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Count Luckner, the Sea Devil
I Running before the wind, the Seeadler,
un der her proper name and with all
Ke Norwegian camouflage cleared away,
■p, „ southward toward Madeira. The gun
H rw worked hard at drill and target prac-
■ >v , and Count Luckner offered a prize to
first man who should sight the first
vessel. Off Gibraltar the raiders met
■ large British steamship, and raising the
"Chronometer time, please,” pre-
to board her.
■chapter IV—Continued
■ shouted the command, and the
drLni heat “clear for action.” A sec*
tint: of the rail could be lowered and
raised as a gun shield. It dropped
ciltiering and revealed the muzzle of
cannon. Dp with the German (lag
aijd life, one across her brows.
■it was the Seeadler’s first shot
against the enemy.
■what’s that, by Joe? Nothing hap
pened, no movement on deck, no slow*
down of the ship. Then a flag
Went up the mast, the British flag. It
Wav like the fantastic things that hap-
An Id a dream. I thought I must be
asleep. Another shot across her bows.
31 e suddenly changes her course.
Hello, she wants to get away. A shot
Xer the stern, another over the
smokestack, and now she hove to,
■ a boat was in the water rowing to
■iird us. We all put on our best man-
Xrs, and 1 welcomed CaptaiD Chewn
lioard the Seeadler. What did we
Sunt of him, he asked, so bewildered
ttnt he stuttered. “Well, first a
Jr endly chat,” 1 replied. He was an
ol I salt with a scraggly gray beard. I
Iked him right off. His ship was the
<Jlid.ys Royal, bound from Cardiff
with five thousand tons of coal for
Buenos Aires. 1 told him that, much
as I disliked sending any ship to the
Bottom of the sea, nevertheless, we
must sink the Gladys Royal.
■ “Oh, no,” he argued, “we are bound
■or a neutral port and won’t harm
Mnything. It will be bad for me to
Ipse my ship, and I have a wife and
J|hiidren at home.”
■ “Do you believe, Captain Chewn,
Ifhat, under the same circumstances, a
British naval officer would show any
laercy to a German ship?”
■ He made no reply.
I We now got an explanation of the
Queer behavior of his ship that had so
puzzled us after our first shot Cap-
Sain Chewn, an old-timer at sea, simply
■bought we were trying to compare
itime in the old traditional way, by
firing a blank mortar. He had raised
ibis flag to serve as the mortar shot on
his side. He would afterward lower
It to give the exact moment. That is
■he way in vogue today*. But when
pur second shot was fired, the cook on
the Gladys Royal saw the shell strike
the water and thought we had sighted
a submarine and were firing at it He
gave the alarm, and the captain
started to zagzag. it was only after
the third shot that they saw our can
non pointed at them and the German
battle flag at our masthead.
“By Joe,” and the captain pounded
the rail with open admiration, “you
fooled me bloody well. It was the
d—dest.trap 1 ever saw.”
I sent a prize crew aboard the
■Gladys Royal with orders to have her
follow the Seeadler. 1 wanted to wait
and blow her up after nightfall. Cruis
ers might be roaming somewhere in
these parts, and it would be unwise to
run the risk of attracting their atten
tion with the sound of an explosion.
We photographed our capture care
fully. At dusk we transferred the
steamer’s twenty-six men, white and
black, to our ship. The captain
brought his belongings aboard. 1 also
sent Lieutenant Preiss to pack up ev
erything aboard the captured vessel
that he thought we might need and
ferry it over. He displayed excellent
judgment, too, and turned up with a
welcome store of excellent provisions.
We sailors could be content with a
sailor’s fare whenever need be, but
wo wanted our guests to dine well at
alt times to help make up for the sor
row of losing their ships.
Preiss and his men planted a bomb
in her hold, lit the time fuse, and
took to the boats. Fifteen minutes
passed. Then the Gladys Royal trem
bled fore and aft.
