“‘They that go down to the sea in ships, that do business in great waters,
“‘These see the works of the Lord, and his wonders in the deep.
“‘They cry unto the Lord in their trouble, and he bringeth them out of their distress.’”
Eric listened, and his respect and esteem for the diver grew tenfold more.
Mr. Lacelle continued:—
“It is a strange business. The danger fascinates some, but the peril is never lost sight of. I put on the helmet, for the first time, more than ten years ago; and yet I never resume it without a feeling that it may be the last time I shall ever go down. Of course one has more confidence after a while; but there is something in being shut up in an armor weighed down with a hundred pounds, and knowing that a little leak in your life-pipe is your death, that no diver can get rid of. And I do not know that I should care to banish the feeling, for the sight of the clear blue sky, the genial sun, and the face of a fellow-man after long hours among the fishes, makes you feel like one who has suddenly been drawn away from the grasp of death.”
“Were you ever in great danger?” asked Eric.
“I think the most dangerous place I ever got into was going down to examine the propeller Comet, sunk off Toledo. In working about her bottom, I got my air-pipe coiled over a large sliver from the stoven hole, and could not reach it with my hands. Every time I sprang up to remove the hose, my tender would give me the ‘slack’ of the line, thus letting me fall back again. He did not understand his duties, and did not know what my signals on the life-line meant. It was two hours and a half before I was relieved, and there was not a moment that I was not looking to see the hose cut by the ragged wood. It’s a strange feeling you have down there. You go walking over a vessel, clambering up her sides, peering here and there, and the feeling that you are alone makes you nervous and uneasy.
“Sometimes a vessel sinks down so fairly, that she stands up on the bottom as trim and neat as if she rode upon the surface. Then you can go down into the cabin, up the shrouds, walk all over her, just as easy as a sailor could if she were still dashing away before the breeze. Only it seems quiet, so tomb-like; there are no waves down there—only a swaying back and forth of the waters, and a see-sawing of the ship. You hear nothing from above. The great fishes will come swimming about, rubbing their noses against your glass, and staring with a wonderful look into your eyes. The very stillness sometimes gives life a chill. You hear just a moaning, wailing sound, like the last notes of an organ, and you cannot help thinking of dead men floating over and around you.
“A diver does not like to go down more than a hundred and twenty feet; at that depth the pressure is painful, and there is danger of internal injury. I can stay down, for five or six hours at a time, at a hundred and fifteen or twenty feet, and do a good deal of hard work. In the waters of Lake Huron the diver can see thirty or forty feet away, but the other lakes will screen a vessel not ten feet from you.