WORKERS UNDER WATER.

Hokitika Guardian, 11 January 1928, Page 3

WORKERS UNDER WATER.

(By A SUBMARINE OFFICER.) Has anybody a Weirder job thou mine l I doubt it. I am not stressing it- risk-. We who serve in submarines do not regard them as abnormally dangerous craft. Yet. however well accustomed to it you get by daily use, the fact remains that there is something inherently uncanny in crawling about under water and seeing only as much, or ns little, ot the world above the surlnee as will he reflected in the prisms of your periscope. Arid in the best of conditions hiwork imposes strain upon the navigator of a submarine. If he makes a mistake neither boat nor his crew of fifty may ever lie seen again. Much nonsense Inis been written eoneernnig safety devices. In reality, unless a miracle happens, there is no chance of escaping from a wrecked submarine.

You may not he thinking consciously of these things, hut subconsciously they come into your mind when " the lid ” is on and the boat ready to (live. AM through her the crew are at their stations', Some you can sec 1 , some yon cannot ; from vour post oil the control paltform you can give orders to all. These orders must he promptly and explicitly obeyed, for it the human lactor fails at any point the result may he disaster —all too easily at that. All the while you must carefully watch “ the bubble.” This is a blob of spirit similar to that in an ordinary spiritlevel, only the bubble which is your guide moves in a orescent-shaped glass tube. And you must pay close attention to what it is telling you. for if the boat is allowed to dive too deeply the weight of water above her will prevent her from coming to the surface again. Water pressure at great depth is sufficiently powerful to crush the stoutest

submarine as flat as a pancake. Keeping out ol such depth is part o! tie navigator’- job. a rimiparativolv easy one if he i- card til. Submarines being built lor war -ei vice have to train their crews to do war work. That tests the nerve ot the navigator. as exercises often produce hairraising situations. Only a cool head and a steady hand will carry one snlol.v through these.

Upon one comforting fact a suhv.arine navigator may always rely: ii per.l [lops up suddenly none ol his men w.M lanie. Calmly fearless, they win through where the timid would not.

PASTY AND PIE. I ox* .Has. Hiibn Wv.noiia.m

In reference to the correspondence in your columns on whether a pie is a tart or not. perhaps Mr Gladstone's opinion may be of interest. 1 once heard him declaim on the subject with fervour and eloquence. He upheld the view that a tart is the open dish tsuch as the Queen of Hearts made) and a pie is the cov-ered-in one; hut Mr Gladstone contended pie should he use only for fruit, that for meat pasty was the proper word, lie said that pasty and pie were good old English words—though, of course, pasty came with the Normans—and that to drop that except for venison and to substitute tart for pie were miserable modern innovations.