Stand by to Surface. By Richard Baxter. (Cassell. ros. 61)
THERE is no object in going on and on writing about " superb skill " and " unsurpassed gallantry," in repeating such phrases until all meaning is drained out of them. There is no object in recording one after another—endlessly it seems—the exploits of submarines, unless the reader can be made to grasp the magnitude of such human endeavour and to understand something of the strangeness of sub- marine life. If we are to understand anything, we must understand first a little of what life is like down there, what human beings think and feel and do when they have been transported through the looking-glass to something so totally strange. Mr. Baxter has obviously been at great pains in gathering his facts, but he has not the know- ledge of his subject to construct from these facts a reasonable picture of what must really have happened. The book is dull ; potted summaries of submarine activity—the number of tons sunk by this submarine, the number of depth-charges that fell around that— could not be anything else. They fail utterly to provide an impres- sion of an existence that has imminent danger as its predominant element. What are the emotions that overtake men as a submarine attacks or is heavily set upon with depth-charges? What is the measure of courage, what are the values of comradeship and trust in such circumstances? You will not find out by reading this book.
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