Under the Ensign of the Rising Sun Part 6

Our gallant and indefatigable little Admiral seemed to spend all his spare time in scheming out plans for the discomfiture of the enemy; and about this time he evolved one which seemed to possess all the elements of a brilliant success.

Knowing that Russian spies swarmed everywhere, he prepared an elaborate scheme to sow Port Arthur roadstead, in front of the harbour entrance, with electro-mechanical mines, with the ostensible object of preventing the Russian fleet from coming out. These mines were stated to be of a peculiarly dangerous and deadly character, invented by Captain Odo.

With great ingenuity the details of the scheme were permitted to gradually leak out, so that in due time they came into the knowledge of the Russian spies and were promptly transmitted to Port Arthur. As a matter of fact, however, the mines which were proposed to be, and actually were, sown, were of a very innocuous character, Togo's object being to imbue the Russian mind with the idea that the j.a.panese mines were so useless that they might be safely disregarded. Then, when this object had been achieved, genuine Odo mines would be sown, with disastrous results to such Russian s.h.i.+ps as might chance to run foul of them.

The task of sowing the innocuous mines was entrusted to two divisions of destroyers, consisting of five craft; the first division being composed of the _Asas.h.i.+o, Kasanumi_, and _Akatsuki_, while the _Akebono_ and _Sazanami_ const.i.tuted the second division. Ito and I had both happily recovered from our indisposition by this time, and were able to rejoin the fleet in time to partic.i.p.ate in the projected operation. Although promoted to the rank of Commander, I was left in command of the _Kasanumi_; but Ito got a step up the ratlines, being given the command of the _Akatsuki_, while a youngster named Hiraoka was given me in his place.

On 9th March we were busy all day s.h.i.+pping our harmless mines; and at eight o'clock in the evening we weighed and, under easy steam, proceeded from our base at the Elliot Islands, bound for Port Arthur roadstead, accompanied by the fast cruiser squadron, the duty of which was to support us in the event of our being attacked, and cover our escape.

By 11:30 p.m. we were within ten miles of the roadstead; and at this point we parted company with the cruisers, who now hove-to for half an hour, to allow us time to reach our destination. At the expiration of that time, a light or two were "accidentally" revealed on board the cruisers for a few seconds, just long enough to give the Port Arthur lookouts an opportunity to detect them, when they were extinguished.

But the ruse was successful, the attention of the lookouts had been attracted, and instantly the searchlights from the station on the cliff to the eastward of the harbour were turned upon the cruisers and kept steadily bearing upon them. They were, of course, so far away that they were only dimly descried, and too far distant to make it worth while to open fire upon them, but their movements were--of set purpose--of so suspicious a character that, having once detected them, the Russians were determined not to lose sight of them again. The attention of the lookouts having thus been attracted to our cruisers in the offing, we in the destroyers were able to slip into the roadstead undetected.

Arrived there, we lost no time in sowing our mine-field right athwart the harbour's mouth, and, had we been so minded, could have finished our work and retired before daylight. But to render the Admiral's scheme successful, it was necessary that we should be seen, and the nature of our work recognised; the 2nd Division therefore reserved a few mines to be dropped after daylight, and when that came they were at once discovered dropping mines, in a state of apparently feverish haste. The forts, of course, at once opened fire upon them; but before they could get the range, our destroyers launched their remaining mines overboard, and took to their heels, their task being accomplished. And now, all that remained was to patiently await the course of events, and thus see how far this part of Togo's plan had been successful.

The game, however, was not yet finished. While we had been busily dropping our mines, what I thought a rather brilliant idea had occurred to me; and, ceasing work for a while, I steamed up alongside the _Akebono_, of our 2nd Division, and imparted my idea to Commander Tsuchiya, who was pleased to very heartily approve of it. In accordance with my scheme, therefore, the 1st Destroyer Division completed its task before daylight, and quietly steamed off round to the westward of Liau-ti-shan, where we remained snugly concealed, close in under the cliffs.

