I at once
ordered hard to dive, and went down to the great depth of ninety-five
metres.
A series of shattering explosions somewhere above us showed that we
were marked down, and we were only saved from destruction by our great
depth, the English charges being set apparently to about thirty metres.
At noon the situation was critical in the extreme. My battery density
was down to 1,150, the few lamps that I had burning were glowing with a
faint, dull red appearance, which eloquently told of the falling
voltage and the dying struggles of the battery.
The motors with all fields out were just going round. The faces of the
crew, pallid with exhaustion, seemed of an ivory whiteness in the dusky
gloom of the boat, which never resembled a gigantic and fantastically
ornamental coffin so closely as she did at that time.
The air was fetid. I struck a match; it went out in my fingers. The
slightest effort was an agony. I bent down to take off my sea-boots,
and cold sweat dropped off my forehead, and my pulse rose with a kind
of jerk to a rapid beating, like a hammer.
I left one sea-boot on.
At 1 p.m. a deputation of the crew came aft, and in whispered voices
implored me to surface the boat and make a last effort on the surface.
A muffled report, as our implacable enemy dropped a depth-charge
somewhere astern of us, added point to the conversation, and showed me
that our appearance on the surface could have but one end.
At 3 p.m. the second coxswain, who was working the hydroplanes, fell
off his stool in a dead faint.
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