This, then, was to be our home, possibly for the next few months. We did not know for how long, but we regarded the prospect with a certain amount of equanimity, as the ship was unarmed, and we knew we should not be fired on by a hostile cruiser, as might have been the case if we had remained on the _Wolf_.
When we arrived on the Spanish boat we were served with meals at the same time to which the Spanish officers had been accustomed, i.e. breakfast at 9 and supper at 4, but these times were soon afterwards changed to breakfast at 8.30, tiffin 12.30, and supper 5.30. We were lucky to get fresh food for some days. But this soon came to an end, though the stock of muscatels, a quince preserve--called membrillo--and Spanish wine lasted very much longer. It would have lasted much longer still but for the stupidity of the German sailor who "managed" the canteen. He allowed stores to be eaten in plenty while there were any, instead of arranging to spread their consumption over a much longer period.
There was on board a certain amount of live stock; some chickens, which seemed to thrive quite well on coal-dust, and a couple of cows, each of which had a calf born on board; these all met the usual fate of such things on appropriate occasions. There were also a few cats and kittens, which later on were joined by a couple of mongrel dachshund pups born on the _Wolf_. The Spanish carpenter had a sporting hen, which had some lively scraps with the dogs, the latter always coming off second best.
For many days after we parted company with the _Wolf_ we ambled and dawdled through the sea on a south-westerly course, sometimes going back on our tracks for half a day, sometimes stopping altogether for an hour or two, sometimes for half a day, sometimes for a whole day. The monotony of this performance was deadly beyond words. On one of these days the Captain offered to land us at Mauritius on the following morning and give himself up with the crew and ship if we could raise £100,000 for him. Unfortunately, we couldn't!
On the afternoon of the 23rd the Germans became very agitated at the sight of smoke on the horizon. At first we all thought it was the _Wolf_, but before long we could see two columns of smoke, evidently coming from two steamers travelling together. The prisoners then became very agitated also, as help might be at hand. But the Germans at once changed the course, and manoeuvred at full speed in such a way that we soon got out of sight of the smoke, when we resumed our original course again, after having boxed the compass more than once, and the German Captain came down from the bridge and told us there was no relief for us yet. We all felt that if the _Hitachi_ had only avoided distant smoke as the German Captain had done we need never have made the acquaintance of the _Wolf_.