, firing
grape, shell, &c. I am convinced we should have destroyed all the
torpedo boats.' 'Well, then,' said the Russian officer, 'I should have
followed and attacked you during the night.' 'There again,' I said, 'I
think you would have failed, because before dark you could not have got
near enough to me, on account of the opposition you would have met with
from my fire, to remark the course I steered after sunset, which course
I should have frequently changed during the darkness. A ship cannot be
seen in the dark if she shows no light at more than five hundred yards'
distance, and a moving ship would have been most difficult to hit;
besides which, if I had stopped and put down my defences, what could you
have done?' This discussion ended in the Russian officer admitting that
he did not think he could have done much.

CHAPTER XIX.

THE TURKISH FLEET DURING THE WAR.

To return to the doings of the Turkish fleet in the Black Sea during the
war, Sulina was a point from the beginning always aimed at by the
Russians. In fact, according to my humble ideas, Russia went to war to
get possession of Bessarabia, the key of the Danube, and Batoum, the key
to Asia Minor, and in a great measure to our Indian possessions. I think
the sentimental story of massacres in Bulgaria was merely a blind
whereby to catch the sympathetic support of Europe, and more especially
the English philanthropists. I think this, because when the most awful
cruelties were committed by the Bulgarians on the Turks _after_ the war,
we heard no outcry about massacres. However, I must not introduce
politics into Sketches from a sailor's life; such would be out of place.
Constant attacks were made by land and by sea on Sulina, which was held
and defended by Turkish ships and their crews, who manned the small
batteries they had planted at the mouth of the river. To the Russians,
to destroy the Turkish squadron lying off that port was of great
importance, as Sulina is entirely surrounded by water and great
impassable marshes, which extend far inland, through which marshes the
Danube runs, and thus can always be defended by ships.

The Turkish squadron generally consisted of five or six ironclads, and
as the Russians had not ships wherewith to attack these ironclads,
torpedo attacks (of which so much was and is expected) was their only
chance.

My idea of defending these vessels when at anchor was by a cordon of
guard-boats, with ropes made fast betwe