In passing the Culebra Cut landslide, in the Panama Canal, one of the propellers of the _Renown_ touched a submerged rock which had escaped the notice of the surveyors. When Balboa harbour was reached the ship's divers went down to see what the damage amounted to; and as poking about the cruiser's bottom, thirty-three feet below the surface, in muddy water infested with sharks, is, to say the least, an unpleasant task, it was characteristic of the ship that one of the first to don diving-dress and go over the side was the Engineer-Commander himself. The result was to ascertain that one of the blades of one of the propellers had had a small piece broken off, but that the damage was so slight that it would not be necessary to dock the vessel for repair. A start was therefore made for San Diego, our next port of call. The course skirted the mountainous coast of Mexico, which showed mistily on the starboard horizon. The water was of the smoothest and clearest, and of tint so blue as to be almost azure. The temperature was tropical, and we found surprising abundance of sea-life. Yellow turtles, as big as footballs, with their little pointed heads stuck out to watch us, floated by in scores. Schools of glistening porpoises leapt in the sun besides a couple of big, slow-moving, log-like blackfish. You can travel from London to Bombay and see hardly a creature, but here the sea teemed. Birds too were plentiful--quantities of duck, white, wheeling gulls, and black, slender, frigate-birds that sailed past like kites. A few days later, in an amethyst sea, off the green slopes of Loma point, the _Renown_ cast anchor. The houses and towers of San Diego, seven miles off, across the Harbour of the Sun, glistened pearl-like in soft morning light, above the golden setting of the Coronada sand. Out at sea, at dawn that day, six grey, business-like American destroyers had met the _Renown_ and escorted her in, a score of United States flying-boats and aeroplanes hovering in well-kept formations overhead. At the mouth of the harbour was lying that fine battleship the _New Mexico_, flagship of the United States Pacific Squadron, which fired a welcoming salute. After the anchor was down, Admiral Williams, acting Naval Commander-in-Chief in the Pacific, who flew his flag on the _New Mexico_, visited the Prince. Mayor Wild, of San Diego, and other local residents also arrived from the shore to pay their respects.