Not content with offering one excuse, he
offers a large and varied assortment of excuses, any one of which ought
to be quite satisfactory. For example he asserts:
That instead of running into the Oneida, the Oneida ran into him.
That his ship struck the Oneida so lightly that he never knew there had
been any collision.
That he saw the Oneida just after he had run into her, and that she did
not appear to have lost any thing but her skylights.
That he stopped his engines and blew his whistle, in order to show that
he was ready to offer any needed assistance to the Oneida.
That the reason why he did not stop his engines and offer assistance,
was that the collision had so injured his own ship that he thought best
to make at once for the nearest port.
That he never dreamed that any assistance was wanted, and therefore did
not offer it.
That he would have gone to the assistance of the Oneida had not one of
his lady passengers been so frightened by the collision that she begged
him to make all possible speed to land her.
That not a single one of his passengers knew there had been a collision,
so light was the shock of the contact.
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