the engine room crew for special watchfulness. Every oiler aft knew a warm bearing would damn him forever in the eyes of his shipmates. WE E raced along about six miles out to sea, where there was less chance of encountering floating mines. Just as dusk was setting in Dallas reported an aeroplane to leeward. I could just make it out with my binoculars, a tiny speck about eight hundred feet up and bearing down toward us. I hated to use the juice of my batteries that would be so precious later on, but I wanted no chances of unnecessary discovery. So I trimmed her down and ran along a depth of sixty feet at eight knots for nearly an hour to be sure of complete darkness when we came up. I kept our course nor'-nor'west, which is just as easy under water as above, thanks to the gyroscopic compass. Soon the man on watch at the bell receiver reported the sound of a ship's propellers above. We sure were in well-populated waters! I turned my place at the periscopes over to Dallas and listened myself. The steady, rhythmic beat was well off our port bow. I blew the main ballast tank so that our conning tower was just awash and went up to have a look for both the aeroplane and the passing ship. Those sky-pilots maintain they can see us and get us with bombs at any depth, but that claim was belied in this case, for a thoro search of the darkening skies showed no bird-man on our trail The only thing the periscope showed me was a 10,000 ton cruiser a hundred yards or so to windward of us. It was nearly dark and cloudy, with just a few stars peeping out. Apparently her lookout didn't see us. What a chance if she had been an enemy! It was after colors, of course, but by her cage masts I placed her as one of our own cruisers, probably the furthest north of our patrol, as we were now on the edge of disputed waters. It did me good to know by actual experience how invisible we were. When we were far enough off so that if I had mistaken her identity we had time to get down before her guns could be trained I fired our recognition signal for that night, greenred-green. She replied according to code, so we came all the way to the surface and kept on steadily at twelve knots. HE CLOUDS gradually thickened through the night and I kept hoping for rain or at least a dull sunrise. Brown, the gunner's mate, said he was sure we'd be favored with suitable weather through the righteousness of our cause, but I pinned my faith on the barometer, which had fallen two points. There was more rest than usual that night on the X-2. I wanted the men especially fresh for the day's work, and so made the two watches off duty turn in and pipe down. Our 165 by 15 feet is divided up with a crew space where the men in their bunks get little of the sound of the engines. At two o'clock we were off C. harbor, according to my reckoning, but, as all navigation lights on the enemy's coast were extinguished or misplaced, we stood off and on near where I placed the shore line, till we should have daylight for an accurate reckoning. I studied the charts for the hundredth time, thanking our stars the harbor mouth was two miles wide, so that the probabilities were against our finding an obstruction built across it. The chart gave the bottom on the sand bar in front of the entrance as shell and hard sand, which was lucky for us, as we could hope to run with very little under our keel in no fear of rocks. But the shallowness worried me. My chart showed a bare six and a half fathoms over the continuing slightly deeper till it sheered off into the deep basin that was the inner harbor. From the top of her periscopes to the bottom of her keel the X-2 displaced exactly twenty feet. It would be ticklish work to navigate in those six and a half fathoms (39 feet) without being drawn down by suction and striking bottom so hard as to rebound up to the surface and be sighted by the enemy. bar, Would sunrise never come? At half-past four, under heavy rain clouds, there was light to make out the big gray forts at each side of the entrance. We lay not more than a mile inside an island that, according to my chart, was two miles outside the forts, so it behooved us to get under way quickly before there was light for the island or fort watches to sight us. Being satisfied of how far our run should be and verifying our course with the compass while still on the surface, I quickly trimmed down and ran at a depth of sixty feet at as low speed as consistent with good handling-about four knots. It was high tide, just beginning to ebb, so at least we would find all the water on the bar that was possible. N O more sleep on the X-2 now. From Dallas down every man was on the qui vive. As we neared where the bar was charted we came up till the pressure gauge showed only ten feet over us, ten feet to hide us from the forts' lookouts and guns. Suddenly there was a jar that stirred us off our pins and we felt the all too familiar sensation of sucking bottom. As previously instructed, the diving-rudder man immediately gave her up-rudder. I ordered full speed ahead, tho I knew it meant our periscope would come up, give ing the fort watches a good look at us. Still if we hadn't gone full speed we would have been sucked down solidly into sand and good-by to our chances at those men-o'-war inside. Curse shallow-water navigation anyhow! Sure enough we had to porpoise, but in a second were down again in the deep basin beyond the bar. We weren't up even long enough for