"A TERRIBLE LIFE."

Taihape Daily Times, Volume 8, Issue 109, 9 May 1916, Page 3

"A TERRIBLE LIFE."

TRIALS OF A U BOAT COMMANDER. The United Press of America, publishes the following from their correspondent, Mr. v,William G. Shepherd, from Messina:

John McDowell, captain of the Greek steamship Atromites, answered the summons of a submarine to stop. The undersea boat an Austrian, drew up 100 ft distant, and McDowell sent over a boat to bring the submarine captain to his .ship. "He was a tall man and so thin and yellow-locking that I felt sorry for him," said McDowell. . "My ship was only a small cne, but he seemed delighted when he put his feet on deck, and he looked about him and sighed with pleasure. He was yellow with the poisonous fumes of gasolene. " 'l've been in that submarine six months,' he told me, 'and I have put my foot on shore only once for a few hours, at Trieste in all that time. It's a terrible life. Every minute, night and day, an awful death stares us in th e face.

" 'Our finish—we are always lookinn- for it—may come any second; Ave get no letters from home, and Ave write none, for Ave have no chance to post them. Our nerves don't stand the and Ave can't help quarrelling among ourselves on the smallest proA'ocation.

" 'l've read cf the test put on good

i nature on Polar expeditons, but it's j no such test as Ave undergo. A Polar 1 explorer can walk alone in the snow jat least. In our submarine there's no ■ place to hide. We are ahvays in sight of one another.'"

"When a storm comes up," the Austrian told McDowell, "we drop down 40ft. and remain until the sea subsides. We don't feel the waves at that depth, no matter how high they may be at- the surface. They never rock our boat. OUr main difficulty, however, is to tell when the storm is over. We have no way of knowing, so cur journeys to the surface to poke cur periscope above water are full of peril."