rating the simple statement
according to their usual habit. Indeed, the nautical expert of _Earth
and Sea_, with the very best intentions in the world, even went so far
as to devote the greater part of a column to the business. It is to be
hoped that his readers were duly edified; but we, who had taken part in
the affair, were merely rather amused.

And so, for perhaps a week, and before being banished to the limbo of
forgotten and unconsidered trifles, the business was a subject for
intermittent conversation and a certain amount of conjecture. Then it
was forgotten, and it is doubtful if it will ever be resurrected in any
naval history of the war.

We had quite a good passage across the North Sea, and at dawn on the
day of the operation we arrived in the vicinity of the Danish coast not
far from the German frontier. The weather was good for the time of
year. Bitterly cold, of course, besides which there were frequent
low-lying snow flurries which came sweeping down across the sea and
made it barely possible to see more than a quarter of a mile; while our
decks, except where the heat of the engine and boiler rooms melted the
snow as it fell, were soon covered. But in between the squalls the sky
was blue, the sea was flat calm, and there was hardly any wind.
Moreover, there was not a sign or a vestige of a Hun anywhere, not even
a Zeppelin; nothing in sight except a few Danish fishing craft.

The seaplanes were soon hoisted out and started off on their job. They
all seemed to get away without the slightest hitch, and it was a fine
sight watching them taxi-ing along the calm water to get up speed, and
then rising in the air one by one to disappear in the faint haze
towards the horizon. What they were to do, exactly, I cannot say, but
within ten minutes they had all disappeared and the squadron steamed to
and fro waiting for their return. They were expected back in about an
hour.

The full hour passed, and nothing happened. Another quarter of an
hour; but still no signs of the 'planes. On board the ships people
began to get rather anxious, thinking that they had been brought down
by the Huns, and everybody with glasses was looking to the
south-eastward for signs of them. But at last, when they had almost
been given up, the first one suddenly reappeared in the midst of a snow
squall. He was hoisted in, and within the next ten minutes the whole
covey, except two, had returned.

How their business had gone