“And away he steams, full speed ahead and cutting zigzags. Or maybe he gets his rapid-fire guns ready and watches for Mr. Submarine to rise—like the X-4’s doing now.”
Freed of the dead weight of many tons of sea water blown from her ballast-tanks by compressed air, the submarine rose to the surface like a balloon. Ventilators and hatch-covers were thrown open and we swarmed up on deck to fill our grateful lungs with the good sea air. Three motor-boats from the tug throbbed up alongside with the four torpedoes we had discharged.
“Those boats wait, one this side of the target, one near it and the third over on the far side, to mark the shots and catch the torpedoes after they rise to the surface at the end of their run,” said Lieutenant Scope. “We very seldom lose a torpedo nowadays. They tell a story about one that dived to the bottom and was driven by the force of its own engines into forty feet of soft mud, where it stayed till it happened to be dug up by a dredger.”
The four torpedoes were hoisted aboard, drained of the sea water that had flooded their air-chambers, cleaned and lowered through the torpedo hatch forward down into the magazine. By this time the bridge and railing were again in place and the flags fluttering over the taffrail as the X-4, her day’s work done, sped swiftly up the coast to home and mother-ship.
CHAPTER X
ACCIDENTS AND SAFETY DEVICES
The following submarines, with all or part of their crews, have been accidentally lost in time of peace:
| Date | Name | Nationality | Men Lost |
| March 18, 1904 | A-1 | British | 11 |
| June 20, 1904 | Delfin | Russian | 26 |
| June 8, 1905 | A-8 | British | 14 |
| July 6, 1905 | Farfadet | French | 14 |
| October 16, 1906 | Lutin | French | 13 |
| April 26, 1909 | Foca | Italian | 13 |
| June 12, 1909 | Kambala | Russian | 20 |
| July 14, 1909 | C-11 | British | 13 |
| April 15, 1910 | No. 6. | Japanese | 14 |
| May 26, 1910 | Pluviôse | French | 26 |
| January 17, 1911 | U-3 | German | 3 |
| February 2, 1912 | A-3 | British | 14 |
| June 8, 1912 | Vendémiaire | French | 24 |
| October 4, 1912 | B-2 | British | 15 |
| June 8, 1913 | E-5 | British | 3 |
| December 10, 1913 | C-14 | British | none |
| January 16, 1914 | A-7 | British | 11 |
| March 25, 1915 | F-4 | American | 21 |
The A-1 was engaged in manœuvers off Spithead, England, when she rose to the surface right under the bows of the fast-steaming Union Castle Liner Berwick Castle. Before anything could be done, the sharp prow of the steamer had cut a great gash in the thin hull of the submarine and sent her to the bottom with all her crew. This was in broad daylight; her sister-ship C-11 was rammed and sunk by another liner three years later, at night. The Pluviôse of the French navy escaped the bow of an on-coming cross-channel steamer when the submarine came up at the entrance to Calais Harbor, only to have her topsides crushed in by a blow from one of the paddle-wheels. Collisions like these are less likely to happen nowadays, for the navigating officer of a modern submarine can take a look round the horizon through the periscope from a depth sufficient to let most steamers pass harmlessly over him, and in case of darkness or fog, he can detect the vibrations of approaching propellers by means of the Fessenden oscillator or some similar device. Yet the frequency with which submarines have been intentionally rammed and sunk in the present war shows that they would still be liable to rise blindly to their destruction in time of peace.