My idea was that if our 2nd Division were discovered--as it was necessary it should be, the Russians would probably send out a few destroyers to attack it; and the event proved that my surmise was correct. Six Russian destroyers were dispatched from the harbour, presumably with instructions to wipe the _Akebono_ and _Sazanami_ off the face of the waters; and as soon as the latter saw the enemy approaching, on a course intended to cut off their retreat to the eastward, the two boats swerved sharply away to the westward, with their funnels belching great clouds of smoke, and every indication that their crews were in a terrible state of fright--but with their engines working at only about three-quarter speed. The Russians, stimulated by our 2nd Division's apparent terror, and finding also that they were steadily gaining upon the chase, strained every nerve to overtake them, and at length came pounding round the point in great style.

Meanwhile, the two retreating j.a.panese destroyers had already swept past us--thus giving us the signal to be on the lookout--and, veering round, in a wide semi-circle, formed up in our rear, we of the 1st Division having already started our engines as soon as they hove in sight.

On came the Russian destroyers, rolling and pitching on the long swell, with the water spouting and curling under their sharp bows to the height of their bridges; and the moment that the first of them swung round the point, over went the indicators of our engine-room telegraphs to "Full speed ahead!" Our gun crews had been standing to their guns for some time past, all ready for action, and as we swept out to seaward, crossing the Russians' bows, we let fly at them with our twelve-pounders and as many of our six-pounders as could be brought to bear, concentrating our fire as much as possible upon the enemy's guns, several of which we succeeded in dismounting.

I feel bound to admit that, taken by surprise though they were, the Russians put up a splendid fight; but although they were superior to us in numbers, our men would not be denied, they worked their guns as coolly and with as deadly precision as though they had been at target practice, and the Russian boats were hulled again and again, clouds of steam arose from them, fires broke out aboard some of them, and so closely were we engaged that we could occasionally hear the cries of the wounded that arose as our shot swept their decks. The fight, which was a very hot one, lasted some twenty minutes, by which time the Russians had managed to get back round the point and under the cover of the batteries. We followed them to the very mouth of the harbour, fighting every inch of the way, but, at length, with heavy sh.e.l.ls falling all round us, in some cases dropping so close that our decks were drenched with spray, it became imperative for us to be off, and we accordingly ported our helms and made off, followed by salvos of shot, big and small, until we were out of range.

Then we slowed down our engines and proceeded to take stock of our injuries.

So far as the _Kasanumi_ was concerned, we had got off pretty lightly, although there was a period of about three minutes when we were hotly engaged by two Russian destroyers at the same time. Our decks were rather severely scored by flying fragments of sh.e.l.ls, we had three shot-holes in our hull, we had one man killed and two wounded, one of them being our chief engineer, who, although severely wounded by a fragment of a sh.e.l.l which burst in the engine-room, gallantly stuck to his post until the fight was over, when he was able to turn the engines over to his second. The _Akatsuki_ had received the severest punishment, one of her steam pipes being severed, and four of her engine-room hands scalded to death. In all, we lost in this fight seven killed and eight wounded; but none of the boats was very seriously damaged.

Meanwhile, our 2nd Division, consisting of the _Akebono_ and _Sazanami_, had vanished, without leaving a sign of their whereabouts. It was now daylight, and the weather tolerably clear, yet, although Hiraoka and I swept the whole surface of the sea with our gla.s.ses, we entirely failed to pick them up. The _Asas.h.i.+o_ and _Akatsuki_ were within hail, both of them engaged, like ourselves, in temporarily patching up the holes in their thin steel sides, through which the water was pouring in whenever we rolled extra heavily; and I hailed them both, inquiring whether either of them had seen anything of the missing craft. An affirmative reply came from my friend Ito, aboard the _Akatsuki_, who informed me that shortly after the fight began, on the other side of the promontory, he had momentarily caught sight of them both, steaming hot-foot after a destroyer which was in full flight, heading toward Pigeon Bay.

