I’m sorry I haven’t written for so long, even at New Year. You know
that I’ve thought of you, but honestly, I’ve not had time to call my
soul my own! If I’m not mistaken my last letter was from Cardiff and
we were expecting to leave for the Strait of Otranto. But we got a
counter-order. The English fleet need a lot of coalers in the North
Sea and is jolly short of them. At the beginning of the war they took
for their motto “Business as usual,” and the Bulls let the coaling
ships go about their regular jobs so as not to disturb “business.” But
as the war kept dragging on, they could no longer guarantee supplies
everywhere, so, in short, the _Pamir_ was sent to Senegal, Togoland,
and the Cameroons, where there is a Franco-British squadron which
needed coal.
At first everything went well, but off Cape Finistère we ran into a
squall. The _Pamir_ was loaded to the very brim and you should have
seen her! The decks were awash for thirty-six hours. The trouble was
that the shaft was up to its old tricks, and we saw that the collar
repaired at K---- was going to leave us in the lurch in the middle of
the gale. Fourgues reduced speed as much as he could without risk of
broaching and made for Cadiz to have the collars manufactured by Muriac
put in place again. The repairs didn’t go at all smoothly because my
men don’t understand a thing about it and I hardly more. We profited by
the occasion to lay in water and provisions. Really, it’s not amusing
to be a Frenchman in Spain at present. They looked at us out of the
corners of their eyes and laughed behind our backs. The Boches have a
good footing there, their Government supports them, while Fourgues was
pretty badly received. And then all the French had been recalled at the
mobilization--there is no one left to represent us. All our affairs
there are going to the dogs. The Boches are profiting by this. They are
getting ready for the war after the war, seriously. And don’t think
for a minute that they all stay there! There are big vessels full of
Germans sailing from Barcelona and Cadiz, which go to neutral countries
and from there to Germany. We could make a big sweep if we went after
them. I hope you’ll tell me if any have been taken. You ought to know.
I don’t know much. I have my hands full on board and the papers talk
such rot, and then, once you have left land you think of other things.
But you only have to walk along the docks there to see the boats
sailing with the Boches. With a Secret Service Agent on the spot,
France could know the hour and the day of sailing and a warship would
bag them as they left Spanish waters.
After that the _Pamir_ went south as far as Dakar. We did the whole
coast, Gorée, Sierra Leone, Porto Novo--leaving coal more or less
everywhere, sometimes on a gunboat, sometimes on a cruiser or at a
dock. It reminded me of the old trading voyages when they made little
trips from port to port to unload three tons and take on a hundred
hogsheads. Only, this time, nothing doing for ordinary merchandise!
There were bales and bales, clusters of bananas and ivory for the
asking everywhere, more than I can tell, waiting to be shipped.
Fourgues is devoured with despair to see all that mouldering when the
_Pamir_ has room enough to clean up the entire coast. But he asked in
vain. He was refused everywhere because he is on Government service, so
we returned empty. With the bananas alone we could have paid for our
return voyage. All that stuff will go to a neutral port and thence I
jolly well know where!
We saw a good many people down there who asked for news and details.
Fourgues’ preserves and brandy were all used up because he invited so
many of the poor devils who were homesick. There are some who have
had three or four years in Africa and it was their turn to come home.
Now they’ve got to stay on. It seems that things are going well and
that Togoland and the Cameroons will not take long. But the Boches had
been getting ready long ago, for away off down in the bush, guns and
machine-guns of the latest type were found and heaps of ammunition. In
spite of this, everybody said that the country would soon be cleared,
which will make two fine colonies the less for them. The English got a
number of their boats, and the Naval officers with whom we talked said
that that would make a good sum in prize-money. When we told them that
with us since the war, prize-money has been suppressed, and allowances
and so forth, they wouldn’t believe us. As they said, the labourer is
worthy of his hire, and one is more apt to hustle if there is some sort
of recompense ahead. There was even one who said that we were mugs and
that we should be obliged to go back to it. Fourgues wanted to jump
on him, but was only half-hearted about it, for he had already told me
that he thought the same.
