huge hulk, "a little, unarmed boat that goes messing around in the ocean until it finds a submarine and then it provokes it."

"How's that?" asked Tim.

"Why, you see," continued the jimmy-legs, "it just sort of steams back and forth in front of the submarine, just steams slowly back and forth in front of the submarine until it provokes it."

"Ah!" said I, taking a deep breath.

"Yes," he continues cheerfully, "and the more you provoked the submarine why the harder it shoots at you, so of course it doesn't notice the real Submarine Sinker coming up behind it. See the tactics."

"Oh," says I, "we just provoke the submarine until it loses its temper and the other boat sinks it."

"That's it," says the jimmy-legs, "you just sort of steam back and forth in front of it slowly."

"How slowly?" asks the Spider.

"Very," replied the jimmy-legs.

"No guns at all?" asks Tim.

"None," says he.

"A regular little home," suggests Tony.

"Sure," says the jimmy-legs, "nothing to do at all but steam slowly back--"

"For God's sake don't dwell on that point any more!" I cried. "We understand it perfectly."

"A regular lil' home," muttered Tim as he began to stow his bag.

(Later) I write these lines with horror. Some one has told me that the Navy needs Powder tasters, something I'd never heard of before, and that perhaps--that's what we are going to be used for. All you have to do, this guy says, is to taste the powder to see if it's damp or dry and if it's damp you take it away and bake it. This sounds worse than the Submarine Provoker.

(Still later) Rumor is rife. The latest report is that we are going to be Mine Openers.

"What's a Mine Opener?" I 

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