ime we met those with whom we were expected to put to sea in an open
boat.

Apparently those in each boat were selected by lot. As one young doctor
in the ambulance service put it: "The society in my boat is not at all
congenial."

The only other persons originally in my boat were Red Cross nurses of
the Post unit and infants. In trampling upon them to safety I foresaw no
difficulty.

But at the dress rehearsal the purser added six dark and
dangerous-looking Spaniards. It developed later that by profession they
were bull-fighters. Any man who is not afraid of a bull is entitled to
respect. But being cast adrift with six did not appeal.

One could not help wondering what would happen if we ran out of
provisions and the bull-fighters grew hungry. I tore up my ticket and
planned to swim.

Some of the passengers took the rehearsal to heart, and, all night,
fully dressed, especially as to boots, tramped the deck. As the
promenade-deck is directly over the cabins, not only they did not sleep
but neither did any one else.

The next day they began to see periscopes. For this they were not
greatly to be blamed. The sea approach to Bordeaux is flagged with black
buoys supporting iron masts that support the lights, and in the rain and
fog they look very much like periscopes.

But after the passengers had been thrilled by the sight of twenty of
them, they became so bored with false alarms that had a real submarine
appeared they were in a mood to invite the captain on board and give him
a drink.

While we still were anxiously keeping watch, a sail appeared upon the
horizon. Even the strongest glasses could make nothing of it. A young,
very young Frenchman ran to the bridge and called to the officers:
"Gentlemen, will you please tell me what boat it is that I see?"

Had he asked the same question of an American captain while that officer
was on the bridge, the captain would have turned his back. An English
captain would have put him in irons.

But the French captain called down to him: "She is pilot-boat No. 28.
The pilot's name is Jean Baptiste. He has a wife and four children in
Bordeaux, and others in Brest and Havre. He is fifty years old and has a
red nose and a wart on his chin. Is there anything else you would like
to know?"

At daybreak, as the ship swept up the Gironde to Bordeaux, we had our
first view of the enemy.

We had passed the vineyards and those chateaux the names of which every
wine-card in every