yde
carried in her womb that day! From where we stood we could see those
square doors, cut in her sides, through which the troops and rushed
into the bullet-hail: we could see, too, the semicircular beach,
where they had attempted to land, and the ribbon of blue water in
which so many, weighted with their equipment, had sunk and died.

And what was that thing a few cable lengths out, a rusty iron
something, rising from the water, and being lapped by the incoming
ripples? It was the keel of the old _Majestic_, which lay there,
deck downwards, on the ocean bed.

"It's too pathetic!" exclaimed the sensitive Doe. "Let's go and
visit the _Clyde_. Fancy, old Moles White was in that boat."

We dropped down from the headland into V Beach Bay, and, in doing
so, passed the limit of the British zone and trespassed upon French
territory. The slope, from the beach upward, was as alive with
French and Senegalese as a cloven ant-hill is alive with ants. The
stores of the whole French army seemed accumulated in the
neighbourhood. There was an atmosphere of French excitability, very
different from the stillness of the British Zone. Stepping from the
British Zone into the French was like turning suddenly from the
quiet of Rotten Row into the bustle of the Boulevard des Italiens.
It was _prenez-garde_ and _attention la! depeches-vous_ and _pardon,
m'sieu_, and _sacre nom de dieu!_ before we got through all these
hearty busy-bodies and drew near the hull of the _Clyde_.

With unwitting reverence we approached. I'll swear I was within an
ace of removing my hat, and that, had I talked to Doe, I should have
spoken in a whisper. It was like visiting a church. Look, there by
the square doors were the endless marks of machine-gun bullets that
had swept the men who tried to leave the boat for the shore. God!
they hadn't a dog's chance. If those bullet indentations meant
anything, they meant that the man who left the square door was lucky
if he got ashore with less than a dozen bullets in his flesh.

We stepped on to the gangway that led to the nearest of the doors
and hurried up to it, catching something of the "Get back--get
back!" sensation of those who had been forced by the bullets to
withdraw into the hold. A huge hold it showed itself to be when we
bowed our heads and stepped into it through the square door. Yes,
they could cram battalions here. What a hive the _Clyde_ was when
they hurled it ashore! And what a swarm of bees it housed