In the midst of a truly deafening din men dashed from cover to hurl the grapnels across the parapet of the Mole. At first the attempt was a failure, for the set of the tide and the scend of the sea caused the _Vindictive_ first to grind heavily and then swing slightly away from the wall. To add to the difficulty of the storming-party most of the "brows" had been shattered by shell-fire. Two only could be run out, and along them literally lurched the seamen and marines. Swept by machine-gun fire the passage of the storming-party along those frail gangways was a heroic one. In cold blood a man would have been pardoned for hesitating to essay the task. Should any of the men slip and fall--and several of them did--a hideous death awaited them between the grinding hull of the ship and the seaweed-covered masonry of the Mole. Encumbered though they were with Lewis-guns, bombs, ammunition, and explosive charges, and carrying rifles and bayonets, the storming-party continued, one after another, to gain the top of the parapet, whence a drop of fully fifteen feet had to be risked before they could reach the fairly broad but much obstructed roadway on the inner side of the breakwater. Meanwhile, not only had the _Vindictive_ put alongside the Mole farther from the mole-head than had been intended, but she obstinately refused to range alongside. It was the little _Daffodil_ that saved the situation. Bows on, and with her engines continuously going ahead, the Liverpool ferry-boat forced her big consort up against the Mole, and thus enabled the rest of the storming- and demolition-party to land. A few yards ahead of the now secured _Vindictive_ came the _Iris_. In the heavy ground-swell she bumped heavily against the hard granite. Most of her scaling-ladders were smashed to matchwood, and those that remained were almost too insecure to attempt to use. Yet, in spite of hostile fire and the hazardous means of ascent, men were not wanting to risk and give their lives for King and Country. One of the first to ascend was Lieutenant Claude Hawkings. For a brief instant he stood upon the parapet, silhouetted against the glare of the star-shells and the flashes of the guns, striving to engage one of the large grapnels flung from the deck of the _Iris_. The next instance he was shot and fell upon the stonework. Almost simultaneously Lieutenant-Commander G. N. Bradford worked his way to the top of a derrick used for lifting out a large mole-anchor. From this precarious perch he leapt down, alighting on all fours on the parapet. Without an instant's delay he was on his feet again and tugging furiously at the anchor to secure it. This he did, and in the moment of success he, too, was shot, his body falling into the water betwixt the ship and the Mole.