Scarcely had this reply been given when the sounds of light gun-fire faintly reached our ears from the direction mentioned, and a few minutes later two destroyers, flying the Russian flag, came foaming round the point, firing as they came, while close behind them appeared our two missing boats, also firing for all they were worth. The Russian boats were running in "line ahead," and it seemed to me that the skipper of the leading boat was manoeuvring her in such a manner as to keep his consort as nearly as possible between himself and the pursuers; at all events the sternmost boat seemed to be getting the biggest share of the pursuers' fire.

At once I shouted an order for the men engaged upon our repairs to hasten their work and bring it to some sort of finish, at the same time signing the quartermaster to put his helm hard over, my intention of course being to go back and render such a.s.sistance as might be required, while the _Asas.h.i.+o_ kept on and stood by Ito, who had his hands full with his severed steam pipe.

But it was impossible for us now to steam at a greater speed than about three knots, for had we attempted to do so, we should have washed overboard the men who were making the repairs, as well as washed the repairs themselves away, in their uncompleted state; consequently, long before we could get near the scene of action, the fight was over. One of the destroyers--the leading one--managed to get safely into the harbour, while the other, which turned out to be the _Stercguschtchi_, riddled with sh.e.l.ls, lost speed to such an extent that at length the _Sazanami_ was able to run alongside and throw a boarding party upon her deck. They found that deck a veritable shambles, no less than thirty dead being counted upon it. Naturally, they took the craft without any resistance worth mentioning, for there were very few left to resist, while, of those who remained, the greater number jumped overboard rather than surrender. Of these, only two were picked up, while two others, too badly wounded to either fight or take to the water, surrendered.

At once the _Sazanami_ took her prize in tow; but the craft was so seriously damaged that, despite all efforts to save her, she rapidly filled and sank, the towing hawser parting as she foundered.

Meanwhile the _Akebono_ was in a somewhat parlous condition, for during the fight she had been struck on the waterline, and was now limping along as best she could, with two compartments filled; when, therefore, the Russian boat foundered, the _Sazanami_ went to her consort's a.s.sistance and took her in tow, for two Russian cruisers, identified as the _Novik_ and _Bayan_, were now seen to be coming out of Port Arthur harbour, and it was high time for us all to be off. Happily for us, by the time that the Russian cruisers were fairly out of harbour, five of our own cruisers had hove up above the horizon, steaming rapidly sh.o.r.eward to our support, whereupon the Russians turned tail and retreated.

As our cruisers came up, their flags.h.i.+p signalled us to proceed to our rendezvous, after ascertaining that we could look after ourselves and needed no a.s.sistance; and shortly afterward we fell in with our main fleet, under Togo, bound for Pigeon Bay, whither the Admiral was proceeding for the purpose of testing his theory that the fortress could be successfully bombarded by high-angle fire projected over the high land between Pigeon Bay and the town. The signal was made for Commander Tsuchiya and me to proceed on board the _Mikasa_, where we jointly made our report, with which the Admiral was pleased to express his satisfaction. He, too, was anxious to know whether we required any a.s.sistance, and finding that we did not, ordered us to proceed to our rendezvous and get our repairs put in hand without a moment's delay. We arrived safely at our destination early in the afternoon, and within the next hour our damaged craft were in the hands of strong repairing gangs, so prompt were the j.a.panese to act.

The main fleet arrived at the rendezvous shortly before sunset, and anch.o.r.ed. I looked keenly at s.h.i.+p after s.h.i.+p, as they steamed in, but could detect no signs of injury to any of them; so after dinner I took our dinghy and rowed across to the _Mikasa_, with several of the officers of which I was by this time on quite intimate terms. The first man I happened to run into, however, upon pa.s.sing in through the gangway was Captain Ijichi, commanding the s.h.i.+p; and he, as anxious to hear my yarn as I was to hear his, instantly pounced upon me and marched me off to his own cabin, where we were presently joined by Lieutenant Prince Kasho, for whom Ijichi had sent.

