During the next four hours these horrid death-traps gave us a terribly anxious time. We had some very narrow shaves, for at low-water hundreds were in sight, and as the seaplane drifted along we were powerless to avoid them.
The pilot got on one float and I got on the other, and once or twice we actually had to ward the mines off with our bare hands in order to keep them from knocking against the machine. Had one of them done so this story would never have been written. Fending off the mines was a ticklish operation, as you may suppose. Great care had to be observed in exerting our strength, and we had to place our hands on parts of the casing of the mine that were devoid of horns, or between two horns, if it was not floating high enough. While engaged in this delightful occupation I went overboard twice, but managed to scramble back safely without getting into trouble with the mines.
Once a mine went off. It was too far away, however, for us to see what caused the explosion. It is not improbable that a luckless porpoise might have bent a horn in one of its leaps.
At length, to our heartfelt relief, the tide turned, and the mines began to disappear under the water again.
By that time we were drifting nearly the opposite way again, carried along by the flood-tide.
Six o'clock came, by our chronometer--seven p.m. summer time--and we were still intact, having for about ten hours been dependent on our frail seaplane floats for buoyancy. Had the sea risen at all, even to a decent cat's paw, we should have been below the surface long ere this.
It was shortly after six o'clock, when--burnt almost black by the sun, with parched throats and swollen tongues--we heard the sound of a propeller chugging away at no great distance. The haze had thickened again as the sun moved west, and at first we could see nothing. In fact, we both thought we were dreaming.
But there was no mistake. The chugging and throbbing grew louder and louder, and I fired three single pistol-shots into the air at intervals. Thereupon the sound intensified, and out of the haze ploughed a trim little armed motor-launch--officially known as an "M.L."
She crept alongside very gingerly, lowered her dinghy, and took us off. Then she made fast a line to the seaplane, and took her in tow at a good seven or eight knots.