Although she made but one passage to New Zealand, the powerful iron ship Thurland Castle provided more than the usual amount of "copy" for the newspapers. A brand-new ship, she made the passage in the good time of 96 days, arriving in Auckland Harbour on February 8, 1877. Her commander was Captain Anderson, a young man only 24 years of age, whose father had an interest in the vessel. Captain Anderson had formerly been chief officer of the Dallam Tower, a vessel which had a notoriously stormy passage out from the Old Country. Sailing from Gravesend on November 4, 1876, the Thurland Castle dropped the pilot off Start Point on the 7th. The Equator was crossed on December 12, and the meridian of the Cape of Good Hope on January 6. When running down her easting on the parallel of 45deg south the ship had the wind from west-north-west and south-west, and averaged 246 miles a day. Strong breezes were experienced round Tasmania, and the ship logged 263 miles a day for about eight days.

Three days before Auckland was reached a young man named Watson Maxwell, while drawing water from over the stern of the ship, fell overboard and was drowned. the Thurland Castle brought out a number of fallow deer for acclimatisation purposes. There were 32 to start with. One jumped overboard in the dock before the ship sailed, and three others died about a fortnight out. The whole herd was taken ill, and after the three had succumbed it suddenly struck the captain that sweet spirits of nitre was a good thing to administer. This "did the trick" and the rest of the herd recovered and stood the long journey very well.

Caught Red-Handed.

A clever capture of cargo-broachers was made by Captain Anderson. Early in December, when the ship was entering the S.E. Trades, an order was given one evening that necessitated "all hands," but two men were missing. As the absent ones had been taken on at the last moment at Gravesend to completepage 319 the crew, and did not bear a very good reputation, the master suspected that something was wrong. He sent a lad below to see if there was any sign of the pair having tried to get at the cargo, and the youngster soon came back and said that he had found a cap down the fore-hold. The fore-hatch cover was clapped on, and a man placed on watch with instructions to immediately call the master if any knocking was heard.

By and by came three gentle raps on the underside of the cover, the skipper was called, and he and the mates quietly surrounded the hatch. Then the knocking grew more impatient, and the skipper gave a signal to lift the cover off. There were the two missing men, with two bottles of grog in each hand, while at their feet were two naked lights and five more bottles of grog. One of the marauders, no doubt taking it for granted that the hatch-cover had been lifted by a pal, passed up a couple of bottles, and had actually put them into the outstretched hands of the second-mate before discovering his mistake. In his fright the sailor dropped one of the two bottles in his other hand and it smashed on the cargo. That ended the play; both men were put in irons, and remained so for the rest of the voyage.

All the hay and straw intended for the deer was stowed in the hold where this precious pair of cargo broachers had been at work, but what made the incident all the more exciting for the rest of the people on board, was the fact that the hold also contained several tons of gunpowder!

Upon arrival at Auckland the two prisoners were handed over to the police, and when brought before the Court they got six months' imprisonment with hard labour.

From Auckland the Thurland Castle went over to Newcastle where she loaded coal, and was never heard of again after she sailed from that port.