September 19, 1918 
LAND 5? WATER 
11 
tills was only the beginning of it, for the other ships came 
driving on through the fog, and mixed in a wild melee, dodg- 
ing, tacking, backing, worse than a madhouse cotillion. One 
just missed our bows. A second passed astern. For a while 
anything might have happened, but as though impatient 
to view his evil work, the fog demon lifted the edge of his 
grey curtain to take a peep. He hastily dropped it again. 
But we had seen each other in the clear. The tangle straight- 
ened into coluipns again. It was one of those " haps " that occur 
to all convoys, and are responsible for a grizzle of grey on 
heads which left our shores only a ytar ago, flying the full 
colours of youth. Leaving a yacht with the stranded ship 
— which backed off at high tide — we sailed on towards a 
point of land which was said to be headquarters for "Pen- 
marsh Pete." a lone Hun pirate. 
"Pete's" Mines 
A red pin with a date under it marked his last reported 
position, and about an hour later a radio warned us away 
from a particular ship's channel in which, during last night, 
"Pete" had evidently sown a devil's spawning of mines. 
But his labours went for nought. Across our bows, just as 
the fog lifted, a fleet of mine-sweepers passed in swift pro- 
cession to clear up the infernal litter. While they were still 
in sight two hydroplanes came booming like great bumble- 
bees from the land to escort us across their sector. Thus, in 
one view, were grouped the three American services that 
render commerce possible in tliese waters. They convoyed 
us until, at dusk, we dropped anchor in a sheltered harbour. 
With the subsidence of the heavy roll and the comfort of 
a good dinner before an open fire, one was glad to be there. 
For this millionaire's yacht boasted an open fireplace, a 
magnificent affair richly carved and surmounted by mahogany 
mermaids posed in a wild struggle for a silver sliip's clock ; 
trove, no doubt, from a deep sea wreck. Than good tobacco 
and an open fire there is nothing in the world more provoca- 
tive of stories, and wliile the mermaids spaced off the long 
warm hours with the silvery bell of their clock, there unrolled 
before me a complete history of the "toy dreadnoughts." 
The steward who served our coffee had been signed on 
from a casta\va\' crew picked up at sea by the yacht after 
they had gone through two torpedoings in twenty-four 
hours. This unusual experience had been capped with the 
steward by a descent into the German U-boat. "The old 
Exford had been sailing through wreckage for a couple of 
days," he said, telling of it, "so we weren't surprised when 
a torpedo came leaping at us out of the sea. The explosion 
killed one man. Six others were drowned by capsizing 
boats ; and as though that wasn't enough, the U-boat com- 
mander sailed around and took snapshot photos of all the 
survivors. Then, after telling us it would go hard with any 
of us that were captured again at sea, he carried off the 
captain and two gunners, ana went below. 
"A few hours later we were picked up by the Trelessick, 
but she was torpedoed early next morning. The raft on 
which I got away was so heavily overloaded that four of us 
were in the water, just hanging on. It was terribly cold, 
and I was beginning to wonder just how much longer I could 
hang on, when the U-boat came alongside and picked us 
four up. This commander was quite different from the 
first one, for after taking us below for a drink of cognac, he 
put us into one of our boats. 
•' The Trelessick was still afloat. She had been the captain's 
liome for nineteen years, and while the tears streamed down 
his cheeks, he begged the commander to let us go back on 
board. 'I can still get her into port,' he pleaded, 'if you 
will only give me the chance.' -^ 
"But the German shook his head. 'I'm sorry for you, 
personally,' he answered. 'But this is war.' And, going 
back, he plugged holes in her waterline with shell fire till 
she sank." 
His story produced other stories and reminiscences from 
the officers ; among them the sinking of the American yacht 
.Alcedo, told by a survivor whom they had brought from the 
fo'castle. It happened at two in the morning, when a brilliant 
moon, always an ally of the Boche, suddenly revealed the 
silver bursting of a torpedo out of the black sea. At two 
hundred yards it swerved, and those who saw it coming 
lield their breath in the hope it might pass astern. But it 
rectified its course ; with a burst of fire it stnick in the forward 
quarters where the men lay asleep. 
