"CAMOUFLAGE"

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 34, 3 November 1917, Page 7

"CAMOUFLAGE"

ART AIDS THE ALLIES ON THE BATTLE FRONT

HUMBUGGING THE" ENEMY'S AIR SCOUTS

LESSONS FROM NATURE

Quick'to adopt any word or phrase that is expressive and tells much in little, Americans havo taken "camouflage" to their hearts. Tho American Army is to have a camouflage unit, and tho chief o't the Engineers has issued a call for "ingenious young men who are looking fot special entertainment in the way o| fooling the Germans." following is u very satisfactory definition of the word:

Humbugging disguise. Its main principle is the destruction of outline by paint or other artifice. See camounej camo'ifleur. British fighters at first evinced . a strong dislike for such methods (6ays an American commentator), and proved quite inept, so much so, in fact, that H. G. WsJls, the novelist, complained: 'The.principle of breaking the outline does not seem to be fully grasped upon the British front. Much of the painting, of guns and tents that one sees is a feeble and useless dabbing or striping; •some of tho tents I saw were done in . concentric ,bands of radiating stripes that wou!d on tho whole increase their visibility i'roin above. In one place I saw a hangar painted a good zray green, but surrounded and outlined with tents. . . .. ■. My impression—and it may be quite an uajust one—was that some of our British colonels misunderstand and dislike cajiiSiflage."

Birth of the Jdea. Of the operation of- camouflage and the many methods in which it is em'ploved, thj> New York "World" sajs:Abbott H. Thayer, the wolUknorn academician, was the first individual over to take up the art of concealment, when he began the study of tho protective colouring, of animals twenty-five years ago. Ho noted that such beasts as the zebra and okapi were merged in tho landscape at a few yards distance; and he evolved the principle that tho breaking of outline was the destruction of visibility. Little was thought of camouflage at the onset of the present big conflict. There were the officers white-kid gloves-fatal .targets for German snipers-and waving plumes; -the burnished cuirass and tho pennqnotf lance. Then the two contending lines dug themselves in and. locked horns. Concealment became all important-con-cealment from the aero with the eagle eye; from tho artillery observation station' binocular-eyed; from the practised glance of the sharpshooter and the keen vision of the patrols. Artists in the ranks busied themselves; a. new branch of tho art military was born-enmou-'flToV it is highly developed. There are two branches, invisib. ity imitation A supply-train may look like a row ofcottage ; that is imitation. A screen tons a great gun so that the green of thfsc'efl bleeds with the grass othe meadow; that s invisibility. There is aThird offshoot-the art of making compelling replicas of camps, guns, pi lai of supplies, trendies, ammunition depots, anf the like, which are not DOM-fident all? but the aero man thinks they are, and wastes his bombs and energy attacking nothing worth while. Rueh lthe 1 great game of hocus-pocus. The French. gSping the idea ol the zebra's. strip s and the leopard's spots, paint their tent in map-like shapes of strong green and bright yellow. At short distances tho objects so painted arc completely swallowed up in the landscape. Other things are concealed with chicken-wire screens woven with reeds. Some great feats of camouflage have been pulled off in the past few months by the clever French poilu camoufleurs. At one time the German positions commanded a railway track far into the distance behind the French lines. The whole track, signals, rails, and ties, and tho trees that fenced in tho line and the hills on tfie horizon, were all painted on a wide screen and set up in the night across a village street which was needed. The enemy never found out the trick. There will bo a lot more achieved in France when the American camouflage gets busy. The American Army and nl its equipment are to bo blotted out, not by German gun-fire, but by paint and chicken-wire.!

