A NAVAL VENTURE (continued 4)

This used to happen day and night, for during those first ten days there was no relaxation of effort whatever, all the twenty-four hours round the clock.

Very often the Orphan had to take his boat alongside hospital ships, and several times it happened that men climbed down their tall, white sides and asked for a passage ashore. One of these, on one occasion, was a stretcher-bearer of the Worcesters, an old soldier evidently. The air, just about this time, was full of rumours of Turkish atrocities, and these caused much anger until they were contradicted—as they generally were—although the contradictions never went the rounds as did the original rumours. The Orphan had just heard one particular story, vouched for, of four English—evidently prisoners—having been found burnt to death in Sedd-el-Bahr castle. So, thinking this man might know something about it, he asked him.

"Know about them? I should think I did; all nonsense, that story. They were burnt right enough—I saw them myself—but so was the wooden storehouse the Turks had put them in. Everything was burnt, and there was the base of a 6-inch lyddite shell lying close by them; one of our ships' shells which had set the place on fire during the bombardment."

He told him of his own experiences. "Why, sir," he said, "twice the Worcesters have had to fall back a bit at night, and leave wounded behind; and at daybreak we got back the ground again and found them all right, though we never expected they would be alive. 'We thought to find you scuppered,' we told them—at first, that was; not afterwards. I remember one—the Sergeant-Major of my company. We found him in the morning, and we asked him how he'd managed to keep clear of the Turks. 'Keep clear of 'em,' he says; 'keep clear of 'em! why, they crept up after you'd fallen back, found me in the dark, and gave me water; pulled me along behind some cover—your firing being so hot—and covered me with a blanket.'"

"Then haven't you seen anything wrong?" the Orphan asked.

"Well, I wouldn't exactly say that; there's a young chap in there"—and he pointed to the hospital ship—"what has some thirty-five bayonet wounds—just pricks—in him. They caught him in a trench and did handle him pretty rough, till he pretended to be dead; then they left him. He'll be up and about in ten days' time. Then I saw two of those Senegalese chaps see 'blue murder' one day; but what can you expect?"

"Are our fellows playing the game?" the Orphan asked.

"You don't know Bert Smith, he's in my section. Well, he and I was carrying a wounded Turk in our stretcher, he taking the head, and me going along in front with his feet, and I notices that he starts a-jerking his end up and down pretty violent, so I says to him: 'Here, Bert, what are you a-doing of? you'll hurt the poor blighter!' and he up and says: 'Poor blighter be darned; he's only a blooming Turk!'"

"What did you do?" asked the Orphan, smiling at the man's so very transparent earnestness.

"I just told him that, Turk or no Turk, he was a-fighting for his home and country, and it wasn't for us to say he was doing wrong—us who was trying to drive him out of it—and to go a-hurting of him."

"He carried him proper like after that, but of course, sir, you don't know Bert Smith; he's a fair 'card'."

The Orphan, noticing that he had a blood-stained bandage round his neck, asked him what he had been doing aboard the hospital ship.

"They sent me off," the man said indignantly. "Just had a bit of a clip—went in in front—came out at the back—under the skin—nothing. I stayed aboard there a little, and then, when the doctors were too busy to notice, I skipped into the first boat that would take me ashore, and am off back again. I can do all the doctoring I wants, and they're getting pretty short of chaps like me up there," and he jerked his thumb Krithia way.

During these days the Orphan allowed a good many men to scramble down from the hospital ships into his picket-boat—men slightly wounded, and who wanted to go back to their regiments. Many of these were Australians and New Zealanders, a brigade of whom had been brought round from Anzac, and had suffered extremely heavy losses in a most gallant but unsuccessful endeavour to capture Krithia.

He often had to take his picket-boat into "W" beach when shells were dropping on it or into the water close by; and these were times when he had to pull himself together, so that Jarvis and the crew should not know that he hated it; especially did he dislike the buzzing noise which just gave him sufficient warning to make him wonder where that shell was going to hit. He also had an extremely narrow escape one day when he was taking a General and his Staff officers to "V" beach. As he approached the River Clyde he saw that some big shells were dropping close to her, and just before he reached her, swish—sh—sh came along the noise of one and it flopped into the sea just ahead, fortunately without bursting. It heaved the bows of his boat right clear of the water, and the splash that fell over them fell on the deck, the General, and on his Staff officers. The Orphan's breath came very fast then; but he could not help laughing as he saw Plunky Bill, who'd been standing in the bows with his boat-hook all ready for going alongside the River Clyde, turn a complete somersault and disappear, head first, down the little hatch there. It was such a relief to have something to laugh at.

One day he was sent to the French flagship—she was probably the Suffren—with a note to the French Admiral, and had to wait on her quarter-deck for an answer. The Admiral brought it up himself; a dapper little man he was—all springs—and when he saw the Orphan standing stiffly to attention, he darted across, laid both his thin, aristocratic hands on his shoulders, gave him a friendly, encouraging shake, and talked French to him, the only words the Orphan was able to understand and remember being: "Ah, mon petit brave! mon pauvre petit garçon!"

On the way back with the answer he told Jarvis about this. "He called me lots of things, and he called me 'his poor little boy'—rather cheek, wasn't it?" In fact, the Orphan rather thought that his dignity had been hurt.

"A funny old bird, that 'ere Gay Pratty, sir," Jarvis said. "D'you know Porter—'Frenchy' Porter, they calls him now—that 'ere leading signalman what comed from the Swiftsure? 'E was lent to that 'ere French ship for the 18th March—when the Bouvet and Ocean and Irresistible were 'outed'. 'E tells me that that 'ere little ladylike gen'l'man was on the bridge all the time, a 'opping about like a bloomin' sparrow, and wouldn't go down in the conning-tower nohow. They had shells all over 'em and all round 'em, and Frenchy Porter couldn't 'elp ducking 'is 'ead. Just as a big one come sloshing along—right over the bridge, it seemed—an' Frenchy 'ad ducked—that 'ere little box-of-tricks comes up to 'im, a-smiling and as jaunty as you please, and says to 'im, a-jerkin' 'is arms and 'is 'ands: 'When the noise come, you duck your 'ead—but then she 'as gone—you are too late'—it ain't no bloomin' use, or words to that heffect. A great, little gen'l'man, that be, sir."

After hearing this story, the Orphan was jolly glad the Admiral had spoken to him.

During the days whilst the piers were being built, the weather was magnificent and the sea quite calm. It never blew at all until the 3rd May, when a breeze got up from the north-east and swept clouds of sand off the ridge above "W" beach—a regular sandstorm, which hid it from the view of the ships for several hours. This fact is very good proof of the enormous amount of trampling which had converted the green ridge and gully into a waste of dry sand in only nine days. The wind increased all the night of the 3rd May, and blew quite hard on the 4th; and though "W" beach gave a "lee", a very unpleasant swell swept round the end of the Peninsula, and made the going alongside the pontoon and trestle pier very tricky work. Lighters empty and lighters loaded broke adrift, and the Orphan had the job of rescuing several; and in doing so knocked his picket-boat about a good deal, and stove a hole in her side, abreast the engine-room, which made it absolutely necessary for her to be hoisted in and patched. The Commander cursed him for his carelessness, and made the poor Orphan miserable until Captain Macfarlane happened to see him. "A day off to-day, Mr. Orpen?" he asked, with a twinkle in his eye, for he knew what had happened.

"I knocked a hole in the picket-boat, sir," the Orphan answered gloomily.

"Only one?" the Captain said, tugging at his yellow, pointed beard. "Only one? Why, when I was a midshipman—— Oh! Here comes the Admiral! I have not time to tell you what I could do in those days in the way of breaking up boats. Come to my cabin and have tea with me in half an hour." The Orphan felt a different "man" after that.

He took the opportunity of his boat being inboard to give her a coat of paint, which hardly had time to dry before she was hoisted out and back again in the water.

Now all this time the Orphan had scarcely set foot on shore, because whenever he took his picket-boat alongside one or other of the piers at "W" beach, there was so much risk of her being damaged that he dare not leave her. He was as wild and harum-scarum a young officer as could be met with, when not in his beloved picket-boat; but once he took charge of her he never forgot that he was in charge of her, and responsible for her safety; and this not because he feared the Commander's sharp tongue or the displeasure of Captain Macfarlane, but from a very firm sense of duty, which he would probably have most indignantly denied if told that that was the reason.

"Hang it all!" he often said, when Bubbles tempted him "to just leave your old boat and come along and see our dug-out"; "but, old Bubbles, I can't, that's all, I'd love to, but I can't."

However, virtue was rewarded, for when the Achates became "bombarding" ship, he and his picket-boat were placed under the orders of the Beach-master at "W" beach. Nothing could have given him greater pleasure. Whenever she was not actually required for duty, and could safely anchor off the beach, he lived ashore with Bubbles and the Lamp-post, and shared their tent, or their "dug-out" if they were being shelled. He had a splendid time: the best time of the three of them, for he was away in his boat most of the day, so escaped nearly all the heavy shells and the abominable pestilential flies; had every other night "in"—often two or three "running"—and could wrap himself up in his blanket and sleep splendidly, outside the tent and under the open sky, with his picket-boat safely anchored a hundred yards off the beach, with Jarvis in charge of her.

Probably of all the Honourable Mess, the Orphan enjoyed himself the most thoroughly.

CHAPTER XIII

The Army comes to a Standstill

On the day after the landing—the Monday—the French troops who had been disembarked on the Asiatic shore and had captured 500 prisoners were re-embarked, and the whole of the French Expeditionary Force commenced to land on "V" beach, where the poor old River Clyde lay, aground, under the castle.

