In Africa | Page 7

of the place, and begged that he be given leave to remain another six months. The war office was amazed, and it gladly gave him the extension. At the end of a year the same exchange of letters occurred and again he was given the extension.
I don't know how long this continued, but in the end the war office discovered that the officer had been in London having a good time while a sergeant-major attended to the sending of the biannual letter. I suppose the officer divided his pay with the sergeant-major. If he did not he was a most ungrateful man.
The Adolph Woermann is a German ship and is one of the best ones that go down the east coast. Its passengers go to the British ports in British East Africa, to the German ports in German East Africa, and to several other ports in South Africa. Consequently the passengers are about equally divided between the English and the Germans, with an occasional Portuguese bound for Delagoa Bay or Mozambique.
When we first went aboard our party of four desired to secure a table by ourselves. We were unsuccessful, however, and found it shared by a peaceful old gentleman with whiskers. By crossing with gold the palm of the chief steward, the old gentleman was shifted to a seat on the first officer's right. Later we discovered that he was Sir Thomas Scanlon, the first premier of South Africa, the man who gave Cecil Rhodes his start.
There were many interesting elements which made the cruise of the Woermann unusual. Mr. Boyce and his party of six were on board and were on their way to photograph East Africa. They took moving pictures of the various deck sports, also a bird's-eye picture of the ship, taken from a camera suspended by a number of box kites, and also gave two evenings of cinematograph entertainment.
There were also poker games, bridge games, and other forms of seaside sports, all of which contributed to the gaiety of life in the Indian Ocean. In the evening one might have imagined oneself at a London music-hall, in the daytime at the Olympian games, and in the early morning out on the farm. There were a number of chickens on board and each rooster seemed obliged to salute the dawn with a fanfare of crowing. They belonged to the governor and were going out to East Africa to found a colony of chickens. Some day, years hence, the proud descendents of these chickens will boast that their ancestors came over on the Woermann, just as some people boast about their ancestors on the Mayflower.
[Drawing: Mauled by a Lion]
When we crossed the equator, a committee of strong-arm men baptized those of the passengers who had never before crossed the line. Those who had crossed the line entered into the fun of the occasion with much spirit and enthusiasm.
On the hottest day of the trip, just as we left Suez, when the mercury was sputtering from the heat, we heard that the north pole had been discovered. It cooled us off considerably for a while.
CHAPTER III
THE ISLAND OF MOMBASA, WITH THE JUNGLES OF EQUATORIAL AFRICA "ONLY A FEW BLOCKS AWAY." A STORY OF THE WORLD'S CHAMPION MAN-EATING LIONS
In this voyage of the Woermann there were about twenty Englishmen and thirty Germans in the first class, not including women, and children. There was practically no communication between the two nationalities, which seemed deeply significant in these days when there is so much talk of war between England and Germany. Each went his way without so much as a "good morning" or a guten abend. And it was not a case of unfamiliarity with the languages, either, that caused this mutual restraint, for most of the Germans speak English. It was simply an evidence that at the present time there is decidedly bad feeling between the two races, and if it is a correct barometer of conditions in Europe, there is certain to be war one of these days. On the Woermann, we only hoped that it would not break out while the weather was as hot as it was at that time.
The Germans are not addicted to deck sports while voyaging about, and it is quite unusual to find on German ships anything in the way of deck competition. The German, while resting, prefers to play cards, or sing, or sit in his long easy chair with the children playing about. The Englishman likes to compete in feats of strength and takes to deck sports as a duck takes to water. I don't know who started it, but some one organized deck sports on the Woermann, and after we left Aden the sound of battle raged without cessation. Some of the competitions were amusing. For instance, there was the cockfight.