Here I was made to start the proceedings by spinning, at considerably greater length, the yarn which I had related to the Admiral earlier in the day, and which I was now able to supplement with the additional information that our 2nd Division had chased the Russian destroyer, of which they had started in pursuit, into Pigeon Bay, where they had sunk her. The honours of the day were of course with them, for they had accounted for two Russian destroyers, whereas we of the 1st Division had only given five of the enemy a very severe mauling; nevertheless, my little audience were good enough to stamp our performance with their marked approval.

Then the skipper of the _Mikasa_ related his story. The long-range bombardment of Port Arthur was not a very exciting affair, it seemed, but it was successful in so far that it proved the correctness of the Admiral's theory that it could be done by firing over the high ground and dropping sh.e.l.ls upon an unseen mark on the other side.

The attempt was of a twofold character, one part of which was to test the above theory, while the other was to destroy the Russian signal station upon the island of Sanshan, off Dalny, from which spot the enemy were able to observe and report to Port Arthur the movements of our fleet. This task was successfully accomplished by a detachment of our cruisers.

As regards the long-range, high-angle bombardment of the fortress, it was accomplished in the following fas.h.i.+on. Our battles.h.i.+ps proceeded round to the westward of the promontory of Liau-ti-shan to a spot where the high land hid them from the sight of the Port Arthur batteries, and, elevating the muzzles of their 12-inch guns to the required extent, they discharged five rounds each from their four guns--one hundred and twenty shots in all, one shot at a time, while our first cruiser squadron, stationed off the port, to the south-east, carefully noted the spot where each sh.e.l.l dropped, and reported the result by wireless to the battles.h.i.+ps, thus enabling them to adjust their aim and rectify any inaccuracies. The result was that one of our sh.e.l.ls. .h.i.t the Golden Hill fort, exploding a magazine and doubtless doing a considerable amount of damage to the structure, while the Mantow Hill fort, on the west side of the harbour, was. .h.i.t several times and considerably damaged. Several sh.e.l.ls fell in the New Town of Port Arthur, setting fire to a number of houses there and causing a tremendous panic and great loss of life. The fifth sh.e.l.l fired by our battles.h.i.+ps struck the Russian battles.h.i.+p _Retvisan_, while another fell aboard the _Sevastopol_, exploding on her armoured deck. Yet another of our sh.e.l.ls struck a train which happened to be just entering Port Arthur station, destroying the locomotive and, as we subsequently learned, killing the engine-driver and severely wounding the fireman. Finally, the _Retvisan_ adopted our own tactics and retaliated by firing her heavy guns over the intervening high ground, while some of the forts did the same, a party of signallers being stationed on the crest of the hill to direct their aim. As a result of this, sh.e.l.ls at length began to drop near our s.h.i.+ps; whereupon the Admiral, in obedience to his instructions not to risk his battles.h.i.+ps, hauled off; the fleet, as it went, observing three dense columns of smoke rising from the city.

Seeing that our s.h.i.+ps were retiring, the Russian Admiral led out to sea such of his s.h.i.+ps as were fit for service, with the evident intention of luring our s.h.i.+ps into the zone of fire of the forts; but he might as well have saved his coal, for Togo was much too wary a bird to be caught with that kind of chaff.

On the following day we learned by wireless, from one of our cruiser scouts, that the Russian fleet was being cautiously taken out to sea through our mine-field off the harbour's mouth, the innocuous character of which they had already ascertained,--as intended by our Admiral,-- and, later on, the further information reached us that the fleet was at sea and carrying out evolutions while cautiously working its way southward. Later still, we were informed that the Russians, learning from their scouts that none of our s.h.i.+ps were in the vicinity, had proceeded as far as the Miao-tao Islands, off the Shan-tung peninsula, which they subjected to a careful examination, under the impression, as we subsequently learned, that those islands were being used by our destroyers as a hiding-place from which to make our raids. All hands of us immediately made our preparations to weigh at a moment's notice, fully expecting that the Admiral would seize what seemed such a splendid opportunity to intercept the enemy and give him battle in the open sea.

