funnel carried away,' I announced to my Staff Paymaster, whom I had kept standing by to take notes and the time of any incidents I thought worth recording, though just why I concluded it was the after one I don't remember. 'After funnel carried away,' he repeated, and jotted down the entry against the time the disaster had occurred.

"Well, I carried on for the next hour or two with the distinct idea in my mind that one of the funnels was gone, and I even recall wondering several times in the course of the next hour or two whether any damage had been caused in the engine-room, or whether the wreckage was likely to get afire, or whether the smoke would be getting in the way of the guns. Indeed, it is quite possible I tried to get some assurance on these points by voice-pipe. I don't remember precisely. At any rate, it was quite definitely fixed in my mind that that funnel was gone, so that when the next time I poked out to have a look round, I found that it was not even dented, I could hardly believe my eyes. I really am not quite sure to this day what it was that made the infernal banging which I took to be that funnel going over the side.