February 6, 1915. 
LAND AND WATER. 
grans against 28 German guns ; of lesser power and calibre, it 
is true, and four of them likely to be masked on account of 
the echelon formation of the turrets of the SeydliU and 
MoWce. Let us, then, call it 16 versus 24; and since the 
16 were bigger and better guns, we arrive at a " more or less 
equal." One big hit may do twice the damage of one lesser 
hit. But if the lesser gun is big enough to do serious damage 
and can get in twice as many hits, the bigger gun is unlikely 
to score much ofiE it. I do not say that this was the exact 
proportion, but I do say that when the Lion and Tiger forged 
ahead and engaged, the action was the most equal thing we 
have ever seen in this war, or are ever likely to see. Thus 
the second stage of affairs. 
The third st.age arose when the Lion was "damaged." 
The Dlucher (which never counted for much) waa out of it, 
and, coming up astern, was another British squadron fully 
equal in gun power to the German one. Deleting one 
echelonned turret in each case, the respective broadsideg 
were : — 
BRITISH. 
Princess Royal ... 8 13. Sin. 
New Zealand ... 6 12in. 
Indomitable 6 12ia. 
GERMAN. 
Derfflinger 8 12in. 
Soydlitz 8 llin. 
Moltko 8 llin. 
The advantage in favour of the Germans, reckoning the 
The Submarine Attack on Trade. 
On January 31 three BritUh merchant Werners were 
captured and sunk off the Mersey by the German submarine 
U^l. In each of these cases the usual cruiser routine was 
followed, warning being given to the crew to leave, and their 
ship then destroyed. This was unpleasant, but it was quite 
legitimate warfare. 
In the Channel, oS Havre, on the same day, two more 
merchant ships were liit and one of them sunk. According 
to an official statement by the French Ministry of Marine, 
both of these ships were torpedoed without warning. It 
chanced that the crew of the sunken ships were saved, as 
some French torpedo craft happened to be about. But this 
in no way excuses the act, which was a deliberate attempt to 
slaughter non-combatants without warning, and so comes 
under the head of " piracy." It is to be hoped that should 
the crew of this submarine ever be captured there will be no 
false sentiment about making them prisoners of war. They 
should be tried, and, if condemned, hanged as any ordinary 
pirate would be. 
That submarines were in the Channel we have long 
imown, as we have had experience of them before, but that 
they should have got into the Irish Sea is certainly un- 
expected news. It throws a marked sidelight on reports 
xne aa vantage in favour of the Germans, reckoning the which have been current as to mysterious si-nals and liehts 
^'if ',r?'/'°"^'^ ^'Z'"''' numerically, but their guns being which have been seen on the Wels^h coast Sl^g thSe 
generally inferior, and some of them probably out of action, 
they would be the weaker squadron. Still, as Hipper had 
the speed gauge of these three British^ships, it certainly looks 
on such evidence as is available as though he should have 
been able to slow down, and give the Tiger some serioua 
pnnislunent, or else inflict more damage on the Lion. 
There are four reasons, any of wliich may explain why 
Hipper did not attempt to do this. They are: — 
(1) That it did not occur to him. 
(2) That he was too damaged to attempt i*. 
(3) That he was obsessed with the idea of drawing the 
Sritish squadron into a mine or submarine area. 
(4) That he was in a state of wLat i» vulgarly known as 
"blue funk." 
Now, of these four reasons the first is very improbable 
indeed, because it was so palpably obvious and because the 
story of the Horatii and Curiatii is as old as the hills. 
Against the second reason is the circumstance that the 
Germans officially deny our statement that two of their battle 
cruisers were badly damaged; In matters ol this sort one does 
not do well to discriminate too mnch between the official 
reports of either side — that is to say, it is rank folly to 
assume that one side is truthful and the other an unmitigated 
liar. By far the safest thing is to assume that the other 
side is "moderately truthful." And this, so far as the 
North Sea action is concerned, we may find proof of in the 
fate of the Blucher. She was hammered and hammered till 
she was more or less out of action ; but it took a couple of 
torpedoes from the Arethusa to send her to the bottom. A 
vivid illustration of the old motto of the torpedo school : " A 
gnn cannot sink a ship I " On which account I incline to 
the opinion that we damaged the Germans a good deal less 
than we think, and also somewhat more than they admit. 
War is not a matter of " glory headlines " in the halfpenny 
Press, but of arriving at as near the actual truth as possible. 
