Chapter V: Part 5

"'I always thought these things were merely yarns out of boys' adventure books. However, I have seen five, the largest about the size of a football field. They are covered with trees and palms, some of them with ripe bananas on them. They get torn away from the swampy parts of the mainland by the typhoons, which are very frequent at this time of year.'

"The story of these things cannot be written here; it will fill many volumes. Here an attempt has been made to sketch merely in its broadest outlines some of the activities of British sailors during the greatest of wars. Whatever the future historian will say of the part they bore he will not minimize it, for on this pivot the whole matter turned, on this axis the great circle of the war revolved. He will affirm that, though in respect of numbers almost negligible compared with the soldiers who fought in the long series of land battles, the sailors held the central avenues, the citadel of power.

"If it be possible in a single paragraph, let us set before our eyes the work of the British navy and its auxiliaries during these loud and angry years. Let us first recall the fact, that, besides the protection of Britain and her dependencies from invasion, together with the preservation of her overseas trade, to the navy was intrusted a duty it has fulfilled with equal success, the protection of the coasts of France from naval bombardment or attack--no slight service to Britain's gallant ally. Behind this barrier of the British fleet, she continued to arm and munition her armies undisturbed. Recall, too, the French colonial armies as well as our own overseas troops, escorted to the various seats of war--more than seven million men--the vital communications of the Allies, north and south, secured; the supplies and munitions--seven million tons--carried overseas; 1,250,000 horses and mules embarked, carried and disembarked; the left wing of the Belgian force supported in Flanders by bombardment; the Serbian army transferred to a new zone of war; and last, if we may call last what is really first and the mastering cause of all the rest, Germany's immense navy fettered in her ports. Bring also to mind that fifty or sixty of her finest war vessels have been destroyed, besides many Austrian and Turkish; five or six million tons of the enemy's mercantile marine captured or driven to rust in harbor; her trade ruined, a strict blockade of her ports established which impoverishes day by day her industrial and fighting strength; hundreds of thousands of Germans overseas prevented from joining her armies; her wireless and coaling stations over all the world and her colonial empire, that ambitious and costly fabric of her dreams, cut off from the Fatherland and brought helplessly to the ground.

"When all this has been passed in review dwell for a moment on the matter reversed--but for the British fleet Germany's will would now be absolute, her emperor the master of the world."

"I KNEW YOU WOULD COME"

We are all very proud that America was permitted to have a share in the holiest defensive war ever known. Then let us also remember that our share in it was largely made possible by England. While we hesitated, considered, debated, who was it that maintained the freedom of the seas and kept inviolate our coasts? The great, gallant, modest navy of Great Britain.

Despite her desperate need of us England uttered no reproaches, and she never seemed to doubt our final decision. It recalls an incident which I discussed with British officers as I stood with them in a concealed observation post on a summit of Vimy Ridge in September. On a dark night a raid on the German trenches was made, and in the party were two brothers, English lads. The raid was successful, but when the men returned one of the brothers was missing. The other pleaded for permission to return and bring him in. The colonel refused on the ground that the attempt would be both dangerous and fruitless. Finally, he yielded to the lad's passionate pleading, and the young soldier crawled out into No Man's Land, returning a half hour later with a machine gun bullet in his shoulder, yet gently carrying the brother, whose spirit rose to the ranks of the greater army just as they reached the trench. "You see, my boy," said the colonel, "it was useless, your brother is gone, and you are wounded." "No, colonel," replied the lad, "it was not useless. I had my reward, for just as I found him out there, he said, 'Is that you, Tom? I knew you would come.'"

This seems a fitting moment not only to thank God that we came in time to be of service, but to thank England for her patience and her confidence which have never failed. If after entering the war we are gratified at placing two million men quickly upon the battlefield, let us remember that nearly 1,200,000 of them were transported in British vessels and convoyed by British warships.

America is beginning to know England. We honored her before; we felt the tie of blood and speech; we were grateful to her for most of our best. But we never knew England as we know her now. That first hundred thousand that gladly flung their lives away for righteousness' sake; the happy lads of Oxford and Cambridge who gave their joyous youth that joy might not depart from earth; the colonials who came from the ends of the world that the old mother might live, and that honor and justice should not perish; these have added brighter pages to England's records of glory. Today one knows England better and one is very proud to be her ally. For the light which shines from England is steadfast faithfulness to plighted honor, to the safety of her children, and to those ideals of civilization of which she has for centuries been the chief and responsible custodian.

REV. ERNEST M. STIPES, D.D.
From _The Churchman_, N. Y.

THE SEARCHLIGHTS

_Political morality differs from individual morality, because there is no power above the State_.--GENERAL VON BERNHARDI.

Shadow by shadow, stripped for fight,
The lean black cruisers search the sea.
Night-long their level shafts of light
Revolve and find no enemy.
Only they know each leaping wave
May hide the lightning and their grave.

And, in the land they guard so well,
Is there no silent watch to keep?
An age is dying; and the bell
Rings midnight on a vaster deep;
But over all its waves once more
The searchlights move from shore to shore.