She went down stern first, and in
ten minutes her forward quarter stuck
straight out of the sea. Her bow re
mained above water for a long time.
A steamer hove into sight. She car
ried side lights, and from that we
judged her to be a neutral. Suddenly
a second explosion, from the accumu
lation of air pressure, burst the bow
of the Gladys Royal. With a final
quiver, she took her last plunge into
the depths and slid out of sight, while
we scurried away into the night with
all sails set.
Captain Chewn was agreeably sur
prised to find himself assigned to a
cozy cabin. His only complaint was
that he had no one to enjoy it with
hitn. This sociable mariner liked com
pany. So we promised to supply him
with companions as soon as possible.
Much as we wanted to please Cap
tain Chewn and show him that we
were accommodating hosts, we al
lowed the next ship to sail by in
peace. She was a British passenger
steamer bound through Gibraltar. We
had room enough for all her passen
gers, but we did not want to be both
ered with women and children.
At noon, with a heavy sea running,
we sighted a steamer cutting diagon
ally across our course. No flag, no
name. We signaled her for informa
tion, but there was no response. Sure
ly she must be an Englishman with a
hard boiled efficient skipper. You
‘By
LOWELL THOMAS
Copyright l>y
Doubloday, Doran & Cos.
know how a British captain often is,
with his nose right down on his Job,
with no thought except his cargo and
his lookout for submarines and cruis
ers? Well, evidently this chap couldn’t
be bothered with a funny old Norwe
gian windjammer. Sails set and mo
tor running, we held across his course
and got in front of him. Now, at sea.
a sailing vessel always has the right
of way over a steamship because the
latter cun maneuver more rapidly.
But that meant nothing to this steam
ship. She swerved not an inch, and
seemed quite content to run us down.
We had to jib and let him go in the
wind, or there would have been a col
lision. The Englishman passed us at
three hundred yards.
The German flag was climbing
swiftly to our masthead.
“Fire,” 1 commanded, “let’s see if
that will make him change his mind.”
The gun boomed and a shell went
screaming over the steamer.
“By Joe,” I said, “he sticks to his
opinions."
The steamer’s stacks belched fresh
clouds of smoke. Her course changed
not at all. Another shot, this one, by
way of emphasis, just over the smoke
stack. The steamer turned into the
wind.
“A wise baby, that skipper,” com
mented Leudemann sacarsticaily. “He
knows a windjammer can’t sail against
the wind.”
We, of course, couldn’t catch him in
a chase, but our range was still point
blaDk. A shot through the smoke
stack and a couple into the hull. We
could see the crew running around
wildly. A siren was screaming. A
shell exploded on deck. The propel
ler stopped, and the steamer slowed
down and lay rolling in the trough
of the sea.
The Englishman must have known
that he hadn’t a ghost of a chance to
escape under fire at such close range.
First of all, he had been discourteous
in ignoring our friendly signals. Then
he had violated the rules of oceaD
traffic in not giving our clipper the
right of way. And now in cold blood
'f ‘ : \
j ;
Lutece, Captured by the Castaways.
he had endangered the life of his
crew. According to the unwritten
rules of etiquette among pirates and
raiders, if was up to us to put out a
boat and board a prize. But instead
L signaled the steamer:
“Captain, come aboard 1” Let him
come over to us. If he’s such a tough
guy, we’ll show him who rules the
waves in this part of the Atlantic.
It was funny. Finally, 1 had to
Laugh. The ship was the Lundy Is
land bound for France with a cargo
of Madagascar sugar. An important
cargo, sure enough. Sugar was scarce
in all the countries at war, and we
Germans, whose supply of sugar con
sisted mostly of a great longing for it,
could sympathize with the captain's
eagerness to get the precious mer
chandise to port. When the first shot
struck the Lundy Island, the crew,
black, brown, and yellow, fell Into a
panic. With shells falling, running
the ship or staying with It meant
nothing to them. The captain roared
and stormed, but that was all the good
it did. So he seized the helm, himself.
