Adventure, February 20, 1922 — page 156: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

“ a 154 _ The ab drove back stern first, and all felt her release herself. Then the chief electrician stopped the motors. At once she began to sink by the head, fast and at a nearly vertical slant. _ The descent had begun so swiftly that it had cut off the command of the first luff ~ to take bilge soundings. The captain’s _ yell of “Blow your tanks!” had brought no - result as the man at the manifold had been thrown half-way down the forward battery _ deck and now hung by the butterfly bolts of _ the battery pilot-cell. Every man on board from the captain Ta down was clinging for dear life to anything Die he could catch. The Qg was diving as ~ when her whales raced after a Hun boat. rat — PA NUN Na Sf . a “A? ~ chief electrician reversed the motors, and the == ee of the propeller began to retard the dive. _ Then she bumped rather gently and lay over We 7k RNP vir Bi nies -_ onher port side at about forty degrees. = “Some one bring pliers and pull this ae pin,” ordered “the old man,” as he stared at the depth-gage. “That needle has been ‘jammed. Sherry Conway freed himself from two Ss -members of the crew who lay across his body and pulled the pin. The indicator BEE spun round from two hundred, where the pin had held it, to two eighty. — “Aumph!” ‘grunted - Captain Griffin. 2S “Eighty below our limit, eh? A pretty - how-d’ye-do. Wall, you did a mighty _ good thing when you set the motors in is Me) ig a we Se ‘ AS 2 -_ reverse. Going at the rate we were, we -_ would have gone plumb to smash when we hit bottom if it had not been for that. Blow tanks, Burrell. Water coming in around all shafting i in spurts.” “They refuse to blow, captain,” came the report after two trials. The captain figured a moment, then looked up quietly, speaking gently. ; Le! : ie aa “Of course not. Aijr-pressure seventy- = - five. Sea pressure one twenty. Start the pumps and see what they can do. Ease the Clutch in slow.” ~ Over and over the machinists tried the | s Py _ pumps, and every time the clutch would slip. Then the men manned the hand- __ pumps, only to fail. “Take bilge sound- ings In all tanks and wells,” came the next order. “Mr. Stevens, step ‘this way and see if we can determine our bearings. I think J know within a mile or two, but that is too vague.” ae hy 7 ha. 1p 4 am c rs St ae Bclogce with one hand and both legs, the © Adventure | | The officers bent over a depth-chart while the chief gunner’s mate began to | sound. All seemed safe and normal till the -gunner’s mate reached the forward main ballast tank. , Here there was a thick glass dead-eye set in the deck, with a water-tight light inside the tank. The gunner’s mate put his face close to this dead-eye, stared and then rocked back in a squatting posi- tion. His face had gone gray. .“There’s a fish t’ other side that dead- eye,” he gasped. “I saw it.” : Two others dropped above the glass and stared. Then they looked around at their mates in horror. The captain came for- ward. | “Two thirty-pounder fish makin’ love to that light, captain,” said one man. “She must have a hole in her a cow could walk through.” Captain Griffin looked, grunted and walked aft the few paces in the control sec- tion. He turned and came forward again, looking haggard. “‘Men, we are so near to Davy Jones’ locker that you can hear the hinges squeak, but we are not. inside of it yet. All petty officers join your captain and chief officer in consultation. Everybody think hard, for it will take some scheming to get®us out of here,”’ he said. en Hy Ree that lasted for hours, but all alike failed. No. sooner had one proved ~ inadequate than some man sat up and raised _ his voice in advocacy of another. At last, Olson, Swede mariner and stolid butt of all: jokes: “Captain, Ay tank yo yust shoot me out das tube an’ turn das salvage buoy loose ° vunce. Ay take das light vat burn van water hits'it. Dan Ay gat holt, of das buoy an’ signal with das light.”’ “Good nerve, Olson, and I appreciate your offer, but have you thought of the ice and cold up there?” said the captain. “Yas, but Ay can stand it,” was the reply. ‘Long enough anyhow to signal so they save yo’ an’ the other fallers.. It don’t matter ’bout me.” “You’re a real man, Olson; but there is another thing. You would be crushed by sea-pressure before you had gone ten feet. It won’t do.” Dejectedly the Swede went back and sat — down, his head hanging low. THEN began a series of experiments ‘(e6) boo ‘S ~