Hocus-Pocus on the Sea. Camouflage is not confined to land campaigns. It is. also practised on the high seas, where at first thought it would not appear that Nature offered any char-acteristics-that could bo duplicated by the art of man. And yet the mind.of the camoufleur is active there, particularly on the German U-boats, lho Philadelphia "Press" tells how sails and liteboats are used to lure the prey:A favourite ruse of the German Üboats is to make use of, neutral vessels as screens in order to pet unsuspecting prey within ready torpedo range, lime and again reports have told of nefarious acts of this kind, when raerchant- : men. have suddenly found themselves confronted by a big U-boat emereM from behind a neutral ship, the latter • being forced to aid the Germans in their work. At other times the U : boats have sought to-hide behind sinking vessels which had sent out calls of distress, coming out to shell or torpedo other ships arriving on the scene to rescue the survivors. . , •' Somewhat on a higher, plane, as far as ingenuity■ is concerned, is the method employed by-a U-boat several, weeks ago. "An American steamers reaching a en-, tish' port reported having come across a row-Boat which served as a decoy for a lurking ' submarine. It appears that the American vessel was zigzagging along at eighteen knots some ninety, •miles off tho Irish coast. It was a trifle after eight o'clock, and because of he bright moonlight every object 001 M readily be seen. Suddenly, the looK.out man Ui'the crow's-nest at the forehTad called out that a boat wa - in sight, four points away on the star- : b The tptain and his officers on the bridge -tooked- through their glasses and 3 out a light object which proved to -be • a ship's life-boat ot -in eitra large size, bobbing up and down •nn'-«,«"waves The ber soon overboat, only to learn thatHLlero were no occupant,. Just then when the liner was some six hundred yards away the crew of the six-inch gun aft -k* a torpedo pass from port to starboard within five feet of the rnddcr. Immediately the captain swung the liner liaid over to starboard, and at the same time the gunners aft fired a shot at the submarine which could then be seen afloat on the port quarter, about 500 yards away. Shots were fired from both gun of the liner, and some of the shells fell clo«e to' the U-boat with questionable results. At any. rate, the liner succeeded in escaping from this ambush. Usin" their wireless masts as supports for sails, German U-boats have on ownion diguised themselves as harmless sail-fn"-vessels, luring. freighters to their fionm .It is said that the sails are so cleverly arranged that the victim comes within'shell range long before the truo nature of the strange craft is discovered. There are so many ways in winch, the 'periscope can bo camouflaged that it is safe to sav that many .a harmless-looking flask, a piece of. driftwood, or a mass of debris serves as a covering for the "eye" of a submarine lying in wait for victims This, together with the fact that periscopes of a telescopic design are beine used, is making it increasingly difficult to detect the presence of U-boats merely by their periscopes.

A Game for Two, So far so good. But marine camouflage is a S^ 116 at wllicll im Cftn ?' ny; I „„,! this is one thing.in which the Allies and ourselves have not been slow 111 copying the enemy's methods ami even iZroving on them. While the subsea craft lends jtself to disguise more rMdilv and more effectively than the lai'"M siirf»ce craft much can be done with the latter in the way of making superstructure; lew; conspicuous rnd being liboral-and skilled—with paints of various shades-and hues. \i present (he camouflaging of steamers has advanced little beyond tho deceptire coat-of-painfc stage, but even this

is said to be most effective. Of the many methods either tried out or suggested two are most promising, the | Brush system and the Mackay system. In the former the camouflage artist paints out all shadows and softens or destroys all outlines, and the entire superstructure is painted a, skv-blue or somo other colour which blends with tho horizon. In this manner, if the work is carried out with consummate skill and patience, the vessel is indistinct even a short distance away, especially if the submarine commander is making his observations through a. periscope. Iu the latter or Mackay system the camouflage takes the form of a leopard-spot design, so that all outlines are 1 broken up by the blotchy coat of paint, and parts of the vessel are even painted with wavy lines so as, to match with tho surrounding water.

Clover feats of camouflage enable vessels to appear' much shorter than they are, tending to deceive the U-boat marksman to a greater or lesser degreo. In the same class is tlio painting of the fake bow waves which give the vessel the appearance of travelling along at a high rate of speed when it may be considerably slowed down. Particularly is the latter scheme invaluable when the U-boat commander, estimating tho intended victim's speed, is fooled into believing that she is a fast boat; for when the torpedo is fired it is Very likely to pass considerably in front of the lumbering steamer.