eral action against overwhelming odds, freed a large number of
allied, and especially British, warships of secondary fighting value.

By the middle of February, 1915, the rendezvous was complete. Besides
the ships belonging to the British and French Mediterranean fleets,
there had arrived, fresh from the battle of the Falkland Islands, the
_Inflexible_, a dreadnought battle cruiser. The _Queen Elizabeth_,
too, arrived, the newest and strongest of the ships of the whole
British navy. It is evident that great reliance had been placed on the
enormous gun power of this vessel, it being hoped that her great
15-inch pieces would blow the Dardanelles defenses to pieces, somewhat
in the way the gigantic German land guns had blown the Belgian forts
into fragments. In no other way is it possible to explain the risking
of this capital ship in the highly dangerous operations in the AEgean
sea.

In addition to the _Queen Elizabeth_ and the _Inflexible_, the British
force included the _Agamemnon_, the _Irresistible_, the _Vengeance_,
the _Triumph_, the _Albion_, the _Lord Nelson_, the _Ocean_ and the
_Majestic_. The French ships numbered the _Charlemagne_, the
_Gaulois_, the _Suffern_, and the _Bouvet_.

Early in the morning of February 19, 1915, these vessels, under the
supreme command of Vice Admiral Sackville Carden, and with Rear
Admiral Guepratte in command of the French division, arrived off the
Gallipoli Peninsula. At 8 a. m. they opened an intense bombardment of
the several forts. At first they battered away at the Turks at long
range but finally, about the middle of the afternoon, the _Vengeance_,
_Cornwallis_ and _Triumph_ of the British forces, and the _Suffern_,
_Gaulois_ and _Bouvet_ of the French fleet, closed in upon the Turkish
forts which were still replying. It was not until darkness that all
the land batteries had been apparently silenced.

At this time, and throughout the various attempts to reduce the
Dardanelles forts by naval bombardment, there was considerable
difficulty in making the demolition permanent. On the following
morning a detachment of the Naval Flying Corps made a reconnaissance
and discovered that the damage was not as great as had been hoped.
Accordingly, preparations were made to give the Turks another dose of
the 12-inch guns. Before this could be done bad weather intervened.

On February 25, 1915, there was a further bombardment and by five
o'clock in the evening all the forts again had b