[Illustration: LIGHT CRUISER.]
Meanwhile another light cruiser of Hood's, the _Canterbury_, was trying
to protect three destroyers, led by the _Shark_, that were fighting
German light cruisers and destroyers. Hipper and Scheer were doing
their very utmost to keep Beatty and Jellicoe at arm's length till they
could complete the German turn round the bull's-eye and make an effort
to get off the deadly target altogether. For if Jellicoe could range
round the inner, at higher speed and with an overlap, they would
certainly be rounded up and crushed to death. The German light
cruisers and destroyers therefore attacked the British light craft with
the greatest fury, hoping to destroy the screen behind which Jellicoe
would form his line of battle in safety from torpedoes. As the _Shark_
charged down at the head of her line she suddenly found two lines of
German destroyers charging towards her. Nothing daunted, she went
straight on, her pulsing engines making her quiver with the thrilling
race for life or death between them. Once abreast of them she fired
her guns and torpedoes right and left, sinking two German destroyers,
one on each side, and giving the rest as good as she got, till, hit by
torpedoes on both sides together, she sank like a stone.
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