And captains that we thought were dead,
And dreamers that we thought were dumb,
And voices that we thought were fled
Arise and call us, and we come;
And "Search in thine own soul," they cry,
"For there, too, lurks thine enemy."

Search for the foe in thine own soul,
The sloth, the intellectual pride,
The trivial jest that veils the goal
For which our fathers lived and died;
The lawless dreams, the cynic art,
That rend thy nobler self apart.

Not far, not far into the night
These level swords of light can pierce:
Yet for her faith does England fight,
Her faith in this our universe,
Believing Truth and Justice draw
From founts of everlasting law.

Therefore a Power above the State,
The unconquerable Power, returns.
The fire, the fire that made her great,
Once more upon her altar burns.
Once more, redeemed and healed and whole,
She moves to the Eternal Goal.

ALFRED NOYES

FIGHTING A DEPTH BOMB

All who have read of the sinking of the _Lusitania_, by a torpedo, shot from a German U-boat, realize the terribly destructive force of this modern weapon of war, but many do not know that the depth bomb is even more destructive and must be handled with much greater care to be sure that it does not explode accidentally or prematurely. The bomb usually contains from 100 to 500 pounds of tri-nitro-toluol, or T.N.T., as it is usually called, the most powerful of all explosives. The explosion of a ship loaded with it in Halifax harbor, December 6, 1917, caused almost as great a loss of life and property as a volcanic eruption.

When the 500 pounds of T.N.T. is exploded it changes suddenly into nearly 80,000 cubic feet of gas. Now this amount of gas will fill a room 160 feet long, 25 feet wide, and 20 feet high. When the bomb explodes under the water the gas must find room somewhere, and with tremendous force it pushes the water in all directions. If a hollow submarine is near the point of the explosion, its walls will give way easier than the water around it and it is crushed like an empty egg shell.

Only very swift boats should drop the depth bombs from their sterns, for the boat must be moving at a rate of at least twenty-five miles an hour to be sure to escape damage from the bombs dropped behind her.

John Mackenzie, the hero of this story, writes in regard to the converted yachts used for dropping depth bombs in European waters as follows: "Only destroyers made speed exceeding 25 knots. There were no converted yachts operating in European waters capable of making 25 knots. A very few made 15 to 18 and the majority about 12. Of course we had to take our chances in getting away safely, although we knew that the chances were about even. That is, we were in about as much danger from our depth charges as the enemy was." His statement shows the risks that American sailors were willing to take.

The bomb, of course, weighs over one hundred pounds. It is made with one end flattened, upon which it will stand, and in the early types its accidental discharge is rendered practically impossible by a sort of peg called a safety pin, which must be removed before the bomb is dropped. The use of depth bombs against the U-boats made fighting in the German submarines so dangerous and so much to be dreaded, that it is said, as the war drew to a close, all U-boat crews had to be forced into service, and that none of them expected ever to return and see their homes and friends again.

In the early days of the war the bombs were carried in cradles, and later in racks or run-ways. From most of the bombs the detonator, which would fire them, was removed; but some were kept ready for instant firing, near the stern of the ship. The early type of bomb was discharged by a length of wire attached to a float. The bomb itself sank, the float remained on the surface of the water and reeled off the wire until the pull upon it discharged the bomb. It can be readily seen that the depth at which the bomb was discharged would depend upon the length of wire attached to the float. Imagine what might follow if one of these bombs, set ready for discharge, should break loose from its case in a storm at sea.

Such a terrible accident did happen on the U.S.S. Remlik. The ship was groaning and tossing in a very heavy sea, for a severe storm was raging. She gave a lurch and pitched back with so much force that a wooden box, containing a depth bomb and securely fastened to the after deck, suddenly broke. The bomb rolled out of the box and began to bound back and forth across the deck as the ship lurched and pitched from side to side.

The crew seemed stunned, and no orders were issued for concerted action. The frightfulness of the situation was greatly increased when it was observed that the safety pin had dropped out. All expected the next time the bomb struck with force against the rail that the float section would be released and reel off enough wire to fire the detonator and utterly destroy the ship and all aboard.

But Chief Boatswain's Mate, John Mackenzie of the Naval Reserve Fleet, needed no orders. He saw what should be done and did not wait for some one to order him to do it. He could not pick up the bomb in his arms and throw it overboard, for it weighed too much, and even if he could this might be the worst thing to do. The ship was laboring and barely holding her own with no headway, although the engines were turning over for 8 knots, and the bomb would no doubt have exploded directly under the ship had it gone overboard.

Mackenzie had a plan, and the first step in it was to stop the bomb. He threw himself in front of it and tried to hold it by his arms and the weight of his body, but the weight and the momentum of the moving bomb were too great and he was pushed aside; but he had stopped its movement somewhat so that when it struck the rail on the other side of the deck it did not explode. He jumped for it as it bounded back from the rail and almost stopped it, but it seemed to those looking on that the hundreds of pounds of metal and explosives would roll over his body and seriously injure him. He escaped this, however, and slowed down the movement of the heavy bomb to such an extent that near the opposite rail he was able to grasp it, lying with feet and hands braced in the grating of the gun platform. Then to be sure that it did not escape him until help came, he turned it upright upon its flattened end and sat down upon the most destructive bomb used in war, on the deck, of a ship lurching at sea in a severe storm.

