182 Crossing the Line 



191S, continued 



chief steward. He was seized from behind and waltzed into the tub, from 

 which he emerged looking like a drowned rat. After him came the barber, 

 from whose pockets, crammed with colored papers, oozed bright green, 

 pink, and yellow dye-stuff. "Beau-ti-ful as the rainbowl" he exclaimed, as 

 he crawled out of the tank and again took his place on the platform, and 

 began to strop his razor. The fun now rose to its height. One by one the 

 company of merrymakers were caught and protesting, struggling, kicking, 

 roUing, were brought to the tank and flung over its sides. It no longer con- 

 tained sparkling water, but a broth of paste, paint, floating wigs, and other 

 accoutrements. Those who had met their baptism in it had an hour's work 

 before them in their private baths to remove the stains of their experience. 

 Each reveler received a diploma, properly signed and sealed by Neptune, 

 attesting the fitness of the recipient to sail "die seven seas." 



(William Jacob Holland. To the River Plate and back. New York, 1913. 

 p. 20-22.) 



Another rare instance of passengers or ofiBcers portraying courtiers of Neptune. 

 Reprinted with permission of G. P. Putnam's Sons, publishers. 



1919 



[In 1919] We held smokers and Happy Hours en route to Rio, [on U.S.S. 

 Idaho, taking down to Brazil the President of Brazil and his party] but the 

 big event of the voyage was "crossing the line" when we ceremoniously con- 

 verted poUiwogs into shellbacks. This was the first of my four round trips 

 over Neptune's mythical frontier, and I was well lathered by the royal bar- 

 bers, paddled by his pirates and after being tossed into the tank, manhandled 

 by the polar bears — aUin the presence of our laughing guests from Brazil. 

 (p. 101-102) 



The Fleet visited Valparaiso, Chile, in the summer of 1921. We again staged 

 an elaborate "Neptunus Rex party" when we crossed the Equator, and being a 

 shellback, I found the excitement a great deal more enjoyable than the first 

 time. Lieutenant Commander Daniel J. CaUaghan, assistant guimery ofiBcer, 

 paid the penalty for being an especially popular shipmate by being subjected 

 to aU the most barbarous forms of equatorial torture. The members of the 

 ship's raceboat crew, enacting the rôle of polar bears in Neptime's royal pool 

 gave Dan what the men called "the works." And Callaghan, since our ship- 

 mate days in the Idaho, has been a dear friend, (p. 107-108) 



... I had everything for the book except the pictures and the story of 

 crossing the Equator. 



This event at sea was the high Hght of the cruise. The governor general 

 [of the Phihppines, Dwight F. Davis] was a good sportsman, winning the 

 hearts of the men when he pleaded with Neptunus Rex to allow him to sub- 

 stitute for his daughter in the initiation ceremonies. Mr. Davis had already 

 crossed the "hne" but he patiently allowed the Pittsburgh shellbacks to lead 



