, and on rough days would board the
schooner by catching the dinghee boom with one hand as it dipped toward
the launch, and swing himself hand over hand inboard. I never expected
the schooner to complete the opposite roll until Chum was "playing
plum" in the centre.

Chum's parentage was romantic--his father a government official and his
mother an island princess--he himself being one of the whitest men I
have ever been privileged to call friend. We never thought he would
get into the army, for though he was as strong as any two of us, he
would require the cloth of three men's suits for his uniform, and he
would always have to be the blank file in a column of fours, as four of
his size would spread across the street, and to "cover off" the four
behind them would just march in the rear of their spinal columns,
having a driveway between each of them.

He was determined to enlist, and a wise government solved the problem
by making him quartermaster, thus insuring in the only way possible
that Chum would have a sufficient supply of "grub." This job was also
right in his hands, because he possessed considerable business
instinct; and you remember Lord Kitchener said of the quartermaster
that he was the only man in the army whose salary he did not know!

The fifth Britisher of our crew will growl himself into your favor,
being a well-bred British bulldog, looking down with pity on the tykes
of mixed blood. Even before the war he showed his anti-German feelings
by his treatment of a pet pig that we had on the schooner.

As I look back on it, our evening sport was a prophecy of what is
to-day happening on the western front. "Torres" would stand growling
and snapping at the porker, which would squeal and try to get away, but
his hoofs could not grip the slippery deck, and though his feet were
going so fast as to be blurred he would not be making an inch of
progress. The Germans have been squealing and wanting to get away from
the British bulldog but they do not know how to retire without collapse.

This pig had a habit of curling up among the anchor chains, and while
we only used one anchor he escaped injury, but one rough day when both
anchors were dropped simultaneously, piggy shot into the air with a
broken back. The Germans have withstood the Allies so far, but now
that America is with us, the back of the German resistance will soon be
broken.

Of course Torres enlisted! In the beginning he was with Chum, and