Just then a shot hit the rudder chain,
and when he turned the wheel nothing
happened. The crew started taking to
the boats, and the tough old salt was
left alone on deck. Our signal for
him to come on board left him help
less. His boats were out there with
the crew floundering at the oars. The
sea was pitching and rolling, and they
were so frightened they could hardly
row. He paced the bridge with his
Legal Knots Untied by Chinese Solomon
In a village near Peking, China, four
tradesmen clubbed together to buy cot
ton. To protect it from rats they pro
cured a cat, and agreed that each of
them owned one of the animal’s legs.
Soon afterwards the cat hurt one of
its paws, and the owner of that par
ticular leg bound it up with a rag
soaked in oil. But the cat went too
near the fire, the bandage ignited, and
the terrified animal rushed amongst
the bales of cotton, which flared up
and were destroyed.
The three owners of the uninjured
THE ROCKDALE RECORD, Conyers, Ga„ Wed., April 24. 1929
handbag in his hand, a solitary, woe
begoue figure. We finally had to send
a boat for him.
On our deck he got a stern, formal
reception.
“Any casualties among your men,
captain?”
“No, worse luck. Not a man
scratched, by Joe, and the blighters
scurried around like rabbits at a dog
show. Look at them in the boats out
there. They haven’t got here yet, the
beggars. Let me at that gun, by Joe,
and I’ll sink them.”
It was hard not to sympathize with
him, hut still his conduct had appar
ently been inexcusable.
“Why did you endanger your men’s
lives like that, captain? It not only
was the height of folly, but it was in
human !”
Just then our ship’s surgeon, Doctor
Pietsch, came along.
“Hello, captain.”
“Hello, doctor."
They greeted each other like long
lost. friends, save that there was a
shadow of uneasiness in the captain’s
fraternal demonstrations.
Doctor Pietsch had gone out with
our armored cruiser Moewe ou one of
Iter t'reebooting expeditious. Among
the captured captains of that cruise
was our present guest, who, while
aboard the Moewe, had struck up a
pleasant comradeship with the doctor.
Now he, along with the other cap
tains, had been released on parole.
They had signed written promises that
they would engage in no further war
actvity. Believing he had broken
his parole, he thought the Germans
would hang him from a yardarm if
they ever caught him. When he saw
we were an auxiliary cruiser, he al
ready felt a rope tightening around his
neck. That was why he had tried so
desperately to get away.
We amused ourselves with a formal
discussion, after which I addressed
our guest with suitable gravity.
“We are of the opinion, captain,
that your parole did not cover your
calling as a merchant captain. Only
direct combatant service was included
under the heading of war activity.
Therefore, we feel ourselves under no
unhappy necessity of hanging yon.”
Well, the smile on that hard, weath
er-beaten face was like a sunrise. We
now understood the all-too-huraan mo
tives behind his actions, and ,we re
spected bis plucky attempt to get
away in the face of point-blank gun
fire. Sailors ourselves, we could only
salute this skipper who, with a worth
less, spineless crew, had to take the
wheel himself, and then only to find
his rudder chain smashed.
The sea was so rough now that we
did not send a bombing party to board
the Lundy Island, but sank her by di
rect gunfire.
That night Leudemann and I sat
over bottles of beer and talked about
our prospects.
“Well, old chap," said I, “everything
has begun well. It’s a tine cruise. But
when will they sink ns?”
“Not, at any rate,” he replied, “un
til our hotel is full.”
You see our buccaneering raid was
pretty certain to remain a secret untii
the time came when lack of space
would compel us to release our pris
oners and send them to port. TheD
the news of our freebooting jaunt
would out, and cruisers would be hot
after us in every part of the world.
“And if we don’t capture any more
ships,” i reflected, “we can go on
cruising indefinitely.”
