And the story of Finnegan's finish went down the hoist and through the ship, everywhere received with momentary sorrow, and increased malediction on the drunken captain, who thought no more—and knew no more—of a blue-jacket than to masthead him with the marines.
The tactics of both admirals being the same, and the speed of both fleets—that of their slowest ships—being equal, they turned, and, like two serpents pursuing each other's tails, charged around in a circle, each ship firing at the nearest or most important enemy. This fire was destructive. A ship a mile distant is a point-blank target for modern guns and gunners, and everything protected by less than eight inches of steel suffered. The Argyll had lost her military mast and most of her secondary guns. The flag-ship Cumberland, raked and riddled by nine- and eleven-inch shells, surrounded herself with steam from punctured boilers shortly after the signal to turn, and swung drunkenly out of line, her boilers roaring, her heavy guns barking. A long, black thing, low down behind the wave created by its rush, darted by her, unstruck by the shells sent by the flag-ship and the Marlborough. A larger thing, mouse-colored and nearly hidden by a larger wave, was coming from the opposite direction, spitting one-pound shot at the rate of sixty a minute, but without present avail; for a spindle-shaped object left the deck of the first when squarely abreast of the helpless flag-ship, diving beneath the surface, and the existence and position of this object were henceforth indicated only by a line of bubbles, a darting streak of froth, traveling toward the Cumberland. In less than a minute it had reached her. The sea alongside arose in a mound, and she seemed to lean away from it; then the mound burst, and out of it, and spouting from funnels, ventilators, and ports, came a dense cloud of smoke, which mingled with the steam and hid her from view, while a dull, booming roar, barely distinguishable in the noise of battle, came across the water. When the cloud thinned there was nothing to be seen but heads of swimming men, who swam for a time and sank. The flag-ship had been torpedoed.
But the torpedo-boat followed her. Pursued by the mouse-colored destroyer, she circled around and headed back in the endeavor to reach her consorts; but she had not time. Little by little the avenger crept up, pounding her with small shot and shell, until, leaking from a hundred wounds, she settled beneath the surface. She had fulfilled her mission; she was designed to strike once and die.
No armored cruiser may withstand the fire of a battle-ship. The Lancaster, leading the Argyll, received through her eight-inch water-line belt the heavy shot and shell of the Moscow and Orenburg. Nine- and eleven-inch shell fire, sent by Canet and Hontoria guns, makes short work of eight-inch armor, and the doomed Lancaster settled and disappeared, her crew yelling, her screws turning, and her guns firing until the water swamped her. The following Argyll scraped her funnels and masts as she passed over.
Eight hundred feet back in the line was the Beaufort, armored like the Lancaster. Her ending was dramatic and suicidal. Drilled through and through by the fire of the Riga, she fought and suffered until the Lancaster foundered; then, with all guns out of action, but with still intact engine-power, she left the line, not to run, but to ram. The circle was narrowing, but she had fully four minutes to steam before she could reach the opposite side and intercept her slayer. And in this short time she was reduced to scrap-iron by the concentrated fire of the Warsaw, Riga, and Kharkov. Every shot from every gun on the three battle-ships struck the unlucky cruiser; but in the face of the storm of flame and steel she went on, exhaling through fissures and ports smoke from bursting shells and steam from broken pipes. Half-way across, an almost solid belching upward and outward of white steam indicated a stricken boiler, and from now on her progress was slow. She was visibly lower in the water and rolled heavily. Soon another cloud arose from her, her headway decreased, and she came to a stop, two hundred yards on the port bow of the onrushing Riga, whose crew yelled derisively—whose quick-fire guns still punished her.
But the yells suddenly ceased and the gunners changed their aim. A small thing had left the nearly submerged tube in the cruiser's stem, and the gunners were now firing at a darting line of bubbles, obliterating the target for a moment with the churning of the water, only to see the frothy streak within their range, coming on at locomotive speed. They aimed ahead; two five-inch guns added their clamor, and even a Hontoria turret-gun voiced its roar and sent its messenger. But the bubbles would not stop; they entered the bow wave of the battle-ship, and a second later the great floating fort separated into two parts, with a crackling thunder of sound and an outburst of flame and smoke which came of nothing less than an exploded magazine. The two halves rolled far to starboard, then to port, shivered, settled, turned completely over, and sank in a turmoil of bursting steam and air-bubbles. Three minutes later the Beaufort lifted her stern and dived gently after her victim, still groaning hoarsely from her punctured iron lungs. In her death-agony she had given birth to a child more terrible than a battle-ship.
The rear ship of the inner column, the Atholl, was officially an armored cruiser, but possessed none of the attributes of the cruiser class. She was the laggard of the fleet, and her heaviest guns were of six-inch caliber; but, being designed for a battle-ship, she carried this temporary battery behind sixteen inches of steel, and had maintained her integrity, taking harder blows than she could give. With the going down of the Beaufort she took a position astern of the Sutherland, and the double line of battle was reduced to a single line; for the Argyll had left the column when the flag-ship sank.
And this is why the overmatched, battered, and all but demoralized cruisers received no more attention from the enemy; it were wiser to deal with the Argyll. The Saratov, blazing fiercely from the effects of a well-planted shell, had drawn out of line, the better to deal with her trouble. Her place in the line and that of the sunken Riga were filled by the following ships drawing ahead; but the fleet still held to double column, and into the lane between the lines the Argyll was coming at sixteen knots, breathing flame, vomiting steel—delivering destruction and death.
She had rounded the Moscow's stern, raking her as she came, and sending armor-piercing shells through her citadel. Some exploded on impact, some inside; all did work. An eight-inch projectile entered the after turret-port, and silenced the gun and gun-crew forever. Before the Argyll was abeam the Moscow had ceased firing. Rolling and smoking, her crew decimated, her guns disabled and steering-gear carried away, she swung out of line; and the appearance in his field of vision of several rushing waves with short smoke-stacks behind, and the supplementary pelting his ship was now receiving from the Marlborough, decided her commander to lower his flag.
On the starboard bow of the Argyll was the armored cruiser Orenburg. Her fire, hot and true, ceased on the explosion of a large shell at her water-line, and she swung out of the fight, silent but for the roar of escaping steam, heeled heavily to port, and sank in ten minutes, her ensigns flying to the last. Mr. Clarkson rejoiced with his gun-crew. He had sent the shell.