"Rotten as the weather was for it, this was being conducted most coolly and skilfully, and three boats had already left her before we came driving down to her assistance. _Smack_ had signalled us to pick up survivors, and we had stood in, at reduced speed, to 250 yards of the now heavily heeling ship, with the intention of proceeding on down, to the leeward of her to the aid of two of her boats, when we sighted three or four feet of periscope sticking out of the water, one point on the starboard bow and at a distance of about a couple of hundred yards. To see anything at all in rough water like that, you understand, a periscope has to be poked well above the slap of the waves, and that about equalizes the greater difficulty there is in picking up the 'feather' when it's choppy. "I was at my action station with the 12-pounder batteries at this juncture, but as it looked like a better chance for the depth-charges than the guns, no order to open fire was given just yet. The captain ordered the helm to be steadied, and rang up 'Full speed ahead' to the engine-room. We passed the periscope ten yards on the port side, and when the stern was just coming abreast it, two charges were released together. As they were both set for the same depth it is probable that the one staggeringly powerful explosion we felt was caused by their detonating simultaneously. The shock was as solid as though we had struck a rock, and I could feel a distinct lift to the ship before the impact of it. There was something so substantially satisfying about that muffled jar that it seemed only in the natural course of things that it effected what it was intended to. The bow of the U-boat broke surface almost immediately, the fact that it showed before the conning-tower proving at once that she was hard hit and heavily down by the stern. Indeed, the deck of her from the conning-tower aft was fated never again to feel the rush of sea air. "She was now less than a hundred yards right astern of us, and heading, in a wobbly sort of way, like a half-stunned porpoise floundering away from the 'boil' of a depth-charge, on just about the course the _Whack_ had been on when she kicked loose her 'cans.' [Illustration: THE LOOK-OUT ON A DESTROYER AND PART OF HIS VIEW] "The skipper put the helm hard-a-starboard, with the idea of turning to ram, at the same time ordering me to open fire with the port twelve-pounder. That was what I had been waiting for. The gun-crew was down to three--through the others having been detailed for boat work in connection with picking up the survivors from the _Amperi_--but that didn't bother a good deal in a short and sweet practice like this one. The ship was bobbing like a cork from the seas, in addition to her heavy heel from the short turn and the vibration from the grind of the helm. But neither did any of these little things matter materially, for we'd always made a point of carrying out our target practice under the worst conditions.