On going back to Dakar we were ordered to touch at Casablanca to await
instructions. We thought it was going to be last August all over again,
but not at all! There were two thousand tons of cereals waiting to be
taken to Montenegro, which is starving. We brought it alongside in
native boats called _barcasses_, like the furniture of the Boches, only
we stowed it better! In the middle of December there is something like
a swell. I spent my time saying, “That’s done it! That _barcasse_ will
capsize in the surf!”--and then it didn’t after all. They know the
trick, those Arabs. Fourgues was glad to have a cargo and not to be
returning in ballast. He was afraid, though, that they wouldn’t send us
to Montenegro after all.
“You’ll see, my boy. They’ll make us unload all that and go back for
coal.”
He doesn’t like coal because, he says, although it keeps the teeth
white and is good for the stomach, you can’t have clean shirts and
handkerchiefs with it. But we were sent to Oran to make up our
cargo with shoes, blankets, and all sorts of clothing. They must be
absolutely on their beam-ends in Montenegro.
Finally the _Pamir_ spent several hours at Bizerta, taking in petrol
for the Montenegrin army. Though we did not loaf around anywhere, all
this took time, and at the worst time of the year, too. I could never
have believed that the Mediterranean was so bad. It is worse than the
Atlantic and the China Sea: rain or wind, wind or rain, and a choppy
sea all the time. Fourgues takes it all in the day’s work and laughs at
me:
“Eh, my boy! You see it’s a mistake to run down the South. The
Mediterranean is not much bigger than a cup, but it takes a devilish
clever fellow to go up and down it without striking a snag. Now look at
that one--and that!”
I can understand why there should be waves as high as the funnel where
they have space in which to pile up, but to find such waves in the
Mediterranean, that beats me. You, old man, have some peace in your
turret, but the bridge of the _Pamir_ is seldom dry.
Our rendezvous was for ten miles west of Fano and the _Pamir_ arrived
about noon. From far off we asked ourselves what on earth was going to
happen. We expected to see a destroyer or perhaps a cruiser, but not
fifty or sixty of you! We could see the smoke thirty miles away, and
all the time other boats kept coming along. It was the first time I had
seen the Fleet out in full force, battleships, cruisers, and T.B.D.’s.
I won’t deny it, the sight’s a staggerer! I looked for the _Auvergne_,
but she wasn’t there. What were you doing? I was so interested watching
the wigwagging, the flags, and all the pinnaces going from one ship
to another, that I forgot to drop you a line during the half-hour we
lay-to in the middle of the lot. I was asking myself what you were all
doing there, dead-still and apparently idle, and it was only at the end
that I saw the mail-boat which had been hidden by a big cruiser, and
understood why there were so many small craft running around. Well,
your Admiral isn’t afraid to stay there in broad daylight, all of you
together, under the very noses of the Greeks.
As soon as we had stopped, a steam launch came for Fourgues and took
him aboard the Admiral’s ship, where he didn’t stay fifteen minutes.
When he came back, he ran up the ladder in a hurry.
“Full steam ahead at once, my boy--due North. Put her behind that
destroyer while I read my orders.”
He went off to open his sealed envelope and I proceeded behind the
destroyer all by myself, proud as could be in the midst of all that
steel. Nevertheless, it was annoying not to have known that we should
run up against the mail-boat. You can get along, old chap, but at home
they will think I’ve been drowned, for they’ve been a month without a
letter.
When Fourgues returned to the bridge I expected him to tell me about
it, and I began:
“Well, Captain?”
“Carry on, my boy.”
He stood near the speed indicator, frowning and tapping on the rail.
I could see that he was disturbed, but there was no use putting in my
oar. I should only have caught it, whereas, as he has no one but me to
talk to, it was all sure to come out before long.
