Astonishing Tales Of The Sea
This morning I woke up with the book title Astonishing Tales Of The Sea in my head. A book I’ve never read, nor really have any great motivation to. Perhaps it’s a nocturnal weirdness motivated by the floods, earthquakes and solar eclipse we’ve been living through this week which make the world feel as if it’s finally spinning off its axis. I’ve also been reading the book Witnesses at Isandlwana, which contains the written testimony of those who survived the massacre of British soldiers in South Africa in 1879. But the event which always stands out to me are the increasingly panicked notes sent between the different commanders and their pleas for help. For God’s sake come back writes the camp commander as the Zulus engulf the position. Fire away boys! writes another as his regiment runs out of ammunition. In more recent years We are holding our own becomes the last transmission from the doomed Edmund Fitzgerald. It’s the written heroism of resignation in the face of the enemy, and in the context of the astonishing tales, that enemy is often the waves. It got me thinking about the famous last words of sea captains before they went down.
I am going down, but God's will be done. Captain James Lawrence (1781-1813)
Hold on, my dear friends. Let us meet death bravely. I shall never see you again. Captain Frederick Marryat (1792-1848)
I am resigned to my fate, but I must not forget my duty. I shall die at my post. Captain Jan Rijp (1757-1807)
And then writing my own:
To the abyss we plunge, amidst the howling winds and raging seas! Farewell, my valiant crew, may our names echo through eternity!
Though the storm engulfs us, our spirit remains unbroken
Fear not the darkness, for it is but a gateway to new horizons
We are the vanguard of liberty, and our legacy shall endure
