NAVAL ADVENTURE

Dominion, Volume 29, Issue 208, 30 May 1936, Page 25

NAVAL ADVENTURE

Story of a Mediterranean Voyage “Naval Odyssey,” by T. Woodroofe. (London: Cape). By allowing himself a heroine and a hero, Mr. AVoodroofe has given this book of naval travel and adventure an entirely new and interesting form. His heroine is the Cassiopeia, a C-class cruiser, in which this Mediterranean voyage was made in 1921, and his hero is Toby, a young officer on the ship. The incidents are told as happening to Toby, but the account of the cruise has the ring of authenticity and recalls recent historical events which have been quickly forgotten by a world in which so much history has been made in the last two decades. The cruise began when the company of the Cassiopeia represented Britain at festivities at the court of Spain, in San .Sebastian. This is a very gay interlude, and makes! a sharp contrast with later events of the voyage, and emphasises how calmly the naval fraternity face the drastic changes which circumstances force upon them. They proved themselves equally at home in the gold lace of dress uniform, accepting lavish Spanish hospitality, and in soiled ducks stowing refugees into cargo boats; for during the festivities in Spain the ship received mysterious sailing orders which brought her finally to Smyrna to assist at the evacuation ordered by Mustapha Kemal at the close of the Turco-Greek war. In seven days one hundred and twenty thousand old men, women and children, were loaded into any boat that was available.

The story of the evacuation is the outstanding chapter in the book. “Naval Odyssey” is all written with a delightful touch, but this tragic account is written with great depth of feeling, and the reader understands the attitude of the British naval officers who slaved willingly in the heat and stench and filth, but remained able to laugh at many little comedies which fioated to the surface of the vast tragedy.

’Mr. Woodroofe relates many other incidents of the Mediterranean cruise, some grave, some gay, but in all there is a refreshing artistry—a sensitivity which moves to laughter or to tears and lifts “Naval Odyssey” above the level of the usual competently-written travel tale.