The _Shark_ was then lying with disabled engines helpless under a heavy fire, and Lieutenant-Commander John O. Barren, who commanded the _Acasta_, and had been second in the line, gallantly brought his destroyer between the _Shark_ and the enemy’s fire, and signalled to ask if he could be of any assistance. The captain of the _Shark_ was then aft, cheering and encouraging the crews of the midship and after guns. The yeoman of signals, who remained at his side, read the signal and reported it to the captain, who replied, “No. Tell him to look after himself and not get sunk over us.” The yeoman of signals accordingly semaphored Commander Jones’s last signal to the division under his orders, and the _Acasta_ followed in the wake of the other two boats which were rejoining the battle cruisers. It is probable that at this juncture Rear-Admiral Hood sighted the British Battle Cruiser Fleet, which he had been ordered to reinforce, and proceeded to carry out his orders. The Third Battle Cruiser Squadron vanished into the mist, and the enemy closed in upon the _Shark_, which lay rolling helplessly in the swell, blazing defiance from her after and midship guns. The after gun was almost immediately put out of action and its crew killed and wounded. Amid a hail of shrapnel bullets and flying splinters the spare torpedo was hoisted off the rack, and, under the directions of the captain, was being launched into the tube, when it was struck by a shell and burst with a violent explosion, causing heavy casualties. Only one gun, the midship one, now remained in action. The ship was settling down by the bows and every moment she shuddered with the impact of a fresh hit. The riven upper-deck was a shambles, and the dead, mingled with shattered wreckage, were blown hither and thither by the blast of exploding shell. Projectiles, pitching short, flung great columns of water into the air, or passed screaming overhead; the upper-works were riddled by splinters from bursting salvos. One by one the wounded crawled brokenly into the lee of the casings and funnels in pitiful attempts to find shelter; among them knelt the devoted figure of the surgeon (Surgeon-Probationer Robert Walker, R.N.V.R.), endeavouring single-handed to cope with his gallant, hopeless task. When last seen he was bandaging a man who had lost a hand when the torpedo exploded. He was then himself severely wounded, and was apparently shortly afterwards killed.