ad turned to the southeast, and the Andrew Jackson,
greatly battered but uninjured in any fighting part was passing between
her and the still fresh and vigorous Furst Bismarck to intercept and
meet the latter's fire. Away to the west the Hermann and the Germanicus
had appeared and were coming into action.

In the pause, after the Susquehanna's disaster Bert became aware of a
trivial sound like the noise of an ill-greased, ill-hung door that falls
ajar--the sound of the men in the Furst Bismarck cheering.

And in that pause in the uproar too, the sun rose, the dark waters
became luminously blue, and a torrent of golden light irradiated the
world. It came like a sudden smile in a scene of hate and terror. The
cloud veil had vanished as if by magic, and the whole immensity of the
German air-fleet was revealed in the sky; the air-fleet stooping now
upon its prey.

"Whack-bang, whack-bang," the guns resumed, but ironclads were not built
to fight the zenith, and the only hits the Americans scored were a few
lucky chances in a generally ineffectual rifle fire. Their column was
now badly broken, the Susquehanna had gone, the Theodore Roosevelt had
fallen astern out of the line, with her forward guns disabled, in a heap
of wreckage, and the Monitor was in some grave trouble. These two had
ceased fire altogether, and so had the Bremen and Weimar, all four ships
lying within shot of each other in an involuntary truce and with their
respective flags still displayed. Only four American ships now, with the
Andrew Jackson leading, kept to the south-easterly course. And the Furst
Bismarck, the Hermann, and the Germanicus steamed parallel to them and
drew ahead of them, fighting heavily. The Vaterland rose slowly in the
air in preparation for the concluding act of the drama.

Then, falling into place one behind the other, a string of a dozen
airships dropped with unhurrying swiftness down the air in pursuit of
the American fleet. They kept at a height of two thousand feet or more
until they were over and a little in advance of the rearmost ironclad,
and then stooped swiftly down into a fountain of bullets, and going just
a little faster than the ship below, pelted her thinly protected decks
with bombs until they became sheets of detonating flame. So the airships
passed one after the other along the American column as it sought
to keep up its fight with the Furst Bismarck, the Hermann, and the
Germanicus, and each airship added to the