Smoke, masts, funnels, and wave-washed hulls, the Whistleresque outlines of our swift guardians had blurred to blankness as I looked back from the companion-way, and only a misty golden halo, flashing out and dying down on our port bow, told where the flotilla leader was talking to the flagship. Tea is no less important a function on a British warship than it is ashore, and nothing short of an action is allowed to interfere with it. Indeed, how the cheerful clink of the teacup was heard in the prelude to the diapason of the guns was revealed to me a few days ago, when the Commander allowed me to read a few personal notes he had written while the light cruiser he was in at the time was returning to port after the Battle of Jutland. "The enemy being in sight," it read, "we prepared for 'Action Stations' and went to tea." A few minutes later, fingers which had crooked on the handles of the teacups were adjusting the nice instruments of precision that laid the guns for what was destined to prove the greatest naval battle in history. Tea was about as usual with us that day, save that the officers who came in at the change of watch were dressed for business--those from the bridge and conning-tower in oilskins or "lammy" coats and sea-boots, and the engineers in greasy overalls. A few words of "shop"--steam pressure, revolutions, speed, force and direction of the wind, and the like--passed in an undertone between men sitting next each other, but never became general. The sponginess of the new "potato" bread and the excellence of the margarine came in for comment, and some one spoke of having rushed off a letter just before sailing, ordering a recently advertised "self hair-cutter." A discussion as to just how this remarkable contrivance worked followed, the consensus of opinion being that it must be on the safety-razor principle, but that it couldn't possibly be worth the guinea charged. All that I recall having been said of what might be taking us to sea was when an officer likely to know volunteered that we would possibly be in sight of land in the morning, and some speculation arose as to whether it would be Norway or Jutland. A recently joined R.N.V.R. provoked smiles when he suggested Heligoland.