Then other members of the crew that had been watching him as if dazed ran to his assistance, and the bomb was soon placed in safety.

The commanding officer of the _Remlik_ recommended that Chief Boatswain's Mate, John Mackenzie, be awarded the Medal of Honor. The report to the Secretary of the Navy was in part as follows:--

"Mackenzie in acting as he did, exposed his life and prevented a serious accident to the ship and the probable loss of the ship and the entire crew. Had this depth charge exploded on the quarterdeck, with the sea and the wind that existed at the time, there is no doubt that the ship would have been lost."

Mackenzie was awarded by the Navy Department the Medal of Honor, and a gratuity of one hundred dollars; but these awards are of little value compared with the greater reward which comes to him in the admiration and respect of all who read or hear the story of his heroic deed.

THE SECOND LINE OF DEFENSE

In Norwich, England, stands a memorial which will forever be visited and prized by travelers from every part of the world, and especially by the people of England and of Belgium. It is the statue erected to Edith Cavell, the British nurse who was wrongfully condemned to death for helping innocent women and children to escape from the terrible cruelties of the invading Huns. That her fine courage equals the bravery of any soldier is indicated in the sculptor's work itself. It represents a soldier of the Allies looking up toward her strong, kindly face, raising in his right hand a laurel wreath to place at one side of her, opposite the one already hung at the other.

The statue is a symbol of the glorious deeds and the beautiful spirit of the women of France, England, and America, during the awful conflict. It is difficult to realize the complete revolution which took place in the lives of the women of the world when they awakened to the need for their services in connection with the war.

In forsaken schoolhouses and barns, as well as in quickly erected hospitals, near the firing lines, they moved quietly in and out among the patients, administering needed medicines, bringing cheer and comfort to the long line of wounded soldiers. At unexpected moments the hospital was bombarded, making it necessary for them hurriedly to transfer their patients to some other building. During a bombardment of a large theater which had been turned into a hospital, several patients were too ill to be moved. So some of the nurses, wearing steel helmets, remained to care for these men while shells burst all around them.

Certain dressing stations in which the nurses cared for the most seriously wounded were so near the firing line that the men could be carried to them. Summoned, perhaps by a Red Cross dog, a nurse at times ventured out under the enemy's fire. In the fields or woods lay a badly injured man who must have constant care until darkness would permit bringing him in unseen by the enemy, for the Huns spared neither the wounded nor the Red Cross workers.

In the operating rooms, in hospital kitchens, on hospital trains and ships, the nurses gave no thought for their own safety but worked untiringly to save the wounded.

But even thousands of miles from the firing line, women were saving lives and winning the victory. There were the girls who assisted the police in the places of the men gone to fight. Gloriously they served during many an air raid over France and England, ready in the face of danger to do their full duty,--like those of Paris, who behaved so bravely that some one suggested they be mentioned in the Orders of the Day. But the commanding officer's reply only reflected the daring spirit of the girls themselves. "No," he said, "we never mention soldiers in orders for doing their duty."

There were the women and girls who went to work in fireproof overalls, stopping before entering the shop to be inspected and to give up all jewelry, steel hairpins, and anything else which might cause an explosion of the munitions among which they worked. They might be seen often with their hair hanging in braids as they hurried to and fro between the different sheds, over the narrow wooden platforms, raised from the ground to prevent them from carrying in on the soles of their shoes any particles of grit, iron, steel, or glass, that might cause a spark among the high explosives. So well did these women work that near the end of the war in many places more shells were made in two weeks than previously could be made in a year. The many women, willingly risking their lives in these shops, made this work possible. In England alone, where seventy-five out of every hundred men stepped out to fight, seventy-five out of a hundred women and girls left their homes and stepped in to work or to serve.

More tiresome were the long hours spent at machines in large closed factories where army blankets and clothing of all sorts were turned out for the use of the fighting men.

Out on the farms the girls could be seen in overalls, plowing furrows in long, sloping fields, and planting potatoes and vegetables to help feed the world. With hard work and small pay, they too helped win the victory. One girl tells how on arriving home from work one night, she found at the house a letter from a friend.

"How jolly it must be," she wrote, "and how you must be enjoying it!" That day had been particularly cold and wet and windy, but the girls had worked right through it. When they had finished, they were damp and weary and only glad that it was time for tea. "I don't feel a bit patriotic," said the girl, "and I don't care if I never plant another potato." She was an artist and found farm life very different from sitting in a quiet studio. But planting potatoes was more helpful to her country and so the next morning found her up early and ready to work again.

