The _Empress of Britain_, one of the new and large vessels, was fitted out as a transport, carrying troops to the Dardanelles, Egypt and India; also from Canada to the Western Front. Besides her own crew she accommodated 5,000 officers and men. During one of her trips across the Atlantic with a full complement of crew and soldiers, a German submarine launched two torpedoes, one of which missed the bow by three feet and the other passed some ten feet astern. It was all in the day’s work; but that was a close shave “between the devil and the deep sea!” The splendid new steamer, the _Calgarian_, of the Atlantic service, was one of the many Canadian ships sunk by the enemy during the War, but not before doing some notable work. Along with the famous _Vindictive_, the _Calgarian_ blocked Lisbon to prevent German ships sheltering there from coming out on raids into the Atlantic; and later, for nearly a year of continuous service, was stationed outside New York to prevent the escape of German ships interned there. Then, when she was convoying thirty vessels across the Atlantic, she was torpedoed and sunk with the loss of forty-nine men. Our old Pacific Coast friend, the _Empress of Russia_, had a thrilling experience as an Admiralty cruiser. She left Vancouver for Hong-Kong on her usual run in August, 1914, but she was already designated for war service. At Hong-Kong her interior fittings were taken out and replaced by coal bunkers, and eight guns were mounted fore and aft. British Naval Reservists and French gun crews were put aboard in place of the Chinese hands, and the _Empress_ started out to work. Shortly afterwards she met the pride of Australia, the cruiser _Sydney_, after that gallant ship had smashed the wicked German rover, the _Emden_. The _Russia_ took off the prisoner members of the _Emden_ crew, including the Captain, Von Muller, and put them out of commission by landing them at Ceylon. With the help of some Indian troops, she captured the Turkish fort of Kamaran on the Red Sea. Then, for twenty-three days, she and her sister Canadian Pacific vessel, the _Empress of Asia_, guarded the British port of Aden until the arrival of British warships. After some more dangerous experiences, the _Empress of Russia_, the _Empress of Asia_, the _Empress of Japan_, the cruiser _Himalaya_, and the destroyer _Ribble_, kept in blockade the Port of Manilla, where fifteen German ships were hiding in the hope of getting out with supplies to their war vessels. Finally the _Russia_ spent a year cruising in the East, and then, when the War was over, slipped back quietly on to her old peaceful run out of Vancouver to the Orient.