As you may surmise, the situation between England and Germany was
peculiar. The secret treaty of the Black Forest was awaiting
ratification by the heads of the two governments. Of course the mass
of subjects--indeed not ten men in each country--knew aught of what
had transpired near Schlangenbad. Politicians had worked up a war
scare to such pitch that the people of the two nations were ready to
rush into conflict. Only a spark was needed to fire the situation.
Realizing that under the menace of existing conditions, the unforeseen
might happen, the Kaiser was not lessening his secret diplomatic
intrigues; rather he was increasing them. It is a fact that even
though two nations have a secret treaty, they each remain suspicious
of the other. After all, secret treaties have been ruthlessly torn
up. The vigilance of European cabinets must be eternal.
Hence my mission. It was included in my instructions to watch the
movements of British warships off the Scottish coast and promptly
cable the German Admiralty Intelligence Department concerning them.
This is where a study of the silhouette charts would be invaluable.
At night or in a fog or early in the morning I would not be able to
distinguish the British ships by name. But knowing the silhouettes of
all the naval types--for example, certain kinds of dreadnaughts,
powerful cruisers, torpedo boat destroyers--I would be able to tell
what ships were putting to sea.
Pages:
151
152
153
154
155
156
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173
174
175