Their objectives were the canal of Zeebrugge and the entrance to the harbor of Ostend—­theirs, and those of five other veteran and obsolete cruisers and a mosquito fleet of destroyers, motor-launches and coastal motor-boats.  Three of the cruisers, Intrepid, Iphigenia and Thetis, each duly packed with concrete and with mines attached to her bottom for the purpose of sinking her, Merrimac-fashion, in the neck of the canal, were aimed at Zeebrugge; two others, similarly prepared, were directed at Ostend.  The function of Vindictive, with her ferry-boats, was to attack the great half-moon Mole which guards the Zeebrugge Canal, land bluejackets and marines upon it, destroy what stores, guns, and Germans she could find, and generally create a diversion while the block-ships ran in and sank themselves in their appointed place.  Vice Admiral Keyes, in the destroyer Warwick, commanded the operation.

[Sidenote:  The conditions favorable for the attack.]

There had been two previous attempts at the attack, capable of being pushed home if weather and other conditions had served.  The night of the 22nd offered nearly all the required conditions, and at some fifteen miles off Zeebrugge the ships took up their formation for the attack. Vindictive, which had been towing Iris and Daffodil, cast them off to follow under their own steam; Intrepid, Iphigenia, and Thetis slowed down to give the first three time to get alongside the Mole; Sirius and Brilliant shifted their course for Ostend; and the great swarm of destroyers and motor craft sowed themselves abroad upon their multifarious particular duties.  The night was overcast and there was a drift of haze; down the coast a great searchlight swung its beams to and fro; there was a small wind and a short sea.

[Sidenote:  The Vindictive heads for the Mole.]

[Sidenote:  The wind helps make a smoke-screen.]

From Vindictive’s bridge, as she headed in towards the Mole with her faithful ferry-boats at her heels, there was scarcely a glimmer of light to be seen shorewards.  Ahead of her, as she drove through the water, rolled the smoke-screen, her cloak of invisibility, wrapped about her by the small craft.  This was a device of Wing-Commander Brock, R.N.A.S., “without which,” acknowledges the Admiral in Command, “the operation could not have been conducted.”  The north-east wind moved the volume of it shoreward ahead of the ships; beyond it, the distant town and its defenders were unsuspicious; and it was not till Vindictive, with her bluejackets and marines standing ready for the landing, was close upon the Mole that the wind lulled and came away again from the south-west, sweeping back the smoke-screen and laying her bare to the eyes that looked seaward.

[Sidenote:  The star shells discover the ships and battle opens.]

[Sidenote:  The Vindictive reaches the Mole.]