On Tuesday the whole Allied forces advanced for two miles along the plain towards the white village of Krithia and the high ridge of Achi Baba, which barred their way. They met with very little resistance.

On the Wednesday a further advance was made; but at the end of the day the Turks counter-attacked so fiercely that it became necessary for our troops to dig themselves in, when they were yet a mile from the village. The Allied army was now "up against" the position which the Turks had so carefully prepared with all the ingenuity and skill their German instructors had taught them, and, for all practical purposes, no real further impression was made on this position during the remainder of "The Great Adventure".

It was on the Tuesday afternoon that Bubbles and the Lamp-post first came under shrapnel-fire. They had obtained leave, for half an hour, to climb up the ridge above "W" beach, and watch the progress of the advance in the plain below them; and whilst there, the Turks began bursting shrapnel above and all around it. This they took all as part of the game, and were rather pleased than otherwise when one shell, bursting not very far above and in front of them, scattered bullets in the ground close by.

Bubbles burst out with a loud guffaw of enjoyment, and would have remained standing where he was—on the sky-line; but the Lamp-post, who had a very old head on his young shoulders, made him take cover in the Turkish trench there—a trench which our Sappers had already begun to deepen.

"It's no use for us to be knocked out," he said; "and it's a rotten kind of bravery not to take cover when you aren't doing anyone any good by making a target of yourself."

It was on that afternoon that Captain Macfarlane, coming ashore to stretch his long legs and to see how things were going with the beach party, happened to find Bubbles and the Lamp-post. The Beach-master's servant had just made them a cup of tea, so they, rather nervously, asked him if he would have one. Of course he would; so they sent the little man away to borrow the Pink Rat's enamelled mug. The Captain had just walked back from the lighthouse, and along the trench up which the midshipmen had carried those boxes of ammunition on the Sunday night. He had heard of this, and was speaking about it when the servant came back. Frightened out of his life he was, the miserable-looking little man, to wait upon so important an officer as Captain Macfarlane. The sight of a strange naval Captain simply terrified him, and made him quite incoherent.

"He helped us," they said. "He took up two by himself, and then helped with another. He was jolly plucky, sir!"

"You must have found them very heavy, didn't you?" the Captain said kindly. "It was a very plucky thing to do, under those conditions. What is your name? I must remember it."

But the little man looked more frightened than ever, dropped the cup he was carrying, opened his mouth, couldn't speak a word, and simply fled.

Captain Macfarlane smiled and pulled his beard. "A strange thing is courage," he said. "It comes at times to the most unlikely people. You can't legislate for it. Now, that little chap probably deserves the D.C.M.[#], if anybody does; and if he had it he would very likely suffer agonies all his life, dreading lest he should have to 'live up to it'."

[#] D.C.M. = Distinguished Conduct Medal.

Before he went away, the Captain advised them to dig "dug-outs" for themselves.

"But the shrapnel hardly comes as far as the ridge," they said; "and they tried to reach the beach this morning from the Asiatic side and couldn't. We saw the shells falling three or four hundred yards short—four of them. Nothing but a few bullets come near here."

"Young gentlemen,"—he smiled, with that kindly, humorous expression of his—"the Turks will bring up more guns in a few days, mark my word, and probably advance those they have. When they do, it won't be only shrapnel and small stuff, so you had better be ready."

But they thought this rather useless waste of time; they didn't mind what came—or thought they didn't—and besides, the soldiers would capture Achi Baba in a few days, and then no Turkish guns could reach them.

"We shall capture that hill in a day or two, shan't we, sir?" they asked; but he only smiled his inscrutable smile, and added: "Young gentlemen, take my advice."

He took them round to select a spot, but nowhere within the limits which the Navy had pegged out as its camp was the ground anywhere steep enough to dig a cave, which, as he told them, "was of course the best of all." He tugged at his beard and smiled again as he looked at a very suitable place just to the left and below the Naval Camp boundary. "Well, you will have to do your best—where you are: the Navy cannot poach, can it?—not on these occasions."

So that very night, whenever they had any time to spare, they began to dig a hole for themselves in the gentle slope on the left of the gully, just behind where the naval mess-tent was eventually put up. Spades were plentiful, and they thought it great fun, although they were rather shy of being the first to do this. However, everyone followed their example—in fact the Beach-master ordered some form of protection to be dug for everyone.

They scooped a place away about four feet wide, and by digging downwards, and nibbling, and broadening it, they soon had a "funk-hole" where all three of them could squeeze uncomfortably. They did try, by undermining the slope, to get some protection overhead; but the slope was too gentle for this to be a success, and the top kept falling in, especially if someone happened to walk near it. No timber was as yet available, so their "dug-out" had really no cover at all, but was simply a deep furrow, deeper at one end than the other.

Though they did this at first for fun, and because Captain Macfarlane had advised them to do it, they were very glad they had taken his advice when, a few days later, the Turks did advance their field-guns and peppered the ridge, the gully leading to it, and "W" beach itself very liberally, not only with shrapnel, but also with common shell. Few of these common shell burst, and when they did, seldom hurt anyone; but no one, however brave or however small, can stand in a place which is being shelled, without feeling that he is the biggest thing there—for miles round—or the most conspicuous person, however many others are round him. The casualties from this first day of thoughtful and thorough shelling were very slight, considering the crowded state of the area, and the men's principal anxiety was to obtain fragments of shells or intact unexploded ones, digging those out before they had time to get cool. However, the competition in making "dug-outs" certainly became much more keen afterwards.

Neither the periods of being shelled nor the making of "dug-outs" was allowed to interfere with the work of the beach parties.

Those men who happened to be off duty crawled into their "funk-holes", but the others went on working; and of course, as most of them were employed below the cliffs, they really were not—as were the soldiers' working-parties stacking stores on the slopes—exposed the whole of the time.

In those first four days an enormous amount of work was done; mountains of stores were piled on either side of the gully, mules and horses in hundreds were landed, guns and their limbers—18-pounders, long 60-pounders, heavy guns and squat 6-inch howitzers—water carts, transport carts, and ambulance wagons. Hundreds of light two-wheeled carts were brought ashore, in readiness to follow the Army when the advance, which was fated never to take place, commenced; and by the end of the first week the slope between the ridge and the cliff, from the end of the Peninsula to Cape Helles lighthouse, was one orderly mass of mule and horse lines, transport "parks" and stores, and the ground which had been so covered with grass and scrubby bushes had been worn bare, as barren as the beach and the cliffs themselves.

Until the fifth day the beach parties had lived in the open, but on that day several marquees and tents were brought ashore and pitched for them. Quite a cosy little collection of white tents they made, at the bottom of the left-hand slope of the gully.

On the Thursday and Friday very little happened. The Army was digging itself in a mile and a half from Krithia, and about three miles from the ridge over "W" beach; practically all guns had been landed; the whole of the Royal Naval Division and other reinforcements had disembarked; and several thousand wounded had been safely sent on board the hospital ships, and transports used as hospital carriers.

On the Saturday night the Turks, at about ten o'clock, commenced a desperate effort, first to pierce our lines (which they did, momentarily, but only momentarily), and afterwards to drive the French into the sea.

The Lamp-post had a night "in" that night; and when the noise of firing woke him, was comfortably snuggled in a corner of the mess marquee, rolled in his blanket. The crackling of rifle-firing broke out on the left at first, and grew so fierce and incessant that he realized this was something quite different to anything he had heard before.

That counter-attack on the first Sunday, when he and Bubbles had helped to take up ammunition, was as nothing compared to it, and had not made him feel nervous—or perhaps anxious is a better word—as this did. He then had had something to do; but now, after a very hard day's work, and two spells of being shelled, he had nothing to do but lie there and listen to the really appalling din of musketry, field-guns, and the roar of the two 60-pounders on the end of the Peninsula, above him, which, every time they fired, lighted up the inside of the marquee and shook the ground beneath him.

As he lay, undecided as to whether or no he should get up and see what was happening, the intensity of the firing grew, until it reached such a pitch of frenzy that he felt certain that this must be the prelude to hand-to-hand fighting. He could not help but feel nervous. He was not blessed with a dull imagination, and he could not prevent himself picturing what was happening beyond the ridge, and what would happen if the Turks drove in our thin lines and forced them back to the sea below. He worked himself into such a state of nerves that at last, when the French "75's" broke into rapid firing—one continuous screech—he could stand it no longer, pulled on his boots, and went outside the marquee. Out over the Straits the sea was all a glitter of transports' lights as usual, and the row of "flares" along the beach lighted up the beach parties unloading boats, and the working parties wearily carrying stores towards the two flares which marked the depots on the slopes of the gully—all went on just as usual. But horse teams with their limbers were coming down from the ridge, past him, towards the ammunition depots, at the bottom of the gully—coming down at an unaccustomed speed; and he heard their drivers shouting impatiently for their limbers to be filled.

He ran to one of these, who had swung round his limber and was now trying to calm the big horse he was sitting—the "near leader" of the team.

"What's going on?" the Lamp-post asked.

"They've broken through the 86th," the man told him; "came on without firing a shot—the beggars!" But the midshipman could get nothing more out of him.

"I don't know nothing more. Curse this darned horse! Keep still, can't you? My job's to get more of the stuff up to the guns. I don't know nothink. Chuck it, yer blighted fools! Ain't yer been long enough together? Cawn't yer smell who you've got next yer?"

The two horses were nosing each other, one trying to bite, and both fretting.

