Behind the commander’s room in the forward gondola was a cabin for the wireless operator, measuring perhaps 6 feet by 4 feet, and behind that again an engine-room containing a 240 h.-p. Maybach Mércèdes engine having six vertical cylinders. Behind the engine was a clutch, a brake, and a reducing gear, through which the power was transmitted to a propeller shaft; a generator for the wireless installation was placed in front. One similar engine was carried in each of the gondolas amidships, and three in the aft gondola, all the engines having wireless generators attached. There were thus six engines, with an aggregate power of 1,440 h.-p., and six propellers. Of the latter, three were worked from the aft gondola, one being placed in the centre at a point distant from the tail about one-fifth of the length of the ship, and the other two one on each side; two were driven from the side gondolas amidships, and the sixth was in connexion with the forward gondola. To reduce air-resistance a streamline form was given to the propeller stays by the aid of a thin two or three-ply wooden casing. The amount of petrol carried was 2,000 gallons, and the speed is supposed to have been about sixty miles an hour in a still atmosphere. The armament, apart from the bombs, consisted of nine quick-firing guns. Of these, two larger than the others were mounted on the roof, two were in the forward gondola, one each in the amidships gondolas, two in the aft gondola, and one in the tail. The lightness of the construction was shown by the fact that the huge tail still containing the remains of the gun platform could easily be rolled over. In addition to the particulars given there were other interesting features. It may be noted, for instance, that practically everything, except the engines and the guns, was made of aluminium alloy. The only woodwork was the narrow platform, known as the ‘cat-walk,’ which ran along the keel and connected the gondolas. It was closed in with fibre. There was a little wood also in the ventilators, which were found intact. The wood was covered with Manchester cotton, which looked like common sheeting, but was really of very fine texture. The pressure of a button in the captain’s cabin opened the sliding grille of framework, and an electrical device permitted each bomb to be dropped separately, either slowly or rapidly. CHAPTER XII LIEUTENANT W. K. TEMPEST, D.S.O. Concerning the raid over England by hostile airships which took place on the night of October 2, 1916, the official report issued by Lord French was to the effect that ten hostile airships crossed the East Coast between nine p.m. and midnight. One airship approached the north of London about ten p.m., but was driven off by gunfire and pursued by aeroplanes. She attempted to return from the north-west, but was attacked by guns and aeroplanes and brought to earth in flames in the neighbourhood of Potter’s Bar shortly before midnight. [Footnote 1: The _Times_, Oct. 3, 1916.]