To Kiel in the 'Hercules'

by Lewis R. Freeman

"Died of fever in Nishbin," again came the prompt answer. "But" (blurting it out quickly) "how do you know about them?"

Being human, and therefore weak, it was not in me to enlighten him with the truth, and to add that I was merely a second-class Yankee hack writer, temporarily togged out in an R.N.V.R. uniform to regularize my position of "Keeper of the Records" of the Allied Naval Armistice Commission. No, I couldn't do that. Indeed, everything considered, I am inclined to think that I rendered a better service to the Allied cause when I squared my shoulders importantly and delivered myself oracularly of, "It is our business to know" (impressive pause) "all."

My reward was worthy of the effort. "Ach, it is but true," sighed the young officer resignedly. "The English Intelligence is wonderful, as we have too often found out."

"It is not bad," I admitted modestly, as I strolled over to make a note of the fact that the machine-gun mounting of one of the Frederichafens had not been removed.

I could see that my young friend was bursting to impart to Lieutenant X—— the fact that he was a "marked man," but it was just as well that no opportunity offered in the course of the inspection. That the ominous news had been broken at luncheon, however, I felt certain from the fact that when, missing X—— from the group of officers who saluted us from the doorway of the Casino on our departure, I cast a furtive glance at the upper windows, it surprised him in the act of withdrawing behind one of the lace curtains. I only hope he has nothing on his conscience in the way of hospital bombings and the like. If he has, it can hardly have failed to occur to him that his name is inscribed on the Allies' "black-list," and that he will have to stand trial in due course.

It's a strange thing, this cropping up of half-remembered faces in new surroundings. The very next day, in the course of the visit to the Zeppelin station at Nordholz—but I will not anticipate.

Under the terms of the armistice the Germans agreed to render all naval seaplanes unfit for use by removing their propellers, machine-guns, and bomb-dropping equipment, and dismantling their wireless and ignition systems. To see that this was carried out on a single machine was not much of a task, but multiplied by the several scores in such a station as Norderney, it became a formidable labour. To equalize the physical work, the sub-commission for seaplane stations arranged that the British and American officers included in it should take turn-and-turn about in active inspection and checking the result of the latter with the lists furnished in advance by the Germans. At Norderney the "active service" side of the program fell to the lot of the two American officers to carry out. The swift pace they set at the outset slowed down materially toward the finish, and it was a pair of very weary officers that dropped limply from the last two Albatrosses and sat down upon a pontoon to recover their breath. It was, I believe, Lieut.-Commander L—— who, ruefully rubbing down a cramp which persisted in knotting his left calf, declared that he had just computed that his combined clamberings in the course of the inspection were equal to ascending and descending a mountain half a mile high.

Practically all of the machines at Norderney were of the tried and proven types—Brandenburgs, Albatrosses, Frederichafens, Gothas, etc.—already well-known to the Allies. (It was not until the great experimental station at Warnemünde, in the Baltic, was visited a fortnight later that specimens of the latest types were revealed.) The Allied experts of the party were greatly impressed with the excellence of construction of all of the machines, none of them appearing to have suffered in the least as a consequence of a shortage of materials. The steel pontoons in particular—a branch of construction to which the Germans had given much attention, and with notable success—came in for especially favourable comment. (The Commander of the station, by the way, showed us one of these pontoons which he had had fitted with an engine and propeller and used in duck-shooting.) The general verdict seemed to be that the Germans had little to learn from any one in the building of seaplanes, and that this was principally due to the fact that they had concentrated upon it for oversea work, where the British had been going in more and more for swift "carrier" ships launching aeroplanes. It was by aeroplanes launched from the "carrier" Furious that the great Zeppelin station at Tondern was practically destroyed last summer, and there is no doubt that this kind of a combination can accomplish far more effective work—providing, of course, that the power using it has command of the sea—than anything that can be done by seaplanes. It was the fact that Germany did not have control of the sea, rather than any lack of ingenuity or initiative, that pinned her to the seaplane, and, under the circumstances, it has to be admitted that she made very creditable use of the latter.

The one new type of machine at Norderney (although the existence of it had been known to the Allies for some time) was the "giant" monoplane seaboat, quite the most remarkable machine of the kind in the world at the present time. Though its span of something like 120 feet is less than that of a number of great aeroplanes already in use, its huge breadth of wing gave it a plane area of enormous size. The boat itself was as large—and apparently as seaworthy—as a good-sized steam launch, and so roomy that one could almost stand erect inside of it. It quite dwarfed anything of the kind I had ever seen before. Nor was the boat, spacious as it was, the only closed-in space. Twenty feet or more above the deck of it, between the wings, was a large "box" containing, among other things, a very elaborately equipped sound-proof wireless room. The technical instruments of control and navigation—especially the very compact "Gyro" compasses—stirred the Allied experts to an admiration they found difficult to restrain.

One of the German officers who had accompanied us from Wilhelmshaven told me something of the history of this greatest of monoplanes. "This flying boat," he said, while we waited for the somewhat lengthy inspection to be completed, "was the last great gift that Count Zeppelin" (he spoke the name with an awe that was almost adoration) "gave to his country before he died. He was terribly disappointed by the failure of the Zeppelin airship as an instrument for bombing, and the last months of his life were spent in designing something to take its place. He realized that the size of the mark the airship offered to the constantly improving anti-aircraft artillery, together with the invention of the explosive bullet and the increasing speed and climbing power of aeroplanes, put an end for ever to the use of Zeppelins where they would be exposed to attack. He set about to design a heavier-than-air machine that would be powerful enough to carry a really great weight of bombs, and the 'Giant' you see here is the result.