"They ain't worked together afore," he said, as the Lamp-post, who loved horses, separated their heads and rubbed their noses soothingly. "I 'ad to get a fresh 'off leader' this morning; the other was killed just t'other side of that 'ere ridge—shrapnel summat cruel there, all day—cawn't move a team but bang bursts a shrapnel—and they've been bursting shrapnel now, all along the road we've just come and have to go back by—curse them! This darned fool brute—chuck it, you blighter!"—as the horse he was sitting slyly bit the neck of the new "off leader", who sidled and trembled—"'e cawn't abide a stranger. 'Ere, stop that kicking! 'Old yer 'eads up, cawn't yer?"

He jerked the two horses apart as the two "wheelers" behind them began to plunge, and their driver to curse as he steadied them.

"'Struth! Ain't they fair cautions? Almost 'uman," growled the Lamp-post's friend.

Someone in the rear of the limber banged down the limber covers and shouted: "Right away, Bob!"

"Stand clear! Get up, you brutes!" and the drivers cracked their whips; but the wheels of the limber had stuck in the sand, and the four horses, excited and plunging, and not pulling together, could not move them.

"Clap on, you chaps! Give us a start!" shouted the drivers; and the Lamp-post and some more men hauled on the spokes of the wheels; the whips cracked, and this time the horses moved the limber, and away it went, jolting up the gully, on its way back with more shells for its battery, somewhere in the valley.

The Lamp-post followed it up the ridge, and there, for two hours and more, he watched the battle in the dark, hundreds of men standing near him. Compared to that Sunday night fight, the noise was as the inside of a boiler-shop, with work in full swing, to the noise of a country blacksmith's forge; and the sight of it like a Crystal Palace firework night, to the five or six shillings' worth of squibs and rockets he and his brothers used to have at home on the 5th November.

He had read of the famous French "75's", but he had thought the descriptions probably more picturesque than real. Now, as he listened to their extraordinarily determined voices, they seemed so self-confident, so absolutely sure of themselves, that he no longer wondered why the French almost worshipped them; and when they started rapid fire, as they did occasionally, a whole battery, sometimes two together, he realized that this was the glorious rafale he had heard so much about.

More empty limbers came toiling up from the valley, unable to go fast because of the darkness, and only dashing across the area over which shrapnel were bursting. The drivers of these passed the word, as they went down the gully, that the Turks had been driven back again, and the line made good. That was reassuring.

He heard Bubbles laughing and guffawing somewhere near, and found him. "The Commander let me come along for half an hour. Isn't it a grand show?"

Whilst they stood there, many tilted wagons passed down into the valley, their wheels creaking and the mule chains jangling; and as those 60-pounders fired, their glare lighted up the white patches and the red crosses painted on them.

A regiment (it had only come back from the trenches the previous afternoon) came up the gully, the men dragging their shuffling feet through the sand, and voices calling wearily: "Step out, men! Don't go to sleep, lads! Close up, lads! Pull yourselves together!" The head of it bent over the ridge and trailed down into the valley, till, like a long snake, it disappeared in the darkness.

When the half-hour which Bubbles had been allowed was "up", the Lamp-post went back with him. The Turks had evidently broken themselves, and their attack was weakening; also, he was dead tired. He threw himself down in the marquee and slept till daybreak, not even wakened by a still more furious attack delivered, later on, against the French flank—an attack which was only repulsed after very heavy losses.

The ambulance wagons came back in the morning crammed; wounded who could walk, stumbled down to the beach, lay down, and slept; also, a large batch of Turkish prisoners came along with a grinning escort. That day there was another general advance, with heavy casualties but little progress; and on the following night the Turks attacked again, more impetuously than the night before. This time they threw their whole weight against the French flank and against the section held by the Senegalese troops, who had been very severely punished already. These troops are not suited for defensive night-work, and again they gave way. The Lamp-post—on duty this time—down on the beach, could be almost certain that they had given way, by the continuous roar of the rafales, and again he could not help being anxious until news came that all was well.

These two nights completely cured him of the nervousness which is only natural for anyone who has had no previous experience; and though there were countless attacks and counter-attacks in the nights to come, they never worried him, nor, if he were asleep, was he often wakened when those 60-pounders "chipped in" and shook the ground under him.

In the early mornings, after these nights, the tired, haggard, earth-stained "working-parties" came back from the trenches, where they had been fighting all night, bringing tales of creeping bombing-parties, of furious rushes right up to their parapets, and of encounters between their night patrols, helping back the wounded, and perhaps escorting a few Turkish prisoners. These tales made each night's fighting a little epic of its own.

To Bubbles, the Lamp-post never confided his ideas or emotions, because that fat, joyous midshipman looked upon the whole thing as one vast "spree", with a spice of danger that only added to its attractions. Each wounded man who was sent off to the ships, he envied his honourable wound, and the fact that many of them were maimed for life never entered his mind, nor the tragedy of the women and children dependent on them.

The day after that second big counter-attack, during a bout of shelling from some field-guns concealed below Achi Baba, a shell came into a "dug-out" where a petty officer and two men of the beach party were sitting, and killed all three. After this, more spare time than ever was spent on deepening these "dug-outs". Then followed two more days of desperate fighting for the capture of Krithia village, and ghastly, never-ending streams of wounded came down the gully to the casualty clearing-station, whose white tents had been pitched above the cliffs, to the right of it. Our losses were terrific, and our gains practically nil. As a set-off to the splendid failure of the centre, the Gurkhas captured a commanding cliff on the left flank—Gurkha Bluff—and under protection of fire from the Talbot and Dublin, dug themselves in so securely that these gallant little men never let go their hold on it.

The continual strain of those first two weeks was already beginning to tell on the three snotties—hardly noticeable, perhaps, in the case of Bubbles, though he was undoubtedly thinner; but the Pink Rat was one mass of nerves—he jumped if anyone spoke to him suddenly—and he lost his appetite. The Lamp-post became more silent and thoughtful than before, and his nerves, too, were very "rocky", but he had such strong control over himself that no one could have thought that this was so.

Their clothes were stained with good honest dirt, and torn and ragged from honest hard work. They became such unpresentable scarecrows that at last the Beach-master suggested that an improvement was desirable. So they went across to the Ordnance Stores and hunted out the stock sizes of the soldiers suits in store, which would fit them best. They also obtained puttees, and after those first ten days or two weeks the only thing "naval" about them was their caps.

On the 12th May—a most perfect day it was—the three snotties were sitting outside their tent after lunch, smoking cigarettes, and watching an aeroplane, circling gracefully above them, looking for a good landing-place on the cliffs, close to the lighthouse Suddenly a great, tearing, rending noise seemed to fill all space. Everyone dropped, automatically, what was in his hand and bent his head; then, looking up, saw a cloud, black and oily—a hellish-looking balloon of smoke—suspended in the air above the ridge.

This was the first high-explosive shell which burst near "W" beach. "Gallipoli Bill"—a stumpy 6-inch howitzer—fired it, and fired many more that afternoon and again an hour before sunset, some of his shells bursting on impact, others in the air—all with that rending, awe-inspiring crash.

There was by this time, on top of the ridge, a broad sandy track, which must have been most conspicuous from Achi Baba. On each side of it, six or eight hundred horses and as many mules had been picketted, and those poor creatures suffered most. The snotties had fled to their dug-out; the Pink Rat lying flat on his face with his hands over his ears, whilst the other two peered over the edge, watching where the shells dropped. They did not—not even Bubbles—want to see them, but the terrible roar fascinated them, and they were obliged to do so. They would hear the noise of another approaching, and, three or four seconds later, up would go a cloud of black smoke and that thunderclap of an explosion—not one farther away than three hundred yards. "Right among the horses!" the Lamp-post would say, with a catch in his breath; and when the smoke drifted clear, there would they see six, a dozen—often more—of these gallant animals lying dead, or feebly trying to regain their feet horribly mutilated.

Other shells burst in open spaces, doing no harm; others among the mules and transport-wagon "parks". After every explosion, men would leave their "dug-outs" and rush to the place, a couple of stretcher-men would perhaps dash down from the casualty clearing-station; and then the noise of another approaching shell would send them scurrying back—scurrying fast, all of them, except the stretcher-men, who if they had found an injured man had to bear him slowly and steadily.

One shell, on that first day, fell right among a warren of crowded "dug-outs", and the Lamp-post turned away his head with a shudder, so as not to see what would come to view when the smoke cleared away. When he did turn round—it was so horribly fascinating—he saw men scrambling from those "dug-outs", jostling each other in the crater just made among them, shouting and laughing, and squabbling and searching for "souvenirs".

Farce and tragedy are, thank God! perpetually associated; if they were not, and only tragedy stared one continually in the face, human brains could not endure the strain of modern warfare as they do.

Writing of "dug-outs", it did not really make much difference where one took shelter, for those "funk-holes" gave no protection from a direct hit, only from sideways-flying splinters and fragments; a hare crouching on its "form" is no more protected from being trodden under foot than a man in one of these from the actual shell itself.

All through these periods when high-explosive shells burst on the ridge and the slopes down to the gully, the empty limbers, water-carts, and transport wagons would jolt down to the depots, fill up, and go back again, up the slopes through the area where those shells were falling, up that broad road between those huddled masses of quivering mules and horses, just as though nothing unusual was happening.

"Gallipoli Bill" at first fired for half an hour in the middle of the day, and again for another half an hour before the close of it; but presently, when he had received a more plentiful supply of ammunition, often gave an additional "hate" in the forenoon.

