Nevertheless,
we sighted ---- Light about where I expected to, and laid a course from
there into the harbor. It was a rather thick, foggy day, and pretty soon
I noted a cunning little rock or two, dead ahead, where they didn't by
any means belong. So I rather hurriedly arrested further progress, took
soundings, and bearings of different landmarks, and found that we were
some twenty-five miles from our reckoning--so far, in fact, as to have
picked up the next light-house instead of the one we thought.
After this 'twas plain sailing, though I had never been into that port
before. Made it about noon, took possession of a convenient mooring-buoy
inside the breakwater--which buoy I found out later was sacred to the
French flag-ship or somebody like that--called on our Admiral there, and
was among friends. Yes, by heck, I let 'em buy me a drink at the club--I
needed it! Had oil enough left for just about an hour more!
Copyright, Atlantic Monthly, April, 1918.
* * * * *
While the great campaigns were being waged on the western fronts, there
was being carried on in a more remote part of the world a series of
operations which involved as hard fighting and as many difficulties as
were encountered in any other field of action. The campaigns in East
Africa which resulted in driving the Germans from their former colonies
are described in the following narrative.
EAST AFRICA
JAN CHRISTIAAN SMUTS
[Sidenote: Learned South Africa in The Boer War.
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