me to get a good look around. We must rush the work along now before the men in the fort, set into frenzied activity by our momentary appearance, could take measures against us. We ran at ten knots at a depth of forty feet and in no time at all had covered the mile from the entrance to where the men-o'-war were reported to lie. Now was the time. Our torpedoes were in place in their tubes, six new 18-inch superheaters ready for their final runs. It only remained to come up, sight the enemy, take aim and fire. I TOOK a firm grip of the periscope wheel and ordered a quick porpoise, putting the glass just out for an observation. Through the spray that broke from it I saw our big gray targets. There on our port side a hundred yards ahead lay a battle-ship of the super-dreadnought type, stern to, alongside the wharf, coaling. Midstream to our starboard lay a light cruiser of the first class, and eight hundred yards up the basin between the two a small armored cruiser. The flat country was thickly veiled with mist and a drizzly rain. A choppy sea added to our chances of making our first shot unobserved. I steered a course straight to thestarboard side of the dreadnought to launch the torpedo just forward of amidships at a distance of about three hundred yards. Her lookout hadn't picked us up yet. As we raced toward her I saw officers on. her stern sighting the forts with binoc ulars. I imagined gunboats and destroy-ers rushing down to the entrance, but there was no time to turn the glass for a. look that way. We crept on unnoticed. I don't mind confessing my hand on the toggle of the firing valve shook, and it wasn't all from the vibrations of our en-gines either. Suddenly a big seaman on the forecastle saw us, waved his cap frantically and ran toward an officer. My range scale read 349 yards. The cross wires of the periscopes were on her middle funnel. I jerked the firing valve for No. I torpedo. The resultant hiss of air and rush of water told me she was launched! I took us down till the periscopes were under, put the helm hard-a-board and made for mid-channel, where I knew the first-class cruiser lay at anchor, stern to, and nosing the strong ebb tide. We were jubilant. The men insisted they had heard a roar that meant the exploding of the battle-ship. In concentrating on giving orders I had heard nothing, but I knew that shot couldn't have failed to get home. THE TRIP OF THE SUBMARINE X-2 on the starboard and at the same time have our movements masked from the smaller cruiser by our second victim herself. To foster the appearance of an attack on her port side I let go a decoy periscope to float with the tide's decided sweep to the left shore and draw the fire in that vicinity. We kept slowly on and soon heard the unmistakable boom of heavy guns. I took that to mean our ruse was succeeding, and my hopes of success against the cruiser surged high. We porpoised and I found we were nearly five hundred yards to the starboard of the big cruiser. We ran full speed ahead straight up to her bow. We were quickly sighted, but before they could get their starboard guns into action-they were so busy firing on the port side-I had launched No. 2 torpedo and was at the bottom again. I had my nerves well under control so that my hand didn't Ishake at this second shot. This time I heard the explosion, a long, roaring boom that must have meant her magazine went, too. I must say I never saw cooler men than our crew. When you're a hundred feet or so below the shots and cries of battle they're neither exciting nor grewsome. I suppose I ought to have thought with pity of the mangled and dying above us, perhaps at that very moment sinking down to their graves, but that side of it didn't occur to me then. I was steering a course to the second cruiser. If I thought of death it was to hope we would finish her before our time came. I decided to fire at longer range in order to have a shorter return run among the wreckage of all three. I N TEN minutes we had porpoised and got the desired range, unobserved by escape. WR WE were making ten knots, for there By whatever cause the deadliest foe of the cruiser, which was lowering her ing there sixty feet below the fresh air boats to assist the others. I found out afterward two gunboats were closing in on us from behind. I had my hand on the toggle of the firing valve and was reading the range scale when their shots hit us and sent us canting toward the bottom. I was sent flying across the deck, and must have been knocked unconscious. The next thing I knew was Hopkins leaning over me. I sat up and heard the hiss of air through the vent of the manifold. Dallas was letting water into the ballast tank to keep us down. I went over to him unsteadily. "They got our periscopes, I think," said he, as cool as you please, tho he was flushed crimson. "But our torpedo went just the same." He sure is a plucky young 'un. Sure enough, the tube was empty! I could not hope the aim was true, but the cruiser must have been hit somewhere, if only with a glancing blow. We remained stationary sixty feet down while I took account of casualties. One of the men had an ugly gash across his forehead from being thrown against a stanchion, another had a bleeding and probably broken nose. I was over my It would be the end of us if that upper was our only hope. Well, better be shelled N O porpoising this time, since our periscopes were gone. We came up well awash and started the engines