Now to appreciate the significance both of these two main divisions and the composition of Beatty's command--the swiftest and most heavily-gunned {171} vessels that had ever flown the White Ensign--there are two further considerations that must always be borne in mind. Placed as it was, the German navy could scarcely be brought to action against its own will, and the deployment in line of battle of so great a fleet in the North Sea--notably in its restricted southern area--would have been a matter of the greatest difficulty even on a clear day. It was Beatty's task, therefore, to lure the enemy, should he be encountered, into the arms of the Battle Fleet; and, for that reason, he had to be strong enough to engage considerable hostile forces, and yet not so strong as to scare them home again. He had to be swift enough to chase, but also swift enough to run away; and, in order that his mission might be fulfilled, it was essential that Jellicoe with his battleships should at once be not too distant and yet far enough away to escape the wide vision of the German aircraft. In a word, Beatty's squadron, cruising in accordance with the orders of the Commander-in-Chief, had been made both strong enough and swift enough to deal with any probable development. Remembering all this then, and to perceive more clearly the general trend of the approaching conflict, let us forget for a moment about Jellicoe's giants, and follow the fortunes of his junior. Throughout the afternoon and evening of May 30th nothing had been seen of the enemy, and, though he had put to sea in full force on the morning of May 31st, steaming northward parallel to the Jutland coast, Beatty had not come into touch with him by noon. About that time, therefore, he turned {172} north again on his way to rejoin the Battle Fleet, with his light cruisers ahead of him, forming an extended screen, and the four super-dreadnoughts--the vessels of the _Queen Elizabeth_ type--bringing up the rear. The weather was still fine, but the sea was hazy, and clouds had begun to overspread the sky. By this time, unseen by Beatty, the German Fleet, also in two divisions, was bearing to the northwest--Admiral von Hipper, with his five battle-cruisers, the _Derfflinger_, the _Seydlitz_, the _Moltke_, the _von der Tann_, and the _Lutzow_, being well in advance of the main force under the command of Admiral von Scheer--as far in advance indeed, at that moment, as Beatty was in advance of Jellicoe. Thus a bird's-eye view, taken just before two o'clock, would have shown the Jutland coast stretching north and south, a hundred-mile strip of more or less empty sea, lying almost unrippled to the east of it; then the thin line of the German Fleet steaming north and a little west, the dark smoke from its funnels lazily rolling in the same direction; then another strip of empty sea, from fifteen to twenty miles wide; and finally Beatty's squadron, with its light cruisers ahead, also steaming