The one thing in his favour, as compared to the field-guns, was that after he had fired his ten or twelve rounds, you knew he would not fire again for several hours. With the field-guns it was different—their little shells fell at all hours and all through the day.

To add to the attractiveness of "W" beach—or "Lancashire Landing", as it was afterwards called—as a health resort, hostile aeroplanes often dropped bombs there. Nobody attempted to take cover when these aeroplanes flew past, for the simple reason that no "cover" existed, except actually underneath the very foot of the cliffs. They had to carry on their work, wait until they heard the rushing noise of the bomb, and when the explosion followed, wait for the second one which almost invariably followed it. Afterwards they knew that this "show" was concluded, and that "Cuthbert", as they called the aeroplane, would not drop any more on that trip. "Cuthbert's" average "bag" in three days would seldom exceed two men wounded and one killed, and perhaps three or four horses or mules killed, or so much injured that they had to be shot. Generally, at about seven o'clock in the morning the first aeroplane would come, on its way to wake the General Head-quarters Staff aboard the Arcadia, anchored close by; and then occasionally in the evening, when he was off to see if he really couldn't—this time—manage to flop a bomb on top of the captive balloon or its parent ship.

This last was one of the pleasures of the day, and the Lamp-post and Bubbles would often sit and watch "Cuthbert" flying towards the big yellow balloon—flying well above it to keep out of range.

The parent ship would haul the balloon down just as fast as she could—"to lessen the bump if it was hit", as Bubbles used to gurgle. Then the Lamp-post, through his glasses, would see first one, then another bomb drop from the aeroplane; would shout: "He's dropped one—two!" and in a few seconds, whilst they held their breath and watched, up would go the splashes these explosions made. Never did they hit either balloon or parent ship. It really became a perfect farce; though, as Uncle Podger told them, when one day, coming ashore to pay the beach party, a small shell had buried itself quite close to him and his money-bags, and a bomb had dropped and burst not fifty yards away: "It's all very pretty to watch, but I prefer watching it from the ship."

Directly it became evident that "Gallipoli Bill" had come to stay, all those horses and mules were brought down and placed in safety beneath the cliffs, and along ledges which the Turkish prisoners and a large number of imported Greek labourers cut for them in the face of the cliffs.

When they were all safely stowed away, the end of the Peninsula presented a most extraordinary sight, and if only the crippled Goeben could have come out and had half an hour's practice, she would have killed them all. Magazines also were dug beneath the cliffs, and the vast stores of small-arm ammunition, shells, charges, bombs, grenades, and explosives of all sorts were placed out of danger.

Water, or rather the scarcity of it, made life still more unpleasant; water for drinking was sufficient, but had to be used carefully; the amount allowed for washing was entirely inadequate. However, whenever the snotties had the chance, they would scramble along to the rocks right at the end of the Peninsula, under Cape Tekke, and have a bathe.

Many a grand hour they put in down there, and forgot, for a time, the discomforts and perils of the day which had passed, or of the days which were to come.

But now, worse than the bombs, the field-guns' shells, or those roaring, rending high-explosives, came the flies. A fortnight after the landing they had been a nuisance; at the end of the third week, bred in the horse and mule lines, they became an unbearable plague. The food on one's plate was covered with them, they crawled over it; they crawled over hands and faces; rest during the day was almost impossible. It was horrid to see a man asleep, with his lips, nostrils, and eyelids hidden in a dense mass of them, clinging there and sucking the moisture. At night, and only at night, was one free from these beastly things, and then they gathered in countless millions on the upper parts of the insides of the tents, waiting till the warmth of next day's sun woke them to start their intolerable persecution.

The mental torture caused by these was infinitely greater than the total effect of the shells and bombs; worst of all, they brought dysentery.

The Pink Rat was the first one to go down. He had worked hard and well, but the strain of the shells had, very evidently, upset his nerves; he had been moody and depressed for some days, and the flies finished him. He had to be sent on board to Dr. O'Neill, thinner, and more like a rat than ever. He was quickly followed by six or seven of the men; but Bubbles and the Lamp-post, though both were affected by a mild form of dysentery—as was practically everyone—and their hands were covered with small "chipped-out" bits which would not heal, "stuck it out" until they, and all who remained of the original beach party, were replaced by officers and men from the sunken Ocean and Irresistible.

The same day on which the Pink Rat left them, the Orphan joined the little naval camp at the foot of the gully, with its marquees and tents, and boundaries marked neatly with white-washed stones.

"My aunt! Isn't this splendid?" he said, as Plunky Bill gave him a hand up the beach with his uniform tin case.

His coming was a great event, just what the other two snotties required to cheer them up. There was so much to show him, and so much to do when all three happened to be off duty—the bathes among the rocks at the foot of Cape Tekke, the 60-pounders above it to show him, the trenches down in the plain, the trench up which they had carried ammunition, the big Turkish guns on Hill 138; and one afternoon they all three had time to walk across to "V" beach, and wander about the neat, orderly French camp, ingratiate themselves with the sentries to let them pass forbidden places, and to look over the old castle itself. The Orphan proudly took them to the "front door", as his friend the Royal Naval Division Sub-lieutenant had called the great arched entrance, and explained to them how he had fired at the Turks coming through it, with a maxim, and started a battle "on his own", pointing to the bows of the River Clyde to show where he and his maxim actually had been.

"You do come in for all the tit-bits; you are a lucky chap!" Bubbles gurgled excitedly.

The late afternoon was not the most pleasant time to choose for such an excursion, because "V" beach was seldom "healthy" at that time of day, and proved to be more than usually "unhealthy" on this particular occasion, for "Asiatic Annie" plumped fourteen or fifteen big 8-inch shells among the stores and the camps whilst they were there.

They all took shelter behind a small mountain of corned-meat packing-cases, in company with a couple of gaily dressed, shiny-black Senegalese, who were not in the least happy, and a young, equally gaudily dressed "Foreign Legion" soldier, who was quite happy—a slim, sunburnt, laughing man in a red fez with a long tassel, a grey-blue embroidered Zouave jacket, a blue sash, and baggy scarlet trousers. One shell came very near them, and burst with a terrific crash on the other side of the packing-cases, blowing in two or three, so that the meat-tins showed through the cracks, but only covering the three midshipmen with dust. This was the first high-explosive shell which had burst near the Orphan, and he did not like it a little bit. Bubbles and the Lamp-post, who had had more experience of them, liked it still less; but the Zouave only smiled: "Mon Dieu! le méchant! le miseréble!" and offered them little twisted cigarettes of black tobacco. They were not in the least miserable when a long pause ensued after one shell, and a bugle sounded to tell everyone that "Asiatic Annie" had "packed up", and they were able to leave the protection of their tinned-meat packing-cases.

On the afternoon when the first German submarine arrived, and sent the old Achates flying to Mudros in the scurry of transports and store-ships, they watched her go without any real regrets. The Orphan and Bubbles certainly preferred to stay where they were; and though, perhaps, the Lamp-post, at the bottom of his heart, longed to get away from the flies and shells, they could never get him to admit it.

Then, three days later, the Triumph was sunk—along the coast, off Anzac—and all the battleships left Cape Helles; all except the old Majestic, who came along and anchored so close to "W" beach that you could almost throw a stone on board her from the casualty clearing-station tents on top of the cliffs.

"They won't 'get' her there, not with all those trawlers and little steamers round her," Bubbles said. But on Friday morning, just as they were turning to work, and the Orphan was "standing by" in his picket-boat to "run an errand", they heard a rumbling explosion, looked round, saw a huge column of water spout up alongside her, close to her after bridge, and heard and felt another explosion.

"They've got her!" everyone sang out as she began to turn over very rapidly; and the Orphan, shouting to Plunky Bill to shove off, dashed towards her to pick up men already jumping from her sloping deck into the sea. She heeled over so extraordinarily rapidly that the Orphan never had a chance of going alongside, but stood off, and with other steamboats, with trawlers, drifters, a French torpedo-boat, and any number of other boats of all descriptions, made a ring round the doomed ship, to which her crew swam. The Orphan pushed his boat so close that he had to back out to prevent her fore mast-head and "wireless" gear fouling him as it heeled down to the water's edge. It was a horrid and sad sight; but the Orphan was too busily engaged pulling people out of the water to pay much attention to that; and when his picket-boat could hold no more, he turned them over to a small coasting steamer anchored near, and went back again. By this time she was bottom up.

The sinking of this ship had a most depressing effect on everyone; and even the casual Orphan and thoughtless Bubbles wondered what "Gallipoli Bill" would do, now that there was no ship left with guns big enough to annoy him. However, that elusive howitzer had evidently very little ammunition to spare—probably one of our "E" submarines in the Sea of Marmora had sunk a steamer with a supply she was expecting—so six shells, twice a day, were as much as he could allow himself.

You will notice that no mention is now made of the small shells. They still fell on "W" beach and in the sea, close to the piers, at all hours of the day; but unless they came in numbers, no one took any notice of them. Their fuses were so poor that they seldom burst, and when they did, they seldom did any harm.

The three midshipmen's time ashore was now drawing to a close, and four days after the Majestic had been sunk—how they did wish her ram wouldn't stick out of the water and remind them of her!—a signalman brought down a signal: "Officers and men of Achates beach party will embark in Trawler 370 at 11.30 to-day. Trawler will take Achates picket-boat in tow."

It was not until they had embarked, and the Orphan had made "fast" a hundred feet of rope from his picket-boat to the trawler's stern, that they learnt that the Achates had been sent to Mytilene, and that they were to join her there.

