Every ship was having a celebration something like that. It's impossible to give the details because when a big fleet is going along at the rate of ten knots an hour and fighting a mean Amazon current as well, and the semaphores and other signals are being kept busy with official messages it isn't exactly good form for newspaper landlubbers to ask to be allowed to inquire what was done on the other ships, matters which, even if told unofficially, would not look exactly attractive all written out in a signal book, because you can't put much fun in a signal book entry. There must have been a good deal of the happy-go-lucky spirit on some of the ships, for on two or three of them the rollickers got at the siren whistles and blew them. That is something that might prove serious to a fleet sailing as this is, because the blowing of siren whistles, except at a certain hour of the day, when all the whistles are tested--they call the noise the loosening of the dogs of war--means grave danger and it is time to act at once. But New Year's came in happily all around and when the fun was over the one thought of the rollickers was that within a week Neptune would come aboard and after that there would be a long dry spell. When quarters were sounded a little after 9 o'clock on New Year's morning all hands appeared. The usual formality marked the occasion. The Captain came up and looked precisely as if his ship had been as quiet as a grave all night; the executive officer answered salutes with an incisive manner, as each officer approached and reported his division "all present or accounted for"; the members of the crew gave no hint that they had seen any officer roaming about the ship only a few hours before in a free and easy manner violating all ordinary traditions of a naval officer's dignity. And as for the warrant officers, when they saluted and gave you an icy stare, as if they might have met you somewhere once upon a time but really had quite forgotten your name, you felt relieved and glad that those two or three red streaks on your left eye ball had escaped general notice, and then it was that you felt like writing an apostrophe to discipline in the American Navy. Of the trip itself to Rio--the mere sailing of it--there is not much to record. It was done in squadron formation--two lines of warships, with the supply ships Glacier and Culgoa bringing up the rear midway between the lines. For six days off the upper part of South America there was quite a heavy swell and a strong Amazon current that retarded the progress of the ships to some extent.