In this year of 1907 pass exams for the Service were stricter than ever. There was a splendid staff of men at headquarters, and they would only have the crême de la crême.
Well, although nobody except the captain and first lieutenant were supposed to know what the Breezy's special instructions were, her duties were soon an open secret.
German ships of war were careering about and along both the west and east coasts of Africa. They wanted looking after. Then marvellous to say the Sultan of Zanzibar had somehow become very wealthy--diamond mines--and had built himself a really smart navy. But his ships were sentinels to the British Government for all that. It was deemed good and wise for Britain to have a scout fleet like this within jumping distance of India and the Red Sea.
The Admiralty had learned experience since 1904 and were making use of it.
They were, as every great nation should be, on the outlook for future eventualities. So, long before they reached the Cape everyone on board the Breezy had quite settled down into his place, and all the officers felt at home. Moreover they all knew each other thoroughly by this time, and knew each other's points of character also, whether hard or soft.
It is a good thing on board a ship during a long commission for officers to be like brothers. They are together in sunshine and in storm, in peace and in danger. Moreover, they ought to respect even each other's foibles.
With so kind a captain and one so interested in the welfare of those under his command the Breezy promised from the very first to be a little community afloat, all willing to please and be pleased, and to adhere strictly in discipline and etiquette to the rules and regulations of the King's Navy.
As they were all young they naturally wanted to, and were determined to, see everything there was to be seen at every port.
They were treated well wherever they went, and if they stayed but a week at a place there was some social function or another every day, and sometimes twice. Dances and dinners, picnics, cricket-matches, or football-matches, fishing parties, shooting parties, or anything the Breezies, as they came to be called, were always in it.
Sometimes, too, they gave a dinner and a dance on board, and this was a real merry evening for all concerned.