As the lunar glow beamed through the clouds, the outlines of a soldier appeared to my view, merely the profile, with his face resting in the palms of his hands. I momentarily seized this opportunity and pounced upon my prey, and, for the “love of Mike,” who was it but “Stormy Bill,” a “character” at the post. “Ha! ha! What in hell are you doing here? robbing the copper pile, hey?” I exclaimed, knowing in my heart Bill was as honest as the night was long. Like the raven, Bill quoth, “Never more.” “What brought you here at this hour of the night?” I asked. “Bad whiskey,” sighed Bill, his light of enthusiasm burning dimly. “I hid a flask here yesterday and came here to-night to look for it.” “Yes, and keep me prowling around all night expecting every minute to be shot by copper thieves,” I interposed. “You’re a fine specimen of a marine! What do you think this navy yard is, a picnic ground?” Continuing, “Now you draw yourself together quick or I’ll have you manacled and thrown in the brig.” “Ah!” he said, “cut out the strong talk. I came here to look for a flask of rye, I am not going to run away with the copper pile.” “That will do you,” I said. “You have evidently found the rye, and I want you to blow out of here.” “Yes,” said “Stormy,” “I have found it.――Eureka! Let’s go.” I felt like kicking him a few times, then rubbing him with liniment and kicking him again, merely using the liniment to keep him from becoming callous lest he should fail to feel the kicks. He became garrulous, and, in order to get him to the barracks without falling into the hands of the guard, it was necessary for me to walk him about two miles to reach one-fourth the distance. Having piloted him over lawns and through the shade of the leafy trees, we finally reached his quarters, where his affable disposition required him to apologize for my trouble, and, thanking me, he hied off to his cot. “Stormy,” in the parlance of the soldier, was “good people,” his greatest fault was in being on too good terms with old “Cyrus Noble.” A few weeks after this event I left “Stormy” behind, having been ordered to another post. _En route_ from the Philippines with the Twenty-ninth Infantry in 1909, as the transport pulled up to the pier at Honolulu a voice from the dock called out my name. Leaning over the taffrail, whom should I see but “Stormy Bill!” He had been made a non-commissioned officer in a battery of artillery and was stationed on the Island of Oahu. Mare Island covers considerable space in the Bay of San Francisco, lying about sixteen miles northwest of the “Golden Gate” overlooking the bay and Pacific Ocean. It is the naval base of California.