In a newspaper account of a shipwreck, a touching incident is thus
described by a survivor:
There was one incident which came particularly to my notice--the
devotion of a woman to her blind husband. With her arm linked in
his, she sought the rail of the _Florida_ to be transferred
to the _Baltic_.
An officer grabbed the man and hurled him to the rear. “Women
and children only in these boats,” he yelled, as the man tumbled
backward. The wife ran to her husband’s side and, again taking
his arm, she appealed to the officer.
“He is blind! Can’t you see he is helpless?” she said. “I have
never left him. If he can not go in the boat with me, I will
stay here until this ship sinks under me.”
The unwritten law of the sea was waived before this plea,
and that lone man, sightless and helpless, was permitted to
accompany his wife, who would not leave the _Florida_ until
her husband was permitted to go with her.
(762)
=Dew, The Existence of the=--See SEPARATION.