Prince went over and settled down at ease on the steel steps of the ladder. "The worst grudge I had against Jutland--save for the way it whiffed out the lives of some of my friends in some of the other destroyers--" he continued with a grin, "was for making me miss my tea that afternoon. We left base the night before, and about daybreak joined up with the 'battlers,' which was our way of speaking of the First Battle Cruiser Squadron, to which the flotilla was attached. It was a fairly decent day, and we were able to make good weather of it with the light wind and easy swell. I had stood the forenoon watch, had a bit of a doss in my hammock in the early part of the afternoon one, and had just gone down to tea before going on for the 'First Dog.' There had been some buzz in the morning about the Huns being out; but that was so old a story that no one paid much attention to it. I was just getting my nose over the edge of a mug of tea when I heard the bos'un growling 'Hands exercise action stations,' and tumbled out on deck to go through the motions of getting ready for a fight that would never come off, or leastways that was how we felt about it. The 'battlers' were speeding up a bit, but there was not even a smudge of smoke on the horizon to hint of Huns. After rigging the fire-hoses and getting out my 'plugs,' I stood by for 'what next,' but nothing happened. At the end of half an hour the order 'Hands fall out' was passed, and, leaving everything rigged, down we went to tea again. The mugs we had left were stone cold by this time, and we were just raising a howl for a fresh lot when, 'Bing!' off goes the alarm bells, and up we rushes again, this time to find signs of what we had been looking and hoping for. A good many hours went by before we went below again, and all through the fight--when things would ease off a bit now and then--I would hear the 'matlos' grousing about missing their afternoon tea.