fer you here the
dedication of your unauthorized biography. You will read these memoirs,
I know, and it is my pious hope that you do not fit the cap on yourself
as their hero. Of course I have sent you along your cruises under the
decent disguise of a purser's name, and I trust that if you do recognize
yourself, you will appreciate this nice feeling on my part. Believe me,
it was not entirely caused by personal fear of that practical form which
I am sure your displeasure would take if you caught any one putting you
into print. Even a working novelist has his humane moments; and besides
if I made you more recognizable, there might be a more dangerous broth
stirred up, with an ugly international flavor. Would it be indiscreet to
bring one sweltering day in Bahia to your memory, where you made play
with a German (or was he a Scandinavian?) and a hundredweight drum of
good white lead? or might one hint at that little affair which made
Odessa bad for your health, and indeed compelled you to keep away from
Black Sea ports entirely for several years? I trust, then, that if you
do detect my sin in making myself without leave or license your personal
historian, you will be induced for the sake of your present
respectability to give no sign of a ruffled temper, but recognize me as
part of the cross you are appointed to bear, and incidentally remember
my forbearance in keeping so much really splendid material (from my
point of view) in snug retirement up my sleeve.

Finally, let me remind you that I made no promises not to publish, and
that you did. Not only were you going to endow the world with a book of
poems, but I was to have a free copy. This has not yet come; and if, for
an excuse, you have published no secular verse, I am quite willing to
commute for a copy of the Book of Hymns, provided it is suitably
inscribed.

C.J.C.H.

OAK VALE, BRADFORD,
June 27, 1899.

CHAPTER I

IN QUARANTINE

"The pay is small enough," said Captain Kettle, staring at the blue
paper. "It's a bit hard for a man of my age and experience to come down
to a job like piloting, on eight pound a month and my grub."

"All right, Capt'n," replied the agent. "You needn't tell me what I know
already. The pay's miserable, the climate's vile, and the bosses are
beasts. And yet we have more applicants for these berths on the Congo
than there are vacancies for. And f'why is it, Capt'n? Because there's
no questions asked. The Congo p