ng out on the dry sun-warmed deck to make the
most of it while it lasted. An importunate whine from a nest of arms and
legs sprawling abreast the midships torpedo-tubes attracted my attention
for a moment as I sauntered aft to see what was afoot, and presently the
rattle of dice on the deck and an imploring "Come on, you Seven!" told
me they were "shooting Craps," with, I shortly discovered, bars of milk
chocolate and sticks of chewing-gum for stakes. Several others were
playing "High, Low, Jack," and here and there--using elbows and knees to
keep the bellying pages from blowing away--were little knots clustered
about the latest Sunday Supplement from New York.

But quite the best thing of all was two brown-armed youngsters going
through a proper battery warming-up with a real baseball. I had seen
enthusiasts on two or three of the American units with the Grand Fleet
playing catch right up to the moment "General Quarters" was sounded for
target practice; but that was on the broad decks of battleships, with
some chance of saving a ball that chanced to be muffed. But here the
pitcher had to wind-up with a sort of a corkscrew stoop to keep from
hitting his hand against a stay, while the catcher braced himself with
one foot against a depth-charge and the other against the mounting of
the after-gun. There were four or five things that the ball had to clear
by less than a foot in its flight from one to the other, but the only
ones of these I recall now are a searchlight diaphragm and a gong which
sounded from the bridge a standby signal to the men at the
depth-charges. I actually saw that skilfully directed spheroid make two
complete round-trips, from the pitcher to the catcher and back, before
it struck the gong a resonant bing! caromed against the side of an
out-slung boat and disappeared into the froth of the wake.

The pitcher and catcher were in a hot argument as to whether that was
the twenty-sixth or the twenty-seventh ball they had lost overboard
since the first of the month, but they fell quiet and turned sympathetic
ears to my description of a net I had seen rigged on one of the
American battleships to prevent that very trouble.

"Nifty enough," was the pitcher's comment when I had finished describing
how the net was drawn taut right under the stern to prevent all leakage.
"Only thing is, the captain might rule it off on the score that it'd
catch the 'cans' we was trying to drop on Fritz as well as the 'wild
pitch