1 SEPTEMBER 1917, Page 1

Last week, according to the Admiralty return, we lost eighteen

large merchant vessels sunk by mine or torpedo, as compared with fourteen in each of the two preceding weeks. The total losses in the four weeks of August number sixty-six, as against sixty-seven in the four weeks of July. Mr. Lloyd George's prediction that the losses would be no greater thus seems to have bean verified, but we

are still losing far too many of those precious merchantmen to view the figures with any complacency. Only four ships were attacked unsuccessfully by the enemy submarines.