CHAPTER IV. 

 GEORGETOWN. 



ANOTHER year has slipped past and again we are 

 soutliward bound, toward that Mecca — the tropics — 

 which never ceases to call us. The time is the fifteenth of 

 February, 1909; the place, the Royal Dutch Mail Steamship 

 " Coppenamc."' 



Nine days out from New York at three o'clock in the 

 morning we are roused suddenly from sleep by a gentle 

 roaring in our cars. When wc have gained partial conscious- 

 ness we realize it is the basso-profundo whisper of good Cap- 

 tain Haasnoot summoning us to the bridge. We ask no 

 f{uestions for we have learned that the voice of the genial 

 Dutchman means something worth while, whether it is 

 raised in a thunderous roar of " Hofineister!^'' or as no^\■ in 

 gentler accents. Wrapped in flapping blankets, we climb 

 the steep ladder to the bridge, there to enjoy for half an hour 

 a most wonderful display of phosphorescence — even excelling 

 that often visible in the Bay of Fundy. The Captain in aU 

 his world-wide sea-faring has never seen anything to ccjual it. 



We are only a short distance off the shore of British 

 Guiana and the ocean is thick with sediment from the rivers. 

 The sky is overcast and no light comes from the moon and 

 stars, and yet the whole sea is plainly visible. The horizon 

 glows with a dull, yellow flare against the jet black sky, and 

 the myriad foam-caps shimmer as with brighter flames. 

 The quenching of these in the opaque water gives a vivid 

 impression of an enormous conflagration half hidden behind 

 billows of smoke. 



