AUSTRALIA: Marksmanship

At anchor in the South Pacific lay the little Australian destroyer Torrens last week. Three-quarters of a mile away Australia's two capital ships, the 10,000-ton cruisers Australia and Canberra, steamed in line of battle, decks cleared for action. Gunnery officers and navigators worked their range finders and slide rules, scribbled calculations. The eight eight-inch guns of the Australia fired a deafening broadside, the Canberra followed with her main battery. Fountains of white spray rose round the little target-ship, but when the smoke cleared, the Torrens still rode at anchor. Australia's navy tried again and yet again until Rear Admiral E. R. G. R. Evans judged that enough of the Commonwealth's money had been blown away, sent a motor launch bobbing over the waves to sink the Torrens with a prosaic charge of good, reliable dynamite.