In one of our trips to carry supplies to Montenegro, the _Dague_ has just been lost. In the open roadstead, at midnight, she was waiting for the cargo-boat to finish unloading its bales and cases on the wharf. Her crew was assisting in this dangerous work. The heavy sound of the cases falling on the planks was all that could be heard.... But a submarine from Austria was lying in wait for the _Dague_. Suddenly the destroyer leaped into the air as if lifted by the hand of a giant. It fell in two pieces like a dead branch of wood. The sailors, enclosed in her sides, did not know they were at the point of death. Thirty seconds later, at the spot where there had been a living ship, and men full of energy, there was no longer anything but the dark water. _1 March._ Malta at last! Landscapes which do not move, roads of hard stone, a desired presence.... Some drives in an English dog-cart behind a frisky pony.... A dress of mauve muslin, the sweet Italian tongue interrupted by silences, the charming visits to the fountain of the swans. Malta, remote island and jewel of the Mediterranean, blessed repose of navigators, peaceful harbor and immense fortifications, feverish atmosphere and nostalgia of the blue sky. All the roads cross there. Between the antipodes and the fields of battle the Hindu, the Canadians and the French pass several hours there; and later, in the night watches, each one will remember his happy rest in that place. Malta, the starting point for the warriors of Egypt, of the Dardanelles, of Mesopotamia, and Flanders; the port of call for the sailors of the Mediterranean, of the North Sea and the Persian Gulf. In the Strada Reale clash faces, uniforms, dialects; they linger on the mystical pavements of the churches, and pass into the rocky countryside to dream those dreams one never forgets. Malta: First pilgrimage of the new crusade. The battleships and cruisers, the drag-nets and dredgers get their second wind here before sailing for the East, for Constantinople. They go there to take part in epic conflicts, and retake from the Osmanlis the city of the Bosphorus, which for five hundred years has awaited its deliverance. Regiments, batteries and squads accompany them, crowded on the transports and eager for victory. May the men who are preparing this great enterprise, this terrible enterprise, measure well its obstacles, and be able to obviate them!