ox, together
with any photos, etc., you think I would like--I have none of you or Pa
or the family (including Carrie)--and send to me.

"I just got in in time--didn't I? Another week would have been too late.
My funds were getting low; I would not have had _anything_ before long.
The U. S. Consul, General Bromley, is much pleased. The interpreter says
it was all in the way I did with the Viceroy in the interview.

"I will have a chance to go to Peking and later to a tiger hunt in
Mongolia, but for the present I am going to study, work, and _stroke_
these mandarins till I get a raise. I am the only instructor in both
seamanship and gunnery, and I must know _everything_, both practically
and theoretically. But it will be good for me and the only thing is,
that if I were put back into the Navy I would be in a dilemma. I think
I will get my 'influence' to work, and I want you people at home to
look out, and in case I _am_--if it were represented to the Sec. that
my position here was giving me an immense lot of practical knowledge
professionally--more than I could get on a ship at sea--I think he would
give me two years' leave on half or quarter pay. Or, I would be willing
to do without pay--only to be kept on the register in my rank.

"I will write more about this. Love to all."

It is characteristic of McGiffin that in the very same letter in which
he announces he has entered foreign service he plans to return to
that of his own country. This hope never left him. You find the same
homesickness for the quarterdeck of an American man-of-war all through
his later letters. At one time a bill to reinstate the midshipmen who
had been cheated of their commissions was introduced into Congress. Of
this McGiffin writes frequently as "our bill." "It may pass," he writes,
"but I am tired hoping. I have hoped so long. And if it should," he adds
anxiously, "there may be a time limit set in which a man must rejoin, or
lose his chance, so do not fail to let me know as quickly as you can."
But the bill did not pass, and McGiffin never returned to the navy that
had cut him adrift. He settled down at Tien-Tsin and taught the young
cadets how to shoot. Almost all of those who in the Chinese-Japanese War
served as officers were his pupils. As the navy grew, he grew with
it, and his position increased in importance. More Mexican dollars per
month, more servants, larger houses, and buttons of various honorable
colors were given him, and, in