m the Turkish guns.
It was out of all compliance with naval tradition for warships
to stand and engage land fortifications, for lessons learned by
naval authorities from the Spanish-American and Russo-Japanese
wars had established precedents which prohibited it. But here the
larger warships were carrying heavier guns than those in the forts.
Whereas the _Queen Elizabeth_ carried 15-inch guns, the largest
of the Turkish guns measured only 10.2 inches.

At 11.30 o'clock in the morning of February 25, 1915, the _Agamemnon_
was hit with a shell which had traveled six miles, but it did not
damage her beyond repair. Meanwhile the _Queen Elizabeth_ had silenced
Cape Hellas, firing from a distance far beyond the range of the
forts' guns. And then, just before noon, and after the larger ship
had silenced the main battery at Cape Hellas, the ships _Vengeance_
and _Cornwallis_ dashed in at shorter range and destroyed the minor
batteries there. The _Suffren_ and _Charlemagne_ also took part
in this phase of the engagement, and later, in the afternoon, the
_Triumph_ and _Albion_ concentrated fire on Sedd-el-Bahr, silencing
its last guns by five o'clock in the evening.

The larger ships needed the respite during the night of February
25, 1915, while trawlers, which had been brought down from the
North Sea for the purpose, began to sweep the entrance to the forts
for mines, and cleared enough of them out by the morning of the 26th
to enable the _Majestic_--which had by then joined the fleet--and
the _Albion_ and _Vengeance_ to steam in between the flanking shores
and fire at the forts on the Asiatic side. It was known by the allied
commanders that they might expect return fire from Fort Dardanos,
but this they did not fear, for they knew that its heaviest gun
measured but 5.9 inches. But they had a surprise when concealed
batteries near by, the presence of which had not been suspected,
suddenly began to fire. Believing now that the Turks were abandoning
the forts at the entrance, the allied ships covered the landing
of parties of marines.

Long-range firing had by the end of February 26, 1915, enabled
the allied fleets to silence the outer forts and to clear their
way to the straits. They now had to take up the task of destroying
the real defenses of the Dardanelles--the forts at the Narrows,
and this was a harder task, for long-range firing was no longer
possible. The guns of the forts and those of the ships would be
meeting on