maged.

I could not stand it any longer. I felt like a man trying to commit
suicide when he misses his aim.

"Quickly dive to twenty-five meters!" I called down to the "Centrale."

Rather dash blindly through this hell than always see your last minute
right before your eyes, and still be unable to do anything. But if,
while submerged, a cable should fasten itself around the U-boat? The
chance of getting through was better down there, I figured.

"Start the phonograph," I commanded, "and put on something cheerful, if
you please!"

In spite of the new, beautiful "Field Gray Uniforms," the song which
soon resounded through the boat, I heard twice a hellish grinding and
scraping above the conning tower--mine cables which we had fouled. At
last, after many long minutes, we were through the mine field. We arose
and I put up the periscope and looked around. God be praised! The
atmosphere, or rather the water, was clearer. The destroyer was several
hundred meters behind us, and we had come through the horrible place
without a scratch.

Aha! There was the first buoy--the first placed on the narrow sand bar.
Now it was careful steering for the ship. We took soundings and
proceeded cautiously. If only the current had not been so strong! It
constantly swung us out of our course. I had to steer against the
current continually.

"Mate, how far are we now from land?"

The sailor quickly brought up the chart and measured the distance with a
scale.

"Two and a half sea miles."

"Oh, the devil! And, as yet, we cannot see anything of it. The air has
been thickening. That's all we need to make things worse for us!"

The cruiser on guard now came rushing past us on the port side. It was
not far from us when I pulled down the periscope for a time.

Who can describe my fright when I put up the periscope again in a few
minutes and could not see anything because of the fog that had settled
down on the sea! A dark rainwall also moved along the surface. And this
was just where it was absolutely necessary for me to see. I must see
where the channel began to be very narrow! Only one narrow passage about
two hundred meters wide, there was, within which we absolutely must
proceed. Every turn away from this--either to the right or left--would
immediately run us into the sandbank. And now there was no sign of the
buoy which marked the channel. In addition to this we faced a current we
had not counted on.

I searched and searched for th