in was standing.

On the after shelter-deck the Gunner, bare-headed and clad only in a
shirt and trousers, was, single-handed, loading and firing a
twelve-pounder as fast as he could snap the breech to and lay the gun.
His face was distorted with rage, and his black brows met across his
nose in a scowl that at any other time would have suggested acute
melodrama. Half a mile away the shots were striking the water with
little pillars of white spray.

The figure on the forebridge made a gesture with his arm. "Fall in!"
shouted the Commander. "Fall in, facing outboard, and strip! Stand by
to swim for it!" Seven hundred men--bluejackets, stokers, and
marines--hurriedly formed up and began to divest themselves of their
clothes. They were drawn up regardless of class or rating, and a burly
Marine Artilleryman, wriggling out of his cholera belt, laughed in the
blackened face of a stoker fresh from the furnace door.

"Cheer up, mate!" he said encouragingly. "You'll soon 'ave a chance to
wash your bloomin' face!"

The ship gave a sudden lurch, settled deeper in the water, and began to
heel slowly over. The Captain, clinging to the bridge rail to maintain
his balance, raised the megaphone to his mouth:

"Carry on!" he shouted. "Every man for himself!"--he lowered the
megaphone and added between his teeth--"and God for us all!"

The ship was lying over at an angle of sixty degrees, and the men were
clustered along the bulwarks and nettings as if loath to leave their
stricken home even at the eleventh hour. A muscular Leading Seaman was
the first to go--a nude, pink figure, wading reluctantly down the
sloping side of the cruiser, for all the world like a child paddling.
He stopped when waist deep and looked back. "'Ere!" he shouted, "'ow
far is it to Yarmouth? No more'n a 'undred an' fifty miles, is it? I
gotter aunt livin' there. . . ."

Then came the rush, together with a roar of voices, shouts and cheers,
cries for help, valiant, quickly stifled snatches of "Tipperary," and,
over all, the hiss of escaping steam.

"She wouldn't be 'arf pleased to see yer, Nobby!" shouted a voice above
the hubbub. "Not 'arf she wouldn't! Nah then, 'oo's for compulsory
bathin'. . . . Gawd! ain't it cold! . . ."

* * * * *

How he found himself in the water, Thorogood had no very clear
recollection; but by instinct he struck out through the welter of
gasping, bobbing heads till he was clear of the