but very major repairs
to the ordnance that comes under their charge. By express
delivery--heavy motor haulage--they can equip a ship on instant
requisition with all that is scheduled for her armament: down to the
waste-box and the gun-layer's sea-boots, they can put a complete
defensive outfit on the road almost before the clamour of a requesting
telephone is stilled.

Another of our staff is the officer in charge of our 'Otter'
installation, an ingenious contrivance to protect us against the menace
of moored mines. For deadly spheres floating on the surface we have a
certain measure of defence in exercise of a keen look-out, but our eyes
avail us not at all in detecting mines under water moored at the level
of our draught. Our 'Otters' may be likened to blind sea-dolphins,
trained to protect our flanks, to run silently aside, fend the explosive
charges from our course, bite the moorings asunder, and throw the
bobbing spheres to the surface.

The 'Otter' expert is invariably an enthusiast. He claims for his pets
every virtue. They run true, they bite surely: they can speak, indeed,
in the complaint of their guide-wires when they are not sympathetically
governed. While it is true that we curse the awkward 'gadgets' in their
multitude of tricks, denounce the insistence with which they dive for a
snug and immovable berth under our bilge keels--those of us who have
come through a hidden minefield share the expert's affection for the
shiny fish-like monsters. We cannot see their operation: we have no
knowledge of our danger till it is past and over, a dark shape with ugly
outpointing horns, turning and spinning in the seawash of our wake.

[Illustration: INSTRUCTIONAL ANTI-SUBMARINE COURSE FOR MERCHANT OFFICERS
AT GLASGOW]

Adoption of the convoy system has brought a host to our gangways. Our
war staff was more than doubled in the few weeks that followed the
sinister April of 1917. If, at an earlier date, we had reasonable ground
for complaint that our expert knowledge of our business was
studiously ignored by the Admiralty, apparently they did not rate our
ability so lightly when this old form of ship protection was revived.
The additions to our staff included a large proportion of our own
officers, withdrawn from posts where their knowledge of merchant-ship
practice was not of great value. In convoy, measures were called for
that our ordinary routine had not contemplated. The shore division of
our new staff aid us in