II

the conveniences of the wardroom.

Now on this eighth day of my journey somewhere to Africa, I find myself on a quite large combination passenger and freight vessel in the midst of a large convoy. I am on the flagship, which is at the head of the convoy, and we have a very comforting battleship at our side and a cruiser directly ahead of us. The entire voyage, so far, has been without incident, the only actual excitement being a severe storm.

The Chief Steward, who is a Chief Petty Officer, is a Philipinno from Rhode Island, who does a little barbering on the side, and I met him in the ship barbershop, where brother Elmo has set up his emporium of hair-scissoring. I had gone there to receive my one-inch haircut, a thing of beauty in deed, and the steward paid me a few choice compliments and thus started a very advantageous friendship for me, as it has given me the opportunity to get occasional meals on the officers left overs, as they eat a thousand percent better than the soldiers. There is a lecture going on in here now for the officers, and the speaker has a very penetrating voice, which doesn’t say much but says it loudly; he is interfering with my letter-writing, darn him.

Well, I haven’t had a thing to do on the trip except sit around, so I cam down to the wardroom and helped out today, resulting in my permission to stay here in the evening. As I look up from the paper, I interestingly watch a cock-roach crawl up and down the wall before me. The ship is thoroughly infested with these nuisances, along with officers, nurses, and, of course, we enlisted men.

[Continue to the transcription of page 3, if desired.]