Waterbury evening Democrat., 1889-03-21

gales, was hurled forward almost on her beam ends until she was under the edge of ono of the vast masses of descending water. The food which. from even the outer limits of this falling sea, poured upon and into the unlucky vessel nearly swampcd her. and when she was swept back by the rushing waves into less stormy waters, her officers and crew lcaped into their boats and deserted her.
 By rare good fortune their boats were
 kept afloat in the turbulent cea until they reached the nearest torpedo vessel
 Five minutes afterward a small but carefully aimed motor bomb struck the nearly swamped vessel ard with the roar of all her own torl;ctloes she passed
 into nothing.
 The British vice admiral hat! carefully
 watched the repeller through his glass, and he noticed that simultaneously with the appearance of the cloud i1 t!lr air.
 produced by the action e. t.. :.,tor
 bombs. there were two pi;:,s, If ! ::.ch
 smoke from the rcp>ll>r, ...;-~. Y,re signals to the crabs to nu;iTy i..,:.t i.!at, motor gun had been discharges. a:.d thus to provide against accidents ia ase bomb should fail to act. One l.":7 sig
 nified that bomb had been tisr..yr.-cd
 to the north: two, that it had gone cast ward, and so on. If, therefore, q crab should see signal of this kind, and per ceive no signs of the action of bomb it
 would be careful not to approach the re- peller from the quarter indicated. It is true that in case of the failure of a bomb
 to act, another bomb would be dropped of the war syndicate provided that every possible precaution should be taken against accidents.
 Of course the vice admiral did not un- derstand these signals, nor did he know
 that they were signals. but he knew that | they accompanied the discharge of a
 motor gun. Once he noticed that there
 was short cessation in the hitherto con- l stant succession of water avalanches, and during this Hull he had seen two puffs from the repeller. and the destruction, at the same moment, of the deserted torpedo l boat. It was, therefore, plain enough to
 him that if motor bomb could be placed so accurately upon one torpedo boat, and l with such terrible result, other bombs l could quite as easily be discharged upon
 the other torpedo boats which formed
 the advanced line of the feet When l the barrier of storm and cataract again began to stretch itself in front of the l repeller, he knew that not only was it
 impossible for the torpedo boats to send
 their missives through this raging tur- l moil. but that each of these vessels was itself in danger of instantaneous destruc- | ton.
 Unwilling, therefore, to expose his 1 vessels to protitless danger, the vice admiral ordered the torpedo boats to re-
 tire from the front, and the whole line of them proceeded to point north of the
 fleet, where they lay to.
 When this had been done the repeller 1 ceased the discharge of bombs, but the
 sea was still heaving and tossing after
 the storm. when dispatch boat brought
 orders from the British admiralty to the flag ship. Communication between the British fleet and the shore, and con-
 sequently London, had been constant, and all that had occurred had been
 quickly made known to the admiralty
 and the government. The orders now | received by the vice admiral were to the effect that it was considered judicious to
 discontinue the conflict for the day, and
 that he and his whole fleet should return
 to Portsmouth to receive further orders. In issuing these commands the British | government was actuated simply by mo- tives of humanity and common sense The British fleet was thoroughly pre- pared for ordinary naval warfare, but | an enemy had inaugurated another kind
 of naval warfare for which it was not
 prepared. It was therefore decided to
 withdraw the ships until they should be prepared for the new kind of warfare To allow ironclad after ironclad to be disa- blcd and set adrift, to subject every ship | in the fleet to the danger of instantaneous | destruction, and all this without the
 possibility of infiicting injury upon tho
 enemy. would not be bravery; it would | be stupidity. It was surely possible to
 devise means for destroying the seven
 hostile ships now in British waters. Until action for this end could be taken,
 it was tho part of wisdom for the British
 navy to contine itself to the protection of British ports.
 When the fleet began to move toward tue Isle or Wight the SIX crabs, which
 bad been lying quietly among and under
 the protection of their enemies, with | drew southwark and making slight
 circuit. joined the repeller.
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