full speed ahead. I immediately opened the hatches and started the ventilating fans full speed, blowing out the gases and letting the cold, damp air in. Lord! It was good to breathe freely again. From my station in the tower I could plainly see the activity of the forts when their lookouts picked us up. But, glancing back, I saw the fighting tops of our first two victims, super-dreadnought and firstclass cruiser, just reaching out of the water. The smaller cruiser was afloat, but from her heavy list to starboard I knew she must be damaged. The forts were getting our range now and their 277 shells fell all around us. One struck the water near us and doused the conning tower with a splash. Well, if our time was coming it was a good thing to know that we had done our work not too badly. I heard one shell hiss and instinctively I ducked, but it hit the water not twenty yards ahead and sank harmlessly. We were half way across the bar. My helmsman was sticking to his post head down and eyes ahead without a look at the forts. Our hull shook with vibrations of the hard-pushed engines straining to get us to deep water before by all the laws of chance some shell must hit us. The lads in the engine room were doing their best. A shell from long range with most of its force exhausted glanced off our port bow, carrying away the towing pennant. Our nose ducked under a bit, but came up serenely in half a second. I encouraged Jansen with the prospect of deep water a hundred yards ahead. Already I could see we were nearly over the bar. The fire from the forts was decreasing. Only the longer range guns could come into play now. Looking back I saw a gunboat and two destroyers racing towards us, the gunboat leading in the narrows between the forts. Our water armor for ours! The first shells from the gunboat whizzed past us as I slammed down the hatch and brought us to the safe haven of the bottom with a hundred and eleven feet of solid protecting water between us and hostile sheels. T ... HAT'S about all there is to tell. We stayed there all day-"went to sleep on bottom," as the phrase goes, and literally that is what we did. The men certainly needed the rest. ... An hour after sunset we blew. No sign of any enemy waiting near. Mines were our worst bugaboo. We might strike one any minute. We were picked up by hostile searchlights twice and had to duck down, but the gist of it was that we reached our own waters before daylight and then met only our own patrol, who would gladly have convoyed us in. But our engines were standing up well and we reached our wharf at one o'clock under our own power after an absence of a little over thirty-nine hours. I found the division commander on the mother ship, saluted and began: "I report the safe return of the X-2 with complete loss of periscope, partial destruction of battery compartment and two very minor casualties in the crew. We damaged one small armored cruiser, totally destroyed one first-class cruiser and one super-dreadnought." I felt my eyelids blinking as I spoke. To this day the division commander laughs over how I went to sleep standing up during his speech on "impairing the morale of the enemy's fleet," and snored all through his eloquent congratulations on the exploit of the X-2. I THE BUSINESS WORLD WORKING TOWARD YOUR LEVEL: SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST IN BUSINESS That the commercial world demonstrates the law, Only the fit survive, is the conclusion presented by Frank Anderson, who holds a man-sized job with a large manufacturing concern in Buffalo, and who expresses the views gleaned from his business career as follows: T IS a common saying that men, like water, are always working towards their level. The only fault to find with such a statement is that the inference is that men are always working downward to their level. In the spring the snows on the hills melt and turn into water, which rushes in torrents down through the valleys to the sea. The course is always downwards. So that the eternal law of the waters is downward to the lowest level that exists. This is perhaps why we so often compare a human life to a stream. Emerson said that he believed in fate, but to him fate was not some mysterious, unseen force that works upon the lives of men from out of the great darkness. Fate, according to him, is simply the limitations of our personalities which determine our places on the social, moral, spiritual and intellectual planes of society. A man's fate may be some peculiar eccentricity of character which makes social intercourse impossible for him and drives him away from men to find conIsolation in resources of his own mind. D ID you ever put a magnifying glass over a large, "ripe" piece of cheese and see the thousands of worms working and wrestling ceaselessly in the midst of it? I think if a man could get above the world in an airship and put a reducing glass over the globe so as to bring all the myriad animals, human and other, within his focus he might enjoy a similar impression. If he were but curious he might simply see a tangling mass of worms; if he were a philosopher he might see an ordered process of natural selection. In every walk of life this struggle is going on; in the polite circles of ladies I and dainty gentlemen where pink tea is consumed by the drop from miniature cups; along the docks where grim and crude handlers of freight toil and strain; in the street, where the ruddy kids are hawking