Like this artist many women, unused to common labor, gladly left lives of ease and good times to help win the war even by drudgery. In the case of English women this was particularly true, and would have been true in America if the war had continued much longer. As it was, the women of America responded to the call of service with the same spirit which sent millions of men to the colors. Besides those positions which, left open by men going into war, were filled by women, countless services were performed by them to add to the comfort and happiness of soldiers, sailors, and marines. Knitted articles were made for the needy in the service, and for the destitute in the ravaged war countries. Not a canteen in the whole United States but has seen the untiring devotion of weary workers who whole-heartedly sacrificed their time and household comforts. In Europe the Salvation Army "lassies" worked in the trenches themselves. Hospitals everywhere have been made more grateful sanctuaries by the tender reassurance of the American nurse. As if by one voice the fighters of the nation unite in praise and appreciation of all the women who by their help made the second line of defense.

U. S. DESTROYER _OSMOND C. INGRAM_

If you were standing on the deck of a patrol boat watching for submarines and, looking down at the water, suddenly perceived a torpedo coming directly toward you and knew it would strike the boat beneath your feet in a few seconds, what would you do?

A bullet or a cannon ball moves so swiftly that it is not seen. If it is coming straight for you, you only know your danger when it is over and you lie wounded; or your friends know it when it is too late. But a moving torpedo can be seen, and for some seconds one may stand and know a terrible explosion and probable death are approaching him.

On October 14, 1917, the United States destroyer _Cassin_ was on duty looking for German submarines. After many hours scouting, a U-boat was discovered five or six miles away, and the _Cassin_ made all speed in its direction; but the U-boat perceived its danger and submerged. The _Cassin_ cruised around for some time, for the U-boat could not be far away and might come to the surface at any moment; but no periscope was to be seen. The patrol boat kept steaming in zigzag lines so that the U-boat would find it more difficult to strike her with a torpedo.

Before an hour had passed, the commander of the _Cassin_ discovered the wake of a torpedo, a moving line of white on the surface of the ocean, and knew that in a few seconds the torpedo would strike his boat amidships. To avoid this he ordered full steam ahead, hoping perhaps to avoid being struck at all, and at least not amidships. But he had not seen the torpedo soon enough and it was quickly apparent that it would strike the _Cassin_ on the side and near the stern.

Ordinarily this would be less dangerous than if it struck amidships where it would very likely disable the engines and possibly explode the boilers, but in the case of the _Cassin_, avoiding one danger only brought another and a more serious one, for piled on the deck near the stern were boxes of high explosives which would be set off by the striking of the torpedo.

Some of the crew had been watching the approach of the torpedo. Most of them were forward and would escape the terrible danger at the stern of the boat.

But Gunner's Mate, O. C. Ingram, did not hurry forward; he rushed aft and began to throw overboard the boxes of explosives. He did not stop to see how near the torpedo had come and how much time he had; he simply set to work to save the boat and her crew. Just as he hurled the last box from his hand, the torpedo struck the _Cassin_ with a terrible explosion, throwing Ingram far overboard into the sea.

The torpedo had struck the destroyer near the stern, and blew off about thirty feet of the boat. It disabled one of the engines, and the steering gear, but the after bulkhead kept out the water and the destroyer was later towed to port and repaired.

Had the explosives not been thrown overboard, the _Cassin_ would doubtless have been sunk and few if any of her crew saved. As it was, Gunner's Mate Ingram was the only one to lose his life, for he drowned before help was able to reach him.

The _Cassin_ did not attempt, even after this experience, to get to safety, but remained watching for the reappearance of the submarine. When the U-boat finally came to the surface, she was greeted with several shots from the _Cassin_ and suddenly sank, or submerged. It is thought she was damaged and possibly destroyed.

The Secretary of the Navy, Josephus Daniels, sent the following letter to the commander, the other officers, and the crew of the _Cassin_:--

"The Department has received the report of the action between the U. S. S. _Cassin_ and a German submarine on October 15, 1917, and notes with gratification the highly commendable conduct of yourself, the other officers, and the crew of the _Cassin_. The manner in which the _Cassin_ was kept under way with her steering-gear disabled and practically at the mercy of the submarine, and opened fire on her when she appeared, is well worthy of the best traditions of the Navy."

Sometime later Secretary Daniels told the following story of the naming of a new and very fast destroyer:--

"Awhile ago I was asked to give a name to a new destroyer. I took up first the names of the great admirals, and then the great captains, and all the American heroes of the sea, and all were worthy. And then I thought of Osmond C. Ingram, second-class gunner's mate on the destroyer _Cassin_. I thought of the night when he was on watch and saw a U-boat's torpedo headed for his ship. He was standing near the place where the high explosives were stored, and the torpedo was headed for that spot. In a flash he was engaged in hurling overboard those deadly explosives, which would have destroyed the ship if they remained on board, and he managed to get rid of enough of them to save the lives of all the officers and sailors on board, but he lost his own life. So I named the newest and finest addition to the American navy the _Osmond C. Ingram_."

JOYCE KILMER

The first poet and author in the American army to give up his life for the cause of freedom was Joyce Kilmer. Like Alan Seeger, another American poet who fell fighting in the Foreign Legion of France, Joyce Kilmer greatly loved life. He loved the flowers and birds and trees. Probably his finest poem is one which he wrote about trees. He loved the people around him, impatient only with those who did not love and make the most of the life that God had given them. He loved children, and simple everyday things, as he shows in one of his latest poems, "The Snowman in the Yard."