Imagine yourself awakened in utter darkness to the groans 
of wounded and dying men. Nothing could be more dis- 
organising. Yet, quietly and coolly, the men turned up and 
went to quarters — even the wireless operator, who was 
blown up through the deck. There was no time to launch 
boats. The yacht was already sinking. In obedience to an 
order to abandon ship, shouted from the bridge, the crew cut 
the boats loose from the falls, and -leaped after them into 
the water. While they swam around trying to bale and 
right them, the yacht slid on down with her load of dead 
and dying under the moonlit sea. 
"It was some job to get those boats righted and baled," 
the survivor, a fine lad, told of it with unconscious humour. 
" I tell you, home and mother looked an awful long way off 
to me: That water was terrible wet. A plank, an oar, 
even a straw looked dry by comparison." 
They had just climbed into the boats when the long, 
sinister shape of the U-boat rose out of the water alongside. 
Fortunately, a cloud had blotted out the moon. As the 
submarine rose higher out of tlie water than the boats, they 
could see the heads and shoulders of three men rising above 
the combing of the conning tower in outUne against the 
bright sky. A voice, mihtary in tone, hailed them. 
"What ship?" 
Prompted by a rapid whisper from an officer, the lad gave 
a French name. 
" Your tonnage and cargo ? " 
"Eight hundred tons, sir. She was an empty bottom 
proceeding to B for cargo." 
Imagine the suspense while the U-boat officers talked 
■together up there in the dusk — the relief when, after calling 
out directions to the nearest land, the U-boat steamed slowly 
away. Twelve hours' labour at the oars before they made 
port had no power to abate it, for jt was the closest kind of 
a call for all of them. "For we were sure," the lad con- 
cluded his story, "that it was Germany for the lot of us." 
Next morning broke clear with pleasant sunshine streaming 
down on the white' hamlets that are so liberally strewn along 
the French coast. The men off watch lolled in it reading 
or studying according to their bent. A Victrolia in full 
blast in the reading-room combined with the warmth and 
sunhght to produce a slight flavour of Long Island Sound. 
But one glance at the frowning guns, grim depth mines 
instantly dissipated such fancies. That evening we delivered 
the convoy at the end of our run, and took on another 
for the return next morning. 
The voyage home was uneventful. We rolled lazily 
northward without a break in the monotony, which is harder 
to bear than the shock of battle. An article compiled from 
the concentrated experience of a fleet is apt to conv.ey an 
impression of a life vivid, dangerous, exciting,^ quite equal 
to the ideal these college lads on board had formed of it. 
Dangerous it really is. One never knows just when a yacht 
may "kick over a mine" or meet a torpedo face to face. 
Apart frorri these ever-present possibilities, the yachts go> 
back and forth on their runs with the same regularity and 
about the same amount of excitement as is to be found in 
a canal boat in tow of a mule. For high-spirited youths who 
enlisted to fight the Hun there could be nothing more trying. 
Yet they take it cheerfully. Between watches, rain or 
shine, they are to be seen muffled in sou'-westers or stripped 
to undershorts according to the weather, conning their naviga- 
tion books in preparation for the commissions they have 
honestly earned. They wiU make better officers and wiser 
men by the loss of their illusions. 
Almost as though it had been rehearsed for this article, 
there passed under our eyes on the last lap of the journey 
all of the various activities in which the "toy dreadnoughts" 
have been engaged during the last year. About mid-day a 
score of dots on the horizon grew into a south-bound coastal 
convoy ; and a fine sight the two convoys made in passing, 
their double columns of ships laid along the green sea against 
the golden loom of the land ; the guardian yachts on their 
flanks, seaplanes booming overhead. Lastly, as we came 
rolling down a vast triangular effing that drew at its apex 
into the base harbour, there appeared between us and the 
sinking sun the leviathan bulk of three transports in outline 
against the smouldering sky. 
In the active campaign which has been recently initiated 
against the U-boats, it is not likely that our "toy dread- 
noughts," because of their low speeds, can take a very active 
part. The job of hunting the enemy out goes more and 
more to the seaplanes, submarines, and destroyers. But 
they will still be "on the job" running their coastal convoys 
between the Frencli ports, ready and willing to nab any 
U-boat that happens to elude the destroyer sleuths. No 
doubt -their honourable labours will continue till a U-boat, 
through extreme rarity, enters the same class as a great 
auk's egg. Whereafter, peace being come again upon eartli, 
let us hope that the "toy dreadnoughts," restored to their 
pristine glo^-ies of polished wood, brass, and enamel paint, 
will spend an honourable old age carrying pretty women 
and little children once more up and down Long Island 
Sound. 
