Just after two o'clock, the _Zemblan's_ stem rose in the air, and hung suspended motionless. The tilted bulk might have been a rock thrust suddenly out of the deep towards the starry sky. Then suddenly, as if released from a pose, the stern plunged under, plunged as if it were the last act of the vessel's conscious will. The destroyer cruised about till dawn. A breeze sprang up with the first glow of day, and scattered the little wreckage which had floated silly-solemnly about. Nothing remained to tell of an act more terrible than murder, more base than assassination. XV CAMOUFLAGE In the annals of the Navy one may read of many a famous duel, and if the code duello were in existence to-day, I feel certain that the present would not be less fiery than the past. The subject which stirs up all the discussion is camouflage. To ask at a crowded table: "What do you think of camouflage," is to hurl a very apple of discord down among your hosts. For there will be some who will stand by camouflage to the last bright drop of blood, and strive to win you to their mind with tales that do "amaze the very faculties of eyes and ears." You will hear of ships melting into cloud, of vessels apparently going full speed backward, of ships whose funnels have one and all been rendered invisible. And now the mocker is sure to ask the pro-camouflager in the most serious of tones if he ever saw the ship disguised as a sunset which the Germans unhappily discovered on a rainy day. The signal gun of the anti-camouflage squad now having sounded, the assault begins with a demand of "What's your theory?" The pro's reply something about breaking up spaces of colour, optical illusions--"if you draw horizontal lines along a boat's hull, she will appear longer; if you draw vertical or angular parallels, the vessel will appear shorter." The anti's answer that such an expedient might possibly, just possibly, deceive an idiot child for exactly five and one-eighths seconds, as for deceiving a wily Hun,--Good Night! "Do you mean to tell me," cries the devotee of camouflage, growing angry, "that a ship painted one flat, dead colour is less visible against the sea than one whose surface is broken up into many colours?" "Yes, that's what I mean," retorts the anti. "You know as well as I do that a thing that looks like Vesuvius in eruption is ten times more easily seen than a boat painted a dull neutral grey."