Horton was really after bigger game, but when out shooting pheasants one does not disdain a pigeon if nothing else is available. He was keen on a battleship, and only a little while before had spotted a fair-sized cruiser, an excellent ‘second best.’ When enthusiasm was at its height, and triumph reasonably sure, circumstances compelled him to dive. We are not told what those circumstances were. Perhaps we should not be far wrong if we ventured the opinion that they were intimately connected with the noisome presence of fleeter craft whose pet particular prey is the British submarine. When the officer had another opportunity to observe what was going on in the upper world, the larger ship had gone out of sight and a smaller vessel come into view. Within a hundred yards of E 9 was S 126, followed at some distance by a second T.B. Horton waited until the leader had travelled another 500 yards, ensuring a ‘comfortable’ range, and then fired. The commander evidently believed in even numbers, for he discharged two ‘rooties’ at his quarry, as he had done when attacking the _Hela_. It was just as well that he did, for one missed. The other struck the enemy amidships and worked deadly havoc. Coastguards on the Dutch island of Schiermonnikoog, opposite Borkum, and some seven miles from the scene, heard the roar of the explosion, and saw a great column of water shoot up near the forepart of the ship. In three minutes all that remained of S 126 was flotsam. She went down bow foremost, like a leaping salmon. As the stern rose her men took to the water. Most of them appear to have been rescued by a cruiser which came up a little later, but did not consider it advisable to make a long stay. “Look at her!” Horton cried. “The beggar’s going down!” as though it was the most surprising thing in the world for a ship to sink after having a 21–in. torpedo plugged in her side. The second torpedo-boat, unwilling to run the risk of sharing her consort’s fate, made off, leaving the shipwrecked crew of thirty-six to fend for themselves. The lost vessel, launched in 1905, had a displacement of 420 tons, and carried three 6–pdr. guns and three torpedo-tubes. [Illustration: The Second Exploit of E 9 When Lieutenant-Commander Max K. Horton torpedoed S 126 in the mouth of the Ems E. S. Hodgson ]