down and adapted myself to the rigid discipline prevailing.

After breakfast we got under way and steamed over to the northern shore to carry out some gunnery tests.

In the afternoon I went ashore with some of the others and visited the little town of ——, which is the only approach to civilization of which this wild and remote spot can boast.

An account of the following weeks' routine would be of little interest to any but Service readers, and the majority of these will be already but too intimately acquainted with the same. The monotony was pleasantly broken on the fourteenth, on which day the Captain gave a picnic to the gunroom. We all, with the exception of the Acting Sub-Lieutenant, who had to keep the afternoon watch, "cleaned" into picnic rig, which consisted of sea-boots, flannel trousers, sweaters, and various forms of weird and unorthodox headgear. ("Cleaning" is naval phraseology for shifting and is always used even when the said shift is into coaling rig.) Having supplied ourselves with large quantities of cigarettes and tobacco, as well as pistols and shot-guns, fishing tackle, etc., we embarked in the cutter, in which the hampers provided by the Captain had already been placed, and so, at about 1 P.M., set sail for a point on the shore previously decided upon. As soon as we were well clear of the ship, those who had fishing tackle put out their lines, while the rest settled down in the bottom of the boat, and pipes and cigarettes were soon in full blast. Several mackerel were caught on the way over, and half an hour after leaving the ship we grounded. Then every one jumped out, and we anchored the cutter in the shallow water by the shore.

Scattering in various directions we ragged about until tea-time. Some tried their hand at tickling trout in a small stream; some bathed; others set up targets of bottles and practised shooting. When the time came to open the hampers it was found that Captain ——'s hospitality knew no bounds. They proved to contain sandwiches of every sort and description, also cakes, sardines, chocolates, and an unending variety of other delicacies, as well as some tins of superlatively good cigarettes such as rarely fall to the lot of the notoriously impecunious midshipman.... Such a blow-out was not conducive to any more active exercise, and most of us relapsed into the slumber of repletion.

At 4.30 we began to pack up, and by 5 had collected all our gear into the cutter, weighed anchor, and set sail for the ship. More mackerel were caught on the way back, and we eventually drew alongside just as the Acting Sub. was setting off in the picket-boat with confidential papers for sundry ships in the Fleet.

We gave him a commiserating hail, for the wind had shifted to an evilly inspired quarter, and it looked like being rather a dirty night, and then we went light-heartedly below to have our baths and shift into proper uniform.... How little we dreamed then that the joyous memory of the Captain's picnic was destined to be linked for ever in our minds with the saddest of tragedies.... We never saw poor De B. again.... While he was away a heavy sea got up, and when the boat drew alongside again he was found to be missing. All the coxswain could tell was that half-way through the return trip and when about a mile and a half from our ship, he had come up to speak to him for a few minutes, and then, as he (the coxswain) supposed, returned to the stern-sheets. It can only be assumed that a sudden lurch of the boat caused him to miss his footing and so fall overboard. Of course in heavy sea-boots and overcoat he would have little chance in a roughish sea. It was pitch-dark, and no cry was heard, and the crew never even suspected that anything was wrong until the boat came alongside and it was found that he had disappeared.

All our searchlights were immediately switched on, and we made a signal to the neighbouring cruisers, telling them to switch on theirs and sweep the sea all around. All boats were called away, and a minute search was instituted, but it was of no avail, and at midnight had to be reluctantly abandoned as hopeless. Next morning boats were sent out to sweep for his body and search the neighbouring shores; but no trace was discovered until a week later, when H.M.S. —— picked up his cap.

CHAPTER II
OF A HOSPITAL SHIP AND SICK LEAVE

Three days after that picnic and its sad ending we weighed and returned to the winter anchorage. Of the weeks that followed there is little to tell, as of the few incidents which broke the monotony of ordinary routine discretion forbids mention.

Some time in November we proceeded to ——, which same, although a very one-horse place in ordinary circumstances, was a step beyond the more northerly district in point of civilization. But we had only been there about two weeks when I was knocked out by a chill which refused to yield to ordinary remedies. My previous winter, spent mainly in tropical climes, had rather unfitted me for the semi-arctic conditions obtaining in the North Sea.

After a couple of days spent in the dignified seclusion of a cabin, the Fleet Surgeon packed me off to the hospital ship China. This was real jam, for I was not so ill but that I was able to highly appreciate the comfort and luxury provided by a paternal Government for the sick N.O. Moreover, the Captain of the hospital ship proved to be an old acquaintance who had often entertained me and my former messmates on his ship when she and the Goliath were lying together at Mombasa a year before. I was put into the officers' ward, which was empty at this time, and the nurses were most awfully kind and attentive. One does appreciate feminine ministrations after living for so long in the exclusive society of the mere man.

It was with great glee that from my luxurious idleness I watched the Fleet depart once more for the northern base, hugging the knowledge that the medical powers had decreed that I was to go south in a few days' time.

On December 2 I said "good-bye" to the staff of the China and embarked in a drifter for the beach. On arrival I walked to the station and there waited for the ambulance with the doctor and the other patients. When they turned up, I strolled up and down with Dr. —— for about three-quarters of an hour until the hospital train came in. This train was magnificently appointed, with big coaches—rather like Pullman-cars, fitted up with swinging cots. The officers' sleeping compartment consisted of one of these cars divided by a curtain from the men's half, and containing about six cots. For some four hours—except when the two medical officers attached to the train staff came in to bear