CANADA: Word from the Wise

While a violent storm lashed British Columbia a fortnight ago, the 101-ton tug George McGregor was returning without tow from Bamberton to Victoria. Rounding Trial Island, near Victoria, she caught the full blast of the gale and the pull of the riptide. The combination was too much. She began to roll, then capsized and sank.

Two men went down with the tug. The other five crewmen managed to launch the small lifeboat. It, too, soon capsized. The only man who could not swim, Gerald Anderson, 17, managed to crawl athwart the upturned lifeboat. One by one the others lost their grip and went down. An hour and a half later the lifeboat washed ashore and Anderson was picked up.

Last week an Indian boy walked into the Victoria Times office, left a scrawled-over sheet of brown wrapping paper, then scurried away. Said his unsigned note: “On Congo River—the witch doctors’ law —all small boats have rope on keels—for his men to hold on to when boats upset on rapids. White men do not never learn.”