"There was a terrible panic I can tell you, amongst the strong, rough men, when it became apparent that the vessel was sinking. To tell the truth, there was that much confusion on board that I really did not know what was going to be done. By this time about a dozen women had got on to the deck. I could hear the captain's voice, now and then, above the praying and crying, but I don't know that any one was paying any attention to him. In the midst of the din and confusion the captain's wife was being lowered into the boat on the starboard side. She had been aroused by her husband, who assisted her to dress, and as a precaution against sinking she put on a cork belt. As she was descending, the Captain waved his hands, and said, 'Good-bye, my dear, good-bye;' and his wife replied, 'Good-bye, my love; I don't expect to see you any more.' One poor fellow who jumped with me on to the tops of the pile of boats, said, 'My last minute's come; if you should live to get ashore tell mother I was thinking of her when I went down.' 'All right, old chap,' I said, 'I will; it I should go and you should get ashore, tell my mother likewise that my last thought was of her.' "In another minute I saw the sea come up to the level of the poop, and the crowd, which stood shrieking there, seemed to mingle with it, and all go away into white foam. Then I myself was struggling in the water, and was just thinking to myself what a long time I was being drowned, when I came up, and feeling out with my hands, got hold of some rigging. I stuck to it; to my surprise I found it did not sink; and presently others came and got hold of it. Eventually a pilot boat came alongside and took us all off." The "Murillo," a Spanish screw steamer, was adjudged to have been the offender in the case; but, as it could not be legally proved, the captain escaped punishment. Very shortly after the sinking of the "Northfleet," news came of another calamity, which stirred the heart of the country with pity. On the 1st of April, 1873, the "Atlantic" foundered off the coast of Nova Scotia, burying with her under the waves four hundred and eighty-one people.