ACROSS THE EQUATOR WITH THE AMERICAN XAVY 



611 



Photograph by Herbert Corey 



FATHER NEPTUNE AND HIS COURT ON BOARD THE "BLACK HAWK" 



Probably never before in the history of the sea has Neptune held so great a levee as 

 when the Atlantic and Pacific fleets of the United States Navy "crossed the Line" on the 

 trip to Peru and Chile. Not less than 25,000 men appeared before his courts on the sixty-odd 

 ships. 



"What's your name?" Neptune would 

 growl. 



As the unfortunate opened his mouth 

 to reply a nauseous pill of grease was 

 slipped between his teeth. The barbers 

 slashed at him with a huge brush covered 

 with a lather of flour paste and shaved 

 him with a wooden razor. He was 

 tripped in the barber's chair and spilled 

 backward into the tank six feet below. 



The bears seized him, thrust him under 

 water half a dozen times, swung him to 

 the deck again, and turned, perspiring, to 

 catch the next apprentice as he whirled 

 head downward through the air toward 

 the floury waters of the tank. 



The extraordinary feature of the visit 

 of Neptune was yet to be seen. In the 

 effort to give a proper scenic investiture 

 to their roles, those of the flat-feet who 

 had been chosen for the parts of courtiers 

 had permitted their beards to grow. 



Later on it seemed they could not give 

 them up. They tortured their whiskers 

 into new and strange shapes. They wore 

 them as torpedoes and paint brushes and 



little dabs of hair high up on the cheek- 

 bones and as gal ways and burnsides. 

 People turned upon the street in Panama 

 and Lima to gaze after them, and the en- 

 raptured gobs thought of new ways in 

 which to train their hirsute adornments. 

 It may be they are still bearded, but I 

 doubt if their mates have resisted tempta- 

 tion. 



THE FLEETS SEPARATE 



South of Callao, Peru, the two fleets 

 separated for a time. The Pacific fleet 

 went on to Chile, while the Atlantic fleet 

 turned back to Peru. Both were to pay 

 visits of ceremony. 



The vessels comprising the Atlantic 

 fleet coasted along this extraordinarily 

 arid coast whose brown dryness is in such 

 contrast to the tropical verdure farther 

 north. 



Both Chile and Peru are bordered by a 

 belt of desert country, lying between the 

 Andes and the sea. Here the Andes have 

 three separate crests, which act as com- 

 pressors in squeezing the last drop of 



