“Looking around I saw our steamer riding quite happily on the water
with her bows clean gone. Afterwards I learned that the torpedo had
cut off her fore-part, to within an inch or two of where I had been
standing, and that it had sunk. I saw another full boat being rowed
away from the ship, and an overturned one with two people sitting on
her keel. I saw a man seated on a grating. All were convinced that
help would be forthcoming speedily. And still the _Sussex_ floated.
Four times I remarked—by way of a _ballon d’essai_—that it seemed as
if she were not going to sink, and always there was an outcry to row,
and get away from her. The Belgian and the Belgian soldier evidently
thought as I did. They proposed that we should return before we were
swamped ourselves. Once again a hysterical outburst. One man jumped to
his feet and shrieked, and asked us if it were to hell that we intended
returning? I began to be afraid that he and those who thought as he
did would throw us others into the sea, but common-sense told me that
to remain all night in that overcrowded half-swamped boat would be to
court death.
“We saw at last that the other boat was returning. This was our chance.
Example is a wonderful thing in dealing with mob hysteria. Tentatively
the two Belgians and I proposed that we should go as close to the
steamer as prudence permitted, and ask the Captain if she were going
to sink. If his answer were favorable, those who desired should go on
board, and any who liked could go off again in the boat. If his answer
were unfavorable, we would stand off again. The maniac still shrieked
his protests, but the rest of the boat was with us. But no one seemed
to know how to turn the boat. As soon as we told one to backwater, the
other two did likewise. It seemed hopeless. Finally, we let the other
two oars pull, and I myself tried to induce my _vis-à-vis_ to ‘ramez
au sens contraire,’ which was the nearest approach I could get to
‘backwater’ in French. He was too dazed to understand, so I simply set
my teeth and pulled against him, and in about fifteen minutes the boat
gradually came round in a wide circle. How I longed to be whole again
so that I could take his oar right away and cox that mad boat! With my
injured back and inside I could only just compass what I did. The pain
kept me from collapsing, and the exertion from freezing.
“It looked as though we were to be swamped, after all, within ten yards
of the _Sussex’s_ gaping bows, for our crew, in their excitement, had
forgotten to bail for some minutes. As we floated in under her sides
I made a final appeal, which a young Belgian put into more forcible
French, for everybody to keep calm and not upset the boat at the last.