The War on All Fronts: England's Effort - Letters to an American Friend by Mrs. Humphry Ward
page 33 of 163 (20%)
page 33 of 163 (20%)
![]() | ![]() |
|
had gone farther afield than they.
I walked back to my motor, disappointed indeed, and yet exulting. It was good to realise personally through this small incident, the mobility and ever-readiness of the Fleet--the absolute insignificance--non-existence even--of any civilian or shore interest, for the Navy at its work. It was not till a week later that I received an amusing and mysterious line from Commodore ----, the most courteous of men. [Illustration: Marines Drilling on the Quarterdeck of a British Battleship.] [Illustration: Fifteen-inch Guns on a British Battleship.] IV By the time it reached me, however, I was on the shores of a harbour in the far north "visiting the Fleet," indeed, and on the invitation of England's most famous sailor. Let me be quite modest about it. Not for me the rough waters, or the thunderous gun-practice-- "Breaking the silence of the seas Among the farthest Hebrides"-- which I see described in the letters of the Russian or American journalists who have been allowed to visit the Grand Fleet. There had been some talk, I understand, of sending me out in a destroyer; it was mercifully abandoned. All the same, I must firmly put on record that mine |
|