soldiers destined for General Pershing's expeditionary forces, was
torpedoed and sunk when homeward bound with a loss of 70 lives out of
237 men on board. The transport was sunk while under the convoy of
American naval patrol-vessels, and she had on board the usual armed gun
crew.

Not only was the _Antilles_ the first American Army transport to be lost
in the present war, but she was the first vessel under American convoy
to be successfully attacked. She was well out to sea at the time and the
convoy of protecting vessels was smaller for this reason, and for the
fact that she was westbound, carrying no troops. The submarine was never
seen and neither was the torpedo. There has been rumor that the
explosion that sank her came from the inside, but so far as any one
knows this is merely port gossip of such nature as arises when vessels
are lost. Our second transport to be lost was the _President Lincoln_,
taken over from the Germans when war was declared. She, too, was
eastbound, well out to sea, and the loss of life was small. The third
was the _Covington_, formerly the German liner _Cincinnati_, which was
torpedoed in the early summer of this year while on her way to an
American port.

Life on merchantmen, freighters, liners, and the like, crossing the
Atlantic, has been fraught with peril and with excitement ever since we
went into the war. Even with armed guards there are of course all sorts
of chances of disaster, chances frequently realized; but, on the other
hand, in a great majority of cases the vessels of the transatlantic
passenger service have crossed to and fro, giving their passengers all
the thrills of an exciting situation without subjecting them to anything
more serious.