A HOLIDAY CRUISE.
AT any rate that's how it is labelled in the daily papers, and they ought to know. It suggests that His Majesty's ships, wreathed in roses, with the ship's company dancing the Jazz on the quarter-deck and free beer flowing on the fo'c's'le, proceed slowly from place to place in the sunshine of a September day.
Now I don't want to crab the show and display myself as a middle-aged pessimist, but the truth will out. We are lying this minute some distance off the pier of a well-known seaside resort with a pea-soup fog all round us and visibility reduced to the end of our noses. Certainly one of our ship's boats had a holiday cruise last night all on her own, as she fetched up eight miles down the coast in her effort to reach the ship, and it would have been unwise to mention joy-cruises to the occupants of that boat as they turned into their hammocks, cold and wet, at 3 a.m. this morning.
It is a thing worthy of note that the cruise any other squadron is going is always the one we should like to have gone, and vice versa; if you were in the ward-rooms of the ships of the other squadron, you would have heard that our particular cruise was the only one they ever really hankered after. Still, away with melancholy. Don't let us get into the position of the tired excursionist mother at Weymouth who, on her child complaining that he was tired, lifted him a neatly executed smack under the left ear and remarked: "Take that for not enjoying of yerself."
It must be confessed that, whatever to-day is, yesterday was gloriously sunny. The ship was open to visitors, a treat we had not experienced, except at Southend, since pre-war days. To any of those who think that I am using the word " treat " sarcastically, I would say that, however tired of open days we used to get before the war, it is very different now and a great pleasure to see the crowds of visitors all over the ship, after the grimness and monotony of the last few years.
At 1.30 yesterday we had about 500 people pouring on board from the tug, and the fun began. The procedure is something like this : From the vantage-point of an upper deck the officers and men watch the visitors arrive. The snotties are generally the first to get going. Two fair visions in white with no attendant mother are spotted standing on the quarter-deck looking rather vaguely round. Two young gentlemen slip down the ladder, execute a flanking movement round a turret, and with a courteous salute and brazen mien address the ladies with: "Would you care to look round the ship ? " General satisfaction, smiles, coyness, and the rest of the female heavy gun-fire is brought into action, and off they go to probe the depths of the engine. and boiler-rooms, the heights of the conning-tower and bridges.
Perchance, sometimes, a dragon is in attendance on the fairies, but this does not daunt the unabashed gun-room. Yesterday I was witness of a strategic movement that spoke
well for the future success of the two gentlemen concerned. A mother with two fair daughters caught the eyes of these two ornaments of the gun-room who, sizing up the field of action in a comprehensive glance, advanced to the attack with the usual formula of a look round the ship. It would be a foolish man who thought that mother was included in the invitation. The Chaplain, standing near, unwitting of his share in the exploit, was petrified on being included in the party with a wave of the hand and the remark : " And I'm sure our Chaplain would be delighted to show your mother the chapel." An enraged but outwardly smiling padre found himself attaChed to an elderly lady from West Hampstead for the rest of the afternoon, while later on from the interior of the gun-room came shrieks of pleasure from the party gathered therein enjoying tea. " Such is life," as a seaman friend of mine, who was an enthusiastic leave-breaker, used to remark every time he found himself on the mat.
Of course, there is not much privacy in the ship when the crowd is on board, as our surgeon found to his cost yesterday. On going to his cabin for a siesta about 2 p.m. he found it occupied by a stout lady and three children who beamed on him with manifest pleasure. He suggested that it was his cabin, but the lady replied with apparent justice that the ship was -open to sightseers. The surgeon, murmuring something about private apartments, retired from the unequal contest and sought a ward-room armchair, where he was disturbed every five minutes by people walking through and only stopping to gaze at him in his chair and remark: "'fire's one of 'em asleep." All this time the men, too, have been taking their share of entertainment by picking out the nicest-looking parties for a personally conducted tour, and there is much squealing and giggling as the parties adventure the various ladders leading to the heights.
The youngsters are the most fascinating of all the ship visitors. Did any one ever examine a ship with the same minuteness ? Useless it is to tell them that that ladder only leads to a dead end quite uninteresting. They must go to prove you right or wrong. I struggled with parties of them round the ship, and they gave me all the exercise I needed for a week. The questions came at me as if discharged from a quick-firer. Explanations which I, in my old-fashioned way, considered suitable for their years were brushed aside and intricate explanations demanded. I nearly broke my heart over the paravanes and the range-finder. Their chief joy was Admiral von Reuter's barge, which we picked up at the scuttling at Scapa and carry on our boat deck. They had to climb inside the cabin and the engine-room, to twist the wheel, to sit on every seat, in short to examine every cranny. Next time I shall take round a party of octogenarian men of science. They would be easier to explain things to.
One of the best parties I have taken round so far was a crowd of wounded soldiers. They were the cheeriest of people. The more battered they were the more they enjoyed themselves. There was one fellow there minus a leg, and he started operations by hobbling up a very stiff gangway from the tug to us; but this was only a taste of his powers. The next place I found him in was the boiler-room in the bowels of the ship, listening attentively to a chief-stoker explaining the various gadgets. How ho got down only himself and his two mates could explain. They all seemed to take it as a matter of course, so I did not dare show any surprise. The nurses, too, were splendid. They enjoyed every minute, climbing everywhere, and these ships want a bit of climbing. Another among the wounded men tickled me immensely. He had been on board with his wife the previous day among the ordinary sightseers and I had taken them round. When he came on board again with this party, I went up to him and asked whether he wanted me to take him round again. He looked at me is surprise, and I wilted away when I saw that this was no amateur now—he had taken his place among the authorities. He replied coldly and firmly : " No, thank you, Sir; I'm takin' a party round meself." I stifled my mirth and retreated behind a turret. I remembered it had taken me two months to learn my way about this huge box of tricks, and I no longer wondered why the British Army had been proved
invincible. • I am going to turn in now. I have negotiated more ladders to-day than I have in the last year. We have got two and a half more weeks of this holiday cruise,and they tell inc we have been quiet so far to what we are going to be. I wonder if I shall
last the course. Bisa.
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