UNKNOWN

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 4, Issue 110, 19 November 1915, Page 4 (Supplement)

UNKNOWN

EEKIE EXI'Mu.hACE BEL(

Men who line the trenches guns spit their venom ad aroun inured in time to the grim exper but it is more than doubtful skilled toiler of the warship's e room, tar below the waterline : really conquers the eerie feelinj duced by the knowledge that i gagemeut is taking place above i hough shut otf on all sides by mg sides of thickest steel, lie hears and teels the action, but t lief which a sight of the enemy to the lighting man is denied n THE MENTAL PICTURE Aided, however, by the intuiti culiar to every man whose life i m perilous moulds, the rate artificer can see the mam featu the battle in his mind's eye. the bridge or conning tower, above the steel decks, come s sharp and insistant, conveying a of meaning to these under-deck zens of the ship—telling them times, indeed, in so many word: a new and thrilling phase of the has been reached. Hut the effec short of actual excitement —a 1 tiie engineer dare not indulge i he knows not the moment the saf the ship and her 800 or 900 soul depend upon th* rap:d executi some order sent him from above cannot help, however, the com the battle becoming indelibly imp: on his mind in the shape of sti oerie whiffs of intuition conjunct these ever-changing engine-roftm mands. Thus, when the order as sharp as a shot for "Full ahead," after a long period of " has prevailed, he feels t crisis of some kind has been re« From overhead there reaches hii dull boom of other ships' guns, an answering crash of those of his vessel, followed by a shivering c great hull under the giant impa<

THE CHANCES.

If the ship is running away, plainly is doing so fighting as she If, as is more likely—for he cannt call having heard any of these vi ing crashes which proclaim tha enemy's shell as found a b llet 't decks—she is the pursuer, there longer any reasonable chance of unlucky projectile tearing a gl right-of-way through the engine-] stokehole, or boilers. But, a few utes later, he knows as clearly the whole fight had been outline lore his eyes that neither of contingencies ha* come about. someth:ng more thrilling, more rible and full of deadly menace While the great ship is being d ahead at the full power of her enj and stokers, naked to the waist, iously feed the greedy furnaces suddenly begins twisting and cap about in an extraordinary fas making prodigious demands on steering engines, themselves of a p mighty enough to propel a decentsteamer. There can be no mists Iho burden of these erratic mot They aro both sinister and signifi Tne most fateful moments in artificer's life have been reached submarine has drawn into torpudo tion, and, real sing how liuniinp the peril, the captain of the nta ship is purposely steering errata so that the aim may be rendered : tive. Jt may even be that he ii deavouring to avoid the impact torpedo already discharged, \w, presence in the water has been de ed by the tell-tale wake in the con atively calm sea.

SELF-SACRIFICING GALLAM lhe man with a scrap of Ima gin; m his composition, let him be as i of heart as a bulldog, cannot but penence the eerie terror of these tnents. The first and heaviest bio a successful torpedo attack will be in the vitals of the ship where gleaming machinery gulsatcs throbs. Her great armoured p may resist complete disintegration) tome part, receiving more than its share of the explosive force, will j and then not lung but a miraci chance can save these brave men, off from sight of sea and sky, J disaster. There its ever in such a a grave fear of the engines being abied, when the vessel is irretnev doomed, for a standing target ha chance in the world with a. subma: What worse terror of war can be vised for the engineer than a 1 steam " main" ? The demoniacal si of the escaping energy is a sound gestive of hideous death—the ter death by scalding of every human t caught m the first rush of that va ous holocaust.

They are brave, stout-hearted feJ these grimy denizens of the wareß lower reaches. Theirs is the self-sl l'cing gallantry of men who face dj so that their fighting men will I every chance —face it without sej its advance, without the heartei which comes from viewing and sha actively in the struggle. u,