"But I have something no architect
or gardener ever made,
A thing that is shaped by the busy touch
of little mittened hands;
And the Judge would give up his lovely estate,
where the level snow is laid,
For the tiny house with the trampled yard,
the yard where the snowman stands."

After his graduation from Columbia University in 1908, he became a teacher of Latin in the high school at Morristown, New Jersey, his home state. He seemed but a lad himself,--tall, with stern, dark eyes, a clear, musical voice, and a winning smile. Jovial, gracious, and gentlemanly in his manners, he made many friends both in his home state and in New York, where he soon took his wife and little son to live.

In college he had written some poetry. In New York he hoped to write more. He began his career there as editor of a journal for horsemen. But he did not remain at this work long. He became in turn a salesman in a large New York book store, an assistant editor, and then an editor. When the war broke out, he was a member of the staff of the _New York Times_. He had written several poems, and prose articles for popular magazines and periodicals. At the age of twenty-five he was widely known, enough of a celebrity, in fact, to have his name appear in "Who's Who in America."

He liked adventure, as does any American youth. He was always glad to visit a friend who had met with an accident or any other unusual circumstance. He found himself in what he considered an interesting and entertaining predicament when in New York he was struck by a train and had to be carried to a hospital. "Such things did not happen every day," he said, and he took the experience in good humor.

Soon after landing in France, he wrote a description of a long march made by his regiment. At the end of the march, the men were too weary even to spread out their blankets, but dropped down to rest on the floor of the loft in the French peasant home where they were billeted for the night. But even that experience was new and interesting. Later, when the men were somewhat rested, they missed one of their mates, and on going down stairs found him with his frozen feet in a tub of cold water furnished him by the peasant woman. The little girl of the home was on his knees, and the two boys were standing beside him--as Joyce Kilmer described them--"_envying_ him" his frozen feet.

He also found interesting work at the front, in connection with the trench newspaper, _The Stars and Stripes_.

At the dawn of a dark and misty Sunday morning in July, his regiment was ordered to charge across the river Ourcq and take the hill beyond, from where the enemy's machine guns were pouring down a withering rain of bullets. His own battalion, he learned, was not to be in the lead. So he promptly asked and obtained permission to join the leading battalion.

Across the river they charged and for five days fought for the heights. But Joyce Kilmer was not there to witness the victory.

In the fiercest battles, the bravest officers often go before and lead their men into the fight, thus encouraging them more than if following them or charging at their side. The fight beyond the Ourcq was a fierce one, and the chief officer dashed on ahead of his men. Touching elbows with him was Sergeant Kilmer. When the battalion adjutant was killed, he served, although without a commission, as a sort of aid to the battalion commander.

To the very heights he rushed, and threw himself down at a little ridge where he might peer over and seek out the hidden enemy machine gun battery. It was there, lying as if still scouting, that his comrades found him, so like his living self that they did not at first think him dead.

They buried him at the edge of a little wood, called the Wood of the Burned Bridge, close to the rippling waters of the Ourcq, and at the foot of the unforgetable hill.

Deep and keen was the loss felt by his comrades and his officers. From their pockets many of the men drew forth verses written by the poet about some incident in the trenches or some comrade who had been lost.

One of the poems to a lost soldier was read over the poet's grave. A refrain, supposed to be sounded by the bugle, is repeated through the verses, and as these lines were read the sad notes of "taps" sounded faintly from the grove. On his little wooden cross were written the simple words: "Sergeant Joyce Kilmer," then his company and regiment, and "Killed in Action, July 30, 1918."

But Joyce Kilmer and his verses will long live in the minds and hearts, not only of his comrades in battle, but of all Americans.

Such a buoyant, happy life does not seem to have passed away. Some beautiful tributes to him, written by other American poets, express this thought.

One friend at the news of Kilmer's death was reminded of his poem, "Main Street."

"God be thanked for the Milky Way that runs across the sky;
That is the path my feet would tread whenever I have to die.
Some folks call it a Silver Sword, and some a Pearly Crown,
But the only thing I think it is, is Main Street, Heaventown."

Then the friend touchingly added, "Perhaps Seeger and Kilmer are strolling down Main Street together tonight."

*******************

TREES

I think that I shall never see
A poem lovely as a tree.

A tree whose hungry mouth is prest
Against the earth's sweet flowing breast;

A tree that looks at God all day,
And lifts her leafy arms to pray;

A tree that may in summer wear
A nest of robins in her hair;

Upon whose bosom snow has lain;
Who intimately lives with rain.

Poems are made by fools like me,
But only God can make a tree.

JOYCE KILMER.

BLOCKING THE CHANNEL

Bruges is an important city of Belgium made familiar to American boys and girls by Longfellow's beautiful poem, "The Belfry of Bruges." He describes what "the belfry old and brown" has seen.

"Till the bell of Ghent responded o'er lagoon and dike of sand,
'I am Roland! I am Roland! there is victory in the land.'"

