When we hit bottom, we all expected to see the hull crushed by the impact, and the water rushing in; but the soft mud had saved us—for perhaps a much worse death. The motors were stopped. The ship gradually came to rest with the bow on the ocean bed at an angle of about thirty degrees. The depth-gauge showed one hundred thirty-two feet. “Bowers,” said the Captain to the chief-of-the-boat, “have all the men go to the engine-room. Tell them there is nothing to worry about—that we will have the boat up in a few hours.” The crew gathered in the engine-room. Although there were several very scared-looking faces, still they were taking it well with no signs of anyone breaking under the strain—as yet. When Bowers joined the officers in the control-room, a conference that I’ll never forget was held. “I guess you all realize what we are up against,” said the Captain. “There’s one thing certain, and that is that we will have to come to a quick decision, and it will have to be the right one the first time. Past submarine disasters have shown us that, for we probably won’t have time to try out more than one plan of saving ourselves. “First, let’s size up the situation: With all that water forward, we have too much negative buoyancy to get to the surface, even with tanks blown dry. “Second, there’s no possible way to get that water out. “Now then, as to the length of time we can live on the air we have—that’s problematical. We have two bottles of oxygen, and plenty of air in the air-tanks—at least for breathing purposes—and as a last resort we could flood the ballast tanks again, which would force the air now in those tanks back through the vents into the boat. Still, what good would a fresh supply of air be, unless we could get rid of the old carbon dioxide given off when we breathe? We might be able to take care of that when the time comes by starting the air-compressor, sucking the bad air out of the boat and storing it in one of the empty air-tanks. Something may happen to our electrical power by that time, in which case we might be able to turn the air-compressor over by hand. Thus, if we can take care of the carbon dioxide, we may have enough air to last a week. Unfortunately, we have no soda lime, or we could get rid of the carbon dioxide that way. “The question is—can they find us in a week? And if they do find us, can they manage to rescue us or get fresh air to us before our air-supply gives out?