FIRST BROADSIDE VIEW.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1723, 14 April 1913, Page 6

FIRST BROADSIDE VIEW.

SEEN NIiAR THE HEADS. Steaming slowly towards the entrance, at times almost obliterated from view by a dense column of black smoke which", oddly enough, did not seem out of nlnce in

I Ihe picture proton ted, the observer was | enabled, as slie came closer, In more definilely pick out her linos until slie last | passed between the rocks forming the entrance channel. Majestically moving 011 beneath the gnus of Fort Dorset, slio presented a broadside view, which, bearing in mind the occasion, will not bo quickly forgotten by those luckv enough to lnivo obtained their first view of 11.M.5. New Zealand at this point. She looked just what she is—a ship of war. No one could possibly call her pretty, even :tt a close view, and when she was steaming slowly past Seatoun she looked grim am! joi-bidiling. Iu colour, against the hills, almost black, without a relieving touch of colour or glitter! of brasswork. One could not help thinking of the terrible seriousness of modern war. 01' how it is stripped of ornament and of all that is not essential. .Some are' inclined to bewail the failing romance that they attribute to the glittering and stately ships of old, but the modern warship, massive and evil-looking, seems to stimulate romance of harder, more cruel, and of a deeper nature. And who will deny that the New Zealand lacked a romantic aroma as she steamed through the Heads last Saturday? But her grim and sullen appearance forced another and more bitter thought into the observer's mind. What if slie came .not to be welcomed: if she came as a liard inexorable conqueror! Could our batteries have kept that steel-girt ship at bay ? Immediately one's picture of the H.M.S. New Zealand slowly steaming towards the various craft bedecked to welcome her vanished, and another picture pierced the imagination—of a modern battleship, such as she, in action—steaming 27 knots straight for the entrance, then the flash of her guns and the moan of the shell— with a mental jerk one dismissed the thought, and with a glance at the flag fluttering from her stern one smiled com-placently,-and remembered that the same ling was flying over our own batteries. And thus she passed on, and was met by the crowded steamers. eager, to give her right of way, and with a dip of the ensign, a sign that she recognised their tidings, she steamed the harbour a Triton among the minnows.