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To their great delight the recruits found that the Dewey, like other submarines built since the beginning of the great world war, was equipped with twin periscopes, and that, furthermore, they would be allowed to watch the submersion of the Dewey through the reserve periscope if they so desired. Would they care to? Well, rather!
Jack was in the conning tower at the wheel when he noticed the U-boat across the water. "Looks like an undersea cargo boat," said Jack after he had reported to McClure, and the two stood gazing intently at it through the periscopes. "The Germans aren't trading with cross-atlantic nations any more," said "Little Mack" with a grim smile. "Most likely she is a mother ship for submarines.
"You're lucky," said the A.O. "I had one of my periscopes hit clean by a bullet this morning. Fritz must be having a nap, or he would have had you for a cert." "Anyway," I replied, "it gives me a comparatively clear view now." Time was drawing near. I prepared my camera by clothing it in an old piece of sacking, and gently raising it on to the tripod I screwed it tight.
She has her wireless antenna up and is talking to some one. Suppose we go above and get in communication with her." Accordingly, the engines were slowed down and the Monitor ascended until she was awash. In that position her wireless aerials, telescopically arranged like her periscopes, were run out and the wires strung. Almost immediately she "cut in" on the big submersible.
There is, indeed, a great difference between the submarine boats of the early twentieth century which had to rely on their conning-tower for steering, and more recent boats with their wonderful periscopes and gyro compasses. Similar progress was made in the development of the means of propulsion. The engines used for surface travelling became more powerful and efficient.
To this I ordered them to convey, secretly by night, oil, spare parts, extra torpedoes, storage batteries, reserve periscopes, and everything that I could need for refitting. The little whitewashed villa of a retired confectioner that was the base from which I operated against England. The boats lay at Blankenberg, and thither I went.
Their radius of vision was limited, and in every way they proved unreliable and unsatisfactory. But, just as almost every feature of submarine construction was gradually developed and most every technical obstacle overcome, experts gradually concentrated their efforts on the improvement of periscopes.
Enough that daylight is here and the sun is shining, that periscopes and sleep are once more permitted, that breakfast is at hand, and that some day we shall get back to billets.
When he was in the front line he smoked, read, wrote, and played cards, or, when particularly bored, rose up with his rifle and potted at elusive periscopes, swinging shovels, loop-holes or indiscreet Turks, of whom there were very, very few, in the Turkish lines. As often as not his little game would be cut short by the reply of one of their snipers.
The hull was constructed of double steel -virtually one hull within another -and the space between hulls given over to the storage of fuel oil, thus increasing the cruising radius of the vessel by permitting the carrying of more fuel. The periscopes were of the telescopic variety that could be raised and lowered.
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