Soon the Montenegrin post of Lovcen signals us by wireless that the harbor of Cattaro is astir. A squadron of torpedo-destroyers is getting up steam. Some ironclads are moving, submarines are making for the channel outlet. Forewarned, the watchers on the bridge, sailors and officers, gaze at the narrows, and soon discern on the surface of the water some fine bluish tufts like the smoking butts of cigarettes. It takes the acute vision of seamen to distinguish them, for we are sailing more than twenty miles from shore. They are two submarines coming out of Cattaro and preparing to submerge. The brightness of the air is enough to dazzle us. And then we see nothing more. These metal fish are buried under the waves, taking unknown paths, and moving mysteriously towards us who are their prey. All eyes on the bridge are fixed upon the scene. We approach danger with clear vision and mind and with a quiet pleasure. On the forward deck the marines not on duty scrutinize alternately the horizon and the faces of the officers on watch to make out what adventures they hold in store.... Among the winding straits of Cattaro glide masts as fine as hairs; these are the destroyers which in their turn are issuing forth to attack us. The _Waldeck-Rousseau_ keeps on toward the hostile coast. At last the first destroyers appear, gray, and plumed with smoke; the moment has come to prepare ourselves for battle, and the commander orders the trumpets sounded to clear the decks for action. At the first notes of this music which they have heard so many times for mere drill, the sailors prick up their ears and cast questioning glances at the bridge. Voices are raised asking nervously: “Is it in earnest this time?” With an affirmative nod I reassure them. A joyous clamor rises from all their hearts, the clamor of children who are at last going to play. In an instant everyone has rushed to his post of battle. The decks are deserted, the ship is abandoned. But in its bosom a hidden life goes forward. The port stanchions are closed; the powerful bolts, which the men hastily shoot, make out of the enormous hull a hive partitioned by steel. In every cell of the hive groups of men, sometimes a single man, look after the apparatus, set it working, and wait. They see nothing, and will see nothing. If the ship is conquered, they will not know how or why. Everyone is silent. Where soldiers in the great moment of battle translate their joy of action into shouting, sailors, on the contrary, must keep absolute silence. Only the rattle of the engines, the telephone orders, and the trumpet calls may be heard. In the turrets and the casemates, behind the guns, the gunners and pointers hold themselves motionless, ready for the swift, precise movements, repeated so many times in innumerable drills, which will send straight to their mark the rain of well-aimed shells.