"THE HUNTING DOGS."

Dominion, Volume 10, Issue 2920, 4 November 1916, Page 7

"THE HUNTING DOGS."

SUBMARINE CHASERS

(By "J.J.," in the "Daily Mail.)

The craft employed in seeking out enemy submarines arc known among bluejackets as "the hunting dogs." This is botli terse and explanatory, sinco hunting is their job, and they do it in pack-like fashion. Oho of their ''catches" now lies alongside Templo Pier, whither all London is craning its neck to get a look at it; although, as compared with what niight have been done, the putting of this particular exhibit on view is somewhat like taking your country cousin to St. Dunstant's when you might have shown her St. Paul's.

However, thore it lies ringing in the nimble sixpenoes while the ''hunting dogs" continue their quost for, more "game" of similar kind. , Now a word as to the "dogs" themselves. One finds in the "packs" quite a motley colleotion of "breeds.'' There are heavy lurchers which beat over tho ground with untiring persistency; pugnacious little terriers which nose arouild the holes, and when they have "found" call up tho bigger dogs to the "killing"; also greyhounds, keen of eye and swift of movemont, which pounce

with deadly spring -upon any quarry that may show itself in the open. But whatever tho "breed" all work hard, and it is 110 secret that their hunting lias been remarkably successful. Flirting With Death. • It is really one of tho most strenuously exciting by-paths of sea war. 'Those who iread it are encompassed by dangers; they have to take many chances, and if • there bo anything l 'glorious about uncertainty, theirs is the glorious life in all its fulness. Never do they know what they are going to bump into, nor in what guise disaster will rise from tho depths and smite them. It may take the form of a

mine or of a torpedo iired from ono 1 of the boats they are tracking 1 down. Whichever it be, tho result is : the same; their own vessel gots re- ; duced to a bundle of splinters. All these risks are cheerfully accepted, as they add relish to the "hunt" by en- : dowing the quiet preliminary of "beating up" the game with a. sporting zest that keeps the blood astir. Submarines are elusive things, "liousting" one out from a stretch of open water somewhat resembles searching for a needle in a hayrick. There is always the chance that one may find the needle by sitting down upon it i unexpectedly, and the submarine may be discovered with similnrly unpleasant abruptness. When this happens there follows a breezy time for tho finder, "Underwater craft are stalked , in strange ways and- with methodical persistency. Those who go out after them havo much skill, in the uso of snare and gin, and "work" tho "dogs" which they -unleash with tho thoroughness of a poacher overhauling a handy covert. So need to reach for your blue pencil, Mr. Censor. No "indiscreet revelations" are coming. All tho same, ono cannot expect the people who are flocking around U C 5 to believe that submarines are taken in a hair spring or coaxed into captivity with lumps of sugar 1 When tracking down TJ-boats the "hunting dogs" work perspicaeiously. Anyone unfamiliar with their methods, who watched them beating over a patch of grey and apparently empty sea, might think they were nosing abont rather aimlessly, when the truth would be that they hot upon a scent. This much can be said for them; once they.do pick up a scent they seldom fail .to kill;', and they kill more often than they capture, as one wotikl expect from tho nature of their hunting. Perhaps one may be permitted also to say that they ; do not do much aimless wandering, and that once an enemy submarine puts fairly to sea it has very small chanco of' getting back to its harbour again. The Rats. In this connection it should be remembered that a dog cannot snap up a rat until the rat has come out of its hole. Quaint tales are accumulating against tho time when the lull story of the auti-TJ-boat campaign may be told. When it is, we shall hear of sub-

marines that fought submarines, albeit not altogether, designedly, of others which bobbed up confidently expecting only an easy victim and found themselves gripped in jaws that crushed them relentlessly to death. Also, there will bo tales of unwary boats which came unwisely and unwittingly to the surface in the midst of British squadrons, and thereafter only Heaven was left to help them. You must know that tho submarine occasionally behaves like a moleblind creature arid blunders into places it 'were better to have kept out of, and thereupon suffers tho usual fato of those who ieap before they look.

Betimes the submarine_ hunters go fishing.' One that was indulging ip this sport "hooped a big 'un—so much ! so that instead of the angler hauling in the fish, the fish ran off with the angler. For some little time tho game went on. The fisher did not worry over it,, but astutely guided the fish into a convenient bay, where it was successfully "landed." More than one queer game of hide-and-seek has been played by U-boats and their' pursuers around the hull of an apparently neutral vessel—usually with results that Were bad for the submarine.

Sometimes submarines have hung about a particular place for so long that they came to be regarded as quito an institution. "Fritz" and "lvarl" were the names given by our bluejackets to a couplo which haunted a locality "Somewhere in the Sea" with great persistency. They did no harm to anybody and afforded much sport To the'"dogs," and so in-time came to bo regarded with a certain amused tolerance. Finally both "Fritz" and "Karl' fell victims to an overweening curiosity, and "Somewhere in tho Sea" knew them no more.

"Sonuwhcre Else in the Sea" there was another U-boat which our bluejackots recognised for an old friend and christened "Von Tirpitz.' This one ended as mackerel do. If you are a dull person and cannot understand why our sailors laugh at enemy submarines and bestow nicknames upon, them, let

me point out that it is because of that priceless gift of dry, grim humour which enables Jack to keep working incessantly at the most trying tasks without losing his nerve, his temper, or his abundant confidence in the ability of tho British Navy to boat tho Hun at any trick ho may try.