It is difficult to give any idea of the strange feelings that possessed us as we crept through the darkness on the night of August 6, knowing that big events loomed ahead. Would it be a surprise to the enemy? Had they any information of our movements? A single bright light showing on the northerly end of Imbros looked suspiciously like a signal to the Turks, a simple matter when one realised that our bases in these islands were held entirely on sufferance and we had practically no jurisdiction over spies. Our occupation of the various islands was somewhat Gilbertian; after the war between Turkey and Greece both parties claimed the islands in the Ægean, neither being in a position to hold them successfully. Consequently, when the Dardanelles operations commenced, we naturally decided to regard the islands as "No Man's Land," although the Greeks knew that, in the event of a successful campaign, we should probably hand them over to their keeping. It is certain that without them we could never have carried on the operations in this theatre of war. We left the anchorage of Kephalo with every light obscured and silence enjoined, even white clothes and cigarettes being forbidden on deck. It was fortunately a dark night even for these parts. At slow speed with a picket-boat close on our quarter we crept across the twelve miles separating us from Suvla Bay, which by now was generally presumed to be the place chosen for what we hoped would be a surprise landing. Two cruisers, the _Theseus_ and _Endymion_, carrying large numbers of men, and specially fitted with gangways over their sterns to allow the troops to walk down into motor-lighters, were sent on with destroyers towing motor-lighters full of troops to be at the point of disembarkation at about 11.30 p.m. We on the flagship steered a slightly more northerly course, in order not to interfere with these vessels in the darkness, and arrived in Suvla Bay at about 12.30 a.m. The fact that the landing had already begun was shown by desultory rifle-fire from the shore, but of so spasmodic a character that a feeling of hope arose that the surprise was complete. Impatience now became general for the first gleam of daylight. After an apparently endless wait the dawn began to make in the eastern sky, and there was enough light to get some idea of the general state of affairs. On C beach the troops had landed from the cruisers and destroyers in the darkness with practically no opposition. A beautiful sandy shore, sloping at sufficiently steep an angle to allow the motor-lighters to beach without difficulty, facilitated the landing. The troops, dashing forward, were able to penetrate inland and drive the small bodies of Turks out of their trenches. They then advanced over the now dry salt lake some considerable distance.