In an hour or two the submarine landed a shot that seemed to have done serious damage. At least huge clouds of steam arose from the engine-room, furnishing external evidence that the engines or boilers had been disabled. The submarine commander did not know that this was a trick; that the vessel was fitted with a specially arranged pipe around the engine-room hatch which could emit these bursts of steam at a moment's notice, all for the purpose of making him believe that the vitals of the ship had been irreparably damaged. The stopping of the ship, the blowing off of the safety valve, and the appearance of the "panic party" immediately after this ostensible hit made the illusion complete. This "panic party" was particularly panicky; one of the lifeboats was let go with a run, one fall at a time, thus dumping its occupants into the sea. Ultimately, however, the struggling swimmers were picked up and the boat rowed away, taking up a position where a number of the _Dunraven's_ guns could get a good shot at the submarine should the Germans follow their usual plan of inspecting the lifeboats before visiting the sinking merchantman. So far everything was taking place according to programme; but presently the submarine reopened fire and scored a shot which gave the enemy all the advantages of the situation. I have described in some detail the stern of the ship--a variegated assortment of depth charges, shell, guns, and human beings. The danger of such an unavoidable concentration of armament and men was that a lucky shot might land in the midst of it. And this is precisely what now happened. Not only one, but three shells from the submarine one after the other struck this hidden mass of men and ammunition. The first one exploded a depth charge--300 pounds of high explosive--which blew one of the officers out of the after-control station where he lay concealed and landed him on the deck several yards distant. Here he remained a few moments unconscious; then his associates saw him, wounded as he was, creeping inch by inch back into his control position, fortunately out of sight of the Germans. The seaman who was stationed at the depth charges was also wounded by this shot, but, despite all efforts to remove him to a more comfortable place, he insisted on keeping at his post. "'Ere I was put in charge of these things," he said, "and 'ere I stays."