ars and over thickly sown beds of tiny phosphorescent
stars that were blown about like flowers in a wind-storm by the frothing
wake of the ships; by day, through a brilliant sunlit sea, a cool
breeze--so cool that only at noon was the heat tropical--and over smooth
water, blue as sapphire. Music night and morning, on each ship, and
music coming across the little waves at any hour from the ships about.
Porpoises frisking at the bows and chasing each other in a circle around
bow and stern as though the transports sat motionless; schools of
flying-fish with filmy, rainbow wings rising from one wave and
shimmering through the sunlight to the foamy crest of another--sometimes
hundreds of yards away. Beautiful clear sunsets of rose, gold-green, and
crimson, with one big, pure radiant star ever like a censor over them;
every night the stars more deeply and thickly sown and growing ever
softer and more brilliant as the boats neared the tropics; every day
dawn rich with beauty and richer for the dewy memories of the dawns that
were left behind.

Now and then a little torpedo-boat would cut like a knife-blade through
the water on messenger service; or a gunboat would drop lightly down the
hill of the sea, along the top of which it patrolled so vigilantly; and
ever on the horizon hung a battle-ship that looked like a great gray
floating cathedral. But nobody was looking for a fight--nobody thought
the Spaniard would fight--and so these were only symbols of war; and
even they seemed merely playing the game.

It was as Grafton said. Far ahead went the flag-ship with the huge
Commander-in-Chief and his staff, the gorgeous attaches, and the artists
and correspondents, with valets, orderlies, stenographers, and
secretaries. Somewhere, far to the rear, one ship was filled with
newspaper men from stem to stern. But wily Grafton was with Lawton and
Chaffee, the only correspondent aboard their transport. On the second
day, as he sat on the poop-deck, a negro boy came up to him, grinning
uneasily:

"I seed you back in ole Kentuck, suh."

"You did? Well, I don't remember seeing you. What do you want?"

"Captain say he gwine to throw me overboard."

"What for?"

"I ain't got no business here, suh."

"Then what are you here for?"

"Lookin' fer Ole Cap'n, suh."

"Ole Cap'n who?" said Grafton, mimicking.

"Cap'n Crittenden, suh."

"Well, if you are his servant, I suppose they won't throw you overboard.
What's your name?"

"Bob,