He went down again and gave orders for doubling the watch--two men
for’ard, one aft. Then he said that as we were going up and down
the Adriatic again he and I should be watch-keepers with the others
to support us except during meals, which we should continue to eat
together, but in the chart-house. Afterwards he ruminated without
uttering another syllable until dinner.
I kept my mouth shut, but I was beginning to be astonished to see
Fourgues shutting up just at the moment when he was going to do
something interesting. He is more apt to let rip. Finally he exploded:
“Well, anyway, we’d better talk things over. Say, kid, do you know what
they asked me on that battleship?”
“Mum’s the word!” says I to myself, says I.
“Well, they asked me why I didn’t have wireless, and why I didn’t have
a lookout on the masthead, and where were signal lights, and how was
I going to communicate with them at night and with the destroyer, and
why this and why that! Holy blazes! they have only to give the order!
I want nothing better than to have the _Pamir_ rigged with all the
gadgets in creation and with new boilers and a whole shaft into the
bargain! But think of it! To act as though they had caught me napping!
I’m not a battleship! Well, then I turned in and asked one of them
who was going to ask me another dam silly question--a little tin-pot
Commander:
“‘And you? What are you lying-to here for? Asking for a torpedo?’
“He burst out cackling and called some others and they looked me over
as though I were a queer beast. There was one who condescended to
explain that submarines were for coast-defence and would never, never
come down as far as Fano; that I really mustn’t get the wind up me--one
could sail _quite_ safely. Farther up, perhaps, it would be as well to
keep one’s eyes open, but out to sea--what a joke! A bit thick that, to
suggest I was afraid! I don’t know what I might have said to them, but
the Admiral came:
“‘Oh, you’re the skipper of the _Pamir_ going to Montenegro! You are
luckier than I! But surely you aren’t afraid!’
“Damn it, I’d have answered him, but he went away without waiting for
an answer, and as soon as they had given me my sealed orders I came
right back. Here I know what I am doing and no one dares to give me
lessons! Let them grant me wireless! I have asked the owner for it
ten times if I’ve asked once, and every time he looks at me as though
I were asking for the moon! Oh, yes--I forgot. On the gangway there
was a little lieutenant. I asked him what I was to do if I saw a
submarine--should I go after it with my fists? He too looked at me as
though I were a freak and shrugged his shoulders and went back to laugh
with the rest of them. Gorblime!”
It did Fourgues good to relieve his mind. He lit his pipe and swallowed
a glass of rum--best Jamaica.
“Go to bed, Sonnie, and try to get some sleep till eight bells, for
to-morrow you won’t get any to worry about! We are going to Antivari,
to arrive at night and leave again the next morning and all the stuff
has to be put ashore. Fortunately the nights are long. They’ll see what
old man Fourgues is made of.”
It’s not really amusing running up the coast of Albania. There is about
as much vegetation as on the back of my hand, and when the wind butts
in from the mountains, it’s no laughing matter. There’s a wind there
called the bora. Well, we got a smack from it that was enough to pull
the masts out! I don’t know how the destroyer managed not to capsize.
Every time we could see her between the waves she was heeling right
over, on one beam or the other. As for the _Pamir_, she has had so much
of that sort of thing that it doesn’t even take off any paint--she
hasn’t any left!
By hugging the coast we arrived at Antivari the next day, the destroyer
ahead showing the way. The wind fell, but still it wasn’t exactly fun,
and there was not a light showing. Fourgues went in as though it were
broad day, but really we could see neither the coast nor the wharf. You
would have believed he was going into the Eure docks at Havre with one
tug in front and another behind.
However, there was somebody on the wharf, Montenegrins who caught our
ropes and belayed ’em pretty well. The _Pamir_ was able to warp in
and didn’t smash anything alongside. The natives leaped on board like
devils. I suppose the weird jabbering meant that they wanted food, for
as we got out the first bags of corn they fell on them and filled their
pockets.
