Shipwrecks -- North Atlantic Ocean -- History -- 20th century; Titanic (Steamship)
In the various trips which I have made across the Atlantic, it has
been my custom aboard ship, whenever the weather permitted, to take as
much exercise every day as might be needful to put myself in prime
physical condition, but on board the _Titanic_, during the first days
of the voyage, from Wednesday to Saturday, I had departed from this,
my usual self-imposed regimen, for during this interval I had devoted
my time to social enjoyment and to the reading of books taken from the
ship’s well-supplied library. I enjoyed myself as if I were in a
summer palace on the seashore, surrounded with every comfort--there
was nothing to indicate or suggest that we were on the stormy Atlantic
Ocean. The motion of the ship and the noise of its machinery were
scarcely discernible on deck or in the saloons, either day or night.
But when Sunday morning came, I considered it high time to begin my
customary exercises, and determined for the rest of the voyage to
patronize the squash racquet court, the gymnasium, the swimming pool,
etc. I was up early before breakfast and met the professional racquet
player in a half hour’s warming up, preparatory for a swim in the
six-foot deep tank of salt water, heated to a refreshing temperature.
In no swimming bath had I ever enjoyed such pleasure before. How
curtailed that enjoyment would have been had the presentiment come to
me telling how near it was to being my last plunge, and that before
dawn of another day I would be swimming for my life in mid-ocean,
under water and on the surface, in a temperature of 28 degrees
Fahrenheit!
Impressed on my memory as if it were but yesterday, my mind pictures
the personal appearance and recalls the conversation which I had with
each of these employees of the ship. The racquet professional, F.
Wright, was a clean-cut, typical young Englishman, similar to hundreds
I have seen and with whom I have played, in bygone years, my favorite
game of cricket, which has done more than any other sport for my
physical development. I have not seen his name mentioned in any
account of the disaster, and therefore take this opportunity of
speaking of him, for I am perhaps the only survivor able to relate
anything about his last days on earth.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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