s then he had turned and rent the
insolent intruder limb from limb.

The main German Fleet and the French Channel Fleet and North Sea
Squadrons had ceased to exist within twenty-four hours of the
commencement of hostilities.

Once more Britain had vindicated her claim to the proud title of Queen
of the Seas; once more the thunder of her enemies' guns had echoed back
from her white cliffs--and the echo had been a message of defeat and
disaster.

If the grim game of war could only have been played now as it had been
even five years before, the victory would have already been with her,
for the cable from Gibraltar to the Lizard had that morning brought the
news from Admiral Commerell, Commander-in-Chief in the Mediterranean,
that he had been attacked by, and had almost destroyed, the combined
French Mediterranean and Russian Black Sea Fleets, and that, with the
aid of an Italian Squadron, he was blockading Toulon, Marseilles and
Bizerta. The captured French and Russian ships capable of repair had
been sent to Malta and Gibraltar to refit.

This, under the old conditions, would, of course, have meant checkmate
in the game of invasion, since not a hostile ship of any sort would have
dared to put to sea, and the crowded transports would have been as
useless as so many excursion steamers, but--

CHAPTER XXII

DISASTER

About eight o'clock, as the half-wrecked victors and vanquished were
slowly struggling into the half-ruined harbour, five winged shapes
became visible against the grey sky over Calais, rapidly growing in
size, and a few minutes later two more appeared, approaching from the
north-east. They, alas, were the heralds of a fate against which all the
gallantry and skill of Britain's best sailors and soldiers would fight
in vain.

The two from the north-east were, of course, the _Flying Fish_ and the
_See Adler_; the others were those which had been ordered to load up at
the Calais depot, and complete that victory of the Allied Fleets which
the science and devotion of British sailors had turned into utter
defeat.

John Castellan, standing in the conning-tower of the _Flying Fish_,
looking down over sea and land through his prismatic binoculars,
suddenly ground his teeth hard together, and sent a hearty Irish curse
hissing between them. He had a complete plan of the operations in his
possession, and knew perfectly what to expect--but what was this?

Dover and its fortifications were in ruins, as th