ey had promised themselves some
kind of a celebration in the morning, but in his own cot with no one to
see, a few tears which he fondly deemed unmanly would come. He had the
midnight watch and he knew that he must get some sleep, but it was a
long time before he closed his eyes and drifted off to dream of home and
his mother.

Athwart that dream came a sudden, frightful, heart-stilling roar of
destruction; a hideous crash followed, a terrible rending, breaking,
smashing, concatenation of noises, succeeded by frightful detonations,
as through the gaping hole torn in the great battleship by the deadly
torpedo, the water rushed upon the heated boilers, the explosion of
which in turn ignited the magazines. By that deadly underwater thrust of
the enemy the battleship was reduced in a few moments to a disjointed,
disorganized, sinking mass of shapeless, formless, splintered steel.

As the explosions ceased, from every point rose shrieks and groans and
cries of men in the death-agony hurled into eternity and torn like the
steel. And then the boy heard the surviving officers coolly, resolutely
calling the men to their stations.

He had been thrown from his berth by the violence of the explosion. His
face was cut and bleeding where he had struck a near-by stanchion. His
left arm hung useless. He had lain dazed on the deck for a few moments
until he heard the orders of his lieutenant. He was one of the signal
midshipmen stationed on the signal bridge. Whatever happened that was
the place to which to go; he still had a duty to perform.

Picking himself up as best he could, he hurried to report to the
lieutenant. With such means as were available signals were made. Calls
for help? Oh, never! Warnings that the enemy's submarines were in the
near vicinity and that other ships should keep away.

The captain was on the half wrecked bridge above. The boy noticed how
quiet he was, yet his voice rang over the tumult.

"Steady, men, steady. Keep your stations. Stand by. Be ready."

The old quar

William Babington Maxwell (18661938) was a British novelist. He was a son of novelist Mary Elizabeth Braddon. Though nearly 50 years old at the outbreak of the First World War, he was accepted as a lieutenant in the Royal Fusiliers and served in France until 1917.

Cyrus Townsend Brady (December 20, 1861 January 24, 1920) was a journalist, historian and adventure writer. His most well-known work is Indian Fights and Fighters. He was born in Allegheny, Pennsylvania, and graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1883. He was also a deacon in the Episcopal church. His first wife was Clarissa Guthrie, who died in 1890. His second wife was Mary Barrett.

Rebecca Sophia Clarke (1833-1906), also known as Sophie May, was an American author of childrens fiction. Using her nieces and nephews as inspiration, she wrote realistic stories about children. She wrote 45 books between 1860 and 1903. The most popular being the Little Prudy books. She lived most of her life in her native town of Norridgewock, Maine, where she lived out her life with her sister, who was also a successful author.