They waved good-bye to "W" beach just as "Gallipoli Bill" dropped a big shell half-way down the gully, and the Lamp-post and Bubbles realized the relief of not having to wonder where the next one would come.

"Well, we've had a jolly good time—take it all round—but for the flies," Bubbles said. "It will be a good thing to get back to the ship for a while."

"Won't we have a bath, and won't it be grand to get into uniform—clean uniform and under-things again!" said the Lamp-post; and Bubbles gurgled: "Won't I have a grand feed!" forgetting what the Orphan had told him of the state of the gun-room stores.

CHAPTER XIV

Submarines Appear

Down in the gun-room of the Achates, during this month after the landing, the air was full of rumours—buzzes of all sorts and little "titbits" of information, gleaned haphazard everywhere and anywhere. Every snotty—the Orphan, the Hun, Rawlins, or any of the "stranger" midshipmen—who took his boat alongside a transport or man-of-war, or to one of the piers at "W" or "V" beaches, came back stuffed with yarns which lost nothing by the telling: the Dublins had lost every officer; the Worcesters all but two; the Turks were torturing prisoners; there was a fearful shortage of doctors; the beaches were simply crowded with wounded, and there was nowhere to put them; Krithia had fallen—the yarn spread after every attack; the Prince George had a huge hole made in her by one of "Asiatic Annie's" 8-in shells; the poor old River Clyde would have to be abandoned—she was being hit so often; the Goeben and two Turkish battleships were just above The Narrows—the aeroplane had seen them—and they might come down at any moment; the Agamemnon had knocked out three "Asiatic Annies" in one afternoon; the Queen Elizabeth had fired three of her big 15-inch shells across the Peninsula—the first had sunk two big lighters filled with ammunition, the second had dropped short and only wiped out a regiment on the march, and the third had sunk a nine-thousand-ton steamer, anchored above Nagara, crowded with troops, none of whom was saved. The Pimple, who brought this last piece of news, knew it was true, because the Navigator had heard it from a man, who had heard it from the friend of a man, who had been told by the "observing" officer in the captive balloon which "spotted" for the Queen Elisabeth.

Then there was the constant rumour that "last night's counter-attack by the Turks was just their last final effort; they were going to make peace now it had failed". Poor old Turks! they had nothing to gain by being so obstinate, and they had no food and were short of ammunition—everything; they were simply longing to "throw up the sponge" if only the Germans would let them.

Russia intended landing five hundred thousand troops quite close to Constantinople; Italy was about to declare war and send fifty thousand to help in the Peninsula; the French had a hundred thousand already on the way; and Kitchener, good old Kitchener, had made up his mind to send out two hundred thousand. Shan't we walk through them?

Another snotty would burst in with the news that he had heard, on good authority, that directly all the mines had been swept up, the ships were to make another dash up The Narrows, this time towing pontoon "things" alongside them to stop torpedoes. Another heard that all destroyers had been ordered to rush through one night, steam up the Sea of Marmora, and bombard Constantinople.

There was no limit to the inventive genius of the "rumour spreaders", and the appetite for fresh, spicy news became so keen that anybody who brought back no titbit was thought a "hopeless rotter".

But one day, on the 12th May, Uncle Podger came into the gun-room with a long face: "Two German submarines have been reported passing Malta," he said. This yarn was too incredible to be believed by the young warriors coiled there, on the cushions, in their dirty Condy's-fluid-stained clothes; and they greeted it with such derisive yells, shouting, "Go away and make up something else, Fatty!" that Uncle Podger, who did not appreciate any such familiarity from strangers, did not bother to tell them that it happened to be the simple truth. This was the first day on which it became generally known that German submarines were approaching; and the certain fact caused much consternation to all, especially to those who had previously buoyed themselves with the hope that these craft could not make such a long voyage in time of war.

A very general feeling of uneasiness made itself felt.

That same day the first high-explosive to burst on "W" beach had brought everyone on deck, drawn there by the sound of its mighty thunder-clap; and sent them down again wondering whether it would be possible to hold "W" beach under such conditions much longer. The most optimistic looked grave, and even the cheery, irresponsible Navigator realized that this was not the occasion to invent yarns and send them rolling.

Discussion in the ward-room that night was carried on fitfully and in low tones, and whenever the door opened everyone would turn to see if the newcomer's face showed that he had heard anything "fresh". Among all brooded a very pervading feeling of depression. The tall, aristocratic, and also pessimistic Major of Marines explained in a low voice to the anxious little Padre, sucking nervously at his big pipe, the terrible anxieties of a General whose army has no secure base and whose lines of communication—in this special case, the sea—are threatened; the Navigator, on the other side, pointed out to the Fleet-Paymaster how impossible it would be for the battleships to stay where they were, when the submarines did put in an appearance. The cheery Fleet-Paymaster kept on saying: "But, my dear chap, we've got plenty of destroyers and trawlers; they ought to keep them away at night-time, and surely we can look after ourselves in the daylight."

The Fleet-Surgeon, more gloomy and querulous than ever, growled: "What the dickens d'you know about it? They'll come right enough. We're just like sheep waiting for the little dog that's coming across the field to worry them; they pretend they'll stick together and show a bold front, and know all the time they'll be off like redshanks directly he gets near. We're rats in a trap, that's what we are." He seemed to obtain great satisfaction from the last idea.

The Gunnery-Lieutenant, stamping nervously from one end of the ward-room to the other, joined in all the conversations, and kept on bursting out with: "We must have a 'go' at that high-explosive chap to-morrow, and try and knock him out before they come;" they being, of course, the submarines.

The War Baby—that youngest thing in subalterns of Royal Marines—sprawled over the ward-room table, with his chin on his fists, anxiously listening to everybody, hoping to glean something or other which would point a way out of the difficulties and comfort him. The Commander, coming down from making certain that the ship had been darkened properly, snapped out: "I can't get those transports to 'darken ship'. The Admiral has ordered everything, big or little, not to show a single light; and there they are, many of them, showing a blaze of lights as bright as the Strand by night." He rang the bell and sent the sentry to find Mr. Orpen. Presently that young officer appeared, and was ordered "to go round every ship in that darned anchorage and make 'em put out their lights—and don't let me catch any of your boat's crew smoking alongside the ship, as they were this morning, or I'll——" But the Orphan didn't wait for the penalty to be mentioned, answered "Very good, sir," exchanged undetected winks with the War Baby, and went out again.

Everybody turned in, that night, with their thoughts full of submarines.

An hour after midnight the poor old Goliath was struck by three torpedoes, and sank. She had anchored only that afternoon, up beyond Sedd-el-Bahr and opposite a promontory known as "De Tott's Battery" to protect the left flank of the French army and she lay farther up the Straits and nearer to Chanak Fort—the big fort at the entrance to The Narrows—than any other ship. Beyond this fort a Turkish destroyer was known to be lying, just above The Narrows; and to prevent her making a sortie, four of our destroyers patrolled the waters between Chanak Fort and De Tott's Battery, dodging a very brilliant search-light on Chanak Fort which lighted up this area night after night.

Now the previous evening, just before sunset, a heavy and most unusual bank of fog had rolled slowly out of The Narrows, and made the night so dark that the look-outs on board the patrolling destroyers and on board the Goliath could hardly see a cable's length in front of them. It was just the night that that Turkish destroyer would be waiting for; and when Chanak search-light was not switched on at all, and the Straits were shrouded in thick, ominous darkness, the Goliath's people had a suspicion that "something" would happen, and kept a more ready watchfulness.

Shortly after one o'clock the "look-outs" on her bridge, and round the guns on the fore shelter-deck, sighted a dark mass on her starboard bow, and made it out to be a destroyer, drifting, stern first, with the current, towards the ship, just as our own patrolling destroyers had been accustomed to do. They used to steam towards Chanak and its search-light, stop engines, and drift back with the current which always flowed down through The Narrows, drift down until they were abreast De Tott's Battery, and then steam back again.

At first she was thought to be a British destroyer, but something roused suspicions, the "challenge" was flashed across; she flashed back, but incorrectly; and, realizing that she was an enemy, orders were given to open fire on her. Two shots blazed out, but they were too late; she let fly three torpedoes, one after the other, all of which struck "home"; and in four minutes the Goliath had rolled over, taking down with her more than five hundred of her officers and men.

Those on deck in the Achates had heard the muffled explosions, and seen the search-lights from the other battleships above Sedd-el-Bahr searching the surface of the water there; but not for some time did anyone know what had really happened—not until a signal flashed across to say that the Goliath had been sunk, and to ask for steamboats to be sent to search for survivors.

The Orphan, who had only just returned from his long job of making all the obstinate transports and other ships "darken ship" properly, was immediately sent up to the scene of the catastrophe, and the Hun, with his steam pinnace, followed. They picked up and brought back one dead body and a mere handful of very much shaken men. As you know, everyone had turned in that night with "submarines on the brain"; so when Dr. Gordon went to the Fleet-Surgeon's cabin and woke him with "Get up, turn out, P.M.O., the Goliath has been sunk, and our boats have gone for survivors!" you can imagine that the Fleet-Surgeon naturally thought that a submarine had done this, so was none too happy. "It'll be our turn next; rats in a trap! My God! I wish I'd never come to sea," he kept groaning as he slipped into his clothes, found his swimming-belt,[#] and hurried on deck.

[#] By this time the swimming-collars had been replaced by belts with greatly increased buoyancy.

The news, when it came at last, that she had been sunk by a destroyer came almost as a relief, because, in spite of the official signal to the contrary, everyone hoped, down at the back of his brain, that perhaps a mistake had been made, and that those submarines reported from Malta would turn out to be a myth.

In fact, next morning at breakfast, the Torpedo-Lieutenant was quite bright and cheery. He was a destroyer expert, and always pooh-poohed submarines as much overrated craft, so now never tired of saying "Destroyers are some good after all, you see," and seemed to take as much pride in the success of the Turkish destroyer, as if it had been an English one which had sunk a Turkish battleship.

Without a doubt, everyone admired the pluck and cunning of this destroyer and its German crew (it was known afterwards that the crew was German), however much—or little—the loss of the Goliath affected him; and, truth to tell, it was not the loss of the ship nor of the men that affected most people, but the moral effect and the addition to the general feeling of depression and uneasiness—uneasiness which, it must be remembered, was not by any means chiefly caused by fear for the actual safety of the ships and themselves, but by the dread of what would happen to the Army when left unsupported in its very insecure position on the Peninsula, with the difficulties of supplying itself with stores and reinforcements so enormously increased. Those howitzers, too, might render the position untenable, especially as, given time, there was no reason why the Turks should not bring up more and still heavier guns.

Some of the surviving officers lived on board the Achates for a few days, and slept in hammocks on the half-deck, close to the China Doll. He will never forget those nights when he turned in—always nervous of submarines, and with his swimming-belt all ready round his chest, in case of need—and then had to listen to them relating their gruesome experiences before and after the old ship rolled over and they had jumped into the water. They were suffering the after effects of their shock, and could talk of nothing else all day long, and most of the night as well.

The China Doll would hear, out of the dark, coming from one of them: "You remember when that second explosion came—you were standing close to me—in the battery—the one that shot up that column of water which cut the cutter in half—you remember—it fell on old Tompkins—it was old Tompkins, wasn't it?—it crushed him—don't you remember him howling?—just for a second—and then, not answering when you sung out to him."

Another voice—a big, gruff one—would "chip in": "I'd just said to the Gunner, 'That's not one of our destroyers—look at her funnels—you mark my word—that's not one of ours'—just before we fired that first shot—it didn't hit—I swear I heard a torpedo fired—the first one—the one that hit us under the bridge—and I'm certain I heard someone sing out: 'Gut! sehr gut!'—he must have been a German—he sang it out after each torpedo hit us."

Another voice out of the darkness, from a hammock close to the China Doll, broke in with: "My word! she did topple over—I could never have believed it I was in my cabin—just had time to rush up to the gangway—the water was pouring over the coaming—couldn't stand on the quarter-deck—I don't know how I got to the rails—I dragged myself up somehow, and crawled right round her—oh, my God! the cries inside her—men who couldn't get out."

The big, gruff voice, which had stopped to listen, interrupted again: "I got out through a gun-port, crawled along the side—when she turned over the bilge keel caught me and dragged me under—I never knew how I came up again—a man close to me—swimming in the water—had his face smashed in by a plank which shot up from below—I got hold of the plank—it kept me up till the Lord Nelson's picket-boat found me."

It was not as if these disjointed remarks were made only once, but they were repeated over and over again; just as if the thoughts they expressed had been fixed so indelibly in their brains, to the exclusion of everything else, that when night and darkness came they were again so vivid that they had to be given utterance to.

The poor China Doll, with his swimming-belt round his chest, would listen, with hair on end, until he could stand it no longer; then he would jump out, and run up on deck and wait, perhaps for an hour, until they were silent. How grateful he was to wake up and see daylight coming through the gaps in the hatchway awning-cover, and to know that another night was over! A good many more were as thankful as he was.

Next day the early morning "air" reconnaissance—made by aeroplane—reported having seen five submarines travelling past Kephez Point.

"That puts the hat on it," moaned the Fleet-Surgeon when he heard of them; and everybody marvelled how they had managed to elude the scouting trawlers and destroyers. But most people felt a sense of relief that the days of waiting for their coming were now over, and that whatever was going to happen would do so soon. However, the evening "air reconnaissance" reported that these five submarines were still there, but had now turned out to be buoys which we ourselves had moored—so the grim tension was relieved for a little while.

On that day "Gallipoli Bill" burst very many high-explosive shells on "W" beach, apparently chiefly out of bravado, to express his glee at the sinking of the Goliath. Next day the Agamemnon, the Swiftsure, and the heavy batteries on shore "went" for him, but could not hit him. The "spotting" aeroplanes did their best to locate him and to direct the firing; but a dummy gun is so easily put somewhere, where it can be seen from above, and a real gun can so easily be shifted and hidden, where it cannot be seen, that quite possibly the ships and the shore batteries were never firing at the real gun. At any rate, directly they ceased fire, "Gallipoli Bill" threw half a dozen more shells along the ridge above "W" beach, and "pulled their legs" pretty thoroughly.

Things went on quietly for the next two or three days, although the howitzers did a lot of mischief on shore. Rumours came that a trawler had sighted a periscope off Imbros island, thirteen miles away, and it seemed definitely ascertained that two submarines had arrived at Smyrna.

On the 18th May the Achates relieved the Swiftsure, and from this date, until driven away by submarines, she became a "bombarding" ship. She once more ceased to fly a flag; the Admiral left her, taking with him his two Assistant Clerks; best of all, the devouring host of strange snotties and their steamboats also departed, and quietness and peace reigned in the gun-room. But, like Old Mother Hubbard's cupboard, the gun-room store was bare—a fact which brought bitter grief to the Pimple and the China Doll.

There was another submarine scare that night. A trawler fired two Very's lights, which meant "have sighted a hostile submarine", and things "hummed" considerably until it turned out that she had mistaken E11, on her way up the Straits, from Mudros, for an enemy submarine.

Also, during that same night the Turks commenced their desperate thirty-six-hour attack on Anzac, and for all that period an almost incessant roar of heavy guns came down wind from there. This attack ended most disastrously for the enemy, who lost more than three thousand men killed. The Honourable Mess heard afterwards many yarns of this fight—yarns of the Turks pressing through gullies against the Australian and New Zealand trenches, pouring through in dense masses, shouting "Allah! Allah!" and never ceasing that cry, because they believed that no bullet would touch them with the sacred name on their lips, and being shot down in hundreds and hundreds, until, in fact, some of the Australians, who had clambered on top of their parapets the better to shoot, refused to shoot any longer. Pressed along by the masses behind them, the front ranks could not retreat—some, throwing away their rifles, ran towards the trenches with their hands above their heads, apparently demented, shouting "Allah! Allah!"

Perhaps they thought that God would give them victory over the "infidel" with their bare hands; perhaps they wanted to surrender; but none reached those trenches. In front of one maxim alone, 380 dead were counted when at last the attacks had melted away, and the Turks had obtained an armistice to bury their dead.

Now that she was "bombarding" ship, the Achates had the job of looking after "Gallipoli Bill", and often an aeroplane would fly up to "spot" for her whilst she tried to knock him out.

Such a day's firing would be arranged and start something like this.

Perhaps Captain Macfarlane had been ashore the afternoon before, to stretch his long legs, and on coming back to the ship would send for the Gunnery-Lieutenant. "Oh, look here, I've been ashore this afternoon. That 6-inch howitzer is bothering everyone a good deal; it dropped one near me—it may not have known I was there—but I thought it distinctly rude; the Left Flank Observation Post—I was up there this afternoon—think they have spotted him—just to the left of that single tree near the windmills—you know it—the place where those dummy field-guns used to be; how about having a try for it in the morning?"

"Yes, sir! Certainly, sir! We had better ask for an aeroplane, I suppose," the very "strict-service" Gunnery-Lieutenant would suggest.

"Certainly! Certainly! Ask them to send a specially nice one this time, perhaps a white one with blue spots would look pretty."

The Gunnery-Lieutenant, who was absolutely devoid of all sense of humour, would look up startled, only to see the Captain thoughtfully tugging at his pointed yellow beard.

"I don't think there are any like that, sir. They have tried various colours, but none are invisible. I think they have none like that, sir."

"Oh! Very well, we must just take our chance. Perhaps they will send us one with pretty red, white, and blue rings," the Captain would reply gravely, without a tremor of an eyelid; and off would go the bewildered Gunnery-Lieutenant to write out a signal "requesting permission to bombard Target 159G7", or whatever was the dot on the military map nearest to "Gallipoli Bill", and wonder whether Captain Macfarlane was going "off his head". Whilst waiting a reply from the Admiral, he might run across the Fleet-Surgeon and tell him what the Captain had said. "I suppose there's nothing the matter with him, Doc.? You don't think the strain is telling on him?"

"Nothing the matter with him! Of course not," would snap Dr. O'Neill. "It's yourself, you fool; your silly noddle's so stuffed with wretched gunnery, you haven't room for a joke. He was pulling your leg."

"But where's the joke about 'white with blue spots'—I've never seen one like that?" and the Gunnery-Lieutenant would scratch his head.

"Oh! get out of it; you're hopeless!" Dr. O'Neill would growl.

Presently the signal would come that the proposed bombarding had been approved by the Admiral, who would make arrangements for a "spotting" aeroplane at ten o'clock.

Thus were details fixed for another attempt to destroy "Bill".

In the morning the Gunnery-Lieutenant waited to see how the current, or the breeze, or both together, made the ship swing. Perhaps that especial morning she swung with her stern inshore, so that "X" group of 6-inch guns—the group on the starboard side, aft—bore most easily. So, after breakfast, the Gunnery-Lieutenant sent for the War Baby—in charge of these guns—and showed him the exact spot on the map and, taking him up into the main-top, the special tree close to which "Bill" had last been seen—the tree on which he had to train his guns.