“Then let’s catch some more quick
ly,” laughed Leudemann. “It will be
great sport to play hide and seek with
cruisers.”
That mate of mine was always itch
ing for trouble. But then that was
what we had all come through the
blockade in hope of finding, so if we
wanted plenty of excitement, then the
sooner we sent the crews of eight or
ten ships into some port the sooner
would the alarm go out —“German
raider in the Atlantic!” Then, too,
Lloyd’s insurance rates would start to
soar when the news got out, and ships
with supplies that the Allies needed
badly would be held in port. Also, a
number of cruisers would no doubt be
detached from blockade patrol duty
across the North sea. That was the
interesting part of it—those cruisers
and how to elude them.
“Leudemann,” 1 said, “the better
the lookout, the more ships we will
catch. We already have a good look
out, but I’ve thought of a way to have
a better one. A hundred pair of eyes
are better than two pair.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, from now on. I’m going to
change that offer of ten pounds and a
bottle of champagne that we promised
to the first of our two lookouts to spy
a ship. I’m going to open it to every
one on board!"
(TO BE CONTINUED.)
legs sued their partner for loss and
damages. The judge ruled thus:
“Since the cat was unable to use
the injured leg, the cotton was set on
fire by the action of the three un
injured legs on which the cat rar.
among the bales of cotton. Conse
quently these three legs were guilty,
and their owners must pay damages
and costs.”
Balsa is the lightest wood known,
weighing only seven pounds per cubic
foot.
v *i* *:* *:* •:**;* *;, •:* *:* -:-y •:* *:* *:* •>- v -t* *:• •:*
WEDDING I
! BELLS, FIRE !
BELLS
• *:• ♦!• *:• *:* •:> *:• *:• -s- •:* -s- *:* -j- -s- -t* *;*
(© by D. J. Walsh.)
WHEN Dave Harris pushed his
way through the revolving
doer of the Dennis Jewelry
company, he felt that all
eyes were upon him. Not that this
young man of twenty-eight had a con
scious makeup or was particularly no
ticeable from any other handsome man
of his age—but, nevertheless, when lie
stepped up to the- counter and rather
diffidently whispered he would like to
see something in engagement rings he
was absolutely convinced that a hun
dred eyes were peering at him.
Dave was a private in ladder com
pany B, city fire department. He had
entered the state agricultural college
with the intention of taking charge of
his father's farm, but cattle and corn
and harness and hay had no appeal
to him, and not being particularly fit
ted to sell bonds he joined the fire de
partment.
And the first thing he did to distin
guish himself was to become engaged
to be married.
Dave’s choice was Dolly Mason,
pretty and sprightly and the belle of
the neighborhood. Her wavy hair and
sparkling blue eyes and cheerful dis
position endeared her to all those with
whom she came in contact. It was no
wonder that company B considered
Dave the luckiest fellow in the world.
Dolly had often told her sweetheart
that while she was decidedly strong
for wedding bells she was equally op
posed to fire bells as far as Dave was
concerned. She wanted hitn to go in
to business, some undertaking more
substantial and less risky.
“How about my selling ice cream
freezers at the North pole?” jokingly
remarked Dave one afternoon. “Or
selling foot-warmers to the Filipinos.”
“Davie, do be serious,” replied Dolly.
“You know how downright in earnest
1 am about it.”
“Of course you are, dear, but you
must be practical. If there is one
thing I am fitted for it is the fire de
partment, and with the fire department
I stick.” Ilis jaw became set, and
whenever this happened Dolly knew
there was no use arguing any further.
But Dave had persuaded Dolly to
marry him notwithstanding his chos
en work, and as he departed from the
jewelry store with the diamond soli
taire safely in his pocket he whistled
gayly and made a beeline to Dolly’s
boarding house. He found her at the
piano lazily running her fingers over
the keys.
She struck a final note on the piano
and looked up smilingly. “Hello, Da
vie,” she said. “Working hard today?”
