II

The boat I would use as an illustration was in 1915 very new indeed.

She was just a standard E boat, with war-taught improvements and

additions, and with a war-taught complement of officers and a

half-taught complement of men. For a month the men had been given a

queer but useful course of instruction by being taken by their First

Lieutenant at "Diving Stations," in a disused shed in the building

firm's premises. On the walls and floor names and rough sketches of

most of the important valves and wheels of the boat herself had been

chalked, and though the men laughed and swore at the make-believe, they

had learnt a good deal of their drill and the probable sequence of

diving orders, without the work of the builders of the E boat being

interfered with. Except in the dinner hour, or during the infrequent

holidays, no drill could be carried out aboard owing to the crowds of

men working there. Overtime had been continuously worked, and nothing

could be allowed to interfere with the firm's sacred "date"--the day on

which the Admiralty had been promised delivery.

The day dawned clear and fine, with no wind and every promise of calm

spring weather. At six o'clock the submarine's whistle blew shrilly,

and a few tardy passengers approaching from the direction of the yard

gates broke into a run. As they climbed the iron rungs up to the low

grey-painted bridge, the gangway by which they had boarded was lifted

clear into the air and swung away to the basin-side by a hissing,

clattering, 10-ton crane, and at an order from the boat's Captain the

securing wires and hemp hawsers splashed into the oily still water. The

telegraph clanged decisively, and to an answering whirr and boil under

her stern the boat moved slowly ahead towards the open basin entrance.

She increased speed as she neared the narrow passage, and the whirling

eddies of a flooding tide outside came in view. As her stem came out

into the river she took a sharp sheer up-stream, then came quickly

round towards the open sea as the twenty degrees of helm that she was

carrying took effect on her. Little puffs of white and brown smoke

began to show round her stern as the engines were clutched in and

started, and in five minutes she was heading down-river at a fair

twelve knots, with the low sun glancing from her round hull and

lighting the queer mixture of Futurist painting that covered her.

She carried a matter of eleven people on her bridge--a bridge designed

to accommodate, perhaps, four or five. Her fighting complement was

thirty-one all told, but at this moment she held over fifty. Needless

to say, it was the passengers who seemed to take up most room. They

comprised overseers, foremen, chargemen, a manager or two, about a

dozen caulkers and engineers, and a pilot. In addition she carried an

overseer of overseers--a Commander from the submarine Commodore's

staff. He was present as schoolmaster, judge, and as friend to the

Captain of the boat, and his job was one the Captain of the boat was

not in the least envious of. The Captain knew that his crew were only

partially trained, that he himself was new to E boats, and that the

boat might not be all he hoped to find her in the way of reliability

and hull-strength, but he felt that at any rate he knew more or less

what the personnel, including himself, were like, while the Inspecting

Commander must be, or ought to be, the most nervous man in submarines,

with his job of travelling from trial to trial, unbroken by a chance of

a trip in a fully-tested boat with a fully-trained crew.

As they swung round the last river-buoy and saw the outer lightship

draw clear of the land, a destroyer overtook them, and passed on ahead

to lead them to sea. The boat was going thirty miles out to get deep

water for her hull-test, and it was not safe for a British boat to be

that distance, or even a third of that distance, from the mouth of a

British harbour unescorted, unless she was there on her war business.

This was not because of the enemy--far from it; it was to save her from

the enthusiastic but misguided attentions of the multitudes of

"Fritz-hunters" who drew no distinction between submarines of their own

or the enemy's flag. As she neared the light-vessel, the submarine

increased speed and some of the "yarning-party" on the bridge departed

below down the conning-tower. The programme included a full-speed

surface-trial which was to start from the lightship and finish at the

diving-ground, and for the next two hours the engineers and

engine-overseers were to be the only busy passengers. From the

engine-room bulkhead to the bows, the crew and officers moved to and

fro--testing, instructing, and, it should be added, grumbling

continuously, for the multitude of passengers were a considerable

handicap in the way of an efficient and (the great ideal) an unexciting

and placid diving-trial.

The inside of the boat was incredibly dirty from a naval point of view.

She had not been built at one of these yards where no workman can live

without a quid of tobacco in his cheek (in fact by the trials standard

of some yards she was clean), but it was obvious that she would take a

good month's scrubbing and polishing before she was, in her officers'

estimation, even sanitary.

