AN ARCTIC RESIDENCE 269 



and opened fire on them, and had quite a little 

 scrap with the underwater boats, which had decidedly 

 the best of it, for they submerged at last un- 

 defeated. This did not prevent the Russian captain 

 from reporting that he had sunk both the U-boats 

 (vide English papers), for which he received medals 

 and decorations. Both U-boats appeared the same 

 evening off Vardo. 



A considerable number of Norwegian vessels 



were sunk by U-boats in September and October, 



and it is not too much to say that in most cases 



these vessels could easily have escaped disaster if 



their captains had not been so obstinate, and had 



come for information, had proceeded east through 



the waters of the territorial limit, or joined our 



convoys. Sometimes it even looked as if they did 



not care as long as they got the insurance money 



for the ships, for they well knew that the Germans 



would in every case safeguard the crews, even in most 



instances towing the ship boats close to the coast 



after sinking the vessels. When dealing with the 



crews of their enemies they acted with their usual 



inhumanity. Any English, American or Roumanian 



crews were simply cast off in their boats in the Polar 



Sea at night, generally many miles from land, and 



left to reach safety if they could. The men of 



more than one boat were completely lost, and others 



died from exposure as soon as they reached land. 



Fortunately, however, the precautions taken by 



our Admiralty were so good that we lost few 



vessels, our only casualties being the G. Y. Short 



(American), October 2nd, the Turgai (Russian), 



October 2nd, Astoria (American), October 9th, 



Bardeby (English), October 10th (which lost one 



