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With the American Submarines: German

The crowd gathered round Captain Ned, who had established contact (this is a military term quite out of place in a work on the navy) with the eagerly sought, horribly elusive German. "Go on, Ned, give us an earful. What time did you say it was?" An enemy submarine that escaped. "About 5 a. m.," answered the captain. He stood leaning against a door, and the fine head, the pallor, the touch of fatigue, all made a very striking and appealing picture. "Say about eight minutes after five. I'd just come up to take a look-see, and saw him just about two miles away, on the surface, and moving right along. So I went under to get into a good position, came up again, and let him have one. Well, he saw it just as it was almost on him, swung her round, and dived like a ton of lead."

The audience listened in silent sympathy. One could see the disappointment on the captain's face. "Where was he?" "About so-and-so." "That's the jinx that got after the convoy, sure as you live." Two blind ships that tried to find each other under water. The speaker had had his own adventures with the Germans. A month or so before, he had shoved up his periscope and spotted a Fritz on the surface in full noonday. The watchful Fritz, however, had been lucky enough to see the enemy almost at once, and had dived. The American followed suit. The eyeless submarine manoeuvred about, some eighty feet under, the German evidently "making his getaway," the American hoping to be lucky enough to pick up Fritz's trail, and get a shot at him when he rose again to the top. And while the two blind ships manoeuvred there in the dark of the abyss, the keel of the fleeing German had actually, by a curious chance, scraped along the top of the American vessel and carried away the wireless aerials! All were silent for a few seconds, thinking over the affair. It was not difficult to read the thought in every mind, the thought of getting at the Germans. The characteristic aggressiveness of the American mind, heritage of a people compelled to subdue a vast, wild continent, is a wonderful military attribute. The idea of our navy is, "Get after 'em, keep after 'em, stay after 'em, don't give 'em an instant of security or rest." And none have this fighting spirit deeper in their hearts than our gallant boys of the submarine patrol. "That's all," said Captain Ned. "I'm going to have a wash-up." He lifted a grease-stained hand to his cheek, rubbed his unshaven beard, and grinned. "Any letters?" "Whole bag of stuff. Smithie put it on your desk." "Trotzky" and "Rasputin."

Captain Ned wandered off. Presently, the door opened again, and three more veterans of the patrol cruised in, also in ancient uniforms. There were more cheers; more friendly cries. It was unanimously decided that the "Trotzky" of the first lot had better take a back seat, since the second in command of the newcomers was "a perfect ringer for Rasputin."

A British patrol hunts a lost torpedo. "See anything?" "Nothing much. There's a bit of wreckage just off shore. Saw a British patrol boat early Tuesday morning. I was on the surface, lying between her and the sunrise; she was hidden by a low-lying swirl of fog; she saw us first. When we saw her, I made signals, and over she came. Guess what the old bird wanted--wanted to know if I'd seen a torpedo he'd fired at me! An old scout with white whiskers; one of those retired captains, I suppose, who has gone back on the job. He admitted he had received the Admiralty notes about us, but thought we acted suspicious. Did you ever hear of such nerve?" Courage of the submarine patrol.

When the war was young, I served on land with messieurs les poilus. I have seen the contests of aviators, also trench-raids and the fighting for Verdun. Since then I have seen the war at sea. To my mind, if there is one service of this war which more than any other requires those qualities of endurance, skill, and courage whose blend the fighting men call--Elizabethanly, but oh, so truly--"guts," it is the submarine patrol.

France took tender care of her wounded heroes, and the following narrative gives a number of touching incidents observed by one who visited several of the French hospitals and received stories and experiences from the wounded soldiers.