“I should say so,” he replied. “Been
a terribly strenuous day.”
“Many of those awful fires?” she in
quired reproachfully.
“Not a one,” the young man replied.
“But I’ve been shopping. And not aft
er collars and ties, either.”
“Been buying some shoes or a hat?”
“Wrong again, honey, but look at
this!” and excitedly he removed the
top of a little box. The sparkle of
the precious stone caught Dolly’s eyes
and she gasped in amazement. “And
it’s for you, darling—the future Mrs.
David Harris.”
Dolly glanced at the ring and then
at Dave and then again at the ring.
Tears came to her eyes. She arose
from the piano and went to the win
dow. Tears were now streaming down
her face and she gazed at the little
garden with its many-colored flowers,
'out everything was a blur. Dave, in
liis astonishment, lifted himself from
the piano bench and went to Dolly’s
side and reached for her hand. She
drew it away and burst out crying.
“I can’t,” she sobbed. “I can’t. Oh,
I do love yon, Dave, but you won’t lis
ten to me. You know how Ido want
you to go into some business.”
And then Dave realized fully for the
first time the seriousness of the situ
ation. Nothing in the world he’d rath
er do than be with the fire department,
and yet he could not lose Dolly. Per
haps after all he had been unreason
able. Dolly’s uncle would be only too
glad to have him with him in the real
estate business and at present busi
ness was booming. He would doubt
less earn a considerable amount of
money and it would result in a little
bungalow and everything else that
went with it. Why, the problem was
very simple after all. He’d send in
his resignation to the chief and things
would be happily settled.
Dolly covered her face with her
hands and cried convulsively. Dave
stroked her head and wondered how
he could do anything to hurt her.
“Honey,” he said softly, and was
about to continue when he abruptly
paused. He drew himself up with a
start, turned his head quickly and lis
tened with tenseness. Off in the dis
tance he heard the peal of fire bells.
And Dolly heard them also. She stood
up and they stared at one another.
And simultaneously through each their
minds ran the same question: Would
it be wedding bells or fire bells? There
was intense quiet all about them. And
Dave detected the G-18-6 alarm.
“My God,” be cried in a whisper,
it’s in the tenement district.”
Dolly’s face was pale and the cor
ners of her mouth quivered in her ef
fort to speak. The handsome young
rnan before her was for the first time
in his life at a loss what to do. In hig
imagination he saw smoke-filled rooms
filled with children with outstretched
arms. He could see mothers frantic
with fear and fathers helpless to save
(he ones they loved. At the same time
lie could see his fond hopes shattered.
Dolly would marry someone else
and—
But something at that moment sud
denly brought him to a decision. It
was the sound of a second alarm. He
tried to speak to Dolly, but words
failed him. He saw grief In her eyes
and yet he could see the love In them
that tells more than mere spoken word.
He paused a moment, turned hastily
and darted from the room. But dur
ing that moment’s pause he knew he
had lost Dolly forever.
The next morning the headlines in
the papers told the story—“ Young
Fireman a Hero” and “Dave Harris,
Fireman, Saves Lives." But praise
from all quarters of the city did not
awaken him from the realization that
he and Dolly had separated. It was
paying dourly, he thought, to win glory
only to lose happiness. Ills hand un
consciously touched the little box in
his pocket and the thought of the fu
ture that might have been made this
the saddest day in his whole life.
Perhaps if he could see her he might
straighten things out. Yes, ho would
resign this very day and the unhappy
yesterday would be entirely forgotten.
He ran to the telephone and called up
her office. While he waited for the
connection it seemed that a weight
had been suddenly lifted from his
heart. He stood there nervously, long
ing to hear the sound of Dolly’s voice.
And then he was told that Dolly did
not come to work that day. Poor child,
he thought, no wonder she is feeling
ill from the strain of yesterday. And
then he called up her boarding house.
