alarial germs until the scourge of the Coast failed
to harm him, Colonel Quarrier possessed one of the principal
qualifications for bush-fighting in the Tropics--a "salted"
constitution.

Already he had served in four African campaigns, having but recently
taken part in the comparatively brief but strenuous Kamarun expedition.
He was a past-master in the art of fighting in miasmic jungles, and now
he was about to engage in operations on a larger and slightly different
scale--bush-fighting in German East, where ranges of temperature are
experienced from the icy cold air of the upper ground of Kilimanjaro to
the sweltering heat of the low-lying land but a few degrees south of
the Line.

The parade over a hoarse order rang out. A drum and bugle band
belonging to another regiment struck up a lively air and the black and
khaki lines swung about into "column of route."

The "Waffs" were off to the conquest of the last of Germany's
ultra-European colonies.

CHAPTER II

CHAOS IN THE CABIN

It was a march of about five miles to the beach along a straight road
bordered with palm trees. At some distance from the highway the
country was thick with scrub, from which the sickly smell of the
mangroves rose in the still slanting rays of the sun.

Most of the heavy baggage had already been sent down, but with the
troops were hundreds of native carriers, each bearing a load of about
sixty pounds, while crowds of native women and children flocked to see
the last of the regiment for some time to come.

The embarkation had to be performed by means of boats from the open
beach, against which white rollers surged heavily, the thundering of
the surf being audible for miles. At a long distance from the shore,
so that she appeared little larger than a boat, lay the transport
_Zungeru_, rolling sluggishly at a single anchor, while steaming slowly
in the offing was a light cruiser detailed to act as escort to the
convoy, for more transports were under orders to rendezvous off Cape
Coast Castle.

Amidst the loud and discordant vociferations of the native boatmen the
troops boarded the broad, shallow-drafted surf boats, each man having
the breech-mechanism of his rifle carefully wrapped in oiled canvas to
prevent injury from salt water. In batches of twenty the Waffs left
their native soil, but not before three boat loads had been
unceremoniously capsized in the surf, to the consternation of the men
affected and the light-hear