For four days the project was under consideration by the Naval General Board at Washington. Time pressed, the need was great, the new mine very promising. The attitude of our officers was favorable. My own expressed view, based on three years’ experience in mining, was that, though much greater difficulties and magnitude would develop even than yet foreseen, the scheme was nevertheless feasible, was within our minelaying experience in principle, and, though it could hardly be more than half or a quarter effective, it was well worth doing. The British Admiralty’s approval and belief in the practicability of the scheme was implied in the original paper, but an explicit confirmation was asked and obtained by cable, on the basis of their three years’ war experience and knowledge of North Sea conditions. And so the plan went to the Secretary of the Navy bearing the General Board’s approval, as promising a sufficient degree of success to warrant undertaking it. CHAPTER THREE THE BASES IN SCOTLAND The British Minelaying Squadron was to operate from Grangemouth, near Rosyth, on the Firth of Forth. As a mine assembling and operating base for the American Squadron, the British naval authorities decided on Inverness and Invergordon, in the Scottish Highlands, situated on Inverness Firth and Cromarty Firth, respectively, which empty into Moray Firth about eight miles apart. One base would have been enough and in some respects more convenient, but the limited transportation means across Scotland necessitated two. To require the slow mine carriers to navigate the difficult passages around the north of Scotland would prolong their exposure to submarines and cause more escort duty for destroyers, so it was decided to discharge their cargoes on the west side, at points which gave a short haul across Scotland—Fort William, at the western terminus of the Caledonian Canal, and Kyle of Loch Alsh, where one crosses to the Isle of Skye. The cargoes were transported by canal motor-barge and by the Highland Railway. [Illustration: MINE ASSEMBLY AND STORAGE SHEDS. U.S. Naval Base 18, Inverness.]