But no orders were issued; and we were given to understand that there were certain good and sufficient secret reasons why the opportunity must be permitted to pa.s.s. A great deal of surprise, not to say dissatisfaction, was caused by this strange decision; but discipline was so strong, and the idea of implicit, unquestioning obedience had been so thoroughly instilled into the j.a.panese mind, that not a word of grumbling pa.s.sed any of our lips.

On the night of 21st March the tactics of the 9th of the same month were repeated, including the laying of harmless mines off the mouth of the harbour, and the high-angle bombardment of the fortress by the _Fuji_ and _Yas.h.i.+ma_ from Pigeon Bay; but the affair was uneventful; it may therefore be dismissed with the bare mention of it. The Russian s.h.i.+ps again came out of harbour and ranged themselves in battle formation in the roadstead, but no wiles of ours could tempt them to leave the protection of the forts, so we drew off and returned to our rendezvous among the Elliot Islands.

During the night of 22nd March, four merchant steamers, purchased by the j.a.panese Government, arrived at our rendezvous from Sasebo, in response to a request from Togo; and the Admiral, with characteristic energy, at once proceeded to prepare them for the task of making a second attempt to bottle up the fleet in Port Arthur harbour.

They were the _f.u.kui Maru, Chiyo Maru, Yoneyama Maru_, and _Yahiko Maru_--all old craft, practically worn-out, and of very little value.

These s.h.i.+ps, like those used in the first attempt, were loaded with stones and sc.r.a.p iron consolidated into a ma.s.s by pouring liquid cement over it, thus converting it into a sort of reinforced concrete, underneath which was buried the explosion charges destined to blow out the bottoms of the s.h.i.+ps and sink them upon their arrival at their destined stations.

Hirose, now promoted to the rank of Commander for the gallantry which he displayed upon the occasion of the first attempt, was given the command of the largest s.h.i.+p, the _f.u.kui Maru_, while, to my intense surprise and gratification, I was given the command of the _Chiyo Maru_, a craft of 1746 tons. The expedition was in charge of Commander Arima, who went with Hirose. The s.h.i.+ps were armed with a few old Hotchkiss quick-firers, for use against torpedo craft, should any attack us.

Our preparations were completed late in the afternoon of 26th March; and we immediately weighed and proceeded to sea, escorted by a flotilla of destroyers and torpedo-boats, among which was the _Kasanumi_, temporarily under the command of my subordinate, young Hiraoka, who had already proved himself to be a very capable, discreet, and courageous lad.

The weather on this occasion was everything that could be desired, perfectly clear, with no wind and a sea so calm that the veriest c.o.c.k-boat could have safely ventured upon it. The only drawback was that there was a moon, well advanced in her first quarter, floating high in a sky dappled with light, fleecy cloud through which enough light percolated to render even small craft distinctly visible on the horizon.

But, after all, this would not greatly matter, indeed it would be an advantage to us, always provided, of course, that we were not prematurely sighted by some keen-visioned, swift-steaming Russian scout; for the moon would set about midnight, while two o'clock in the morning was the time set for our attempt.

The run to the offing of Port Arthur was like a pleasure trip; our fleet of old crocks pounded along steadily, with a soft, soothing sound of purling water rising from under their bows, dominated from time to time by the clank of our crazy engines, which our mechanics had doctored up as thoroughly as time permitted, in order to ensure that they should outlast the run across. There was nothing for us to do but follow our leader, so I spent an hour of the time in making sure that our solitary boat should reach the water with certainty and on a level keel when the time should come to launch her, taking the turns out of the davit tackles, well greasing the falls, oiling the block sheaves, and rigging up a device of my own contriving whereby the necessity to unhook the blocks could be avoided when the boat touched the water.

