New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1915-02-14
WHEN TEUTON MEETS BRITON ON THE HIGH SEAS

hath shall be given" Before the war
j Great Britain had merchant marine
sunage computed at 100000 gross
...s Germany had one of 100000 tons.
snce then Germany has suffered the al
.ost complete loss of her merchant ma
"a. il we include those ships of hers in
med in foreign ports. But Great Brit
80 despite the activity of Won Tirpitz's
u,bmarines and the ubiquity of Teutonic
,;nes. has materially increased hers.
,u.nce. some of the wrath which curls
inward the Kaiserliche's mustache.
This NAV seem rather surprising (the
Increase in British ships, not the curl OF
The imperial mustache) to those OF us
those imaginations have been fired with
,b. past exploits of the German subma-
IN. and with those to come as promised
:, the announcement from Berlin pro-
s,ribing a ring round the British Isles
There has been something spectacular
and novel. almost inspiring-neutrally
sp.aking-about the German raids on
British commerce, a something that has
seemed wholly lacking in British raids on
German commerce. The Germans have
fought and lodged and captured and fed;
thew have used dynamite and torpedoes;
they have attacked not alone on the seas
surface. in the manner of the Emden and
Karlsruhe but from above and below, as
we'll They have filled the mind; they
have made history! Still rather stupefled
by their pyrotechnics one may be excused
for the subconsciouS impression that they
have been evening up their score in the
merchant marine field with the imperturb-
able J. Bull.
The fact is that they haven't begun to!
The ALLIES FLEETS MADE GREAT
NUMBERS OF PRIZES.
In the first two months OF the war the
allied navies captured as many as 400 Ger
nan and Austrian ships Cat a ratio OF
gwen or eight German to one Austrian)
ia all parts of the world Quietly, with
out anv fuss, the allied cruisers, British
for the most part, conveyed these capt
ured vessels into allied ports, also mainly
British. With almost the entire German
navy bottled up at home the Allies ships,
in virtual command of the seas, could
spare their prizes. A blank shot as sig
nal to heave to; the visit of an officer IN
a whaleboat; the imposition OF a prize
crew : run to the victor nearest colonial
or home port, and the thing was accom-
plished The German crew was informed
or dismissed and in neither case did its
members get home to tell their troubles
to their kinsfolk. The incident was closed
and promptly forgotten.
But the Germans, hunted from port to
port and over the seven seas, possessing
no colonial ports to which to make run
with their prizes and no means OF IN
terning their captured crews, have had no
other recourse than to sink practically all
Of the enemy's ships they have taken and
to turn the captured crews loose to de-
scribe to breathless public the details OF
their capture and the methods and man
ners of such will-of-the wisps as the
Emden and Karlsruhe and those long sub
marines which appear suddenly out OF the
depths to seal the fate of proud bark
Or saucy tramp
John Ashbrook, chief wireless operator
on the British steamer Highland Hope,
one Of the Karlsruhe's victims, has told a
vivid story of the six weeks in which he
was a prisoner aboard one of the ksrls-
fuhes tenders. In that time the little Ger
man fighting ship captured and sunk OH
the coast OF South America eleven British
steamers, including the Highland Hope
and didn't once put into port.
She came upon the Highland Hope
about ! o'clock in the midwatch OF the
morning Of September IA, 200 miles Oh
the coast Of Brazil "a dark ship on the
starboard beam She ran abreast OF her
Prospective prey unit dawn at 4 O'CLOCK
and then, without flag of any sort to
proclaim her nationality, she closed in' q
silent, gray menace. The crew OF the