The end, when it came, was as gradual as everything else had been since
the first impact. Just as there was no one moment at which everyone in
the ship realized that she had suffered damage; just as there was no one
moment when the whole of her company realized that they must leave her;
just as there was no one moment when all in the ship understood that
their lives were in peril, and no moment when they all knew she must
sink; so there was no one moment at which all those left on board could
have said, "She is gone." At one moment the floor of the bridge, where
the Captain stood, was awash; the next a wave came along and covered it
with four feet of water, in which the Captain was for a moment washed
away, although he struggled back and stood there again, up to his knees
in water. "Boys, you can do no more," he shouted, "look out for
yourselves!" Standing near him was a fireman and--strange
juxtaposition--two unclaimed solitary little children, scarce more than
babies. The fireman seized one in his arms, the Captain another; another
wave came and they were afloat in deep water, striking out over the rail
of the bridge away from the ship.
The slope of the deck increased, and the sea came washing up against it
as waves wash against a steep shore. And then that helpless mass of
humanity was stricken at last with the fear of death, and began to
scramble madly aft, away from the chasm of water that kept creeping up
and up the decks. Then a strange thing happened. They who had been
waiting to sink into the sea found themselves rising into the air as the
slope of the decks grew steeper. Up and up, dizzily high out of reach
of the dark waters into which they had dreaded to be plunged, higher and
higher into the air, towards the stars, the stern of the ship rose
slowly right out of the water, and hung there for a time that is
estimated variously between two and five minutes; a terrible eternity to
those who were still clinging. Many, thinking the end had come, jumped;
the water resounded with splash after splash as the bodies, like mice
shaken out of a trap into a bucket, dropped into the water. All who
could do so laid hold of something; ropes, stanchions, deck-houses,
mahogany doors, window frames, anything, and so clung on while the stern
of the giant ship reared itself towards the sky. Many had no hold, or
lost the hold they had, and these slid down the steep smooth decks, as
people slide down a water chute into the sea.
We dare not linger here, even in imagination; dare not speculate; dare
not look closely, even with the mind's eye, at this poor human agony,
this last pitiful scramble for dear life that the serene stars shone
down upon. We must either turn our faces away, or withdraw to that
surrounding circle where the boats were hovering with their
terror-stricken burdens, and see what they saw. They saw the after part
of the ship, blazing with light, stand up, a suspended prodigy, between
the stars and the waters; they saw the black atoms, each one of which
they knew to be a living man or woman on fire with agony, sliding down
like shot rubbish into the sea; they saw the giant decks bend and crack;
they heard a hollow and tremendous rumbling as the great engines tore
themselves from their steel beds and crashed through the ship; they saw
sparks streaming in a golden rain from one of the funnels; heard the
dull boom of an explosion while the spouting funnel fell over into the
sea with a slap that killed every one beneath it and set the nearest
boat rocking; heard two more dull bursting reports as the steel
bulkheads gave way or decks blew up; saw the lights flicker out, flicker
back again, and then go out for ever, and the ship, like some giant sea
creature forsaking the strife of the upper elements for the peace of the
submarine depths, launched herself with one slow plunge and dive beneath
the waves.
There was no great maelstrom as they had feared, but the sea was
swelling and sinking all about them; and they could see waves and eddies
where rose the imprisoned air, the smoke and steam of vomited-up ashes,
and a bobbing commotion of small dark things where the _Titanic_, in her
pride and her shame, with the clocks ticking and the fires burning in
her luxurious rooms, had plunged down to the icy depths of death.