A Yankee in the Far East

by George Hoyt Allen

I'm ashamed to chronicle it, but all interest in the war seemed to dwindle with me. I was obsessed with one idea, one ambition—to make that shirt stand me until we could make Gibraltar.

Eighteen days from Bombay to Gibraltar, and I'd got by with sixteen of them. Two days more and we would be at Gibraltar, where I could get some dress shirts. There was no hope of being sunk, and getting out of it that way. The Mediterranean was as quiet as a duck pond.

I had found out by this time that the English would stand for anything in the shirt front, if the conventional dress-suit was on for dinner. So I contemplated that shirt fore and aft, inside and out, and used the best sides.

I was a good fellow and one of the boys. I had managed to dress every day for dinner, and while I felt like a thief in that shirt, it went, and I was accepted, and we got to Gibraltar.

But just before we anchored in the harbor at Gibraltar this notice was posted: "Only British subjects allowed ashore," and there were four more days to London!

I felt like a thief in that shirt

I entreated the commander, I entreated the purser to give me a pass to go ashore.

They were adamant. The rules of war couldn't be broken. Only British subjects would be allowed ashore at Gibraltar.