Parts of New Jersey and Long Island are noted for their mosquitoes. Alaska is also somewhat remembered on this account by unfortunates who have summered along the southern shores, but Honolulu in the historic year 1898 could boast of one of the most vicious swarms of torturers lining the shores of the seven seas. We were ripe for them, our skins spiced with the salt horse and pea soup fluid that coursed through our veins. We were tired from the labors of the day, and slumbered unmoved while the enemy put all that was exposed of us to the bayonet. I lay stripped in my bunk gasping for breath, and in the morning found I was a mass of bumps, red and unsightly. The next day the china merchants along Nuuanu Street did a big business in mosquito bars, supplying us on the strength of our "chits" after the captain had verified the statement that each man was to be paid five dollars, on account, at the end of the week.
All hands working together made us better acquainted with the men of the starboard watch. Axel and I developed a lasting friendship, and of course Old Smith joined the higher councils of our watch. Hitchen and Mike and Tommy proved to be a great team of kidders, and with Australia, of our side, formed a dandy quartette, singing such old time favorites as "Tom Bowling" and "All in the Downs." Hitchen, a very superior sort of sailor, an Englishman, reticent about himself, but a volume of information about the ports of the world, was a great addition to our life aboard. In fact the men of both watches were sea worn and tired of each other, and we welcomed the new contact with our shipmates. Add to this the unusual sights of the shore and the fresh provisions, as well as the possibility for rational sleep, and sailors will know what I mean when I say that we were a very happy lot of men aboard the _Fuller_.
Scouse had a large mouth organ, "Made in Germany," a gaudy tin affair well fitted for his capacious maw. Tony had an accordion, and no one could deny that we were a lively crowd forward. On the other hand the people aft were shrouded in gloom. The mate lived very much alone and Captain Nichols was separated by more than a bulkhead from his first officer. Chips was also a lonesome figure, dining in dreary state at the second table. Tommy said that since the second mate had gone, the Jap boy felt it beneath his dignity to wait on Chips, and the lanky carpenter found the table set with all that he was to have at one load, soup, meat, dessert, etc. "I wisht they'd let me at it once," said Joe, his mouth watering at the mention of dessert.