o torpedo the large craft, but I was aware that the auxiliary
cruisers of the British Government were all over ten thousand tons, so
that for all ships under that size it was safe to use my gun. Both these
craft, the _Yelland_ and the _Playboy_--the latter an American ship--were
perfectly harmless, so I came up within a hundred yards of them and
speedily sank them, after allowing their people to get into boats. Some
other steamers lay farther out, but I was so eager to make my new
arrangements that I did not go out of my course to molest them. Just
before sunset, however, so magnificent a prey came within my radius of
action that I could not possibly refuse her. No sailor could fail to
recognize that glorious monarch of the sea, with her four cream funnels
tipped with black, her huge black sides, her red bilges, and her high
white top-hamper, roaring up Channel at twenty-three knots, and carrying
her forty-five thousand tons as lightly as if she were a five-ton motor-
boat. It was the queenly _Olympic_, of the White Star--once the largest
and still the comeliest of liners. What a picture she made, with the
blue Cornish sea creaming round her giant fore-foot, and the pink western
sky with one evening star forming the background to her noble lines.

She was about five miles off when we dived to cut her off. My
calculation was exact. As we came abreast we loosed our torpedo and
struck her fair. We swirled round with the concussion of the water. I
saw her in my periscope list over on her side, and I knew that she had
her death-blow. She settled down slowly, and there was plenty of time to
save her people. The sea was dotted with her boats. When I got about
three miles off I rose to the surface, and the whole crew clustered up to
see the wonderful sight. She dived bows foremost, and there was a
terrific explosion, which sent one of the funnels into the air. I
suppose we should have cheered--somehow, none of us felt like cheering.
We were all keen sailors, and it went to our hearts to see such a ship go
down like a broken eggshell. I gave a gruff order, and all were at their
posts again while we headed north-west. Once round the Land's End I
called up my two consorts, and we met next day at Hartland Point, the
south end of Bideford Bay. For the moment the Channel was clear, but the
English could not know it, and I reckoned that the loss of the _Olympic_
would stop all ships for a day or two at least.

Having