ith wide, comfortable berths and all the appliances for taking good care
of ill men. Sam Truax was carefully placed in one of the berths. He was
the only patient there at the time.

Doctor McCrea frequently felt the fellow's pulse, then ran a hand lightly
over Sam's face, forehead and temples.

"You might tell me what's the matter with me, Doc," protested Truax.

"Oh, you'll be all right," replied the doctor, evasively.

"When?"

"Oh, in a few days, anyway."

"What have I got? A fever?"

"Now, don't ask questions, my man. Just lie quietly, and let us get you
on your feet as soon as possible."

Just then the hospital man returned with a glass of something for which
Doctor McCrea had sent him.

"Drink this," ordered the surgeon.

Truax obeyed.

"Now, in a few minutes, you ought to feel better," urged the surgeon,
after the man in the berth had swallowed a sweetish drink.

Did he? Feel better? Truax soon began to turn decidedly white about
the gills.

"I--I feel--awful," he groaned.

Doctor McCrea, in silence, again felt the fellow's pulse.

But, in a minute, something happened. A man may feel as well as ever,
at one moment. Twenty minutes later, however, if he vomits, it is
impossible to convince himself that he feels anything like well.

More of the same draught was brought, and the sick man made to swallow
it. Even a third and a fourth dose were administered. Sam Truax
became so much worse, in fact, that he did not even hear when the bow
cable chains of the gunboat grated as the anchors were let go opposite
Blair's Cove just before dark.

Certainly no man of medicine could have been more attentive than was
Doctor McCrea. Even when one of the ward-room stewards appeared and
announced that dinner was served, the naval surgeon replied:

"I don't know that I shall have any time for dinner to-night."

Then Doctor McCrea turned and again thrust his thermometer between
Truax's lips. The reading of that thermometer, two minutes later,
seemed to give him a good deal of concern.

"I wish there were a capable physician on shore that I could call in
consultation," he remarked in a low tone, but Truax heard and stirred
nervously under his blankets.

"I--I wish you could perspire some," said Doctor McCrea, anxiously,
as he leaned over the sufferer.

"I--I'm icy c-c-c-cold," chattered Truax.

"Too bad, too bad," declared the naval surgeon, shaking his head.

There was a short interval, during