MS Found in a Bottle

In the novel the ship was deluged by a whirlpool. The narrator and one other man are still alive. The message in the bottle is so popular because they are real and they are so rare that when you find them you feel like it was meant to happen to you. The message is a success because the message was able to withstand the whirlpool with no infirmity. My favorite quote was "We are plunging madly within the grasp of the whirlpool and amid a roaring, and bellow, and thundering of ocean and tempest, the ship is quivering, oh God! where going down!"