"At the moment of the explosion I felt a sharp twinge in the back, and found that I had been struck by a flying splinter of steel. The strain of those hours had been terrible, and of the events that followed I can only recollect two things. I remember finding myself struggling alone in the water with a shower of bullets from the _Dvenadsat Apostoloff's_ tops sending up little splashes about me. Then I felt my strength failing, my limbs seemed paralysed, and I could no longer strike out to save myself. Abandoning all hope, I was sinking, when suddenly a rope was flung to me. I remember how frantically I clutched it, and that a few moments later I was hauled aboard a torpedo boat; but for days afterwards I lay hovering 'twixt life and death, oblivious to all. I was one of the thirteen only who were saved out of a crew of 327 brave officers and men." Such a ghastly disaster could only produce profound dismay among those who manned the remaining British vessels. Straining every nerve to uphold the honour of Britain, the guns' crews of the _Jupiter_, _Sans Pareil_, _Repulse_, and _Undaunted_, with smoke-begrimed hands and faces, worked on with that indomitable energy begotten of despair. Regardless of the awful rain of shot and shell, they reloaded and fired with calm, dogged self-possession, the officers on all four vessels inspiring their men by various deeds of valour, and preserving such discipline under fire as none but British sailors could. The British naval officer is full of undaunted defiance and contempt for his foes; but, above all, he is a strict disciplinarian, and to this our country in a great measure owes the supremacy our Navy has hitherto enjoyed upon the seas. During the fight the vessels had been moving in a north-easterly direction, and although the Russians were unaware of the fact, Her Majesty's ships had therefore continued in their course. Hence, just as a cool breeze sprang up at sundown, soon after the _Edgar_ had sunk, a line of low dark cliffs was sighted ahead. The officers of the _Diana_, watching anxiously through their glasses, distinguished the distant crest of Mount Genargentu gradually appearing against the clear evening sky, and then they knew that they were off Sardinia, outside the Gulf of Oristano. Altering their course, they headed due north, still keeping up a running fire, but the Russians prevented them making headway. All our vessels were suffering frightfully, when there was a sudden explosion, and, to the Englishmen's dismay, it was seen that a torpedo had struck the _Undaunted_ nearly amidships. Still the doomed vessel managed to evade a second attack, and by a desperate manoeuvre the captain succeeded in turning and heading for land.