to make land in safety.

We laid up two days in a harbor on the Albanian coast, spending the time
pleasantly enough in swimming and sailing, while we waited for a new
escort. Another night's run put us in Navarino Bay. The grandfather of
Lieutenant Finch Hatton, one of the officers on board, commanded the
Allied forces in the famous battle fought here in 1827, when the Turkish
fleet was vanquished and the independence of Greece assured.

Several days more brought us to Port Said, and after a short delay we
pushed on through the canal and into the Red Sea. It was August, and when
one talks of the Red Sea in August there is no further need for comment.
The _Saxon_ had not been built for the tropics. She had no fans, nor
ventilating system such as we have on the United Fruit boats. Some
unusually intelligent stokers had deserted at Port Said, and as we were in
consequence short-handed, it was suggested that any volunteers would be
given a try. Finch Hatton and I felt that our years in the tropics should
qualify us, and that the exercise would improve our dispositions. We got
the exercise. Never have I felt anything as hot, and I have spent August
in Yuma, Arizona, and been in Italian Somaliland and the Amazon Valley.
The shovels and the handles of the wheelbarrows blistered our hands.

[Illustration: Map of Mesopotamia showing region of the fighting. Inset,
showing relative position of Mesopotamia and other countries.]

We had a number of cases of heat-stroke, and the hospital facilities on a
crowded transport can never be all that might be desired. The first
military burial at sea was deeply impressive. There was a lane of Tommies
drawn up with their rifles reversed and heads bowed; the short, classic
burial service was read, and the body, wrapped in the Union Jack, slid
down over the stern of the ship. Then the bugles rang out in the haunting,
mournful strains of the "Last Post," and the service ended with all
singing "Abide With Me."

We sweltered along down the Red Sea and around into the Indian Ocean. We
wished to call at Aden in order to disembark some of our sick, but were
ordered to continue on without touching. Our duties were light, and we
spent the time playing cards and reading. The Tommies played "house" from
dawn till dark. It is a game of the lotto variety. Each man has a paper
with numbers written on squares; one of them draws from a bag slips of
paper also marked with numbers, calls them out, and those