10 THE ARCTURUS ADVENTURE 



tip derived from the profits of the slaughter houses 

 of Seville! 



Perhaps the best way of visualizing our life and 

 adventures in the Sargasso Sea will be to compare 

 them with the notes of Columbus made upon geo- 

 graphically identical days of his memorable voyage. 



September 23rd, 1492, Christopher Col- 

 umbus Wrote in His Journal, "We Saw a 

 Tropicbird." 



On the 28th of February, 1925, on the Arcturus, 

 so exactly at Columbus' location, that four hundred 

 and thirty-three years before we would probably 

 have been within sight of the Santa Maria, the 

 dismal bleat of a tin fish-horn woke me. I slid out 

 of my berth on the next roll of the ship and groped 

 sleepily for dressing-gown and slippers that were 

 arranged in fireman fashion ready to be donned. 

 The captain and officers of the Arcturus had been 

 instructed to blow the horn whenever they sighted 

 any living thing, and their eyes were uncommonly 

 sharp. 



Like figures in a demented Swiss weather in- 

 dicator, the port cabins simultaneously decanted a 

 row of bathrobed observers, who peered earnestly 

 at heaving grey sea and lowering grey sky. It was 

 that dreary hour of dawn when the whole world is 

 grey, without a hint of the color-bringing sun. 

 Shivering, we lined up at the rail in time to see a 

 snow-white tropicbird skim past the wireless struc- 

 ture, his two elongated tail-feathers trailing like a 

 foamy wake. 



