He looked up suddenly as he glimpsed through the port-holes a dark shape passing above, and then saw that it was but one of the submarines of the fleet above, descending after them and following them, score upon score of long, dark, fishlike hulls, that circled and dipped and sank after them, down toward the fate of a world. Surely in all the record of battles had men never gone toward battle like this, with no shouts or cheers or flying flags or defiant shots, but only the dark, grim shapes that sank gently down and down into the peaceful, darkening depths of the sea. Down, down, down--a thousand feet the dial registered, and the waters about the submarine had become dark blue, all but lightless, and darkening still more as they steadily dropped lower. There were no lights turned on, nothing to betray their presence, and into a still deeper darkness the great fleet sank, while Clinton and Evans and the seamen in the little room stared from the dials to the dark port-holes with strange, set faces. Great currents had begin to rock and sway the submarine as it dropped on, currents from the mighty generator below, Stevens knew, but still they held to their downward progress until the bathometric dial showed a depth of a mile--a mile and a half--two miles---- Abruptly Clinton, at the port-holes, made a sudden gesture, and pointed downward. Stevens gazed intently down into the blackness that seemed to press against the glass, and then he uttered a low exclamation. For he could make out, far below, a ghostly white radiance that filtered faintly up toward them through the filmy depths. Stronger and stronger it was growing as they sank down toward it, and he saw Evans turn, give swift orders through the speaking-tube by his side, and heard the clang and clash of metal somewhere in the submarine as its great torpedo and bomb tubes were made ready. In an instant, it seemed, while they dropped downward still, the stillness of the submarine had been replaced by swift activity. And then, cutting abruptly across the sounds of that activity, came a sharp cry from Clinton. "Those globes!" he cried. "They are coming up! Look!"