bourhood. We got into Milos and found five French
battleships, submarine destroyers. One of the maritime ships was in
the harbour that had been torpedoed two weeks ago. The island is very
picturesque; the houses are built in the Turkish style. We remained in
the harbour for about two hours. We have a submarine destroyer
escorting us, also another ship was with us, so we feel quite safe.
Written notices were sent round to each passenger with instructions
what to do in case we were struck. The captain had an anxious voyage
from here on, keeping watch all the time. We kept going out of our
course and the destroyer and our boat were constantly signalling to
each other. We had to come round by Crete instead of Cape Matapan. The
wind has risen and it is very rough; most of the people are ill. We
had a bad night, continuous thunderstorms and heavy rain. The boat is
rolling as well as pitching.
Saturday, _October 23, 1915._
It still continues very rough and very few passengers are visible.
Nothing exciting has happened; our two escorts are still in front of
us.
Sunday, _October 24, 1915._
This morning a large steamer signalled to our destroyer, so it left us
for two or three hours and then returned. In the night it was
exchanged for another one. We were told that they had to be very
careful along this route, as nine boats were torpedoed in one week;
naturally we were all more or less anxious, looking down into the cold
water. I much dreaded the risk we ran as I should much prefer to be
shot or shelled to being drowned. We heard that we reach Malta in the
evening, but owing to our having to go so much out of our course we
did not arrive until the following morning at 6 a.m. It was an anxious
night; neither the captain nor the chief officer appeared for dinner;
no end of men were on the watch for enemy submarines; it seems that
there are many in the Mediterranean just now, and we were told that
this is the worst danger zone at present. The Germans have a specially
large new one here which is doing a lot of damage. It has been very
rough all night, and the boat had to slacken speed as we were not
allowed to enter Malta before 6 a.m. I met a very interesting English
lady from Constantinople on board this morning. She has lived there
for forty years. Her husband is a doctor. She had three sons--two
solicitors, the third an invalid. He suffers from
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