[Illustration: HUGE ICEBERG AS PHOTOGRAPHED ABOUT 100 MILES NORTH OF THE SCENE OF THE “TITANIC” DISASTER.] [Illustration: ISADORE STRAUS THE NEW YORK MILLIONAIRE MERCHANT AND PHILANTHROPIST WHO LOST HIS LIFE ON THE GIANT TITANIC.] [Illustration: A TYPE OF MAGNIFICENT OCEAN GREY HOUND. THE STEAMSHIP “KAISERIN AUGUSTE VICTORIA” OF HAMBURG-AMERICAN LINE. This steamer is 700 feet long, 77 feet wide and 54 feet deep. She has accommodations for 550 first-class passengers, 350 second-class, 300 third-class and 2300 steerage passengers, making altogether a floating city of 3500 population. ] [Illustration: MAIN DINING ROOM, STEAMSHIP “KAISERIN AUGUSTE VICTORIA,” OF THE HAMBURG-AMERICAN LINE. It has promenade decks, large cabins with lower berths only, grand combination suites of rooms, and in addition to the grand dining saloon a perfectly equipped restaurant. Small tables have been provided in place of the long tables that have for many years been in use on steamships.] [Illustration: SEEKING INFORMATION ABOUT LOST RELATIVES AND FRIENDS AT THE OFFICE OF THE STEAMSHIP COMPANY.] [Illustration: EFFECT OF THE MIRAGE AS SEEN AMONG THE ICE FLOES.] [Illustration: THE SINKING “TITANIC” CARRYING HUNDREDS OF SOULS TO WATERY GRAVES BEFORE THE EYES OF TERRIFIED SURVIVORS IN LIFEBOATS. THIS AWFUL TRAGEDY SENT A MAGNIFICENT SHIP THAT WAS CALLED “UNSINKABLE” TO THE BOTTOM OF THE OCEAN AFTER RUNNING INTO AN ICEBERG] [Illustration: COPYRIGHT BY UNDERWOOD & UNDERWOOD, N. Y. THESE BRIGHT LITTLE FRENCH CHILDREN WERE RESCUED FROM THE “TITANIC;” MISS HAYS, HERSELF A SURVIVOR, IS TAKING CARE OF THEM. THEY WERE COMING TO AMERICA WITH THEIR FATHER, WHO WENT DOWN WITH THE SHIP] [Illustration: SINKING OF THE “TITANIC.” THERE WAS A MIGHTY ROAR WHEN THE SHIP WENT DOWN. THE BOW SANK FIRST, WITH STERN POISED IN THE AIR, WHEN SUDDENLY IT PLUNGED OUT OF SIGHT, CARRYING HUNDREDS OF SOULS TO ETERNITY] CHAPTER I. FROM A DAY OF DELIGHT TO DEATH. April 14, 1912, a Fateful Date--Lulled to False Security--Peaceful Sabbath Ends in Dire Disaster--Hopes Sink Beneath the Cruel and Treacherous Waves of the Atlantic--Man’s Proudest Craft Crumbles Like an Eggshell. The hands of the ship’s clock pointed to 11.40. The beautiful day of April 14, 1912, rapidly was drawing to its close. A solemn hush brooded over the ocean, the stillness broken only by the swish of the waters as they protested against being so rudely brushed aside by the mammoth creation of man. Then, too, the soft cadences of sacred music from the ship’s orchestra sent their strains dancing o’er the billows to mingle with the star beam and intensify rather than mar the stillness. Above, the stars and planets twinkled and glittered as they beam only in the rarified atmosphere of the far northern latitudes.