The first shot from her 12-pounder was an extraordinarily happy one--it hit the periscope and scattered it in splinters. The Chief Skipper lost not a moment--he rang the telegraph for full speed, turned towards the enemy, and as soon as he got way on the ship dropped a depth-charge set for fifty feet. His miniature fleet was perfectly in hand, and seconded him brilliantly. Drifter _Livelihood_ closed on his port quarter, and dropped her depth-charge almost on the same spot; trawler _Lysander III_ followed with another. The three boats continued to play the game in combination; the leader dropping five depth-charges in all and the others three each. All these exploded satisfactorily, and one of the Chief Skipper’s produced a second heavy under-water explosion, after which large quantities of dark oil and air bubbles rose to the surface. The position was then buoyed, and the division patrolled the area all night, using hydrophones at intervals. Next morning a wireless message was sent to Penzance, and another trawler took the watch as relief. Sweeping operations followed, but the bottom was reported rocky and foul, and no satisfactory result was obtained. Diving was not possible in such a place, and in the end the official verdict was one of ‘Probably seriously damaged.’ For this the reward was only half of what would have been given for a certainty; and, to the gallant trawlers and drifters, that was probably the smallest part of the disappointment. It is trying to end so exciting a chase with a cry of ‘gone away,’ and especially so when you are positive that the cry is a mistaken one. The evidence for a kill was very strong--the enemy’s speed was slow, his periscope was blinded, he was liberally depth-charged at close quarters--there was a violent double explosion to be accounted for, and a good uprush of oil and bubbles. But the line is strictly drawn, and this time the conclusive evidence was unprocurable. Among the many cases of fine team-work by these gallant little fishing-boats two more must be given here--one as an example of the deadly thoroughness and precision with which our trawler and drifter divisions can do their hunting, and the other to show how keenly they will fight against an enemy armed with vastly superior guns.