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ine until we were forced back by Turkish counter-attacks in the afternoon and evening of the 25th. The whole stretch is now dominated by Turkish fire from the ridges, and along it lie the bodies of those killed at the first onset, and afterwards in the New Zealand bayonet charge. Several boats are stranded along this no man's land; so far all attempts to get out at night and bury the dead have only led to fresh losses. No one ever landed out of these boats--so they say. Towards evening we re-embarked on the _Colne_ and at the very moment of transhipment from the picquet boat the enemy opened a real hot shrapnel fire, plastering with impartiality and liberality our trenches, our beaches and the sea. The _Colne_ was in strangely troubled water, but, although the shot fell all about her, neither she nor the picquet boat was touched. Five minutes later we should have caught it properly! The Turkish guns are very well hidden now, and the _Q.E._ can do nothing against them without the balloon to spot; we can't often spare one of our five aeroplanes for Gaba Tepe. Going back we had some long range shots with the 15-inch guns at batteries in rear of Achi Baba. Anchored off Cape Helles at dark. A reply in from Maxwell about the East Lancs. They are coming! The worst enemy a Chief has to face in war is an alarmist. The Turks are indeed stout and terrifying fellows when seen, not in a poetry book but in a long line running at you in a heavy jogtrot way with fixed bayonets gleaming. But they don't frighten me as much as one or two of my own friends. No matter. We are here to stay; in so far as my fixed determination can make it so; alive or dead, we stay. _30th April, 1915. H.M.S. Queen Elizabeth._ From dawn to breakfast time all hands busy slinging shells--modern war sinews--piles of them--aboard. The Turks are making hay while the sun shines and are letting "V" Beach have it from their 6-inch howitzers on the plains of Troy. So, once upon a time, did Paris shoot forth his arrows over that selfsame ground and plug proud Achilles in the heel--and never surely was any fabulous tendon more vulnerable than are our Southern beaches from Asia. The audacious Commander Samson cheers us up. He came aboard at 9.15 a.m. and stakes his repute as an airman that his fellows will duly spot these guns and that once they do so the ships will knock them out. I was so pleased to hear him say so that I took him ashore with me to "W" Beach, wh
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