At ten o'clock an order came from on deck, and a couple of sailors

ascended the conning-tower carrying a few rounds of 12-pounder

ammunition. The trials she was to do were to be complete and to

everybody's satisfaction, and the building firm, being a firm which

would sooner see their work over- than under-tested, had suggested a

few rounds from the bow-gun before the dive, with the idea that if the

gun-mounting was going to cause leaks through to the hull as a result

of recoil, it should be given the chance to do it now instead of later

when the boat was in enemy waters. A biscuit-tin was dropped, the boat

circled round, and at a range of a hundred yards the gunlayer proceeded

to miss the box completely. However, the shooting did not matter--the

gun had recoiled a few times and that was all that was required. The

fact of the gunlayer finding later that he had shipped the sights of

the H.A. gun on to his bow-gun before practice, was a merely trifling

incident among the errors that one might expect to occur on trials.

At eleven o'clock the destroyer, which had been jogging along a few

cables ahead, circled round and slowed up. The Submarine Captain rang

"Slow" on his telegraph, smiled encouragingly at the civilians who

still remained on the bridge, and made a pointing gesture with his

thumb at the open conning-tower lid. The civilians, with a nervous

straightening of bowler hats and several lingering looks at the sunlit

sea and sky, clambered slowly below, and the Captain remained watching

the whirling arms of the semaphore on the destroyer's bridge. He

dictated a reply to his signalman, then rang down "Stop," and, leaving

the lid open, descended to see what order his First Lieutenant was

producing out of the crowded chaos below.

From the foot of the conning-tower ladder he could see nothing but a

mass of humanity, mostly civilian, through which his uniformed crew

moved apologetically and bent double. He moved forward into the crowd

and assisted his officers in their efforts to station the passengers in

positions where they would be as much out of the way as possible, and

would at the same time be comfortable enough to lose their desire to

move about. At the end of five minutes comparative peace reigned, and

the crew were standing at their stations looking at their officers for

orders across a new deck of caps and tilted bowler hats.

The Captain took a sweeping glance fore and aft, then ascended the

conning-tower. He ordered the signalman below, looked across at the

destroyer through his glasses, and then descended, closing and locking

the lid above his head. As he re-entered the boat, he caught the eye of

the First Lieutenant. "Flood one, two, five, six, seven, and eight," he

ordered. "Slow ahead both--keep her level." The vent valves indicated

their opening with a snort and a roar of air, and the rush and gurgle

of flooding tanks cut off the chatter of the passengers, as the clang

of a closing breech-block brings silence to a gun's crew. A few seconds

later the Captain spoke again. "Flood three and four--take her down."

Each order was repeated by the First Lieutenant--an officer whose eyes

seemed to note the doings of every man in the boat at once. As the

Captain moved to the diving-gauge by the periscope to watch for the

first slow movement of the long black needle, the First Lieutenant's

hand shot out and gripped the neck of a seaman by the starboard pump,

and he spoke in a voice of concentrated, hissing rage. "_That's_ the

main line, you fool! Close it, quick, and don't you dare touch it till

I tell you!"

The gauge-needle quivered and began to rise. At eight feet the Captain

stepped back, and, taking the periscope training-handles, began to look

into the rubber-padded eye-piece, "Check at twenty feet," he said.

"Take the angle off now, coxswain." "Twenty feet, sir, horizontal." The

coxswain sat on a low heavy music-stool facing another white-faced

diving-gauge, his big brass hydroplane wheel moving a turn or two each

way under his hand. "Pump on Z internal--_don't_ start till I tell

you." The Captain was watching the hydroplane helm indicators beside

him, which showed, by the amount of "rise" helm they were carrying,

that the boat had a touch of negative buoyancy.

"All ready the pump, sir!"

"Start the pump--keep her _up_, coxswain."

"Coming up, sir--horizontal, sir."

"Stop the pump--close main line--close Z internal."

On an even keel the E boat ploughed along--her periscope top four feet

above the surface, and the periscope-wake bubbling and foaming on the

perfectly smooth sea. The watcher in the following destroyer saw the

wake die down till it was a barely visible ripple, as--her trim

correct--the Captain eased the boat's speed down to less than two

knots. Then the shining periscope began to disappear, slowly reducing

in height as the planes took the boat down for her deep hull test.

Inside her hull there was silence except for an occasional whisper from

one seated civilian to his neighbour. The gauge-needles crept slowly

round, and as the depth increased the little spot of daylight thrown by

the periscope eye-piece on to the pump-starter abreast of it changed

from yellow to green of ever-darkening shades till the last link with

the sun above them died away.

At ninety feet the Captain spoke again, and the hydroplane-wheels spun

as her downward way was checked. "Keep her at that," he said. "Mr

Ramage, will you send your men round now? We'll mark leaks before we go

further."

