The civilians, to the number of nineteen, were formed upon the poop. A few bore the appearance of being respectable, the others looked utterly out-and-out scarecrows.. The "Trone's" second mate appeared with the passenger list. To Billy's surprise ten of the men were English. "Yes; men sent back from Germany," declared the mate, who, like his skipper, spoke English fluently. "They were exchanged, and were to have travelled through Holland, but the Dutch steamers are temporarily stopped, so they came through Denmark instead." The scarecrows greeted Barcroft with cheerful smiles as he approached. In spite of their rags, the torments of hunger and degradation that they had undergone, they were British to the core--men over sixty years of age who, deemed to be useless by the Germans, had been repatriated: living examples of the gentle and humane treatment afforded to the unfortunate captives who had the ill-luck to fall into the hands of the apostles of kultur. Billy interrogated the men one by one. No need to doubt their words. One and all were unanimous in their story of the horrors of the famine-prisons of Germany. "I won't ever turn up my nose at a dogbiscuit after this, sir," said one old veteran of seventy-two. "William McDonald--where's William McDonald?" inquired Barcroft reading the names from the list. "Here, sir." The speaker was of different appearance from the nine. Although dressed in rough clothes his garments bore the appearance of being practically new, nor did his features betray the traces of months of semi-starvation. "Not much to complain about," he replied in answer to the flight-sub's question. "I was at Eylau. Fair amount of food and of good quality." "You are not sixty, by any means," said Barcroft. "No, not fifty yet. Heart trouble--fit for nothing, so they sent me back to England." "H'm," muttered the flight-sub. "He's one of a few that drew a lucky number, I'm thinking, sir," remarked the man who stood next to him. "Fair slave-driven, that's what we were. But that's all over now, thank God." The rest of the passengers passed muster. They were Danish subjects--merchants and farmers, brought over at the instance of the British Government to assist in certain transactions between Great Britain and Denmark. "A clean bill of health," reported Billy as the destroyer's sub rejoined him. "And all serene down below," rejoined the latter. "We'll shove off. Thanks, captain, for your assistance; sorry we had to hold you up, but we're at war, you know." "Yes," added the Dane, "and you have our moral support. I wish that we were a bigger nation. We, too, have old scores to wipe off--my family lived at Flensburg for years until '66. Flensburg is in Germany now, but some day--who knows?"