At eleven o'clock Commander Arima signalled the destroyer flotilla, and five of the fastest of them at once went full speed ahead, spreading out in a fan-shaped formation ahead of us and on either bow to reconnoitre the roadstead. At ten minutes to midnight the moon, a great golden half-disc, swimming in a violet sky flecked with great islands of soft, fleecy cloud, touched the high land of Liau-ti-shan; and as she sank behind it, the order was given to stop our engines and lay-to for a short while, as we had made a good pa.s.sage and were somewhat ahead of our scheduled time; also to await the return and report of the destroyers. We were now about twelve miles off Port Arthur, and far enough beyond the range of the searchlights to ensure our presence being undetected.

With the setting of the moon, the clouds seemed to bunch together and acquire a greater density, and it fell very dark, such starlight as filtered through the canopy of cloud only barely sufficing to enable us to detect our next s.h.i.+p ahead and astern. The land about Port Arthur loomed up in the darkness like a shapeless black shadow, stretched along the horizon to the west and north, pierced only by the long beam of the searchlight on Golden Hill, sweeping slowly to and fro at intervals.

Watching this, for want of something better to do, we presently noticed that, for some reason not explicable to us, the beam never travelled farther south than a certain point, where it invariably paused for a few seconds, and then slowly swept round toward the north again.

Wondering whether Arima also had noticed this, I rang our engines ahead for a revolution or two, and hailed the _f.u.kui_ to inquire. It appeared that he had not; and I was in the middle of a suggestion, the observance of which would, I believed, enable us to get close in, undetected, when our destroyers came rus.h.i.+ng back with the information that everything was clear ahead, and that the prospects of success looked exceedingly promising. Whereupon Arima, hailing me, directed me to take the lead in the _Chiyo_, steering such a course as seemed desirable, and the rest would follow. Accordingly, we in the _Chiyo_ went ahead, the _f.u.kui_ falling in next astern, and the other two retaining their original positions.

We started at a speed of six knots only, to give our stokers a chance to get their boilers into the best possible trim and to raise a good head of steam for the final rush, and as soon as our safety valves began to blow off, we increased the number of our revolutions until, when we arrived within four miles of the harbour's mouth, we were racing in, as though for a wager. At this point the destroyers stopped their engines and lay-to. They had done the first part of their work, and must now wait until we had done ours.

Meanwhile, I had quite made up my mind as to the proper thing to do, and accordingly shaped a course by which, instead of running straight in, and so crossing the track of the searchlight beam, we edged away to the southward and westward, traversing the arc of a circle, and so just keeping outside the range of the beam. But of course this sort of thing could not go on indefinitely; to enter the harbour we must, sooner or later, get within the range of the light; and when we arrived within two miles of the harbour's mouth further concealment became impossible. But we had done not at all badly, for a ten minutes' rush would now see us where we wanted to be, if in the meantime we were not hit and blown out of the water.

As we came within reach of the searchlight, I called down to the engine-room, enjoining those below to give the old packet every ounce of steam they could muster; and the engineer responded by calmly s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g down the safety valves, ignoring the fact that, by doing so, he risked the bursting of the boilers. This was no time for caution, and if the worn-out kettles would only stand the strain for another ten minutes, all might be well.

Slowly the searchlight beam came sweeping round toward us, until it rested fully upon us. It swept on for a yard or two, switched back, paused for a few seconds, and then began to wave wildly to and fro, seemingly by way of a signal, while a solitary gunshot pealed out upon the air. Then the light came back to us, fully revealing the four steamers making their headlong rush for the harbour entrance.