their papers; in the pulpits, where sincere and insincere men are giving messages to the world; in factories, amidst the noise and music of machinery; in offices, where intellect wrestles with intellect-everywhere, eternally, the struggle for the survival of the fittest is going on. It is going on beneath the surface. We are seldom aware of it. It is with us in our work and in our play. It is inseparable from us, it is omnipresent. S OME accident of circumstance or caprice of fortune may throw a man above his plane, where he will stick for a time, caught temporarily in some groove of the social or economic fabric; but always, night and day, by virtue of that very fate which is his peculiar limitation of character, he is wriggling and struggling to get back to his level. He is perhaps unaware of it, in all probability he does not know what is going on; he may be basking in the serene contemplation of his good fortune; and all the while the old law is working inexorably, not outside of him or through foreign agents, but in him and through him, by virtue of his own acts and tendencies, to put him where he belongs, to readjust him to his proper relation to the eternal scheme of things. And so, also, some accident of circumstance may throw another man at the very bottom of the social scale, among the dregs and refuse of humanity, and by virtue of that same fate, which is the circumference of his imagination, the volume of his spirit WHERE TO LOOK FOR BUSINESS IN THE October number of this magazine was printed a series of letters from prominent manufacturers expressing their views on this important question. These letters resulted in considerable discussion of the subject. Here is the view of one of the executives of Brown and Bigelow, of St. Paul: "There are two ways of getting the right men to fill responsible positions that open up from time to time in any business. One method is to raise them in your business, and the other is to hire them from the outside. Sometimes it is absolutely necessary to go into the open market and find just the man needed to fill a position of im and the power of his will, he will steadily work to that level which is his by divine right. He will, in all likelihood, do it unconsciously, joyously, always poised and balanced, without setting a particular value on any goal, but enjoying almost gluttonously that work to which he has set his hand. His level may not be generally recognized as high, according to social or financial standards, and yet he will belong to Wordsworth's society of "The noble living and the noble dead." B UT how does all of this apply to you and to me? Does it sound like impractical rant? Well, it is not. The point to which we are coming is, let us always stand on our own feet. Let us be sure we are on no false levels whether we are proprietors or just salesmen and workmen. Let us remember that the old law is working among us as well as among imaginary people in remote parts of the world. Let us ask no favors. Let us look every man in the eye and ask him to challenge our right to the positions we hold. If we have no right to them, let us get out of our own accord and get readjusted and begin again. We cannot for long hold positions that are not ours. It is childish for us to ask others to retain us in positions to which we have no right. The most tragic and pitiful thing about all this is that when we strike our level, if it is lower than we imagine it should be, and before we have got adjusted, we blame our fellows. We blame all the world and rail at the stars, but refuse to recognize the great Beneficent Cause. Let us say it again: It's not what the opportunity brings to you-but what you bring to the opportunity-that makes it a turning point to success or failure. EXECUTIVES portance, because of the lack of material at hand; but often it happens that employers go outside the business and pay big prices to bring men in when a careful analysis of the available timber within the business would disclose the right party for the place. "Go outside and bring in a stranger to fill an important position and you WASTEFUL HABITS OF NEWSPAPER READING take nothing less than a gamble in the majority of cases. Hire a man from your competitor and you've got to pay him more than he's worth to that competitor. Hence you start him out in your establishment under the necessity of paying dividends, in service rendered, on a certain amount of watered stock, over and above his inventoried worth. He may be able to meet the demands made on him from the very start, in which case he has 'made good.' More likely it will take an appreciable length of time for him to get acclimated to your way of doing business, to start the ball to rolling nicely-and in the mean time his salary goes on. In that case perhaps he will make good' anyway, if you do not fire him before he gets well started. It takes a real business man to be willing to wait for a fellow to make or break himself -and pay the bills in the mean time. F IND an employee right in your business who seems to have the elements of character and ability necessary to master the job in question -and how much less of a gamble you take. In the first place, he knows your business and products, he is familiar with your policies, he has been steeped in your ideals. The time the other man spends getting acclimated, this employee can spend in learning the new work. He may require more help, more teaching, more