Out of all of which I am inclined to fancy that Hipper could 
have slowed and closed and done extra damage had he 
desired to. 
The third reason — that of drawing the British into a 
trap — is, I fancy, the most probable of any. It represents 
the integral idea of Teutonic notions of naval warfare. I 
have not seen much of them at naval war game, but such little 
as I have seen has always been influenced by some such idea, 
as being considerably superior to any stand-up fight. It is 
— to a certain extent. But its weak point is that it pre-sup- 
poses a certain amount of stupidity on the other side — ^a 
dangerous assumption to act on. 
The fourth rcMon is permissible. It is to be deduced 
from the wild firing .at nothing of the first East Coast raid ; 
from the bnmod and wild bombardment of Whitby in the 
second raid (when British ships were known to be approach- 
ing). But I t"hink we should discard it, if only for the reason 
that it is blank folly to assume that the enemy is inferior in 
courage or determination to win. 
When the war is over and the books are opened, and all 
is known, I think we shall find that we won and Germany 
lost the "battle cruiser action of the North Sea" because 
Hipper was obsessed with the idea of getting something for 
nothing out of drawing our sliips over a submarine or mined 
are;*, and because Beatty, as the superior tactician, was able 
to f.-ithom that idea. In short, it was rather an aflr.air of 
Beatty versvs Hipper, than an aHair of a certain number of 
British ships against a eertain number of Grerman ones. 
- __ „-gnalIing ,., 
abouts seemed pointless, and so the stories were not generally 
believed. Now, however, it certainly looks as though a sys- 
tematically-arranged campaign was being indulged in; and 
the lights iu-e probably intended to indicate to German sub- 
marines the places where supplies have been smuggled in in 
the past. 
There is only one recorded case of any trace of sup- 
plies having been discovered near any spot from which sig- 
nalling has been reported. That was an empty ten-gallon 
drum of petrol ; but as all the German submarines burn 
heavy oil, it probably had no connection with the war. It 
stands to reason that the enemy would not be so indiscreet 
as to signal from the place where the stores actually were, 
but adopt some code to indicate that the stores were so many 
miles away in one direction or another. 
A really systematic search of all likely hiding places, 
including lonely and deserted buildings, outhouses, sandy 
dells, etc., could be carried out by the civil population 
along the coasts, who might be enrolled as special constables 
for that purpose. Or for that matter. Boy Scouts could bo 
employed, as part of their training is the search for hidden 
objects, and also Boy Scouts have a wonderful trick of 
nosing out things which do not strike other people. 
It was a Boy Scout who some years ago discovered a 
German who had been serving in the British Army for two 
years tinder an English name, and about whom no one 
had the remotest suspicion as to his nationality. 
In any case, one main point is clear. It is absolutely 
impossible for a German submarine to reach and maintain 
itself in the Irish Sea for more than about twenty-four hours at 
the very outside, and when the problem of having to get 
home again is taken into account this seem.3 an exaggerated 
proposition. The distance from Heligoland to the Mersey is 
roughly abouS 800 miles — perhaps a little more for a sub- 
marine compelled to observe secrecy. There and back call 
it 1,600. The maximum radius of U2l is 2,000 miles. At 
the very beet, allowing for lying by and everything, that 
could not possibly give her more than three days in which 
to operate. Allowing for contingencies, twelve hours would 
bo nearer her actual limit, and even this is a generous cal- 
culation. 
Economical speed, on vhich the endurance calculations 
are made, is, however, a slow speed, and at that a result 
achieved under the most favourable conditions. One way 
and another we arrive at the fact that while it is just physi- 
cally po.'isible for USl to get off the Mersey and returfi 
home, there are very material possibilities against her re- 
maining off the Mersey for more than an hour or so without 
aid from outside. 
Now all the evidence is to the effect that she must have 
remained there for considerably longer than the possible 
period. 
We must discard all theories about an intention of re- 
maining to do as much damage as possible, and then sur- 
rendering — for one reason that her supply of torpedoes or 
explosives is necessarily very limited ; for another, that 
such a policy would result in the extinction of all the 
German submarines without much more loss to the British 
Mercantile Marine than was achieved single-handed by the 
Emden. 
A priori, therefore, there are stores and supplies some- 
where- cither on the Welsh coa.ft or on the Irish coast, or 
possibly on both. Maybe, also on the Isle of Mao, since 
15* 
