The Military Writings of Rudyard Kipling. Rudyard 1865-1936 Kipling

      Chapter I

       Table of Contents

      ‘. . . . the sailor men

       That sail upon the seas,

       To fight the Wars and keep the Laws,

       And live on yellow peas’

       ‘A Gunroom Ditty-Box.’ G. S. BOWLES.

      Some thirty of her Majesty’s men-of-war were involved in this matter; say a dozen battleships of the most recent, and seventeen or eighteen cruisers; but my concern was limited to one of a new type commanded by an old friend. I had some dim knowledge of the interior of a warship, but none of the new world into which I stepped from a Portsmouth wherry one wonderful summer evening in ’97.

      With the exception of the Captain, the Chief Engineer, and maybe a few petty officers, nobody was more than twenty-eight years old. They ranged in the ward-room from this resourceful age to twenty-six or seven clear-cut, clean-shaved young faces with all manner of varied experience behind them. When one comes to think, it is only just that a light 20-knot cruiser should be handled, under guidance of an older head, by affable young gentlemen prepared, even sinfully delighted, to take chances not set down in books. She was new, they were new, the Admiral was new, and we were all off to the Manœuvres together—thirty keels next day threading their way in and out between a hundred and twenty moored vessels not so fortunate. We opened the ball, for the benefit of some foreign warships, with a piece of rather pretty steering. A consort was coming up a waterlane, between two lines of shipping, just behind us; and we nipped in immediately ahead of her, precisely as a hansom turning out of Bond Street nips in in front of a City ’bus. Distance on water is deceptive, and when I vowed that at one crisis I could have spat on the wicked ram of our next astern, pointed straight at our naked turning side, the ward-room laughed.

      ‘Oh, that’s nothing,’ said a gentleman of twenty-two. ‘Wait till we have to keep station to-night. It’s my middle watch.’

      ‘Close water-tight doors, then,’ said a Sub-Lieutenant. ‘I say’ (this to the passenger) ‘if you find a second-class cruiser’s ram in the small of your back at midnight don’t be alarmed.’

       Fascinating Game of General Post

      We were then strung out in a six-mile line, thirty ships, all heading Westwards. As soon as we found room the Flagship began to signal, and there followed a most fascinating game of general post. When I came to know our signalmen on the human side I appreciated it even more. The Admiral wreathed himself with flags, strings of them; the signalman on our high little, narrow little bridge, telescope jammed to his eye, read out the letters of that order; the Quartermaster spun the infantine wheel; the Officer of the Bridge rumbled requests down the speaking-tube to the engine-room, and away we fled to take up station at such and such a distance from our neighbours, ahead and astern, at such and such an angle on the Admiral, his bow or beam. The end of it was a miracle to lay eyes. The long line became four parallel lines of strength and beauty, a mile and a quarter from flank to flank, and thus we abode till evening. Two hundred yards or so behind us the ram of our next astern planed through the still water; an equal distance in front of us lay the oily water from the screw of our next ahead. So it was ordered, and so we did, as though glued into position. But our Captain took up the parable and bade me observe how slack we were, by reason of recent festivities, compared to what we should be in a few days. ‘Now we’re all over the shop. The ships haven’t worked together, and station-keeping isn’t as easy as it looks.’ Later on I found this was perfectly true.

       A Varying Strain

      One thing more than all the rest impresses the passenger on a Queen’s ship. She is seldom for three whole hours at the same speed. The liner clear of her dock strikes her pace and holds it to her journey’s end, but the man-of-war must always have two or three knots up her sleeve in case the Admiral demands a spurt; she must also be ready to drop three or four knots at the wave of a flag; and on occasion she must lie still and meditate. This means a varying strain on all the mechanism, and constant strain on the people who control it.

      I