We left Punta Arenas on Saturday, November 29th, 1913, spending the night in Freshwater Bay, and the next afternoon anchored in St. Nicholas Bay, which is on the mainland. Opposite to it, on the other side of the Straits, is Dawson Island, and separating Dawson from the next island to the westward is Magdalen Sound, which leads into Cockburn Channel; it was in this last that the _Dresden_ found her first hiding-place after escaping from Sturdee’s squadron and obtaining an illicit supply of coal at Punta Arenas. St. Nicholas Bay forms the mouth of a considerable river, the banks of which are clothed with forests which come down to the sea; near the estuary is a little island, and on it there is a conspicuous tree. Mr. Corry and I went out in the boat, and found affixed to the tree a number of boards with the names of vessels which had visited the place. Jeffery scrambled up and added _Mana’s_ card to those already there. This was our first introduction to a plan frequently encountered later in out-of-the-way holes and corners, and which subsequently played a part in the war. At the outbreak of hostilities the _Dresden_ was in the Atlantic, and had to creep round the Horn to join the squadron of Von Spee in the Pacific. She put into Orange Bay, one of the furthest anchorages to the south; there she found that many months before the _Bremen_ had left her name on a similar board. Moved by habit someone on the cruiser wrote below it “_Dresden_, September 11th, 1914”; then caution supervened, and the record was partially, but only partially, obliterated; there it was shortly afterwards read by the British ships _Glasgow_ and _Monmouth_, and formed a record of the proceedings of the enemy. [Illustration: FIG. 10. RIVER SCENE, ST. NICHOLAS BAY. ]