Shows her sheering out of line;
When, her passage undiscerned
We must turn where she has turned,
Hear the Channel Fleet at sea:
Libera nos Dominie.
Kipling
It was on January 15, 1916, that I finally rejoined my ship. She was then in floating dock at ——. That night the dock was flooded, and next morning we warped out and proceeded to our billet in the harbour. About a week later we left ——, and once more the northern mists closed down upon us.
The deadly monotony of the work of the Grand Fleet will probably never be fully realized by any but those whose fate it was to wait day after day, and week after week, for the longed-for encounter with the enemy. Only that ever-present hope carried us through that dreary second winter of war. An occasional interval at sea for manœuvres was the sole relief, and such was our cussedness that even these were greeted by most of us with moans and groans, for we were reduced to a state of irritability and boredom which only the prospect of "action" or "leave" could mitigate. Perhaps, however, to the non-Service reader, an account of one of these periodical trips may not be too uninteresting.
After a period of swinging at anchor at the northern base, we received the customary signals preparatory to going to sea, and about 6 P.M. on the same day we weighed and proceeded in the wake of the Second Battle Squadron. That particular month I had been detailed for a course of engineering instruction and consequently did not have to take any night watches—a stroke of luck since night watch in mid-winter in the North Sea is not a job to be coveted by even the most enthusiastic. The weather was quite calm and no change seemed imminent, although it is not really possible to tell in these latitudes what conditions may obtain from hour to hour. As a proof whereof, the next morning showed a rapidly falling barometer, accompanied by a rising sea, which increased to such an extent that it was not possible to carry out any exercises with the Fleet in the forenoon. However, we held on our course in hopes that the weather would mend, but by lunch-time the sea was running so high that we were forced to turn for home. The main deck was already six inches deep in water, in which floated the usual medley of debris: the gunroom skylight was leaking like a sieve; and even the engine-rooms and boiler-rooms held their unwelcome quota of sea water, which poured down the ventilating shafts.
At one time the Flagship made a signal for all destroyers to close in on her, and of course a rumour started—as rumours will—that she had been mined or torpedoed. But it was happily a totally false alarm, and her signal was only a precautionary measure to enable the C.-in-C. to keep an eye on the small craft, which were making very heavy weather of it indeed. Even our 20,000-ton Dreadnought was creaking and groaning under the impact of the waves, and fenders and life-buoys had broken loose and were sweeping back and forth across the decks, and crashing against the turrets and superstructures.