THE CREW AT A SMALL GUN ON A BATTLESHIP
From this point of view the shield partly hides the muzzle of the gun. The gun crew are listening to instructions. Note the “Navy Warm” worn by the figure in the middle: often, when the weather is “fine” from the landsman’s point of view, it is still bitterly cold on the North Sea. Two larger guns can be seen protruding from their turret in the deck below.
XC
THE FO’C’SLE OF A BATTLESHIP
The crew of a Battleship at “General Drill” on a brisk spring morning is an exhilarating sight to the spectator posted at a quiet corner well out of the way. The band of the Marines plays, and the maximum of everything possible seems to be going on at once. In the sketch the ship’s boats have been launched and are making their way with steady stroke out to a neighbouring ship and back.
XCI
ON A BATTLESHIP: THE AFTER DECK
The delicate but firm precision of the drawing conveys aptly the general air of a man-of-war’s deck, where everything is intricate without confusion, and busy without fuss.
XCII
INSIDE THE TURRET
Interior of a Big Gun Turret on a Battleship, with the crew at their stations. The breech of the gun is open and looks gigantic in this confined space where every inch is made to serve some purpose. An officer is seen in the gangway between the twin guns, but of course the higher direction of the firing is transmitted from the “Fire control” station situated elsewhere.
XCIII
A BOILER ROOM ON A BATTLESHIP
The vessel is oil-driven, so the stoke-hold is robbed of its old terrors and is remarkably cool. The stokers seem few in proportion to the size of the place, but they are experts of a higher class than coal furnaces required.
XCIV (a and b)
PRACTICE FIRING: BIG GUNS ON A BATTLESHIP
Here the scale of the great guns is only given by the dwarfed rail beneath and by the long stretch of horizon which the funnels subtend. But no merely physical ratio can convey the impression of enormousness that a great naval gun makes on the imagination. By subtler technical means the artist has managed to transfuse this impression from his own imagination to that of the spectator of the drawing.
