A Trip to the Sulu Archipelago――New Year’s Eve on Board the _Zafiro_――A Royal Bit of a Time in the Cabin of McDonald――Blowing the Siren――New Year’s Dinner at 1.00 A.M.――Isabella de Basilan――Prang Prang――Dancing Girls of the Nippa Villages――Roasted Grasshoppers――Outpost Duty――Nearly Converted to the Darwinian Theory――Experience with a Boa Constrictor while Hunting Wild-Boar――Rescued from Hostile Moros――Relief of the Outpost. Two men were caught in a Moro trap, and the Datto’s guns sang near, And one wore an officer’s shoulder-strap, the other a private’s gear; One was a black of the Twenty-fourth, and one was a Southern man, And both were caught in a dark defile by the line of the Moro clan. Oh, wonder it is, and pity it is, that they send the scouts alone To die in the silent jungle paths with never a word or groan; Wonder it is, and pity it is, but the two stood back to back, And never a word between them passed as they waited the first attack. What prayers they said they said them low, and to their beating hearts That thumped so loud and out of tune; and now the battle starts. A ring of flame about them ran; a tongue of fire shot through; Then as machines their muscles moved and aimed their rifles true. The bullets whined, the wounded shrieked, the rifle bores grew hot; But still the two stood back to back, and answered shot for shot. And now the Moro fire dies down, and now there comes a hush; And white and black, with bayonets fixed, await the bolo rush. They heard the Moro chief call out, “Oh, black man, hark to me! You give to us the Christian dog and you shall go out free. Heed you the call of color and blood――what need we longer fight? In color and blood you’re brother to me. Oh, black man, give the white.” Now, one was a white of the Southern breed, and cheap he held the black, And little he’d thought, as the two had fought, of the man behind his back; He loved to live as the white man lives, but the Datto’s words rang true; And he had no doubt, as the chief called out, what the black behind would do. Two men they stood them back to back, and never a word they said; But, face to face with an easy death, what thoughts were in each head! “You go,” the white man spoke at last; “for you owe naught to me; You go; for I can die alone, that you may go out free; “You go; it seems your time has come to draw the color line; You and your breed owe naught to me, nor certainly to mine. I’ll go to death as my fathers went”――between his cold set lips―― “My fathers who used to use your kind for trade――and poker-chips.”