H.M.S. Severn was originally built as a monitor for the ilian Navy and had just been completed when the Great War commenced, Before delivery could be made, in stepped the Admiralty and promptly took her over. Designed solely for river work she seemed at first glance in perfect order for the upper reaches of the Amazon but definitely and decidedly al! wrong for the treacherous waters and tid that wash the British Isles. Single-funneled, having a freeboard of not more than 3% eet forward and aft, she measured 26} feet long and 49 feet wide and when fully loaded rev no more than 6% feet of water, all of which' suggested not so much a ship or sea-going craft as some squat. floating fort or a floating steel platform on which to mount guns, Of 1260 tons the slender grip that Severn had on the water always made her an ungainly creature, extremely difficult to handle save in a flat calm and the great difficulties experienced in moving her from place to place during her lifetime form many a humorous albeit dangerous episode in. this volume,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.