many dense fogs would be met with off the English coast.

She has been cruising about in wait for her prey for over a week. The crew have been given incessant drill and sub-calibre target practice. The plan of attack has been discussed so often that it is known by all the officers.

The ship is "cleared for action." Every stanchion and boat-davit has been lashed to the deck. Every movable object on the deck below has been sent to the protective-deck to avoid, as far as possible, the danger from flying splinters.

The smoke on the horizon has approached, until now it is seen from the top to come from two smoke-pipes framed by something that looks suspiciously like two military fighting-masts.

The crew are gathered on the forecastle. The enemy is now in sight, and the Captain's glass is upon her. A careful scrutiny shows her to be a war-vessel similar in appearance to his own. At a sign from him the drummer beats to "quarters." This sound calls every man to some station. The Captain goes to the conning-tower, a small heavily armored turret beneath the bridge. An aid enters with him to steer the ship by his direction from the wheel within. A small opening near the top gives the occupants a view around the horizon, and numerous speaking-tubes and telephones put them in communication with all the vital parts of the ship. Crews of twelve men each enter the turrets in charge of an officer. Steam is turned on the turret-engines. The guns on the deck below are divided between two divisions of men, each division in charge of a lieutenant, who has an ensign and midshipman as assistants.

The men are stripped to the waist, and their guns are ready for battle; division tubs are filled with water, and the decks are covered with sand. On the berth-deck hatches and scuttles are opened, tackles are hooked, and the cooks are hoisting powder and shell for the battery.

The torpedo clews are charging their deadly weapons with compressed air. Below the protective-deck are half-naked men in the magazines and shell rooms, handling the missiles that are soon to speed towards the approaching enemy.

Down in the depths of the steel hull the firemen feed the mighty furnaces to a white heat. It is all the same to them now as when the monsters are engaged in a death-struggle. The sounds of the discharges, of the explosion of shells, and the cries of the wounded will be too distant and muffled to give them an idea of what is going on in the world above them. The first news will come when the terrible torpedo explodes against their ship's side, dooming them to a watery grave, or the merciless ram sinks into its very bowels, or when a heavy shell penetrates one of the huge boilers, dooming all hands in the terrific explosion that will follow.

The stranger has altered her course and is steaming in the direction of the Kearsarge. There are her two military masts, but no flag as yet to show her nationality. Suddenly something flutters from her mast-head. It is the flag of England! There is no time now to consider what must be done. The ships are but five miles apart, steaming for each other at twenty-knots speed. One minute more and the cruisers will be within battle-range.

The Captain is a man of quick judgment, and his mind is made up in an instant.

From his point of vantage on the bridge he takes a careful look at the stranger and then at the drawing he has of her, furnished by the Navy Department. It is the same vessel; yet why would she be cleared for action if a British cruiser?

Starboard!

The mighty ship swings around in answer to her helm, and is heading perpendicularly to the course of the stranger.

Two midshipmen stationed at the range-finders in the tops are pointing the delicate instruments towards the approaching ship. Dials at each gun automatically show that the distance is rapidly diminishing. The marines have taken their rifles to the superstructure-deck, and are crouching behind a breastwork constructed of closely lashed hammocks. The doctors have removed their medicines and instruments to the ward-room, and the long mess-tables are in readiness to receive the dead and wounded. The chief quartermaster stands ready aft with a spare ensign to hoist over the ship should his country's flag be shot away.

When the range-finder registers three and a half miles the Captain orders the forward turret to fire at the stranger. The air is rent immediately by the blast of the discharge.

The crew wait breathlessly while the shells reach the height of their trajectories. One strikes the sea short, while the other strikes the stranger and explodes.

The irrevocable step is taken. England's flag has been fired upon.

All hands wait to see what the stranger will do. Three miles told the range-finder.

A brown mist shoots from the stranger's forward turret; at the same time the British flag is hauled down, and the flag of the enemy floats defiance in its stead. Two 10-inch shells fall but a few yards short of the Kearsarge, and a moment later the sound of the discharge reaches the ears of her crew.

Two miles and a half registers the range-finder, and all the officers are directed to open fire. Shot after shot belches forth from the Kearsarge's broadside and speeds towards the enemy, exploding against her armor and topsides.

As yet the Kearsarge has not been hit, but now the vapor from the enemy's smokeless powder shoots from the muzzles of a score of guns not two thousand yards away, and two tons of steel are launched on their deadly flight.

The havoc aboard the Kearsarge will never be forgotten. The armor is pierced, the topsides are riddled. The carnage among the unprotected men on the gun-deck and superstructure is awful. But worst of all, many men not wounded by shot and shell are laid insensible by some unseen power.

Skulonite is the word that passes from lip to lip. The poisonous gas is the aftermath of the explosion of shells loaded with this deadly compound.

The men are carried from the compartments filled with the vapor, and the air-tight doors are closed to prevent the spreading of the noxious fumes to the magazines and engine-rooms.

The cruisers are now but fifteen hundred yards apart, steaming in opposite directions. As they circle about one another like mighty birds of prey they are fast approaching within range at which a new weapon will be launched against the other's steel hull, the silent but relentless torpedo. Then the ram will soon crash through one of the cruisers. Which will it be?

The Kearsarge's fire is becoming more desultory as the crew of one gun after another succumbs to the terrible influence of the skulonite.

Suddenly a steel fishlike weapon is seen shooting from the enemy's side. The Captain of the Kearsarge watches with breathless anxiety the line of bubbles on the water's surface, as the torpedo approaches his ship at a terrific speed. It suddenly swerves, and goes but a few yards clear of her stern.

The Kearsarge's breast torpedo is launched at the enemy. With a splash it leaps from her side and speeds on its errand of destruction. The bubbles in its wake show the aim is good. It must strike. But no, it has gone under the enemy's ram.

What is that hazy line to windward, but half a mile distant? It is a most welcome sight to the brave man in the conning-tower, and he heads his crippled ship for the oncoming mist. Soon she is swallowed up in the dense fog-bank, and shut out from her enemy's view.

The enemy gives chase, as the American commander had expected. He turns the trumpet of his sound-detector in the direction of the pursuing vessel, and from its dial ascertains her course.

The enemy is still firing, but the guns of the Kearsarge have ceased to roar, and "silence fore and aft" is commanded of the crew. The fleeing ship goes on until her Captain is sure that his foe has entered the fog, then the helm is put hard