveying vessel was that her hull was of wood sheathed in copper, so that if, as must inevitably happen in an exploring vessel, she should touch on the rock for which she was searching, or come upon it unexpectedly, less damage would be done than if she had only a thin steel plate between her and the chance of sinking. At no time, perhaps, did the Penguin's limitations become more accentuated than when engaged on Deep Sea Sounding. When this takes place the ship has to be headed up to the wind and sea, and kept in a single position, steadily, for perhaps several hours, while the sounding weight, with its attached wire, is being lowered 1 to the bottom, some thousands had to be taken in, steam of fathoms down, and then brought forward, and the ship wound in again. Consequently turned round and got into the ship required for such a position for the sounding. None purpose is a handy steam- of these were very deep-a vessel, with twin screws, steam mere two thousand fathoms or steering gear, and no top- so, or two sea miles, so that hamper-a ship with a good the whole operation would be hold on the water, that will over in a couple of hours. Then answer her helm and engines sail would be made again, easily and immediately, for it steam pressure allowed to die is by these means only that down, and off we would be she can be kept in the proper blown to the next delectable attitude for the sounding. In- spot, fifty miles on. stead, here was a round-bottomed, three-masted, sailing vessel, with a single (auxiliary) propeller, and a rudder worked by ropes brought to a wheel, slowly moved from hard-a-port to hard-a-starboard by two perspiring, heavily labouring men. Nothing could have been more unlike "business." This pursuit of Pure Science for it was of small practical use to Navigation-was a very wearing one, not only to the ropes and sails so frequently set, taken in, and set again, but almost more so to the human manipulators thereof. And between the sail drills to bob about for a great part of each successive twenty-four hours under cold and wintry skies, carefully watching and attending a wire running out, and then as carefully watching and attending it while it was being wound in, with the drenching salt spray whipping across the forecastle, was a desolating occupation. It had in it little of the interest, and none of the feeling of practical utility, by which one can be buoyed up by ordinary survey work was and sounding, even in thor For the first two days out from Auckland we had a fair wind, and as coal had to be saved for taking the soundings, we allowed the old ship to be blown along before it, under canvas only, and without the moderate assistance that might have been given by the screw. It would be overstating matters to describe this mode of progression as "sailing." Like St Paul's ship, the Penguinnearly of the same period in nautical development was only able, when under sail, to "drive." So to the Kermadec Deep we drave. But our orders were to sound at every fifty miles along our course; and consequently, at every six hours or so, day and night, every stitch of canvas oughly bad weather. Also it was maddening to be kept standing still at each separate sounding spot for all those hours hours necessarily deducted from the time we were to spend in the placid waters of those soft islands to which so slowly we were making our way. There was at that time only one sounding to indicate the existence of the Kermadec Deep. It was a little more than 4000 fathoms, and was the deepest then known to exist in any part of the ocean. It was my morning watch on the day on which we reached this historic spot, and it was in its vicinity that we were to make our attempt to eclipse the existing "record." That inspiring thought, however, did not make any more welcome the arrival of the corporal of Marines of the Middle Watch in my cabin with his infernal lantern. "Ten minutes to four, sir, and th' Orfficer of the Watch told me to say it's bin rainin' orff an' on all the Watch, and was comin' down 'ard now." This was evident; for a cold pool from the copious drippings of his oilskin was swiftly forming in the middle of my strip of carpet, at the precise point where presently I should have to land warmfooted from my bunk, to provide me with an unnecessary foretaste of the Hereafter of misery awaiting me on deck. from his opposite number of the Middle. "Well, old chap, here we are, all a-taunt-o," he began, with a most misplaced cheerful sea-dogginess. "Course is N. 10° E. She's making seven and a half by the log, and we're booming along under all plain sail, with topmast and top-gallant studding sails. Here's the the Skipper's Order Book. You're to call the old man at daylight, and everything is to be ready for sounding at seven. I've warned 'em in the engine-room, but you'd better give 'em another shake up presently. So long," he said, gladly climbing down the ladder. Wish you luck; see you at breakfast at one bell." And before any effective reply could be given, other than a grunt of gloomy acquiescence, he had disappeared for a wellearned four hours' sleep after his four hours of sea - boot weather on the bridge. 66 At five minutes past four "Little One Bell" struck, followed by a short squeak on the boatswain's mate's whistle, and then his harsh voice commanding "Wa-atch to mustah." The wretched men, who already had had four long hours on deck in the First Watch, and had just been roused from their four short hours of sleep during the Middle, to face once more the wind and the rain, went past the mustering lantern; and, this concluded, it was time for "Wa-atch to Co-coa," which included a steaming basinful, |