The foreman addressed rose from his seat and called to his half-dozen

caulkers sitting at hand. The boat dived easily on while the men passed

fore and aft painting red dabs on rivets and seams overhead where

trickles of water spoke of red-lead or packing which was not yet "set"

or in condition to face the pressures of active service. Their tour

over, the party settled back to their stations, and at a nod and

gesture from the Captain the hydroplane men tilted the bow slightly

down again for further descent. At a hundred and twenty feet the order

came for the motors to stop, and with failing headway the boat sank

gently down. One or two men (naval as well as civilian) reached out a

hand to grasp for support as they stood, for the moment before touching

bottom is always one of slight uncertainty; for, however reliable the

chart, it is yet possible to bounce roughly on these occasions on such

unexpected obstacles as isolated rocks or even wrecks. But there was no

need for bracing against the unexpected to-day. The boat touched and

slid on to a standstill so gently and imperceptibly that her Captain

watched the gauge for at least thirty seconds after she had landed,

with the suspicion that she might be only "statically trimmed" and that

she had a fathom or two farther yet to fall. Then he spoke--"Flood

A--hydroplanes amidships."

There came a bubbling roar from the vent of A, well forward, and then

the clang of a heavy "water-hammer" in the pipe as the tank filled. The

boat lay now as he intended her to do, bedded with negative buoyancy

and with her bows well down, so that her screws and rudder were clear

of the oozy mud in which she lay. "Carry on--all hands--and look for

leaks."

The caulkers did not linger over the task. They did not (and small

blame to them, for they were not case-hardened to the situation) relish

the idea of staying longer than was necessary at a hundred and

thirty-six feet by gauge and with a pressure of sixty pounds to the

square inch trying to force the round steel hull inwards on itself. In

a quarter of an hour they reported "All leaks located and marked."

But their ordeal was not yet over. The gloomy-eyed First Lieutenant (a

pessimist, as all First Lieutenants should be) had found a new leak

right aft, and the Captain was called into consultation over it. For

ten minutes more the two officers conversed and searched, then came

leisurely forward again. "That's all right, I think," said the Captain

cheerfully. "Anybody want to look round any more? I can stay down here

while they do--there's no hurry, you know."

There was an enthusiastic chorus from a group of overseers and

officials--"Not at all, not at _all_, we're _quite_ satisfied--quite...."

The Commander, who throughout the dive had sat unmoving by the

periscope, notebook in hand and his eyes half closed, allowed

himself a faint smile and a lazy yawn.

"Blow on A--fifty pounds--Blow one and two externals."

The air hissed and whined along the pipes, and the eardrums of those

aboard tingled to the rising pressure from overloaded relief valves.

For five minutes the hissing and roaring continued, then at a shouted

order the noise stopped. The First Lieutenant looked back from the

motionless gauge to the Captain. "Shall we put more on A, sir? Fifty

pounds won't have moved any out at this depth...."

"No--don't put any more on, I've got One and Two pretty near out and

the fifty will blow A as she rises. Then I'm going to fill One and Two

again and catch the trim before we break surface. She's stuck in the

mud, that's all, and we'll have to pull her out. Stand by the motors,

aft there!"

The passengers were fidgeting slightly, and the Commander, noting

the fidgeting, looked up and spoke, laughing, to the youthful

Captain--_apropos_ of absolutely nothing at all. The Captain laughed

back (for publication and as a guarantee of good faith) and turned to

the motor-room voice-pipe: "Slow ahead Port--half ahead Starboard"--a

pause filled by a dry humming from right aft where the big motors

purred. "Stop both--slow ahead Starboard--half astern Port"--another

droning pause, and then--"Stop Starboard--half astern Starboard." The

boat quivered, then with a lurch she pulled free and her bows rose

sharply. "Stop both--half ahead both--flood One and Two--flood

A--_Dammit_--hard-a-dive, coxswain."

The angle increased fast, faster than the forward tanks could fill, and

the boat rushed upwards with chests, men, and other loose impediments

sliding and slipping aft. At eighty feet she began to level slightly,

but the angle could not be taken off her in time,--the destroyer men

had a vision of a grey conning-tower foaming ahead for a few seconds,

surmounted by fifteen feet of silver periscope, before, to the drive of

her powerful screws, the boat dipped again till only the tops of the

hooded lenses showed as she settled at her diving depth.

"_Rotten_," observed the Captain gloomily to the First Lieutenant.

"I mustn't break surface like that when we get to the Bight, or we all

go West one-time,--I think that'll do for the dive, though. She'll be

tight as a drum when the firm's had another day or two at her. We'll do

the helm and speed trials now and then go in. Hands by the blows!

_Surface!_"