Following that solitary gunshot there was a tense silence, lasting for perhaps half a minute, while searchlight after searchlight was turned upon us from the heights and from every s.h.i.+p so placed that they could be brought to bear. Then, as though at a preconcerted signal, the batteries on the heights and two gunboats anch.o.r.ed at the harbour entrance opened fire upon us, and the darkness of the night was stabbed and pierced by jets of flame, while the air became vibrant with the hiss and scream of projectiles of every description, which fell all round us, las.h.i.+ng the surface of the sea into innumerable jets of phosph.o.r.escent foam. The crash of the heavy gun-fire, and the sharper crackle of the quick-firers, raised such a terrific din that it quickly became impossible to make one's voice heard; but my crew had already received their orders, and the moment that we got within range they opened a steady fire with our two old Hotchkisses upon the gunboats at the harbour's mouth, while our destroyers, pus.h.i.+ng boldly in after us, opened fire upon the searchlights, hoping to destroy them, and endeavouring by every possible device to distract the attention of the gunners and to draw their fire from us. But in this they were unsuccessful; the Russians at once divined our intention to seal up the harbour, and recognised that it was vastly more important to them to frustrate our purpose than to waste their fire upon our elusive destroyers; and I doubt whether a single gun was turned upon them.

On through the tempest of projectiles we rushed, our old and patched-up engines rattling and clanking and groaning as they worked under such a pressure of steam as they had not known for many a long day; the stokers, after a final firing-up, came on deck, by order of the engineer, and went upon the topgallant forecastle to a.s.sist with the guns; and I took up my station by the wheelhouse to con the s.h.i.+p to her appointed berth, which was immediately under Golden Hill, and about a hundred yards from the sh.o.r.e. One of the two gunboats that were guarding the entrance was anch.o.r.ed so nearly in our way that I was sorely tempted to give her the stem and sink her where she lay. But I successfully resisted the temptation, for, had we sunk her, she was too far out to have become an obstruction, while we should probably have smashed in our own bows and gone to the bottom before arriving at our station. As we surged past her, however, within twenty fathoms, we peppered her smartly with our quick-firers, receiving in return a ragged discharge from her entire battery, including a sh.e.l.l from her 6-inch gun which happily pa.s.sed through our starboard bulwarks and out through our port without exploding. Our foretopmast was at this moment shot away, and fell on deck, but hurt no one, our funnel was riddled with shrapnel, and a bridge stanchion, within a foot of where I was standing, was cut in two; but none of us was hurt. The next moment a sh.e.l.l struck our mainmast and sent it over the side, luckily severing the rotten shrouds and stays also, so that it fell clear and did not foul our propeller. A few seconds later a sh.e.l.l dropped upon our after-deck and exploded, blowing a jagged circular hole of some twenty feet diameter in it, and setting the planks on fire; but a few buckets of water promptly applied sufficed to extinguish the blaze.

Meanwhile we were plugging along in grand style and drawing so near to our destination that I called to the men to cease firing, and for two of them to stand by to let go the anchor while the rest came aft and held themselves ready to jump into our solitary boat when I gave the word.

It was wonderfully exciting work, for as we drew nearer in we came into the range of fire of other forts and s.h.i.+ps, and the air seemed to be thick with missiles, while shrapnel was bursting all round us, and the water was torn by flying shot to such an extent that our decks were streaming, and all hands of us were wet through with the thrown-up spray.

At length our appointed berth was so close at hand that I rang down to stop the engines and signed to the helmsman to put his helm hard a-port, while I stationed myself close to the electric b.u.t.ton, pressure on which would fire the explosives in our hold and blow our bottom out. We were now so close in under the cliffs that the Golden Hill guns could no longer reach us, also we were out of range of the great searchlights, consequently we were enshrouded in darkness, yet the forts on the west side of the harbour still maintained their fire upon us; but we were now lost in the deep shadow of the cliffs, and the shots flew wide.

Half a minute later, I called down the tube to the engineer to send his engines astern to check our way, and then come on deck; and he was still ascending the engine-room ladder when I shouted to the men forward to let go the anchor. It fell with a great splash, and as we had snubbed her at a short scope, she quickly brought up in the exact spot destined for her.

"Lower away the boat, and tumble in, men," I shouted; and the words were hardly out of my mouth when I heard the murmur of the falls through the blocks, and the splash of the boat as she hit the water. A few m.u.f.fled e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.ns followed as the men slid down the falls, then came the rattle of oars as they were thrown out; and finally a voice crying: