GUARDIANS OF DEATH.

Dominion, Volume 2, Issue 570, 27 July 1909, Page 3

GUARDIANS OF DEATH.

AND THE CHILDREN. ,'Tear after jear the sombre grey cruisers slip into out ports, < stay for a sjhort time, wjule the 'seamen pay occasional, and the officers pay; many, visits to shore; here one reads of B. t dance ori board the Challenger or the Encounter, there one watches on° a black night 'the fingers of the searchlight slowlj touching one cloud after another, or resting nottion the iheightsfof Brooklyn, now on the shores of Kafwarra, doing this perhaps for the benefit of the crew, but more for the entertainment of tho townsfolk, , 'and one grows accustomed to-the Cruisers, learns t<? think 1 " of them t as tho watchdogs of our coast—tame, and well-behaved and silont— forgetting that they are Iha grimmest things \yrthin the bounds of Empire, floating,'arsenals, steel habitations of destruction, from stem ,to stem filled with thoughts , of annihilation that they are—death itself, silent, and muzzled, and J ' /( , But their true significance is emphasised, eyennn these times of peace. It was so jesterday afternoon, when a visitor to H.M S Encounter, passing* down the long King's Wharf, where-the King's , shipe lie, saw the} Encounter in a new light, the playground 'pf children Boys, medium-sized and small, and little girls swarmed everywhere dver the ship. At the side of the ship were" some sdilors. 'hard at work, but vwth rather,an ai? been crowded there by the smallifolk", who ran about the I decks,-manned tho guns, climbed'restlessly up and down the stairs, leading to tho bridge and chart-room, or venturesomely mounted the, upright steps that led above to the tops The , children of tho Navy League from vauous schools in the suburbs—lsland , Bav, Worset Bay, New town, and others— ' ',had come down on a visit of inspection,'and apparently roado qilite free of the ehip. 'Ihc iirst thing ono on reaching the deck was ajpartj of s'mall children; quite alone and uncontrolled, placing with one of the large guns aft They seemed to know ; as much about it as was necessary'for their enjojment, and the 1 command was divided between a ■\oungis.h boy and a cotrynander in short skiH«i iv ho did her fair siiaro in swinging the great thing round he"re and theie, and lifting its noso as far' as the awning would permit they were learning from their play it was not easy to 'understand, bu|; they were not on the look-out for instruction At a littlo distance a seaman gunner' stood and smiled amiably at them, but they paid not tho least attention to him, nor'asked his' advice. Right along the ship thoiguns received similar attention —an some cases adoration—and the little girls liked to find that, if they stood on the little steel platform, they could bo swung round with t}io guns. It was quite as much fun as riding oil a? gate, and so very much bettei for their ''patriotism. A good deal of time was spent in gathering the children together for a photograph. They had to be herdjed up from the distances of the ship, as fast as one lot appeared, another loi disappearing on som6 new quest, It may be that tho photographing was, from the Navy League's point of view, the most useful part o| tho afternoon's expedition, that , the fact of Johnny's and Mabel's appearing in a picture of the cruiser will appeal more to them and to their parents, than will tho memory -of what they saw of a sailor's life J ' \ They saw practically all there was Into tho sick bay they went, and when they found that two men wero lying in their hammocks, more than one little girl thought it amusing to swing the hammocks, the sick sailors merely smiling in a placid way without protest Through the mess-ropms they passed with littlo curiosity, 'hardly realising, per-

haps, how largo a part tbe'so rooms played in the lives of the men, some of whom were writing, otheis sewing,,and still others sleep ing quito peacefully, regaidless of tho scoies of curious" little visitors " 'Ihc kitchen, did not appeal to the small girls Perhaps, if they Had shown that in them, food for 450 men was cooked all at once, their domestic interest might have Deen aroused, hut at a glance for all tho extraordinary depth of the oven, the galley was just an ordiuary kitchen Littlo lingers strayed curiously over tho lolig lines of rifles in their stands, and poked at the rusty empty shells upon the' deck, but the curiosity of the girls Was gene ral rathor 'than detailed, and they merely thought that it was a grand outing "Jack 1 ' —amiable, splendid "Jack"—was very good to thorn, and one would see some goodnatured young sailor lad looking almost hko tho pied piper of Hamelin, so closely was ho followed by the little- girls aE ho took them from deck to deck. Down' to the engine-room, where no girls could go, the boys penetrated, viewing everything with great interest, and the torpedo flats fascinated them The engineer and otheis wore kept quite busy there showing oft tho swift, "stealthy creatures This was the gayest part of the ship Nearly every- | thing else was whitish or dull grey, with here and there a bit of burnished brass, but down I in the torpedoes' home there was colour ' enough and to spare —white and gold and greab3plashes of scarlet or green, scarlet for the things on the port side, dark green on £he starboard side, and thesa were the colours of the casings into which the compressed air is driven violently to thrust out the slim, grey torpedo, which slips through the greui water, and drives home destruction at tbo | unseen heart of tho foe, for, like the red dog of the Dcccan, the torpedo bites low There •it is Whilo the children swar,m laughing and chattering all ovor the ship, tho men who manipulate the deadly weapons are busily explaining ]ust how and why they I can be deadly, taking pleasure in' tbeir I power to destroy, and the children who listen are thrilled with a vague feeling that this is what Empire means, not knowing that Empne means the power of enduranco, tho standing-by and keeping ready for a tune of emergency that may never como —that it is the daily drudgery, tho burnishing and practising, and the dull routine with no more thrill or sentiment m it than doing long division sums or learning conjugations —the . "becoming efficient and the keeping Teady that I makes the bluejackets of supreme importance to r the Empire they serve Somehow one wishes that the children of the Navy League | could have had'that aspect of tho case put before them, that instead of running wild all | over, the ship without thought or discipline or respect, they, could haVe been taken I through it )B an orderly manner and' made to see how the sailors went about their daily ' tasks , Twelve years a sailor serves his country jn'the Navy—twelve years of daily toil and preparation, doing the samo things over and over again, day after day, gradually getting a step higher, perhaps, but with few opportunities for rapid prdmotion, smart and efficient through tho obedience and dull discipline, such discipline as, unfortunately, falls to the lot of very few New Zealand boys or girls, though ,6ome of them most certdmlyi requiro it. If the children could bo made to appreciate this side of the sailor's life, a visit to the warship would be well worth while." *■ " < ' , '