After much sifting, the choice was at length made. Those chosen were brave, trustworthy, and--a not unimportant point--powerfully built; each one of them a match for two ordinary men. After four days of uneventful outpost duty, we were back once more. Even before returning I had received by signal the joyful news that my appointment to the command of the _Libau_--that was to be the name of the mystery ship--had been confirmed. I lost no time, you may be sure, about proceeding in, locking through, making fast in the inner harbour, and reporting on board the leading-ship of the flotilla. The best of the volunteers from the other sections were chosen, and the ship's company finally made up. The C.O. of the flotilla, Commander Forstmann, bade us farewell in a short and pithy speech; and then we set to at our packing, for by midday the next day we were to be in the train, bound for a destination as yet unknown. That was the sum of our knowledge, for everything was, so far, in Navy phrase, 'extremely hush.' Neither our friends nor our comrades were to know anything of what we had in hand, for a careless word might be picked up by a spy, and might jeopardise the success of our undertaking, to say nothing of costing us our lives. Next day the train took us to our unknown destination--in fact, to Hamburg. At the dockyard, where we were expected, our first surprise awaited us, in the shape of our future abode. Not, as we had imagined, some patrol boat fitted with all the newest devices, but what, to our outpost-boat ideas, looked, as she lay before us in the evening light, a truly imposing vessel. The chorus of exclamations which broke from my gallant fellows showed that they were as agreeably disappointed as I was myself. She was not, of course, really 'an Atlantic liner,' as one of my men called her, but on account of her lofty upper-works, and of her being completely empty, she stood high out of the water, which considerably increased her apparent size. The _Libau_--why she received this name will be explained later--was an almost new English steamer. Under the name _Castro_ she had formerly belonged to the Wilson Line of Hull, and in the early days of the war she had been brought in as a prize by one of our destroyers. On board, everything was still in the same condition as when the English crew abandoned her--a welter of oddments of various kinds, hastily pulled-out drawers, papers, and so forth. The engines and boilers, which had been overhauled by the dockyard people, and the living accommodation for officers and men, which had likewise been re-conditioned, made by contrast a quite satisfactory impression. On the bridge, on the other hand, and in the chart-house--with us the holy-of-holies of every ship--everything was rather neglected-looking. In an English tramp steamer that did not, of course, surprise us.