The _Corsair_ arrived punctually at Plymouth and was waiting to obey the foregoing instructions when, at midnight, there came a telegram which quite overshadowed the episode of carrying the Secretary of the Navy, with all due respect to the dignity of his office. The message, for which the yacht had waited so long, came in the form of a smudged carbon copy as sent through the U.S. Naval Post-Office, but in the eyes of those who scanned it the document was beautiful. It read: U.S.S. _Corsair_ hereby detached duty European Waters. Proceed Brest with Secretary of Navy and report to Admiral Halstead. Load any personnel for which space is available and then proceed New York, touching at Azores if necessary. Transfer any flag records to U.S.S. _Chattanooga_ before leaving Plymouth. Escorted by the American destroyer _Conner_, the _Corsair_ made a fast and comfortable run to Brest. The passengers were the Secretary and Mrs. Daniels; Rear Admiral David W. Taylor, Chief of the Bureau of Construction and Repair; Rear Admiral Robert S. Griffin, Chief of the Bureau of Steam Engineering; Rear Admiral Ralph Earle, Chief of the Bureau of Ordnance; Commander Stewart E. Barber, Pay Corps, who was officially attached to the _Corsair_; Commander Percy W. Foote, personal aide to the Secretary; and Private Secretary May. Brest Harbor was a familiar panorama to the few men aboard the _Corsair_ who had shared the toil and excitement of those early months of patrol work offshore, almost a year before. Now, however, the transports were crammed with troops homeward bound, and there was no more convoying the “empty buckets” out of Saint-Nazaire and Bordeaux and Quiberon Bay, nor was there any chance of a brush with the persistent U-boat which had been dubbed “Penmarch Pete.” The _Corsair_ undertook her good-bye courtesies and ceremonies, one of them a luncheon party on board, at which the guests were Rear Admiral A. S. Halstead who succeeded Admiral Wilson as commander of the naval forces in France; Major General Smedley D. Butler, commanding the embarkation camp at Brest; Vice-Admiral Moreau and Rear Admiral Grout of the French Navy and Mme. Grout; and Commander Robert E. Tod, Director of Public Works at Brest. [Illustration: THE HOMEWARD-BOUND PENNANT. “WE’RE OFF FOR LITTLE OLD NEW YORK, THANK GOD”]