The forward turret of a battleship turned, its hooded rifle lifted its muzzle to an angle of fifteen degrees, and spoke with a great voice.
Eleven miles away a ton of steel rushed from the sky, crashed into the water of the bay roaring, ricochetted, struck again half a mile beyond, and again and again. Four times it rebounded, like a pebble, before it disappeared at last; and each time it filled the air with its clamor, like a suffering thing.[59]
The ships’ wireless caught a signal from the aeroplane. The shot had fallen short. The battleship steamed on, and another one in line opened up the mouth of the harbor and fired.
From the aeroplane fell a silver ball. It glittered in the brightening sun, splendid. “Hit!” went the message to the turret; and the crew there embraced and cheered.
It had hit the outer earth-works of the defenses. It had plunged down with a shock that stunned men in mortar pits and gun-emplacements far away—small wonder, for this thing falling from the sky had struck a blow equal to that of New York’s obelisk plunging into Broadway from the top of Trinity Church steeple.[60]
“No Effect!”
“No effect!” reported the watchers in the coast defense to the commandant. Though the impact had shaken the works and the very earth: though the blast from the explosion of its charge had twisted three-inch iron bars within the works, and bent the steel doors of casemates, it had done no harm to the defenses. So well had they been built by the engineers that the rending explosion left a crater for only a moment. The earth rippled down and closed it. The steel and concrete facing underneath held true.[61]
The enemy had the range. Ship after ship passed the entrance, delivered its single shot, proceeded and returned to follow in the circling line. These were the most modern dreadnaughts, firing from 16-inch guns. Their shells tore the earth embankments away in tons and flung dirt high in air and sent it down to bury everything in its way under mounds. But all their fire and all their havoc was in vain, unless they could hit a gun. And the guns were protected by steel armor and concrete and earth piled on earth.
To hit a gun was to attempt to hit a bull’s eye only a few feet square at a range of eleven miles, farther than men can see.