ather,
she was a regular hog, for she rolled, pitched, and wallowed to her
heart's content, varying the monotony at odd moments by burying herself
in green seas or deluging herself in masses of spray.

Her small bridge, with its 12-pounder gun, steering wheel, compass, and
engine-room telegraphs, was placed on the top of the turtle-back and
about 25 feet from the bows. It acted as a most excellent breakwater
and took the brunt of the heavier seas, and how often the _Rapier_ came
back into harbour with her bridge rails flattened down and her deck
fittings washed overboard, I really do not know. It was a fairly
frequent occurrence, for war is war, and they kept the little ship out
at sea in practically all weathers.

Even in harbour, when her officers and men were endeavouring to obtain
a little well-earned sleep, she sometimes had an exasperating habit of
rolling her rails under and slopping the water over her deck, and then
it was that Langdon, her lieutenant in command, wedged in the bunk in
his little cabin in the stern, and driven nearly frantic by the
irregular thump, thump, crash of the loosely hung rudder swinging from
side to side as the ship rolled, rose in his wrath and cursed the day
he was born.

But whatever he thought in his heart of hearts, he would not hear a bad
word against his old _Rapier_ in public. She might be ancient; but
then she had done "a jolly sight more steaming" than any other craft of
her age and class. She might burn coal in her furnaces instead of
oil-fuel, and every ounce of coal had to be shovelled on board from a
collier by manual labour, whereas, in an oil-driven destroyer, one
simply went alongside a jetty or an "oiler," connected up a hose, and
went to bed while a pump did all the work. But Langdon never could
endure "the ghastly stink" of crude petroleum, while coal, though
dirty, was clean dirt. The _Rapier_ might have old-fashioned engines,
but with them one ran no chance of developing that affliction of
turbine craft: water in the casing, the consequent stripping of blades
off the turbine rotors, and a month or so in a dockyard as a natural
concomitant. Moreover, everybody knew that destroyers with
reciprocating engines were far and away the easiest to handle.

So, from what Langdon said, though it is true that he may have been
rather prejudiced by the fact that she was his first independent
command, the fifteen-year-old _Rapier_ was a jewel of fair price. The
power