18 January.
In the morning the three groups of ships returned to the bay of Katakolo. This morning we found delicious, because the sun, though invisible, had whitened the edges of the clouds, and the monotonous rain had given place to brief showers; fragments of rainbow, scattered over the network of the waves, brightened the gray web of the sea. And land was near, fair, almost gay, under the false smiles of day, after being lashed by so many weeks of rain. At the edge of a little jetty some slender masts were swaying like bushes; from the white houses of the port a road emerged, winding among the rocks, the olive orchards, and the herds, towards a town situated on a hill. Green foliage covered the buildings of this little town, which the distance rendered imposing. Small imagination is necessary to give grandeur to the stones in Greek lands; as our eyes rested on these buildings, that were perhaps very ugly, they sought there some temple with classic colonnades or majestic portals. Illusion of our memory! This town is named Pyrgos, this province is Arcadia, and the brook which flows into the bay was formerly celebrated by the name of Alpheus; unconsciously we are paying its insignificance the homage which has been won for it by the divine liars of Greek poetry.
But why discuss such meager pleasures? This coast and anchorage are pleasant; would it not be more worth while to enjoy a few agreeable hours? Moreover, our order for departure has come, for it would be strange indeed for a cruiser to remain forever in one spot. The weather is spoiled, no more rainbows or showers. The rain begins to fall again, and shuts out all the light. The Waldeck-Rousseau, accompanied by the Ernest Renan, weighs anchor.
In a few minutes the two cruisers part from the battleships. When shall we see them again? They follow their vague courses in the south, wandering from roadstead to roadstead, and remaining in each without doing anything. They cover fewer miles than the cruisers, but their existence is perhaps duller. We watch, they wait; we run risks, they take shelter. Certainly I had dreamed of another kind of warfare, but I prefer the campaign of the cruiser to that of the battleship.
Just as troops in the army are transported by railway to the seat of operations, so the great ships tow the French submarines to the entrance of the Adriatic. Their base is in the bay of Plateali, behind the palisade of the Archipelago. Between two chases towards Pola and Cattaro, they assemble around an old battleship, the Marceau, which serves them as mother ship. The Marceau collects shipwrecked crews, renews the commissary, furnishes its tools for repairing the small engines. Anxious to get away, the sailors of the submarines work with file and anvil, and are happy when they shorten the delay by a day, or an hour.
We go to look for the Gay-Lussac, whose turn for refitting has arrived. After a night of heavy seas, the Waldeck-Rousseau clears the narrows of Dukato. In default of fine weather, she finds here a little calm. Ithaca, Cephalonia, Santa Maura, the Echinades, and the splendid mountains of Epirus are capped with mist; a foaming sea rages round their base; brooks cover them with a silver network. Some strips of fog float in the channels, cling to the rocks, and tear apart like carded wool.
A winding channel opens out on the cove of the submarines and the Marceau. Crouched in the depths of their den like a nest of strange animals, they look gray and shiny; a thread of smoke is rising lazily from the battleship; the Gay-Lussac, ready to depart, is throwing from its stacks short black wreaths of smoke. Islands and rocks form an enclosed frame all about the waiting Waldeck-Rousseau. Some rocks are formed like saws, crafty and dangerous reefs, scarcely emerging from the water; others suggest a face left unfinished, where some capricious giant, after sculpturing the rough outline of a chin, a nose, or a jaw, has fixed them there forever; certain ones reveal exquisite curves, which one wants to caress like the back of a supple cat or the thigh of a statue.
The Gay-Lussac detaches itself from the group, and emerges from Plateali. On our after deck a group of seamen are arranging the towing tackle; the prow of the submarine halts a few meters from us, and we make the proper maneuver. We can distinguish the features of our comrades in their cramped black garments. Their young faces, ruddy with a fine color that has been tanned by the spray, are gravely happy. A few words are shouted down to them; brief responses come back.
“Are you ready?”
“Quite ready.”