What a terrible story the historian or poet will have to tell who narrates what the belfry of Bruges has seen during the fifty-two months of the World War, a year, we may call it, in which each week had become a month.

The port of Bruges, called Zeebrugge or Bruges on the Sea, lies not far from the city, at the mouth of a maritime canal. The entrance to this canal was protected by a great crescent-shaped mole thirty feet high inclosing the harbor.

The Germans in the shipbuilding yards at Antwerp built small warships and submarines and sent them over the canals across Belgium to Ostend and Zeebrugge, from where they went out to destroy Allied shipping.

The English determined to put an end to this and on the night of April 22, 1918, an expedition was sent to block the channel and to destroy as far as possible the mole which protected it. It has been said that it was "one of the most thrilling and picturesque of the naval operations of the war. To Americans it recalled Hobson's exploit with the Merrimack, at Santiago, while to Englishmen it brought back memories of Sir Francis Drake and his fire ships in the harbor of Cadiz." The fight lasted only an hour but the British lost 588 men, for the channel and the mole were so fully guarded with searchlights, machine guns, and artillery that such an attempt was looked upon by the Germans as foolhardy and doomed to absolute failure.

A British cruiser, the _Vindictive_, in charge of Commander Alfred F. B. Carpenter, with two ferryboats, the _Daffodil_ and the _Iris_, were to escort six obsolete British cruisers filled with concrete and sand to the harbor mouths at Ostend and Zeebrugge and to sink them there in the channels. The ferryboats carried sailors and marines who were to attack and destroy the mole. It was thought that this attack would divert the attention of the defenders and make it easier to sink the concrete laden cruisers in the channel. Two old and useless submarines, filled with explosives, were to be blown up against the viaduct joining the mole and the shore.

A heavy protective curtain of smoke was essential to the success of the plan. Commander Brock, who was killed during the action, planned the smoke screen and carried it out so successfully that the _Vindictive_ was able to get almost to the mole before being discovered. At Ostend the wind blew from such a direction that the smoke screen did not hide the boats and the attack there on that night was for that reason a failure. It succeeded better later, on May 9, when the battered _Vindictive_ was sunk in the channel.

The following is the story of the action at Zeebrugge taken from the official report of the British Admiralty:--

"The night was overcast and there was a drifting haze. Down the coast a great searchlight swung its beam to and fro in the small wind and short sea. From the _Vindictive's_ bridge, as she headed in toward the mole, with the faithful ferryboats at her heels, there was scarcely a glimmer of light to be seen shoreward. Ahead, as she drove through the water, rolled the smoke screen, her cloak of invisibility, wrapped about her by small craft. This was the device of Wing Commander Brock, without which, acknowledges the Admiral in command, the operation could not have been conducted.

"A northeast wind moved the volume of it shoreward ahead of the ships. Beyond it, was the distant town, its defenders unsuspicious. It was not until the _Vindictive_, with blue-jackets and marines standing ready for landing, was close upon the mole that the wind lulled and came away again from the southeast, sweeping back the smoke screen and laying her bare to eyes that looked seaward.

"There was a moment immediately afterward when it seemed to those on the ships as if the dim, coast-hidden harbor exploded into light. A star shell soared aloft, then a score of star shells. The wavering beams of the searchlights swung around and settled into a glare. A wild fire of gun flashes leaped against the sky, strings of luminous green beads shot aloft, hung and sank. The darkness of the night was supplemented by a nightmare daylight of battle-fired guns and machine guns along the mole. The batteries ashore awoke to life.

"It was in a gale of shelling that the _Vindictive_ laid her nose against the thirty-foot high concrete side of the mole, let go her anchor and signaled to the _Daffodil_ to shove her stern in.

"The _Iris_ went ahead and endeavored to get alongside likewise. The fire was intense, while the ships plunged and rolled beside the mole in the seas, the _Vindictive_ with her greater draught jarring against the foundations of the mole with every lunge. They were swept diagonally by machine-gun fire from both ends of the mole and by the heavy batteries on shore.

"Commander (now Captain) Carpenter commanded the _Vindictive_ from the open bridge until her stern was laid in, when he took up his position in the flame thrower hut on the port side. It is marvelous that any occupant should have survived a minute in this hut, so riddled and shattered is it.

"The officers of the _Iris_, which was in trouble ahead of the _Vindictive_, describe Captain Carpenter as handling her like a picket boat. The _Vindictive_ was fitted along her port side with a high false deck, from which ran eighteen brows or gangways by which the storming and demolition parties were to land.

"The men gathered in readiness on the main lower decks, while Colonel Elliott, who was to lead the marines waited on the false deck just abaft of the bridge. Captain Halahan, who commanded the blue-jackets, was amidships. The gangways were lowered, and they scraped and rebounded upon the high parapet of the mole as the _Vindictive_ rolled in the seaway.

"The word for the assault had not yet been given when both leaders were killed, Colonel Elliott by a shell and Captain Halahan by machine-gun fire which swept the decks. The same shell that killed Colonel Elliott also did fearful execution in the forward Stokes mortar battery. The men were magnificent; every officer bears the same testimony.

