Gallipoli Diary, Volume I | Page 9

with 10 per cent. extra, over and above their establishment, troops bound for Constantinople ought to have a 25 per cent. margin over establishment?
17th March, 1915. H.M.S. "Phaeton." At sea. Last night we raced past Corfu--my birthplace--at thirty knots an hour. My first baby breath was drawn from these thyme scented breezes. This crimson in the Eastern sky, these waves of liquid opal are natal, vital.
Thirty miles an hour through Paradise! Since the 16th January, 1853, we have learnt to go the pace and as a result the world shrinks; the horizons close in upon us; the spacious days are gone!
Thoughts of my Mother, who died when I was but three. Thoughts of her refusal as she lay dying--gasping in mortal pain--her refusal to touch an opiate, because the Minister, Norman Macleod, had told her she so might dim the clearness of her spiritual insight--of her thoughts ascending heavenwards. What pluck--what grit--what faith--what an example to a soldier.
Exquisite, exquisite air; sea like an undulating carpet of blue velvet outspread for Aphrodite. Have been in the Aegean since dawn. At noon passed a cruiser taking back Admiral Carden invalided to Malta. One week ago the thunder of his guns shook the firm foundations of the world. Now a sheer hulk lies poor old Carden. Vanitas vanitatum.
Have got into touch with my staff. They are all General Staff: no Administrative Staff. The Adjutant-General-to-be (I don't know him) and the Chief Medico (I don't know who he is to be) could not get ready in time to come off with us, and the Q.M.G., too, was undecided when I left. There are nine of the General Staff. I like the looks of them. Quite characteristic of K., though, that barring Braithwaite, not one of the associates he has told off to work hand in glove with me in this enterprise should ever have served with me before.
Only two sorts of Commanders-in-Chief could possibly find time to scribble like this on their way to take up an enterprise in many ways unprecedented--a German and a Britisher. The first, because every possible contingency would have been worked out for him beforehand; the second, because he has nothing--literally nothing--in his portfolio except a blank cheque signed with those grand yet simple words--John Bull. The German General is the product of an organising nation. The British General is the product of an improvising nation. Each army would be better commanded by the other army's General. Sounds fantastic but is true.[4]
CHAPTER II
THE STRAITS
Cast anchor at Tenedos at 3 p.m., 17th March, 1915, having entered the harbour at the very same instant as le g��n��ral d'Amade.
Hurried over at once to a meeting aboard that lovely sea monster, H.M.S. Queen Elizabeth.
Present:--
Admiral de Robeck, Commodore Roger Keyes, Admiral Gu��pratte, cmdg. French Fleet, General d'Amade, General Braithwaite, Admiral Wemyss, Captain Pollen, Myself.
De Robeck greeted me in the friendliest fashion. He is a fine looking man with great charm of manner. After a word or two to d'Amade and being introduced to Wemyss, Gu��pratte and Keyes, we sat down round a table and the Admiral began. His chief worry lies in the clever way the enemy are now handling their mobile artillery. He can silence the big fortress ordnance, but the howitzers and field guns fire from concealed positions and make the clearing of the minefields something of a V.C. sort of job for the smaller craft. Even when the Fleet gets through, these moveable guns will make it very nasty for store ships or transports which follow. The mine-sweepers are slow and bad with worn out engines. Some of the civilian masters and crews of the trawlers have to consider wives and kids as well as V.C.s. The problem of getting the Fleet through or of getting submarines through is a problem of clearing away the mines. With a more powerfully engined type of mine-sweeper and regular naval commanders and crews to man them, the business would be easy. But as things actually stand there is real cause for anxiety as to mines.
The Peninsula itself is being fortified and many Turks work every night on trenches, redoubts and entanglements. Not one single living soul has been seen, since the engagement of our Marines at the end of February, although each morning brings forth fresh evidences of nocturnal activity, in patches of freshly turned up soil. All landing places are now commanded by lines of trenches and are ranged by field guns and howitzers, which, thus far, cannot be located as our naval seaplanes are too heavy to rise out of rifle range. There has been a muddle about these seaplanes. Nominally they possess very powerful Sunbeam engines; actually the d----d things can barely rise off the water. The naval guns do not seem able to knock the Turkish Infantry out of their