THE SORROW OF THE LIVING
Of the survivors in general it may be said that they escaped death and they gained life. Life is probably sweet to them as it is to everyone, but what physical and mental torture has been the price of life to those who were brought back to land on the Carpathia—the hours in life-boats, amid the crashing of ice, the days of anguish that have succeeded, the horrors of body and mind still experienced and never to be entirely absent until death affords them its relief.
The thought of the nation to-day is for the living. They need our sympathy, our consolation more than do the dead, and, perhaps, in the majority of the cases they need our protecting care as well.
CHAPTER XXVII
The Tragic Home-Coming
THE CARPATHIA REACHES NEW YORK—AN INTENSE AND DRAMATIC MOMENT—HYSTERICAL REUNIONS AND CRUSHING DISAPPOINTMENTS AT THE DOCK—CARING FOR THE SUFFERERS—FINAL REALIZATION THAT ALL HOPE FOR OTHERS IS FUTILE—LIST OF SURVIVORS—ROLL OF THE DEAD
IT was a solemn moment when the Carpathia heaved in sight. There she rested on the water, a blur of black—huge, mysterious, awe-inspiring—and yet withal a thing to send thrills of pity and then of admiration through the beholder.
It was a few minutes after seven o’clock when she arrived at the entrance to Ambrose Channel. She was coming fast, steaming at better than fifteen knots an hour, and she was sighted long before she was expected. Except for the usual side and masthead lights she was almost dark, only the upper cabins showing a glimmer here and there.
Then began a period of waiting, the suspense of which proved almost too much for the hundreds gathered there to greet friends and relatives or to learn with certainty at last that those for whom they watched would never come ashore.
There was almost complete silence on the pier. Doctors and nurses, members of the Women’s Relief Committee, city and government officials, as well as officials of the line, moved nervously about.