get out of the way and
get into the boat. We were on the port side, practically opposite
the engine well. Up and down the deck passengers and crew were
donning lifebelts, throwing on overcoats, and taking positions in
the boats. There were a number of women, but only one appeared
hysterical....

The boat started downward with a jerk toward the seemingly hungry
rising and falling swells. Then we stopped and remained suspended
in mid-air while the men at the bow and the stern swore and
tusselled with the lowering ropes. The stern of the boat was
down, the bow up, leaving us at an angle of about forty-five
degrees. We clung to the seats to save ourselves from falling
out.

[Illustration: Permission of _Scientific American_.

_Salvaging H-3, View I._]

[Illustration: Permission of _Scientific American_.

_Salvaging H-3, View II._]

[Illustration: Permission of _Scientific American_.

_Salvaging H-3, View III._]

"Who's got a knife? A knife! a knife!" bawled a sweating seaman
in the bow.

"Great God! Give him a knife," bawled a half-dressed, gibbering
negro stoker who wrung his hands in the stern.

A hatchet was thrust into my hand, and I forwarded it to the bow.
There was a flash of sparks as it crashed down on the holding
pulley. Many feet and hands pushed the boat from the side of the
ship and we sagged down again, this time smacking squarely on the
billowy top of a rising swell.

As we pulled away from the side of the ship its receding terrace
of lights stretched upward. The ship was slowly turning over. We
were opposite that part occupied by the engine rooms. There was a
tangle of oars, spars and rigging on the seat and considerable
confusion before four of the big sweeps could be manned on either
side of the boat.

The gibbering bullet-headed negro was pulling directly behind me
and I turned to quiet him as his frantic reaches with his oar
were hitting me in the back.

"Get away from her, get away from her," he kept repeating. "When
the water hits her hot boilers she'll blow up, and there's just
tons and tons of shrapnel in the hold."

His excitement spread to other members of the crew in the boat.

It was the give-way of nerve tension. It was bedlam and
nightmare.

We rested on our oars, with all eyes on the still