guidance, but the difference between his salary at the start and the salary you would have to pay the man from outside leaves his service cheaper in the end. It is hard "New blood means new life, to be men 279 with the house and is in absolute sympathy with its policies, ideals and methods, and in harmony with his environment and his fellow workers. To do our best work we need to be in perfect tune to everything about us. On the other hand, I have known many an employee who was shoved up into a position for which he seemed ill fitted to all but the boss. His experience along the line needed had been littlebut he had a mind open to suggestions, an ambition to succeed, an average amount of ability, and absolute knowledge of those little things about the business which seem so unimportant except when you don't know them. He had to be taught much, scolded a little, praised occasionally-but he got there in the long run. "Too many employers are blinded by the apparent brilliancy of some shining light on a competitor's staff, and overlook the fact that among their own employees is some young fellow with just as great possibilities within him, if only he were given a fair chance to grow up to them. He who looks only to the open market to fill the responsible positions in his business not only pays high for what he gets but he sadly weakens the esprit de corps of those within his business and quenches the ambition of capable employees who might be made of far greater use to the business if allowed to step higher and make or break themselves." Advice is seldom useful to those who do not know how to weigh it. E THE THINGS DWIN N. FERDON insists that newspapers are made in a hurry and should be read the same way. He says: "The right kind of newspapers have done a fine work in the education of the masses. Surely I for one would rather find a man perusing a good newspaper than never reading anything at all. Every man and woman should keep in touch with affairs in general-local, national and worldwide. But to make it a point to read everything in a newspaper, to spend over its columns all the time or even a major part of the time one may have free for reading, that is carrying the newspaper habit too far. "A newspaper is gotten up in a hurry and it should therefore be read in a hurry, while a greater amount of time and attention should be given the perusal of books or periodicals that are not made up in a hurry and the contents of which, therefore, are apt to be more worth assimilating. Get on a street car in any fair-sized city between the hours of 5.30 and 6.30, when the great mass of workers are homeward THAT BUSINESS MEN READ bound and notice the men whose noses S "When there are so many really worth while things that we can read about-things that will help to develop our minds, our souls, our efficiency in life and business-why spend much time over those ephemeral things that constitute ninety-nine per cent. of newspaper news? Let's read our newspaper for the news, merely catching the headlines, going deeper into what is worth knowing, skipping entirely all the yellow stuff and then let us pull out UCH a man would certainly pass of our pocket some little book or publisumma cum laude, as some of the cation that we ought to read—and read universities put it, if he were to it. take an examination on batting averages, club standings, and the relative merit of different twirlers; but just what good will that ever do him in life? I guess most red-blooded Americans enjoy a good, scrappy baseball game occasionally, and most of us look instinctively to see how the home team came out to-day; but life is too short to spend three-quarters or even half an hour a day keeping up with the baseball dope sheet or any other sheet like it. "Those who have the newspaper habit badly ought to try cutting off a few minutes each day until they get down to where they can run through a newspaper hurriedly, and yet come out with everything worth while. It doesn't take long, not over five or ten minutes. Then turn to something worth while-something solid, brain-building and thought-provoking. And take as much time as is necessary. But hurry through the newspaper, or there will be little time for the better things." A BUSINESS STRATEGY IN WAR TIME Previously to last August, a great many manufacturers in this country were dependent upon Europe for essential parts and ingredients for their products. When the supply of this raw material was suddenly cut off, many concerns were struck with business paralysis. From a commercial viewpoint, the more or less complete cessation of industry in Europe and the uncertainty of imports foreshadowed a closing down of plants in this country. Many American manufacturers came to realize their dependence on Europe for raw materials. This article tells how some of them met the situation triumphantly. MANUFACTURER of boxed water colors for school use found himself in the following predicament. With each box he had been supplying a fine grade of brush. The hair used in these brushes came from Germany. Then imports ceased. Hasty experiments were made to discover a substitute for the imported hair, but without avail. Hair and bristles a-plenty could be had, but it all lacked the essential fine texture of the imported article. Out in Chicago the water-color people got in touch with a department manager at the stock - yards. "Fine hair," replied this man, "the most delicate yet strong