Vagabonds of the sea

by Maurice Larrouy

Morning passes. Halted before the harbor of Lissa, the three cruisers wait while the destroyers finish their task at leisure. Midday sounds. Beyond doubt, the Austrian bases of Cattaro, Pola, and Sebenico have been notified of our action. The early hours of the afternoon pass. No enemy squadron appears to take up the challenge. Will our armed forces below the horizon have to wait in vain for the wireless announcing that our enemy will avenge the insult offered their territory? Is France really at war with Austria? The commander of the squadrons comes to make his report to the rear-admiral of the Waldeck-Rousseau. He tells of the terror of the inhabitants of Lissa, their meekness, the taking of two hostages on board his destroyer. Our wireless requests supplementary orders from the Commander-in-Chief. Suddenly, emerging from the maze of the Austrian islands, appear at last two columns of smoke. All the glasses and telescopes are turned towards these longed-for shadows. Our hearts leap; our eyes fear they are mistaken. But no! The enemy is replying to the insult. Numerous masts are graven on the horizon. Everyone sees them rise, and whenever a new one appears utters a cry of joy. Five! Ten! Fifteen! Eighteen! The great Day has come.

The sun shines brightly. Not a ripple breaks the sea. Our rear-admiral hoists signals of chase and combat, the division of cruisers and two squadrons of destroyers advance with all speed toward the hostile smoke. As yet we do not know the strength, the number, the armament, of this enemy who offers battle. What matter! The tops of its stacks cover the northwest sky. We must hasten to the fray. If our first engagement is not victorious, the wireless calls we send to the battleships will bring them hurriedly to the victory we have led up to with our first attack. Joyous trumpets sound to clear the decks for action; the ships of France hoist the shield of battle, the national flag, perfectly new, at the junction of two masts. In a few minutes all the men are running to their posts. They laugh, they sing, they are crazy with excitement. But hardly have they reached their apparatus than they have regained the silence of duty. Firemen at the fires, engineers at the engines, gunners at the guns, have prompt arms, steady spirits, and alert eyes. Along the hull the spray leaps and glides, like the road beside an automobile. In the turret the commandant, the firing officers, and the maneuver officer, await anxiously the moment when they will recognize the enemy as he presents himself to us. They want to increase the speed of the ship, but our screws are already turning madly; they cannot add a millimeter to our speed. At last, on the curve of the sea, are clearly drawn the outlines of our enemy.

Alas! They are nothing but destroyers! Rapid and powerful destroyers, indeed; but Austria could have afforded to offer us antagonists equal to ourselves. Let us be content with the windfall. Too many days have been squandered against invisible enemies. These are real, living, and full of fight. They gallop towards us, with torpedoes leveled. We point our guns, which cannot yet reach them. The match is even. Like us, they have hoisted the flag of battle; and the Waldeck-Rousseau, springing over the water like a full-blooded steed, leads the cruisers and the two squadrons to the adventure where death awaits.

A few minutes of anxious silence pass. Shut in the cells below, the men listen, trying to catch the heavy sound of the first broadside; they would be killed in an instant if a well-aimed torpedo should touch the cruiser, but they devote their stalwart souls to the machinery and the engines, that no one may be wanting in this crisis. Through their telescopes the gun-pointers watch the distance vanishing as if by miracle. Twenty thousand meters.... Eighteen thousand.... Fifteen thousand.... Fourteen thousand.... Only two thousand more, and the rattle of our artillery will rain upon the enemy. In three parallel lines the Austrian destroyers throw out torrents of smoke, which seem to merge; each line glides over the blue water like a shining serpent. Around us our own destroyers have closed up, and are plowing up clods of spray silvered by the sunlight.

But what is this! The Austrian lines swerve, deflect; their head makes a great curve! Is it possible? They would retreat! They would refuse an engagement! We are so angry that our eyes refuse to believe the retreat. It is an illusion of the light; a jest of the wind that makes the smoke bend. Not at all. They complete the circle, turn their backs on us, and fly off at top speed like three trains along their rails of foam.

Oh! To have this revenge in sight for so many futile weeks, and then to see it escape just at the point where our guns cannot reach! To feel that the great engines under our feet, strong as they are, are unable to catch the prey, because its legs are too long! To measure the distance, and feel it increase a little with every second, like an elastic band of air stretched between us! Fourteen thousand meters!

Fourteen thousand one hundred.... Fourteen thousand two hundred. Ah! we should like to be able to control the waves, to throw into the air a sudden squall, to chop up a sea of billows and swells. Our own powerful keels would not be slowed down, but the destroyers would run foul of each crest of the waves, would slacken, become exhausted, and our mettle would triumph over their cowardice.

They make speed towards the labyrinth of the Dalmatian Isles, which loom before us as a family of marine monsters might emerge from the water. We continue the pursuit. Sixteen thousand meters.... Seventeen thousand meters.... Perhaps remorse or faintness will seize the cowards. But no, their confusion is a premeditated ruse. Up in the sky, gliding and descending through the transparent clouds, an aviator drops toward the French ships, enfilades them, and lets fall on us bombs which only the cleverest tacking evades; they burst against the hulls. One of the cruisers catches the wake of a periscope on the surface of the water. It may be that some prowling submarine has already fired its torpedoes, and our speed has deluded it; no one is affected. We shell the path of this streak of foam, which immediately vanishes. The submarine flees below the water, the aeroplane is already out of sight, the destroyers are nearing the entrance to the islands. Eighteen thousand meters.... Nineteen thousand.... Each second of pursuit increases the danger, the useless danger which has no chance of reward. It is becoming evident that this Parthian flight leads us into the zone where other submarines are prowling, and other aviators lurking, where slumber dangerous mines, which can inflict slaughter without stirring from their position. Why excite ourselves? We are rushing towards a death that will bring no glory to the Navy, no benefit to France. Austria will have a victory which will not even have achetée son courage.

The rear-admiral has the signals hoisted. While the Austrian destroyers are hidden in the straits into which they hope to draw us, our cruisers and destroyers make a wide detour in the offing; our engines carry us disdainfully away from these coasts which shelter no gallant enemy. One by one, from the depths of the ship, the men who have been enclosed during the combat come out again. They have seen and heard nothing, and they eagerly ask the news. The sailors on deck talk to them in a low voice. Their cheeks turn pale, they clench their hands, their eyes flash with rage. The dejected crew moves silently up and down. Their faces are melancholy, their hearts sore, their nerves seem to have lost their spring.

At twilight, a few hours later, we call together the “naval army.” By means of the wireless messages sent during our chase, the ships have followed with passionate interest the enthusiasm, effort, dangers, and disappointments we have been through. Ready enough to help us, and to give the Austrian fleet a good reception had it come out, they are awaiting us for still another descent of the Adriatic, also to be unfruitful, like so many others. For half an hour, under the golden beams of the setting sun, the squadrons go through the usual maneuvers and get their sailing orders for the night. The majestic, supple lines cross one another, approach and recede upon the parade ground of the sea. Every movement is perfect; the scene resembles a procession of moving cathedrals. In the evening light the hulls take on all the colors of stained windows. The water is strewn with azure and purple flowers. The signals run up and down the masts. Into the sky rise curls of smoke. A religious silence prevails.