magnetic force. It reminded me, too, of seeing in my little boy's bath
how a large celluloid floating duck would draw towards itself, by what
is called capillary attraction, smaller ducks, frogs, beetles, and
other animal folk, until the menagerie floated about as a unit,
oblivious of their natural antipathies and reminding us of the "happy
families" one sees in cages on the seashore. On the New York there was
shouting of orders, sailors running to and fro, paying out ropes and
putting mats over the side where it seemed likely we should collide;
the tug which had a few moments before cast off from the bows of the
Titanic came up around our stern and passed to the quay side of the
New York's stern, made fast to her and started to haul her back with
all the force her engines were capable of; but it did not seem that
the tug made much impression on the New York. Apart from the serious
nature of the accident, it made an irresistibly comic picture to see
the huge vessel drifting down the dock with a snorting tug at its
heels, for all the world like a small boy dragging a diminutive puppy
down the road with its teeth locked on a piece of rope, its feet
splayed out, its head and body shaking from side to side in the effort
to get every ounce of its weight used to the best advantage. At first
all appearance showed that the sterns of the two vessels would
collide; but from the stern bridge of the Titanic an officer directing
operations stopped us dead, the suction ceased, and the New York with
her tug trailing behind moved obliquely down the dock, her stern
gliding along the side of the Titanic some few yards away. It gave an
extraordinary impression of the absolute helplessness of a big liner
in the absence of any motive power to guide her. But all excitement
was not yet over: the New York turned her bows inward towards the
quay, her stern swinging just clear of and passing in front of our
bows, and moved slowly head on for the Teutonic lying moored to the
side; mats were quickly got out and so deadened the force of the