Captain Campbell and his associates paid as much attention to details in their ships as in their personal appearance. The ship's wash did not expose the flannels that are affected by naval men but the dungarees that are popular with merchant sailors. Sometimes a side of beef would be hung out in plain view; this not only kept up the fiction that the ship was an innocent tramp, but it served as a tempting bait to the not too well-fed crew of the submarine. Particularly tempting cargoes were occasionally put on deck. One of the ships carried several papier-mâché freight cars of the small European type covered with legends which indicated that they were loaded with ammunition and bound for Mesopotamia. It is easy to imagine how eagerly the Hun would wish to sink that cargo! These ships were so effectively disguised that even the most experienced eyes could not discover their real character. For weeks they could lie in dock, the dockmen never suspecting that they were armed to the teeth. Even the pilots who went aboard to take them into harbour never discovered that they were not the merchant ships which they pretended to be. Captain Hanrahan, who commanded the U.S. mystery ship _Santee_, based on Queenstown, once entertained on board an Irishman from Cork. The conversation which took place between this American naval officer--who, in his disguise, was indistinguishable from a tramp skipper of many years' experience--disclosed the complete ignorance of the guest concerning the true character of the boat. "How do you like these Americans?" Captain Hanrahan innocently asked. "They are eating us out of house and home!" the indignant Irishman remarked. The information was a little inaccurate, since all our food supplies were brought from the United States; but the remark was reassuring as proving that the ship's disguise had not been penetrated. Such precautions were the more necessary in a port like Queenstown where our forces were surrounded by spies who were in constant communication with the enemy.