fully than the other. Suddenly, in the twilight the men in the
second sambuk felt a shock, then another, and a third. The water
poured into it rapidly. It had run upon the reef of a small island,
where the smaller sambuk had been able to pass on account of its
lighter draft. Soon the stranded boat began to list over, and the
twenty-eight men aboard had to sit on the gunwale.

"We could scarcely move," narrated Lieutenant Gerdts, who commanded
the stranded boat. "The other boat was nowhere in sight. Now it grew
dark. At this stage I began to build a raft of spars and old pieces of
wood that might keep us afloat. But soon the first boat came into
sight again. The commander turned about and sent over his little
canoe; in this and in our own canoe, in which two men could sit at
each trip, we first transferred the sick. Now the Arabs began to help
us. But just then the tropical helmet of our doctor suddenly appeared
above the water in which he was standing up to his ears. Thereupon the
Arabs withdrew: We were Christians, and they did not know that we were
friends. Now the other sambuk was so near that we could have swum to
it in half an hour, but the seas were too high. At each trip a good
swimmer trailed along, hanging to the painter of the canoe. When it
became altogether dark we could not see the boat any more, for over
there they were prevented by the wind from keeping any light burning.
My men asked: 'In what direction shall we swim?' I answered: 'Swim in
the direction of this or that star; that must be about the direction
of the boat.' Finally a torch flared up over there--one of the torches
that was still left from the _Emden_. But we had suffered considerably
through submersion. One sailor cried out: 'Oh, psha! It's all up with
us now, that's a searchlight.' About ten o'clock we were all safe
aboard, but one of our typhus patients wore himself out completely by
exertion and died a week later. On the next morning we went over again
to the wreck in order to seek the weapons that had fallen into the
water. You see, the Arabs dive so well; they fetched up a considerable
lot--both machine guns, all but ten of the rifles, though these were,
to be sure, all full of water. Later they frequently failed to go off
when they were used in firing.

"Now we numbered, together with the Arabs, seventy men on the little
boat. Then we anchored before Konfida and met Sami Bey. He had shown
himself useful, even before, in the service of