The Naval Captain In Battle

Writing of the perils of naval warfare, Park Benjamin in The Independent says : Nobody now believes that a captain who finds his visión through the slits of the conning tower cut off by smoke wil! stay thus shut up. It is extremely doubtful if it will bo physically possible for him to remain there af ter the shells commence to hamnier its sides and burst against it. and in any event the intense anxiety to see and know clearly what the enemy ís doing will inevitatrly lead liim to take his chances in the open. Conning tower or no conning tower, his duty is to place hiinself at whatever point he can manage his ships' to the best advantage, and this he will eer tainly do. Lord Charles Beresford, witL grim humor, has suggested that the captain 's safest place is uot in but be hind his couuing tower, "because then he has two thicknesses of steel between hiinself and the enemy, don't you see?' But while conning tower arrnor may re sist penetration it is by no means certain that the whole structure will not be swept away by the first heavy projectile which squarely hits it.