Now we will take E14 on various work, either alone
or as flagship of a squadron composed of herself and
Lieutenant-Commander Nasmith’s boat, E11.
Hers was a busy midsummer, and she came to be intimate
with all sort of craft—such as the two-funnelled
gunboat off Sar Kioi, who “fired at us, and
missed as usual”; hospital ships going back and
forth unmolested to Constantinople; “the gunboat
which fired at me on Sunday,” and other old
friends, afloat and ashore.
When the crew of the Turkish brigantine full of stores
got into their boats by request, and then “all
stood up and cursed us,” E14 did not lose her
temper, even though it was too rough to lie alongside
the abandoned ship. She told Acting Lieutenant
R.W. Lawrence, of the Royal Naval Reserve, to
swim off to her, which he did, and after a “cursory
search”—Who can be expected to Sherlock
Holmes for hours with nothing on?—set fire
to her “with the aid of her own matches and paraffin
oil.”
Then E14 had a brawl with a steamer with a yellow
funnel, blue top and black band, lying at a pier among
dhows. The shore took a hand in the game with
small guns and rifles, and, as E14 manoeuvred about
the roadstead “as requisite” there was
a sudden unaccountable explosion which strained her
very badly. “I think,” she muses,
“I must have caught the moorings of a mine with
my tail as I was turning, and exploded it. It
is possible that it might have been a big shell bursting
over us, but I think this unlikely, as we were 30 feet
at the time.” She is always a philosophical
boat, anxious to arrive at the reason of facts, and
when the game is against her she admits it freely.
There was nondescript craft of a few hundred tons,
who “at a distance did not look very warlike,”
but when chased suddenly played a couple of six-pounders
and “got off two dozen rounds at us before we
were under. Some of them were only about 20 yards
off.” And when a wily steamer, after sidling
along the shore, lay up in front of a town she became
“indistinguishable from the houses,” and
so was safe because we do not loewestrafe open towns.
Sailing dhows full of grain had to be destroyed.
At one rendezvous, while waiting for E11, E14 dealt
with three such cases and then “towed the crews
inshore and gave them biscuits, beef, and rum and water,
as they were rather wet.” Passenger steamers
were allowed to proceed, because they were “full
of people of both sexes,” which is an unkultured
way of doing business.
Here is another instance of our insular type of mind.
An empty dhow is passed which E14 was going to leave
alone, but it occurs to her that the boat looks “rather
deserted,” and she fancies she sees two heads
in the water. So she goes back half a mile, picks
up a couple of badly exhausted men, frightened out
of their wits, gives them food and drink, and puts
them aboard their property. Crews that jump overboard