The aeroplane with its pilot, the "observer" and his wireless apparatus, started away from the "advanced" aerodrome near Helles lighthouse, commenced to climb up into the "blue", and, when ready, signalled "Ready to Commence".

By this time the Gunnery-Lieutenant in the fore-top, the Captain on the bridge, the War Baby in the sighting hood of X1, and the guns' crews in X1 and X2 beneath it, just abaft the gun-room, were all ready and waiting. "Ranging shot at eight—five—o—o, common shell," the Gunnery-Lieutenant sang down through his voice-pipe; and watched, as X1 fired, away along to the right of Krithia, between the last of the windmills and that single tree, where he hoped that the aeroplane could see "Bill", although he could not do so himself. Up went the cloud-burst, and in perhaps fifty seconds the voice-pipe from the "wireless" room called "Short 200"—the signal that had just come from the aeroplane.

Frequently, on these occasions, the enemy "wireless" stations would "block" the "wireless" signals from the aeroplane, or make "spotting" signals of their own, to confuse the annoyed Gunnery-Lieutenant. Always if the aeroplane ventured too near "Bill", the Turks burst shrapnel round her.

Sights were corrected, and another shot fired; out of the "blue" came the signal "Right, one hundred and fifty yards". That meant altering the training or, if the gun was kept on that single tree all the time, altering the deflection scale on the sight.

And so, for perhaps twenty rounds, firing went on. "Bill", wherever he was, had never spoken a word; the aeroplane signalled "O.K.", the interpretation of which being that, as far as she could see, the last shell had made a direct hit; and presently the Gunnery-Lieutenant, who generally had the idea that the aeroplane "spotter" didn't know his left hand from his right, or "overs" from "shorts", and also was as blind as any bat, thought it was about time to finish, and would climb down and ask the Captain if he should "pack-up".

The War Baby's guns' crews were then ordered to secure and "sponge out" their guns, and a searchlight signal was made to the aeroplane that the firing was finished. Down she would circle to her aerodrome, and if she had anything exciting to tell, would signal it across from the Naval Signal Station close at hand.

After such a proceeding it often happened that, almost before the aeroplane had come down to land, "Bill" would plump three or four high-explosive shells on "W" beach or in the soldiers' "rest" camp. He was a facetious fellow, very wanting in tact, and most elusive.

To understand the difficulties of hitting him, you must try and imagine yourself on the deck of an ordinary steamer, standing somewhere about twenty feet above the level of the water. The distance of the sea horizon is then just a little over five miles. If you now imagine that, instead of a continuous, uninterrupted curved line, the curve of the horizon is broken up by small gullies and ravines and depressions, in any one of which "Gallipoli Bill" may be concealed—in fact, is absolutely hidden from you—and all you know is that he is supposed to be in line with, perhaps, a particular tree which you can see; that up above, there is an aeroplane quite possibly "spotting" on a dummy gun, and that only a direct hit will destroy "Bill", you obtain a good idea of the difficulties of hitting him from where you are—standing in your steamer.

One day, in order to reduce the range, the Achates anchored in another billet, off "X" beach, farther along the "outside" coast of the Peninsula, and had hardly dropped her anchor before a cheeky battery of 4.1-inch guns began dropping their shells all round her. It was impossible to locate the battery, and there was no option but to shove off again, out of range. Again, you must bear in mind that the flashes these guns make when fired are very slight, and quite momentary, also that dummy flashes were also fired some distance away. The only sure proof that the actual position of the firing gun had been located was by observing the cloud of dust blown up from the ground in front of the gun. The size and density of this depends naturally upon the kind of ground, and also, of course, a position behind ground thickly covered with bushes is generally chosen to reduce the dust to a minimum; so that, at a range of five miles, what dust is thrown up is very, very seldom visible.

In the course of the campaign many of the Turks' guns were knocked out by the ships; but every shell must fall somewhere, and if you fire a sufficient number, sooner or later a lucky one may do the "trick" and fall on the exact spot required.

But a ship's magazines are not inexhaustible; with very little effort she could empty them in an hour, and be as useless as a Thames barge until they were refilled. If there had been an inexhaustible supply in the ammunition ships at Mudros, and if a ship had made full use of it, she would have worn out her guns in next to no time; accurate firing would be impossible, and the ship again practically useless.

Knowing all these things, you should now be able to realize the extraordinary difficulties of hitting a single gun from ships at those necessarily long ranges, and be able to understand their comparative failure to do so.

To return to the submarines. It was on a Saturday, the 22nd May, that the first German submarine actually made its appearance off the Peninsula. Just as the Honourable Mess had finished their meagre lunch, a signalman brought the Sub a signal, just received from the Triumph, at anchor off Anzac. The Sub read it aloud: "Hostile submarine sighted N.E. of Gaba Tepe".

"Well, it's a good thing to get the show over," the Sub said; and Uncle Podger remarked that "At any rate it will be pretty to watch." They all went on deck; and the sight of a long line of transports, store ships, and hospital ships hurrying across from Anzac to the little protected harbour of Kephalo, in the island of Imbros, made it certain that they evidently did not doubt that a submarine had been seen.

"They're in earnest, at any rate; there's a pretty picture for you," said Uncle Podger as he watched them, the smoke simply pouring out of their funnels as they made haste to get out of danger. All ships round Cape Helles—some forty or fifty ships of all kinds—were ordered to raise steam, and the Achates, shortening in her cable, waited for whatever would turn up. Close to her lay the Swiftsure; and both had to rely for protection on the keenness of their "look-outs" and the quickness of their guns' crews, because neither ship had torpedo-nets—the Achates never possessed any; the Swiftsure's were lying in a store-house in Bombay Dockyard, where she had left them a year before war broke out.

Everyone felt sure that "something" would happen shortly, and actually experienced a sense of relief to at last be faced with the danger which had so long threatened. Very many took good care—very good care—to secure their swimming-belts under their tunics, in readiness to blow them up should the necessity arise.

It was a glorious day, with a very slight "ruffle" on the sea; and, as Uncle Podger told the nervous China Doll: "My dear chap, you couldn't want a better day for a swim."

At half-past one the Prince George, in a new coat of paint, steamed under the Achates' stern. She had returned from a twenty-four-hours "spell" up the Straits, looking after the Asiatic howitzers, and as she turned slowly into position, to anchor, she suddenly began to blaze away with her small guns, for'ard, and went full speed ahead. At the same moment the cruiser Talbot, about a mile away, hoisted the signal "hostile submarine in sight", and fired a blank charge to draw attention to it. "Close water-tight doors" was piped along the decks; the crew dashed down below; and the China Doll, trembling with excitement, made his way for'ard, and saw the splashes of the Prince George's shells following and bursting all round what looked like the swirl and heave of water which a big fish would make when swimming just below the surface. One of the gun's crews near him shouted that he saw a periscope; another, an obvious liar, swore that he could see the tail rudders.

Two destroyers came dashing down—a smother of black smoke and white foam—dashing right in among the shell splashes—or so it seemed to the nervous Assistant Clerk—and then began scurrying round and round in circles, seeking something to pounce upon.

But the submarine had dived, and, whatever her skipper's intentions were, she never showed herself again that day.

The Prince George came solemnly back and let go her anchor, like some half-worn-out old watch-dog who had gone barking round to drive off intruders and then returned to his kennel door; whilst the Swiftsure started off to join the destroyers in their search.

But then commenced a most extraordinary exodus of shipping from Cape Helles. Transports and store ships hove up their anchors and started off on their sixty-mile journey to Mudros to seek safety behind the submarine net across the entrance. The Achates received orders to proceed there too, and, you may be sure, was not long getting under way, steaming on a straight course until a signal came from the Admiral, "Achates zigzag". The sea from Cape Helles was one long line of hurrying steamers. Two big "crack" French liners, the France and La Provence, the first of which had only arrived that morning, and had not yet begun to disembark the four thousand troops on board, lingered at anchor for nearly an hour. They were such huge ships, and were such tempting submarine targets, that everyone wondered why they delayed. Presently, however, they joined in the race for safety, and catching up the Achates, steamed past her as though she had been at anchor.

Was not the China Doll, and many more, too, aboard her, delighted when the Achates slipped through the "gate" in that submarine net!

That night the Albion and Canopus, off Anzac, remained under way, for safety. During the night the Albion "took" the ground off Gaba Tepe, and, not being able to get off, was exposed to a very heavy fire at daybreak from howitzers, field-batteries, and also from the 12-inch guns of a Turkish ironclad, somewhere above The Narrows, and firing across the land. Fortunately, this fire was as inaccurate as it was heavy; but the situation was most dangerous and unpleasant until the Canopus came along, in the thick of the shells, laid out some hawsers to her, and at the second attempt towed her clear, with a total loss of only one man killed and nine wounded.

The next two days passed quietly; no submarines were seen or heard of, until on the second morning, at half-past eight, a periscope was suddenly observed passing along between the Swiftsure and Agamemnon, at anchor off Cape Helles not six hundred yards from each other. Fire was opened immediately, and down dipped the periscope, to appear again just ahead and on the Swiftsure's starboard bow. The Swiftsure's 14-pounders blazed away, under went the periscope and did not appear again.

It is a mystery why she did not fire a torpedo; presumably she had no time to get into position to make a good shot. A signal sent to the ships off Gaba Tepe and Anzac warned them; but just before half-past twelve the Triumph there was struck by two torpedoes. The news that she had a list brought all the Swiftsure's officers and men on deck. Sure enough, they could see her through telescopes listing heavily, and two destroyers standing by. In twenty minutes the red composition on her bottom showed above the water; she rapidly fell over, remained bottom upwards for some eight minutes, and then disappeared. Fortunately, very few of her crew were lost.

