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Dominion, Volume 12, Issue 217, 7 June 1919, Page 7

. Whether by coincidence or design, this .vessel, had got. under way as the destroyers passed, and at the tail of tho proces6ion.,it passed up the harbour, "like a .captured vessel. She symbolised that otner procession: to Scapa Flow. , His',Excojjency.'s" Welcome. The Governor-General, • Commodore Glossop,- and. Senator Russell .landed on Garden Island, and' boarded ' the Melbourne. The. commander and his staff were drawn lip to welcome him. A few brief greetings.and. handshakes, and then the brisk order came, "All men aft!" Instantly the crew-doubled "to their places beneath the.' big,awning, forming a hollow square! There His Excellency stirringly addressed them.'. Tho said:—Wo are light glad to welcome you home, after several years'. continuous service in the Grand Meet on the' other sido of the world. It i 6, thanks to that Fleet,' to jts fighting power, its strangling blockade, to its discipline and spirit, that the Allies have been able to tight in all quarters of tho world; that we have been able to maintain communication with all parts of tho British Empire; that Australia, within her peaceful borders, has uninterruptedly pursued the even tenor of her way in comfort and prosperity. If we insular British—for we, seem to bo ablo to be insular even when we live in a continent—occasionally fail to connect all this with the unsleeping seutry-go of the great ships in the North Sea, yet ono dav of thrit "intense suspense'Which:.followed the- first inadequate report of the Jutland Battle brings home to the public in tho remotest port of the Empire our utter denendence on sea power, and it only needs one such incident, as the splendidly audacious landing on the mole of '/eebruggc, and the sinking in the enemy's fairway of the old cruisers— when Drake's drums seemed .to sound once more, down. Channel—or that fine combat iii which the Broke and the Swift responded onco more to the Nelson touch, to re-kindle in every heart the old conviction that the sea- is the. British element, and that Ihe destiny of the Empire is confided to. the Navy. Nor can, wo on an occasion of welcome to our naval men forget those other seamen who man. the ships of transport a-nd commerce and mine-sweepers,' and unflinchingly faced continued'perils from mine and torpedo. No finer tribute could be paid to them than the fact that,-in spito of-tho millions of tons of shipping

sunk, 110 vessel ever failed to secure a full complement of men fur any voyage. It is witli a consciousness of duty done, on. the lonely seas, that you'return/to your homes, and right glad am I to be hero to Rive you a welcomc and to express the pride wo all feel in our Navy, and in the seamen, who can, under these happier circumstances, say, in the words of Nelson at tho close of. Trafalgar Day, "Thank God, I have done my duty."

Their Work in the' War. The Australian ship Melbourne floated round East Africa, the West Indies, the Tropics, and the North Sea, yet not a man of the Melbourne can recall, in all that vigilance an incident worth recounting. Tho Navy's part in this war has largely been-the part of the watchers. They- have been the watchers of tho sea. Thoy have left nothing go by them. The racing cruisers have threaded (lie seven .seas. They have found no enemy to fight—the. Melbourne, leader of the flotilla that came in yesterday, has scarcely, fired a shot. But tho ceaseless vigil, has gone on, from Scapii Flow to Plymouth. She has been battered bv the waves of- the North Sea—this sunny-born tiling. "Cold!".said one of her men. "Cold! I should say.it was." The newspaper man commiserated wilh him-on the conditions,of tile day that marked his arrival. Ho laughed. ''Why, bless my soul," lie said, "this is a joke to what we have been used to."

But if the sedate cruiser, though she had ranged the seven seas, was something almost beyond approach, the destroyers "were not.

For the most part they were located in the Mediterranean. They were engaged in transport and patrol work, the latter amounting to seeing that the Austrian fleet stayed where it was. Six Australian destroyers, indeed, flung tho first famous dtraiito mobile barrage across the Straits of Otranto. It was '-insufficient, and Sir Eric Geddes, after expressing admiration for the service, sent, nlong forty-four more destroyers to reinforce them. . But the fact remains that until so reinforced the six. Australians did all the work. It was k-fact that at the time something like one-third of the submarine sinkings of merchant ships'was being carried out in tho Mediterranean.

How efficient was the barrage is conveyed in the words of an officer yesterday. "At the signing of the armistice there was only one . Austrian submarine ' at large, and we know where she was. The. armistice saved her."