"The mere landing on the mole was a perilous business. It involved a passage across the crashing and splintering gangways, a drop over the parapet into the field of fire of the German machine guns which swept its length, and a further drop of some sixteen feet to the surface of the mole itself. Many were killed and more wounded as they crowded up the gangways, but nothing hindered the orderly and speedy landing by every gangway.

"Lieutenant H. T. C. Walker had his arm shot away by shell on the upper deck, and lay in darkness while the storming parties trod him under. He was recognized and dragged aside by the commander. He raised his remaining arm in greetings. 'Good luck to you,' he called as the rest of the stormers hastened by. 'Good luck.'

"The lower deck was a shambles as the commander made the rounds of the ship, yet those wounded and dying raised themselves to cheer as he made his tour. . . .

"The _Iris_ had troubles of her own. Her first attempts to make fast to the mole ahead of the _Vindictive_ failed, as her grapnels were not large enough to span the parapet. Two officers, Lieutenant Commander Bradford and Lieutenant Hawkins, climbed ashore and sat astride the parapet trying to make the grapnels fast till each was killed and fell down between the ship and the wall. Commander Valentine Gibbs had both legs shot away and died next morning. Lieutenant Spencer though wounded, took command and refused to be relieved.

"The _Iris_ was obliged at last to change her position and fall in astern of the _Vindictive_, and suffered very heavily from fire. A single big shell plunged through the upper deck and burst below at a point where fifty-six marines were waiting for the order to go to the gangways. Forty-nine were killed. The remaining seven were wounded. Another shell in the wardroom, which was serving as a sick bay, killed four officers and twenty-six men. Her total casualties were eight officers and sixty-nine men killed, and three officers and 103 men wounded.

"Storming and demolition parties upon the mole met with no resistance from the Germans other than intense and unremitting fire. One after another buildings burst into flame or split and crumbled as dynamite went off. A bombing party working up toward the mole extension in search of the enemy destroyed several machine-gun emplacements, but not a single prisoner rewarded them. It appears that upon the approach of the ships and with the opening of fire the enemy simply retired and contented themselves with bringing machine guns to the short end of the mole."

The story of the three block ships that were to be sunk in the channel at Zeebrugge, also from the report of the British Admiralty, is as follows:--

"The _Thetis_ came first, steaming into a tornado of shells from great batteries ashore. All her crew, save a remnant who remained to steam her in and sink her, already had been taken off her by a ubiquitous motor launch, but the remnant spared hands enough to keep her four guns going. It was hers to show the road to the _Intrepid_ and the _Iphigenia_, which followed. She cleared a string of armed barges which defends the channel from the tip of the mole, but had the ill fortune to foul one of her propellers upon a net defense which flanks it on the shore side.

"The propeller gathered in the net, and it rendered her practically unmanageable. Shore batteries found her and pounded her unremittingly. She bumped into the bank, edged off, and found herself in the channel again still some hundreds of yards from the mouth of the canal in practically a sinking condition. As she lay she signaled invaluable directions to others, and her commander, R. S. Sneyed, also accordingly blew charges and sank her. Motor launches under Lieutenant Littleton raced alongside and took off her crew. Her losses were five killed and five wounded.

"The _Intrepid_, smoking like a volcano and with all her guns blazing, followed. Her motor launch failed to get alongside outside the harbor, and she had men enough for anything. Straight into the canal she steered, her smoke blowing back from her into the _Iphigenia's_ eyes, so that the latter was blinded, and, going a little wild, rammed a dredger, with her barge moored beside it, which lay at the western arm of the canal. She was not clear, though, and entered the canal pushing the barge before her. It was then that a shell hit the steam connections of her whistle, and the escape of the steam which followed drove off some of the smoke and let her see what she was doing.

"Lieutenant Stuart Bonham Carter, commanding the _Intrepid_, placed the nose of his ship neatly on the mud of the western bank, ordered his crew away, and blew up his ship by switches in the chart room. Four dull bumps were all that could be heard, and immediately afterward there arrived on deck the engineer, who had been in the engine room during the explosion, and reported that all was as it should be.

"Lieutenant E. W. Bullyard Leake, commanding the _Iphigenia_, beached her according to arrangements on the eastern side, blew her up, saw her drop nicely across the canal, and left her with her engines still going, to hold her in position till she should have bedded well down on the bottom. According to the latest reports from air observation, two old ships, with their holds full of concrete, are lying across the canal in a V position, and it is probable that the work they set out to do has been accomplished and that the canal is effectively blocked. A motor launch, under Lieutenant P. T. Deane, had followed them in to bring away the crews and waited further up the canal toward the mouth against the western bank.

"Lieutenant Bonham Carter, having sent away his boats, was reduced to a Carley float, an apparatus like an exaggerated life-buoy, with the floor of a grating. Upon contact with the water it ignited a calcium flare and he was adrift in the uncanny illumination with a German machine gun a few hundred yards away giving him its undivided attention. What saved him was possibly the fact that the defunct _Intrepid_ still was emitting huge clouds of smoke which it had been worth nobody's while to turn. He managed to catch a rope, as the motor launch started, and was towed for a while till he was observed and taken on board."

