achieved their liberty, however, without the proverbial crust of bread
or cup of water; and in consequence, after fasting all day, gave
themselves to predatory nocturnal forays, which were rather startling
when unexpectedly aroused by them from sleep. The ward-room pantry was
near my berth, and I remember being awaked by a great commotion and
scuffling, as one or more utensils were upset and knocked about in the
unhappy beast's attempt to get at water kept there in a little cask.
No reconcilement between them and man was effected, and one by one
they dropped overboard, the victims of accident or suicide, noted or
unnoted, to their deliverance and our relief. While they lasted it was
pathetic to watch their furtive movements and unrelaxed vigilance,
jealously guarding the freedom which was held under such hopeless
surroundings and must cost them so dear at last.

When the ship had rounded Cape Guardafui and fairly entered the Strait
of Bab-el-Mandeb, the alteration of weather conditions was immediate
and startling. The heat became all at once intense and dry. From the
latter circumstance the relief was great. I remember that many years
afterwards, having spent a month or more determining a site for a
navy-yard in Puget Sound, where the temperature is delightful but the
atmosphere saturated, I experienced a similar sense of bodily comfort,
when we reached Arizona, returning by the Southern Pacific Railroad.
One morning I got up from the sleeper and walked out into the rare,
crisp air of a way station, delighted to find myself literally as dry
as a bone, and a very old bone, too; tertiary period, let us say. The
sudden change in the strait proved fatal to one of our officers. He
had been ailing for a few days, but on the night after we doubled the
cape woke up from a calm sleep in wild delirium, and in a brief period
died from the bursting of an aneurism; an effect which the surgeon
attributed to the abrupt increase of heat. I may add that, though dry,
the air was felt by us to be debilitating. During the ten days passed
in the gulf, young as I then was, I was indisposed to any unusual
bodily or mental effort. What breeze reached us, coming over desert
from every direction, was like the blast of a furnace, although the
height of the thermometer was not excessive.

It was scarcely fair to Aden to visit it in midsummer, but our voyage
had not been timed with reference to seasons or our comfort. I shall
not weary a reader wi