t over him until his temper had burned itself out and he
had become amenable to reason.

The afternoon of January 22d, as we were lounging about the deck, John
Ward, glancing up from the pages of a book that he was engaged in
reading, happened to catch a glimpse of a sail ahead, and announcing the
fact, there was a rush made by all hands to the steamer's rail in order
to get a good view of the welcome sight, for a strange sail at sea is
always a welcome sight to the voyager. She was under a cloud of canvas
and, as we drew near, with the aid of a glass, we made out her name,
"San Scofield, Brunswick, Me." A moment later the Stars and Stripes were
thrown to the breeze from her masthead and the cheers that went up from
our decks could have been heard two miles away. If there were tears in
the eyes of some of the members of our party as they saw the old flag
gleaming in the sunlight and thought of God's country at that time so
far away, the display of emotion did them no discredit.

We were all astonished one morning by a performance on the part of our
mascot that was not down on the bills, and that might have resulted in
his becoming food for the sharks with which the Indian Ocean abounds had
he not played in the very best of luck.

The performance of Professor Bartholomew had fired the "coon" with a
desire to emulate his example, and he had made a wager with one of the
boys that, using an umbrella for a parachute, he could jump from the
rigging some thirty feet above the deck and land safely on the awning.
It was late one afternoon when half a dozen of the party were sitting
beneath its shade that a dark shadow passed over them followed by a dull
thud on the canvas that made it sag for a foot or more, and a wild
scream of terror followed. Climbing up the rope ladder to where they
could overlook the awning, the boys found the mascot crawling on his
hands and knees toward the rigging and dragging behind him an umbrella
in a badly damaged condition. When Fogarty asked him what he was doing,
he replied, after a long interval of silence, "Just been a practicin',"
after which he informed them that had he landed all right he should have
attempted to win his bet the next morning. One experience of this kind
was enough for him, however, and though the boys begged him to give them
another exhibition of his skill in making the parachute leap, nothing
could induce him to do so.

"Craps," a game introduced by the mascot, soon becam