And here he was told that Dolly had
moved the night before —address un
known. Dave mechanically hung up
the receiver, lie unsteadily walked to
a chair and sat down. Dolly gone!
Dolly gone! The words ran through
his brain and tortured him. And he
sat there staring at the floor.
Weeks passed. Dave had pulled him
self together, but the littlebboax —a sa
cred reminder —remained in his pocket
always. Ilis promotion had been rapid
and his savings had been well invest
ed, and Dave not only had money in
the bank, but an equity in a little
house off in the country. He would
have his mother come and live with
him in his loneliness.
And then came an alarm —the third
of the day. To Dave one alarm was
the same as another. But to each fire
he gave all that was in him.
“Where is it this time?” yelled n
passerby as Dave swung onto the
speeding ladder wagon.
“In the neighborhood of James and
Pine,” he called back as he adjusted
his helmet. And the neighborhood
came to his mind immediately—rows
of old residences turned into rooming
houses.
As usual, Dave’s truck was the first
to reach the scene of the fire. Dave’s
trained eyes told him at once that the
house was doomed. Smoke and flames
poured from the ton windows and a
reddish glow could he seen through
the windows of the third floor. Dave’s
wagon pulled up directly in front of
the burning house. The chief began
to give orders.
“A ladder to the third floor, Harris,”
he called out. “Look out for the walls
—they look bad.”
The crowd gave out a roar as the
ladder extended itself and was tilted
over to the building. Dave was the
first to mount the rungs. And he
started upward. Small flames now
were coming out of the third-story
windows and the sound of cracking
walls could be heard above the din of
the puffing engines.
“Down from there,” megaphoned the
chief to Dave. “Walls coining down
down, Harris.” But at one of the win
dows Dave saw a figure —arms out
stretched, and he heard a smoke-muf
fled cry. And lie continued up the lad
der. The multitude below yelled to
him in alarm. “The walls are falling”
came to him from hundreds of mouths,
but Dave still saw the figure in the
window and continued upward un
mindful of the warning.
Through the smoke he put his arms
around the figure and pulled It
through the window. The crowd be
low gave out a mighty yell. Dave
steadied himself and carefully began
to descend. Great hisses of flames
now shot from the third-floor windows
and bricks began to fall. Dave con
tinued in his descent, his only thought
being to protect the figure he firmly
held in his arms. And he suddenly
realized it was a woman he was hold
ing. To protect her face he started
to cover it, and then he stopped. And
her eyes opened just a few inches
from Dave’s eyes. And then the din
below seemed to cease suddenly and
all was quiet except the sound of two
beating hearts.
“Dolly,” he said tenderly.
“Davie,” she murmured. “I want
you always.” And underneath his
great helmet he kissed her.
Grecian Painted Wall*
Instead of wallpaper, the ancient
Greeks had painted walls. Instead of
bare colors of bands and panels, such
as are being used to some extent to
day, they were inclined to make their
walls more the colored setting for
their finer wall paintings, which were
works of art. Instead of hanging
paintings on the walls, they painted
them there. Little attention was
paid to furniture from an artistic
standpoint. For the Greeks regarded
furniture as something useful, not
ornamental. —Detroit News.
Their Sense of Color Disturbed
Ilobbs —The modern girl with bet
powdering and rouging makes me furi
ous.
Dobbs —Me, too. Every time I look
at a flapper’s daubed mouth I see
red.
. ' j
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His Lucky Day
! D. L. Davis of Fresno, Calif., if
noted as a good marksman with A
Shotgun. He seldom wastes a shell.
But Davis surprised even himself the
other day when lie brought down a
rabbit and a quail with one shot.
Just as lie raised his gun to fire at a
rabbit a quail Hew into range of tha
scattering lead pellets and both ani-'
mal and bird were killed.
More aliens became United States
citizens in 1!)2S than in any previous
year, and only about 5 per cent of
applications were denied.
I
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