The Pensacola journal. (Pensacola, Fla.) 1898-1985, 1915-07-10
CHAPTER ~.
All That Our submarfnSs Could Ae-
eompIish.

S0sAARi@tAs
TNHE volunteer scouts spied out
the air as they did the roads.
It was q volunteer who scared
out IN his biplane from New
Bedford In Massachusetts, that morn
ing when the newspapers announced
the approach OF the hostile feet. He
had learned to loop the loop for fun,
fun being the great object of his gay
though strenuous existence. For fun
he went out to have look at the CON-
Ing invader.
Fortunate it was, indeed, that rich
men had taken up aviation as a sport,
for the enemy had COME with aero
planes counted not by scores. but by
hundreds, and to oppose them the
American army and navy combined
had exactly %. [Of1cial figures: u
army aeroplanes, Is navy aeroplanes,
no dirigibles. two aeroplanes not serV-
Iceable; total effective. 23.1
The volunteer. emerging from a fog
bank, saw ships. Instantly he went
up, up, up. It was a racing one man
bipiane. He thanked heaven for its
speed, for even as he was looking down
On the ships little things detached
themselves from the decks and arose
They were specks at first, but in a
moment they had grown. He watched
them grow out Of corner Of his eye,
but with all the vision, all his concen-
trated attention, he looked at the feet
There. surrounded by war vessels,
be saw a long line Of Immense two
funneled, three funneled and four fun
neled steamships, and he knew that
he was the first American to see the
troops transports OF the enemy.
He was turning In sharp circle to
Zee even while he counted them. He
was darting toward the coast with i've
navy planes behind him, coming on the
wings Of their explosive storm.
He wondered if they were firing at
him. All that he knew was that his
world just then was only One blur Of
whistling, strangling, shifting air and
deafening roar. He struck a hole in
the air and pitched sharply. He swept.
over the fog bank. 1t could not help
him now. He dared not sink low
enough to hide In 1t. Shining brightly
In the bright air. be vo1leyed straight
on, as If he were going to dash into
the blue wall of sky ahead.
He won. He never knew how far
the enemy planes had pursued or
whether they had come near him or
not. He knew only that suddenly
there was a yellow band Of sandy land
deep, deep under him, that the next
Instant trees and hills swept past like
little color prints, and then he came to
earth.
Then he heard the roar OF a motor on
one side OF him and the roar OF mo-
tor on the other. Hands upp' shouted
q man In khaki, leaning from the side
of a swaying. drunkenly rolling car.
He put up his hands, laughing hyster-
icaIly.
Fifteen minutes later the telephone
bells rang in the forts on Fishers is-
land, Plum island, IN the Narragansett
haxbor defenses and In the headquar-
tiers OF the field army. It told them
that the enemy transports were thirty
miles south OF Nantucket island, stand
ing In for Block Island sound or Long
Iaaand.
Up from Fishers island under the
Connecticut shore mounted an army
hydroaeroplana. It rose 1900 feet and
circIed there with such graceful, steady
wheelings that despite It's constant
speed it seemed to be soaring in lazy
spirals Ike sleepy gull. Under the
two fiers in the machine lay the east
ern entrance of Long Island sound
the water gate to New York, with half
open jaws, whose fangs were the guns
Of Fishers island on the north and
Plum island on the south. Utterly
harmless and innocuous seemed those
two jaws, for not even the keenest eye
could make out from above anything
more savage than grassy mounds and
daintily graded slopes Of earth. Not
even the sharpeSt glass could see with
in those pretty models In relief the
dragons of twelve inch mortars that
squatted In hidden pits sixteen in a
group or the sleek, graceful rifled can
non, whose secret machinery could
swing their thirty-five tons upward In
an instant and as instantly withdraw
them after they had spat out their half
ton Of shot.
Between the guarding jaws there
was deep water-deep ana beautifully
green. One Of the air men spoke to the
other. There they go" he said. nod
ding to indicate the water below. Both
looked. They looked into fifty feet Of
ocean, but their height made il but as
thick pane Of dim green glaas. They
saw things moving, deep down. They
were sleek and gray. like small whales