And the man who takes his place straight-way forgets that he ever looked down on great rollers from a sixty-foot bridge under the whole breadth of heaven, but crawls and climbs and dives through conning-towers with those same waves wet in his neck, and when the cruisers pass him, tearing the deep open in half a gale, thanks God he is not as they are, and goes to bed beneath their distracted keels.
Expert Opinions
"But submarine work is cold-blooded business."
(This was at a little session in a green-curtained "wardroom" cum owner's cabin.)
"Then there's no truth in the yarn that you can feel when the torpedo's going to get home?" I asked.
"Not a word. You sometimes see it get home, or miss, as the case may be. Of course, it's never your fault if it misses. It's all your second-in-command."
"That's true, too," said the second. "I catch it all round. That's what I am here for."
"And what about the third man?" There was one aboard at the time.
"He generally comes from a smaller boat, to pick up real work—if he can suppress his intellect and doesn't talk 'last commission.'"