estward, we thought we sighted a periscope ahead, and turned off in
pursuit. We lost our course. Our engine dropped dead, and at 11.30
o'clock forced us to land on the surface of a rough sea. We had no kite
nor radio to call for assistance, so we released our two
carrier-pigeons. We tied a message with our position and the word
'Sinking' on each. The first, the blue-barred one, flew straight off and
reached home. But the other, which was white-checked, lit on our machine
and would not budge until Moore threw our navigation clock at him, which
probably upset him so that he failed us.

"Heavy seas smashed our tail-planes, which kept settling. I saw that
they were pulling the machine down by the rear, turning her over. We
tore the tail-fabric to lessen the impact of the waves. It wasn't any
use. The tail-flat was smashed and its box filled with water.

"This increased the downward leverage and raised her perpendicularly in
the air. At 2.30 P.M. we capsized. We climbed up the nose and 'over the
top' to the under-side of the pontoons. Our emergency ration had been in
the observer's seat at the back, but we had been so busy trying to
repair the motor and save ourselves from turning over that we didn't
remember this until too late. When I crawled aft for food Moore saw that
I was only helping the machine to capsize. He yelled to me to come back
and I did, just in time to save myself from being carried down with the
tail and drowned.

"From then on for nearly four days, until picked up by a trawler, we
were continually soaked and lashed by seas, and with nothing to eat or
drink. We had nothing to cling to, and so to keep from being washed
overboard we got upon the same pontoon and hugged our arms about each
other's bodies for the whole time. We suffered from thirst. I had a
craving for canned peaches. Twice a drizzle came on, wetting the
pontoon. We turned on our stomachs and lapped up the moisture, but the
paint came off, with salt, and nauseated us. Our limbs grew numb. From
time to time the wreckage from torpedoed ships would pass. Two full
biscuit-tins came close enough to swim for, but by then in our weakened
state we knew that we would drown if we tried to get them. We did haul
in a third tin and broke it open; it was filled with tobacco.

"Every day we saw convoys in the distance and vainly waved our
handkerchiefs. We had no signal-lights to use at night. Our watches
stopped, and we lost all track of time. We realized