Nice night-job, that! Not allowed to show a light, not allowed to use
the winch, not allowed to shout! Just pitch the stuff over on to the
wharf without knowing where it will fall--so much the worse for any
one who is underneath! Those ashore grabbed the stuff as well as they
could and dragged it into the sheds--petrol, shoes, blankets, sacks of
corn--over it went! We didn’t kill anyone, though Lord knows why not,
nor did the Austrian aviators who came at two o’clock in the morning
and dropped four or five bombs which burst all around--excepting one
which fell into our corn without going off and which Fourgues threw
overboard as though it were a cigarette end. As soon as they heard the
airplanes, all the natives ran like hares, and there was no getting
them to come back. A nice lot, want food, but won’t work for it! The
destroyer sent us some men, and although they must have longed for
sleep after the dog’s life of these last few days, they dragged the
things out as though they were doing it for themselves. They were
certainly doing someone else’s dirty work! By five in the morning
the hold was empty and scraped clean and the _Pamir_ left without
waiting for anything more. The destroyer, having received a wireless
during the night, stayed behind, so she put out to patrol around the
neighbourhood, and we went down the Adriatic without being convoyed.
If a hydroplane with a rifle had fired on us we should have been
prisoners, and wouldn’t that have looked pretty! Fourgues was cursing
below his breath, saying that a ship of three thousand tons is worth
taking and that France is not rich enough to cast them loose in enemy
waters like that. And we had no orders, and Fourgues was wondering
whether to return to Cardiff or go to Toulon, or what. In short, life
on the bridge was far from amusing. As a climax, a crank started
heating. We had to slow down to three knots and turn the hose on it.
There was time for us to be sunk ten times over, for it took fifty
hours to get back, with dirty weather and head winds.
Fourgues wanted to go in between Corfu and the coast to find still
water and to anchor if the crank wouldn’t cool off; but just as we were
turning into the north channel, a whole flotilla of torpedo-boats came
along and signalled for us to keep outside. They shouted through the
megaphone that French boats should not go into Greek waters. But the
_Pamir_ is not a war-vessel....
They talked on. It seems that the whole Navy believed the _Pamir_
had been sunk or torpedoed and that they had been searching for us
everywhere for twenty-four hours. The destroyer which was with us at
Antivari had received orders to come back and try to find us, while
the others went up. Our convoying T.B.D. started out at full speed and
passed us without seeing us, of course, because we were hugging the
coast for shelter, and was cursed like the deuce, by wireless, by the
Commander-in-Chief, but Fourgues was annoyed, a little, to learn of it.
“Too bad! If they would give us wireless that sort of thing wouldn’t
happen,” he concluded.
They were also looking for us because they wanted us to go to
Alexandria, where we arrived the day before yesterday. We don’t yet
know why, but I believe it is because of an expedition in the direction
of Constantinople. Fourgues is rather pleased, for, he says, it will be
amusing to anchor as a conqueror where he has anchored so many times
with a lot of junk. I only hope it may be so! He spends his time now
telling me about the Bosphorus and the Dardanelles where I have never
been.
He says that with nerve the thing is possible--that we should take them
by surprise and go right in, and then in three days the Turks would be
done for. “Only,” he adds, “it isn’t enough to talk about going; you
must go!”
Meanwhile we’re having a rest. The English are charming and they don’t
worry at Alexandria. The crew are improving the opportunity! We’ve
had a few broken heads, but Fourgues shuts his eyes because they have
worked like dogs for three months and this is the first time there has
been any chance of a beano.
I took the chance of writing some letters as you see. I wish I had some
books. Since August I have been doing a lot of thinking, especially as
Fourgues has made me see what a lot of things there are that I don’t
know. Before, I never read anything but the papers, but now I need
something more serious, if only to make conversation with him. Send me
a list of books, old man, on nautical subjects and European history,
and some classics too. I will buy them in France. If you aren’t sick
at my having abandoned you for so long, ship me a parcel of books
you’ve done with and don’t need any more. Here’s wishing you a happy
New Year.