Another exodus of ships followed, and only the poor old Majestic and the Henri IV, that quaint old Frenchman—with the Captain who feared neither mine nor torpedo—remained off the Peninsula. Three days' grace the Majestic received, and then she too met her fate, a submarine creeping up, with her periscope just showing, and firing two torpedoes at her through a gap between two small store ships. At 6.45 a.m. on Friday, 28th May, the poor old ship received her death-blows, and seven and a half minutes later capsized. For months her ram just appeared above the water off "W" beach, until the autumn gales made her settle farther down and mercifully hid her from sight.

It is not surprising that the general feeling of uncertainty and uneasiness due to the approach or German submarines should, now that they had arrived, sunk two big ships, and driven the others away, give place to one of foreboding and depression.

The army, which had landed with such proud hopes of opening the gates of The Narrows for the fleet to pass through, had fought itself to a standstill at Helles and Anzac; its supply beaches were constantly under shell-fire, and even the "rest" camps daily gave up their toll of dead and wounded from shells shrapnel or high-explosive.

The big ships could not use the narrow waters with freedom or safety; and if one, two, three, or five submarines, whatever their number was at this time, had already made the long voyage from Germany, ten, fifteen, or twenty might follow; and even if the big ships forced their way to Constantinople, these submarines could make it impossible for them to stay there.

Everyone wondered what would be the next move—what would happen next.

There were two bright patches of cheerful sky between the dark clouds: our own submarines, working with unparalleled daring and skill, passed up and down The Narrows, through the nets laid across to catch them, almost at their ease, and prevented the Turks from using the Sea of Marmora to bring up troops or stores; the Commander-in-Chief himself remained optimistic, in spite of all.

Dr. O'Neill, meeting Captain Macfarlane, who had just returned from the yacht Triad, which now flew the Commander-in-Chief's flag, asked him: "How about the Admiral, sir? I suppose he is even more depressed than we are?"

"Not a bit of it," Captain Macfarlane told him. "He is quite cheery; he has a lot 'up his sleeve' yet."

From now onwards, the battleships remained behind the nets at Mudros or Kephalo. From these, every now and again, one or other of them would dash out with escorts of destroyers; an aeroplane would circle overhead to 'spot' for her; and she would bombard the Asiatic guns, Achi Baba, Sari Bair, above Anzac, or the Olive Grove, near Gaba Tepe, where the Turks always had several guns. Having done as much damage as possible, back she would steam, zigzagging all the way into safety.

And from this time all stores, ammunition, and reinforcements were carried across to the Peninsula at night in trawlers, small coasting steamers, and what were termed "fleet sweepers"; these being small steamers, of a thousand to fifteen hundred tons, which had—most of them, at any rate—previous to the war, been employed in the passenger and freight traffic on the cross-Channel, Irish, or Channel Island services.

Splendidly did they carry out their work—very frequently under fire.

CHAPTER XV

A Peaceful Month

The day after the Triumph had been torpedoed, and two days before the Majestic met the same fate, the Achates left Mudros for the island of Mytilene, zigzagging all the way, because Mytilene lay at the mouth of the Gulf of Smyrna, and Smyrna harboured several submarines which might possibly be in wait for her.

A grand day it was, the sun shining out of an almost cloudless sky, the sea bluer than the sky, and ruffled pleasantly by a gentle breeze. In the evening she passed through a narrow channel between tree-clad heights, and anchored in the land-locked harbour.

For the last month it had not been possible to go on deck without seeing a gun fired or a shell burst. Down below, in cabin, ward-room, or gun-room, you did escape the sight of them—and the sight of those high explosives bursting among men and horses on the beaches can never be forgotten—but you could not escape the sound of them. Each time the air, coming through scuttle, doorway, skylight, or hatchway, thudded against your ears, the shock, big or little, from far or near, made you wince, and made your mind stop momentarily to picture the actual explosion; your ears tingled, alert and braced, to receive the next shock, until the constant, expectant waiting and wincing became a strain which affected many people, even those who were not then exposed to personal danger. It made them irritable or taciturn, or brought about little alterations of character and disposition, not sufficiently definite, perhaps, to state in words, but real enough to notice at the time. In addition, the constant sight of trawlers and boats full of wounded, passing the Achates on their way to hospital ships, had a constant depressing effect, not perhaps fully realized at the moment.

Later, when there came the more imminent personal danger from submarine attack, culminating in the capsizing of two battleships, torpedoed in broad daylight and in full view of thousands, in circumstances which showed how impossible it was, under those conditions of service, to meet submarine attack successfully, the effect of the strain became more pronounced.

Above all, there lacked the success of the expedition, which alone could act as an antidote to the strain.

When, therefore, the Achates wound her way through the tortuous channel into Ieros harbour, her yards almost touching the thick brushwood which clothed the cliffs, and these cliffs, shutting out all sight of the sea, opened out to give a view of an inland lake surrounded by olive-clad hills fading away in the distance, and glowing at the warm touch of the evening sun, their many-tinted green slopes reflected in its placid waters; of villages, quiet little peaceful villages, with the peasants clustering along the water's edge as the ship floated past, or white-sailed boats crowded with smiling, gaily-welcoming Greek men and women, it seemed as though a magician's wand had suddenly guided and wafted her into some fairy harbour, where war and the brutalities of bloodshed could never have been known and would never dare to intrude.

Officers and men stood, drinking in, in their various ways, the beauty, the peace, and the overwhelming quietness of it all.

"Old 'Gallipoli Bill' will drop one among those people in a moment; they're exposing themselves terribly," the Hun grinned.

"They've got 'dug-outs' all handy, somewhere close by; you bet they have!" Rawlins said.

"I wonder how our three chaps are getting on at 'W' beach;" said the Sub, smacking the open-mouthed and staring China Doll on his back, so that his doll's eyes nearly fell out. "My jumping Jimmy, what a place! My blessed stars! What a bathe we'll have when we've dropped the 'killick'. I'll ask the Commander," and stalked away to find him, banging every member of the Honourable Mess he met with his fist, with shouts of "My jumping Jupiter, what a place!" The Pimple pointed out to the China Doll one of the boats they passed. Half full of oranges and bananas it was; and their mouths watered and their eyes brightened as they thought of the feast they would have if it came alongside and the ward-room messman did not buy them all.

The ship slowly turned round another bluff, and a collier with two English submarines lying alongside her came into view.

"They rather spoil the picture," Uncle Podger said, "but we needn't look at 'em."

Then the Achates let go her anchor, the cable rattled noisily, stopped, and the ship lay still.

A quarter of an hour later, "hands to bathe" was "piped", and in less than ten minutes, at least five hundred officers and men were bobbing in the water alongside, and the air was alive with their cheery shouts. The men dived off the booms, the nettings, out of the gangways, or climbed down her sides; the water for'ard was so thick with black heads and white shoulders, that when another man and yet another, a constant stream of them, dived in, one could not help wondering if there was a clear space for them to dive into, though the others always did manage to "open out" and let the newcomer in without accident.

Aft, some of the Honourable Mess were diving off the top of the accommodation ladder; others, the more cautious ones, preferred to drop off the foot of it. The Hun went off the top, so did Rawlins. Uncle Podger walked sedately down the ladder, turned a back somersault, and bobbed up again, in time to see the Pimple make a show of diving off the top, decide that it was too high, and walk down it. The China Doll, trying to attract attention, wouldn't even dive from the foot of the ladder. "You'll promise not to duck me, won't you?" he squeaked, and lowered himself down, holding on to a rope. The Sub, with his gnarled muscles showing under his bathing dress, and disdaining the twenty-foot dive from the ladder top, climbed to the edge of the after bridge with a water polo ball under his arm, threw it far out from the ship, climbed the rails, balanced himself for a moment, roared out "Look out, you jumping shrimps!" and dived forty feet into the water, cutting it like a knife, and coming to the surface some thirty yards farther away. The more sedate ward-room officers, disrobing in their cabins, heard his stentorian, roaring shouts of, "My jumping Jimmies! What a place!" Presently they too appeared on deck, twisting their towels round the quarter-deck rails before they joined the merry splashing throng; the little Padre had his swimming-belt round his chest, and his everlasting pipe in his mouth. The Hun and Uncle Podger, seeing him come down the ladder, winked at each other, and waited to see what would happen when he jumped into the water; but were disappointed, for he lowered himself carefully; the swimming-belt kept his head well above water, and he paddled about, still smoking.

Around and among all these swimmers paddled the Greeks in their quaint, picturesque boats, watching them and smiling with amusement.

The Hun and Rawlins, slightly out of breath, after having disappeared for a few brief moments below the surface of the water in their efforts to decide which had ducked the other, caught hold of the stern of a boat which happened to be near, and drawing themselves half out of the water, grinned happily at a bevy of plump young damsels sitting there. The girls, laughing merrily, gave them each an orange; whereupon they slipped back into the water and proceeded to eat them. But the sight of these two lying placidly on their backs and devouring their oranges was too much for the others. Uncle Podger with his trudgeon stroke reached the unsuspecting Rawlins first, seized his orange, ducked him, and dived, only to come up among the enemy—the Pimple, the Sub, and the outraged Rawlins. The War Baby threw himself into the mêlée; the Hun, swallowing the rest of his orange, joined in too; and the life of Uncle Podger was only saved by a shower of oranges, and peals of girlish laughter from the boat.