shot her manning out at
parting of the forward tackle. Lowered by the stern, she rights,
disengages, and drifts aft with the men clinging to the life-lines. We
can make no attempt to reach the men in the water. Their life-belts are
sufficient to keep them afloat: the ship is going down rapidly by the
head, and there remains the second line of boats to be hoisted and swung
over. The chief officer, pausing in his quick work, looks to the bridge
inquiringly, as though to ask, "How long?" The fingers of two hands
suffice to mark our estimate.

The decks are now angled to the deepening pitch of the bows. Pumps are
utterly inadequate to make impression on the swift inflow. The chief
engineer comes to the bridge with a hopeless report. It is only a
question of time. How long? Already the water is lapping at a level of
the foredeck. Troops massed there and on the forecastle-head are
apprehensive: it is indeed a wonder that their officers have held them
for so long. The commanding officer sets example by a cool nonchalance
that we envy. Posted with us on the bridge, his quick eyes note the
flood surging in the pent 'tween-decks below, from which his men have
removed the few wounded. The dead are left to the sea.

Help comes as we had expected it would. Leaving _Nemesis_ to steam fast
circles round the sinking ship, _Rifleman_ swings in and brings up
alongside at the forward end. Even in our fear and anxiety and distress,
we cannot but admire the precision of the destroyer captain's
manoeuvre--the skilful avoidance of our crowded life-boats and the men
in the water--the sudden stoppage of her way and the cant that brings
her to a standstill at the lip of our brimming decks. The troops who
have stood so well to orders have their reward in an easy leap to
safety. Quickly the foredeck is cleared. _Rifleman_ spurts ahead in a
rush that sets the surrounding life-boats to eddy in her wash. She takes
up the circling high-speed patrol and allows her sister ship to swing in
and embark a number of our men.

It is when the most of the life-boats are gone we realize fully the
gallant service of the destroyers. There remain the rafts, but many of
these have been launched over to aid the struggling men in the water.
Half an hour has passed since we were struck--thirty minutes of frantic
endeavour to debark our men--yet still the decks are thronged by a
packed mass that seems but little reduced. The coming of the destroyers
alters the outloo