We have a patrol along the coast, which is composed chiefly of what is known as the Life-Saving Service, or the Coast Guard, as it is now known. We also have an organized system for procuring information from fishermen and others on the coast, extending from Maine to the Gulf. Those sources of information were organized and in operation through the Navy Department at least two years before we entered the war, so I believe that so far as our own coasts are concerned the chances of a base there are almost negligible. * * * I did not rise to go into the details to describe to you the different naval districts of the country and what has been done in each one of them, but simply to tell you what my own opinion is after having examined all the arrangements with the utmost care of which I was capable and with the most intense interest, and I give my word for what it is worth, that in my judgment the Navy and the Navy Department, the Secretary and Assistant Secretary, and all the officers, the Chief of Staff, and every head of a bureau has done everything that human foresight could suggest. * * * I want the Senate also to remember that when newspaper editorials ask what the Navy is doing I should like to have them consider why it is that we have sent all the troops we have sent--and we have sent a great many thousands--why it is that they have gone to Europe without the loss of a transport, thank God, as I do. How is it that that has happened? It has happened because of the American Navy, which furnished the convoys, and no other cause. I wish I could go on and tell you what the American Navy has been doing in the narrow seas. I can not. The Navy has remained largely silent about its work and its preparation, and it is one of the best things about it, but it has been doing the greatest possible work everywhere. It has not failed in convoying the troops. It has not failed in its work in the Baltic and the Channel and the coast of France and the Mediterranean, and it will not fail here. It will do everything that courage and intelligence and bravery can possibly do. In addition to the elusive U-boat, mines laid by the "subs" also proved a constant danger, quite as much as gunfire, bombs and torpedoes. The afternoon of June 3, the tanker _Herbert L. Pratt_ struck a mine two and a half miles off Overfalls lightship, and sank. But she was not in deep water, and was quickly salvaged and towed to Philadelphia. Late that evening at 6 o'clock, the U-151, in another locality, overhauled and sank the _Sam C. Mengel_. The first officer, John W. Wilkins, stated that when the crew were leaving the schooner, the German boarding-officer shook hands with them, and exclaimed: "Send Wilson out here and we will finish him in ten minutes. Wilson is the only one prolonging the war."