A short time after the attack, the Kaiser visited Zeebrugge and gave out the statement that practically no damage had been done and that the channel was still clear. But then an Allied airplane flew over the channel and the mole and secured photographs showing two cruisers sunk in the channel just as had been planned, and effectively blocking it, and also a break in the viaduct sixty to one hundred feet in length. "Only another German lie, this time indorsed by the Kaiser," declared the British papers. A leading German daily said, however, "It would be only foolishness to deny that the British naval forces scored a great success. By a stroke, crazy in its audacity, they penetrated one of the most important strongholds over which the German flag floats."

THE FLEET THAT LOST ITS SOUL

Sailors and especially fighters on the sea have in all ages possessed the noblest and bravest of souls and the finest morale. This is why the British sailors have felt so bitter about the atrocities committed by the German U-boats. In case a ship is sinking, the members of the crew do not expect to leave her until all the passengers are in the lifeboats, and the captain is always the last man to leave. Sometimes he prefers to go down with his ship so that it may never be said that his soul failed him. For sea fighters in U-boats to disregard this traditional chivalry of the sea and to sink merchant ships without warning and without assuring the passengers of their safety seemed to the sailors of other lands like giving up the high ideals that had grown out of their dangerous calling--like poisoning their souls with deceit and violence.

Most naval officers would rather die than surrender. Captain Lawrence, fighting for America in the war of 1812, wounded and dying, cried to his men, "Don't give up the ship." To fight rather than to surrender even in the face of the greatest odds has been for centuries the idea of sea fighters.

Admiral Cervera at Santiago in 1898 knew he was outmatched by the American fleet waiting for him off the harbor; but he brought his ships out and made a brave fight in trying to escape. Lieutenant Hobson knew there were terrible odds against him when he and his little company went in under the guns of the forts and attempted to block the channel. In the Russo-Japanese War, the Russians in the Sea of Japan with their ships foul and barnacled after a voyage of thousands of miles were not afraid to face certain defeat. Brave men do not lose their souls in the face of tremendous odds or even in the face of sure death.

Did the soul of Private George Dilboy of Somerville, Massachusetts, faint in him when he charged alone the German machine gun? He had come with his platoon up a little rise to a railroad track at the top, when suddenly an enemy machine gun opened fire upon them at about one hundred yards distance. Dilboy did not throw himself on the ground to escape the bullets. No, he raised his rifle to his shoulder and standing in plain sight of the German gunners, began to fire at them. As they were partially hidden he was not sure of his aim. So he ran down the embankment and across a wheat field towards them. The machine gun was immediately turned upon him and before he reached it, he fell with one leg nearly severed above the knee by the rain of lead and with several bullets through his body. Half crouched on the only knee left him, he aimed at the gunners one after another until he had killed or dispersed them all, and then fainted and died. He had advanced in the face of certain death, but had saved the lives of many of his comrades, for the gun had to be captured to gain their objective.

The brute is usually a coward at heart. The sinking of unarmed merchant ships and of hospital ships by the German U-boats, the bombing of undefended towns and hospitals, and the firing upon Red Cross workers were acts of brutes and cowards. So it is not strange that the great German fleet which all through the war, except at the battle of Jutland, had hidden in security behind the guns of Heligoland and the defenses of the Kiel Canal lost its soul when, as a last hope, it was ordered out to fight the Allied fleet. The German sailors knew the battle would really be a gigantic sacrifice and refused to fight it for the Fatherland.

There is always a very slight chance that through accident or some peculiar combination of unusual circumstances, a battle even against very great odds may be won. The German fleet had this chance--a very, very slight one, to be sure; and did not take it. The fleet had lost its soul.

Two weeks later, after the signing of the armistice, the German fleet surrendered to the Allies. It was the greatest, the most amazing, and some add, the most shameful surrender in the naval history of the world. It was also the greatest concentration of sea power and the most magnificent spectacle old ocean has ever witnessed.

The surrender was demanded by the terms of the armistice and was made on November 21, according to the program laid down by the commander of the British fleet. It was not the surrender of a foe beaten in a fair battle and yet recognized by his enemies as worthy of his steel. It was the surrender of a foe who declined to fight with the strong and the armed, but who had taken every opportunity to kill the weak and the defenseless. The British sailors could not forget, and they say they never will, the barbarous treatment of their brothers in the merchant marine by the German U-boats. There was therefore none of the sympathy and the fraternization that usually has accompanied a great surrender at sea.

On the afternoon of the day before the surrender the following notice was posted on all the Allied ships:--

"Let it be impressed on all--officers and men--that a state of war exists during the armistice. Their relations with officers and men of the German navy with whom they may now be brought in contact are to be strictly of a formal character in dealing with the late enemy, while courteous.

"It is obligatory that the methods by which they waged war must not be forgotten. No international compliments are to be paid, and all conversation is forbidden except in regard to the immediate business to be transacted.