In the afternoon of the same day, while the news of the disaster was still fresh, there came a whisper, which gained in loudness and in precision of detail as it passed from mouth to ear and from ear to mouth, that the worst had not yet been told. There had been not one, but two disasters. Two battle-cruisers, it was declared, had been sunk in the Channel by German mines or submarines. What were their names? inquired the white-faced women. The names were not yet known, but they would soon come. A little later the severity of the rumour became softened. The battle-cruisers had not, it appeared, been sunk, but severely damaged. They were at that moment on their way to the Sound, crippled sorely, yet afloat. Men groaned. Two battle-cruisers blown up in the Channel; what in God's name were two battle-cruisers doing in the mine-strewn Channel when their proper place was in one of the safe eyries overlooking the North Sea? A plausible explanation was offered. The two battle-cruisers had been coming to Plymouth to take in stores that they might speed away south to avenge those other two cruisers sunk by the Germans as had been told in the morning's papers. If this were indeed true, the news was of the worst; England's prestige afloat was gone. She could not spare two other whole battle-cruisers to proceed upon a mission of vengeance to the South Seas while the Germans' Battle Squadrons in the North Sea ports were still undefeated. Meanwhile the Germans far away to the south could do what they pleased; they could sink and burn our merchant steamers at will. The command of the Pacific had passed from England to Germany, and the White Ensign hung draggled and shamed for all the world to sneer at. The Three Towns almost forgot their personal grief for drowned friends in their horror at the disgrace which had come to their own sacred Service.