Of course it was impossible to practise sinking blockships or taking storming vessels alongside breakwaters. Breakwaters are only to be found in such public places as Dover, Portland, etc.; it would have been inadvisable to publish our intentions in such a manner. Thus, as far as these special vessels were concerned, the seamanship difficulties could not be lessened by proper realistic practice. The suggestion that we might use _Hindustan_ as the Mole did not {126} appeal to us much, especially as the _Vindictive_ was originally built for ramming and consequently had a very large ram; we had no desire to start badly by sinking one of our own battleships. The life on board _Vindictive_, uncomfortable as it was owing to our numbers greatly exceeding the normal complement, was not altogether devoid of humour. As one walked round the ship there would be a blood-curdling yell and a party of men with fixed bayonets would charge round a corner and hurl themselves upon an imaginary foe. The steel helmets, gas masks, and respirators gave these men a weird appearance, such as one is unaccustomed to see on board ship. Some carried knob-kerries--loaded ash sticks; others grenades, flame projectors, or machine-guns. There was no half-heartedness about the men. Clearly enough they meant business; we had no misgivings about the result. Those days were busy indeed. When work had finished for the day opportunities for sports arose, and there were occasional concerts in the evenings. The tugs-of-war evoked much friendly rivalry between the various sea regiments--the seamen, stokers, Marine Light Infantry, and Marine Artillery. One afternoon a boxing tournament took place and the fighting augured well for the near future. One day, two officers from a blockship paid a call on the _Vindictive_. Visiting cards were not required; we were obviously At Home. But we were quite mystified when one of the officers produced a small chunk of iron and remarked that he had brought it on board in case we ran short of ammunition. He then explained that, during the passage from his {127} vessel, some description of explosive missile had burst within a few yards of his dinghey, and the piece produced had fallen into the boat. Incidentally he accused _Vindictive_ of firing the missile, but we pleaded not guilty or alternatively, as the lawyers say, asserted that he had no right to cross the firing line! Apparently it was a portion of a bomb of sorts fired from one of the ships, fortunately without any other result than to cause considerable merriment to the occupants of the dinghey. Such an incident in the ordinary course of events would have led to very pertinent enquiries, but we were too much preoccupied with the business in hand to worry about such trifles.