The formality attending these official arrivals, so often to be repeated throughout the tour, was practically always the same. The visitor who came up the gangway from the dock or the launch, as the case might be, saluted the quarter-deck--a survival this from the days when it bore a crucifix--and was saluted in turn by the Officer of the Watch, who, with his telescope tucked under his arm, conveyed the stranger past the row of marines drawn up at attention to the Captain and the Equerry in waiting, who brought him up the starboard companion to the mezzanine deck. Here he would be received by the Prince attended by his Staff. The visit seldom exceeded twenty minutes. When H.R.H. left the ship for the shore the Captain awaited him on the quarter-deck and conducted him past the marines presenting arms to the gangway. On these occasions the junior members of the party were the first to step off, finishing with the Admiral and last of all the Prince, both Admiral and Prince being "piped over the side" to the shrill music of the bos'n's whistle. There was as little variation about the arrival on shore. Always the guard-of-honour, the band, the stunting aeroplanes, always six bars of "God Save the King" and the pause at attention, always the hand-shaking with the officer commanding the guard-of-honour, the inspection, and so to the business and pleasure of the visit. [Illustration: PANAMA CANAL: A SHARP CORNER] [Illustration: SURF-BOARDING AT HONOLULU] On this occasion the guard of American soldiers in white uniforms and the familiar wide-brimmed hats was drawn up upon the lawn beside the topmost lock. Thence, past some thousands of prosperous-looking employees of the Canal, and their families, who had turned out to see the reception, the Prince was taken to the Control House, whence the whole of the operations of the locks are regulated, from the manipulating of the little, black, towing mule-engines, which ran busily, like scarabaeid beetles, up and down rails set in concrete slopes on the top of the lock walls, to the opening and closing of the seventy-foot high gates, and the letting in and letting out of the green sluggish water.