I am writing this book-but under protest for two principal reasons. They are :

1. My memory is bad, and I have never kept a diary.

2. Writing books is not in my line of life.

But I have remembered some interesting occurrences during the twenty-five years I served in the Royal Navy, and my wife thinks it only fair to the world in general that I should pass them on. So she is really responsible for this production.

When I read some recent autobiographies I am amazed at the mass of detail and evidence which the writers have presented, dating from remote childhood to modern times, and I am disposed to envy a man who can sit in his arm-chair of an evening and re-live the days of his strenuous youth. On the other hand I do not envy, because it seems to me that whether you have a bad memory or not you can always recall the pleasant things that have befallen you.

5

Nature appears to have arranged that unpleasant experiences and discomforts are soon forgotten, otherwise many of us would have thrown up the sponge long ago. I, for one, certainly could not have carried on in H.M. destroyers in the War if I had not been able to forget the unpleasant side and start afresh each time I put to sea.

Tennyson must have had this in mind when he wrote :

A truer saying was never put into poetry.

But to go back to my point. Having a bad memory, I can only marshal pleasant and interesting experiences and yarns with any clearness to my pen. The disagreeable ones are mostly a merciful blur "Shadow'd by the growing hour" - indefinite, merging into the background of time. I find no difficulty in leaving them there.

I cannot go back to the old sailing days, because all the ships I served in were comparatively modern, and it would be of little interest to go into any detail regarding most of them ; consequently this book boils

6

down to miscellaneous anecdotes and experiences, with an occasional outburst, such as that on the convoy system.

I hope that these pages will prove interesting ; if not, as I have already explained - somewhat cravenly, I fear - I am not to blame.

And if information is sought concerning the author's career it will be found in the Appendix.

7

^ back to top ^