down over the stern of the ship. Then the bugles rang out in the haunting,
mournful strains of the "Last Post," and the service ended with all
singing "Abide With Me."

We sweltered along down the Red Sea and around into the Indian Ocean. We
wished to call at Aden in order to disembark some of our sick, but were
ordered to continue on without touching. Our duties were light, and we
spent the time playing cards and reading. The Tommies played "house" from
dawn till dark. It is a game of the lotto variety. Each man has a paper
with numbers written on squares; one of them draws from a bag slips of
paper also marked with numbers, calls them out, and those having the
number he calls cover it, until all the numbers on their paper have been
covered. The first one to finish wins, and collects a penny from each of
the losers. The caller drones out the numbers with a monotony only
equalled by the brain-fever bird, and quite as disastrous to the nerves.
There are certain conventional nicknames: number one is always "Kelley's
eye," eleven is "legs eleven," sixty-six is "clickety click," and the
highest number is "top o' the 'ouse." There is another game that would be
much in vogue were it not for the vigilance of the officers. It is known
as "crown and anchor," and the advantage lies so strongly in favor of the
banker that he cannot fail to make a good income, and therefore the game
is forbidden under the severest penalties.

As we passed through the Strait of Ormuz memories of the early days of
European supremacy in the East crowded back, for I had read many a
vellum-covered volume in Portuguese about the early struggles for
supremacy in the gulf. One in particular interested me. The Portuguese
were hemmed in at Ormuz by a greatly superior English force. The expected
reinforcements never arrived, and at length their resources sank so low,
and they suffered in addition, or in consequence, so greatly from disease