hair in the world is found only in a cow's ear. Camel's hair and imported rabbit's hair can't begin to equal it for quality. It makes the best water-color brushes that can be made. We ship carloads of it to eastern brokers." was were Water-color brushes were hastily made up from samples supplied. They proved to be the equal in every way of the imported article. The business that was threatened with extinction saved. Contracts immediately signed for sufficient quantities to prevent surplus supplies from going abroad. And it is the suspicion of the water-color people that the imported hair they had been buying is none other than that which is shipped abroad from the stock-yards. Simply another case of prospecting in distant parts for gold while a gold mine exists in one's own back yard. A manufacturer of automobile headlights found himself in the same predicament as the water-color people. He had been relying on Germany to supply the curved glass doors and reflectors. American manufacturers could supply flat glass, but not curved. They frankly said they were not equipped to supply curved glass, and even if they were they could not compete with Germany in price. American dependence on Europe was receiving a hard jolt. It began to look as if the only reason why American manufacturers could not compete with Europe on certain goods was that they had never tried hard. The big watch and clock companies were faced with suspension of business due to inability to obtain curved glass for watch and clock faces. They had been importing this from Germany. Then the supply ceased. Bottle makers were appealed to, and they willingly started experiments. But all they could produce was a green crystal. For a time it looked as if a new fashion in green watch crystals would be launched as a result of the war. Incandescent lamp manufacturers also were tried. They could produce the desired crystal, but their price ran too high. Finally a firm of table glassware manufacturers solved the problem. They were eager to get the business, and their prices paralleled those of the German suppliers. As a result, three large watch and clock factories that were faced with a shut-down are now running along as usual, war or no war. Crystal originally intended for frappe cups is now being manufactured into watch and clock faces. I N TRAILING down these instances "Circular letters were then sent out to Chicago firms likely to be affected by the war, informing them of the work we were doing. We wanted to bring sellers and buyers together. We invited the man with a problem to put it up to us for solution. While we made no claims to omniscience we knew we could render a great public service. Our help was not limited to members of our Association, nor to Chicago manufacturers alone any American manufacturer was free to call upon us for help. We have had the pleasure of cooperating with manufacturers the country over. We did not wait for people to get into trouble -we went after them before trouble broke and suggested ways to avoid difficulties." A burlap manufacturer was faced with the closing down of his plant through inability to obtain supplies of hemp and jute. An expert on this class of work was called in the Chicago representative of Krupp, the German gunmakers. He suggested that the fibers of a certain Brazilian plant could be substituted for hemp and jute, and, furthermore, he had the machinery necessary for decorticating the fibers. Accordingly he was helped to form a company to make a substitute Thus was the for hemp and jute. burlap manufacturer helped to keep his factory running. Around Christmas time a merchant boxes. He had been getting them from wanted his usual supply of music Switzerland. But now the supply had almost ceased because Swiss credit had of how American manufacturers rose to the occasion, the writer noticed a similarity of method that seemed to suggest a central driving force. Each manufacturer called upon mentioned the Chicago Association of Commerce. And so he went direct to this Association. Anderson Pace, in- been knocked to bits. By correspondence alone a man was dustrial commissioner of the AssociaNew York who tion, proved to be the man behind the was familiar with music-box manufacture in Switzerland. plan. Mr. Pace said: A $10,000 contract started him in business to produce the goods in the United States. "When the war broke out we realized that many manufacturers would be hard hit through cessation of imports. And so we organized a research bureau. We collected a wide range of data as to where all manner of raw materials and partly manufactured articles could be obtained. In this work we had the cooperation of all the industries in the more than seventy divisions into which our membership is divided. In cases where we found it impossible to duplicate in America goods that had been obtained from abroad, we set chemists and engineers to work to develop the necessary processes to produce these goods. C located in AME a call for hydrogen. A firm that had been buying two million feet annually from Germany found its supply cut off. Why couldn't hydrogen be manufactured in the United States? Why, indeed! The firm offered a long-time contract for the American product, and on this basis a plant was started to permanently usurp the German business. A man who controls a big market for women's clothes ran out of goods at the height of an unsurpassed demand. Supplies from abroad were im |