July 20, 1927. Aboard Nitro at sea. Calm, cirrus clouds on horizon.
2,276 to go last night at 8:00, Chaumont 602 miles astern, P.S.C. 77 one hour advanced. Sighted Wake Island about 10:30. Went fishing with exec. Many fish. That is the only reason we stopped. Very rough. We almost dove a few times. The punt that the whaleboat towed had trouble staying away from the ship’s exhaust. Exec caught 8 fish, four of which got away. The place is very low on the horizon, the highest point being 21 feet. The beach is very deceiving. It looks very gradual but is actually perpendicular. It is almost a horseshoe in shape as a big lagoon rests in the dip. Many strange and beautiful birds are in evidence. They are so tame that they will not move though they are sitting on their eggs. All the nests are on the ground as the highest shrub is 8 feet. There are about 8 square miles in the place. The fish look at you fearlessly and should you throw a rock at them, they would flock around it to see what it was. Mr. Borne caught a bird and had his picture taken with it, then he let it go. A Marine Lieut. named Edgar Allen Poe is aboard collecting material for a book. He went swimming in the lagoon. The Nitro stood on and off about a mile out waiting for us all the while it was too deep to anchor. The water there is so intensely blue that a jug of it is slightly tinted. The bottom was 30 fathoms down and it looked as though it were four feet. Very beautiful and covered with sea life; coral, (dead and living) and fish. Sharks and barracuda are all around. There are two houses for the shipwrecked and two water tanks which are filled by the geodetic survey every three months. The fish in the lagoon are plentiful and multicolored. They looked like a Fourth of July parade. Lucky no ladies were around today. The exec sure can swear. About twenty went ashore and most of the officers fished while the men towed them around. Sure is a desolate place. Nothing, not even a palm breaks the sky. Beautiful weird clouds are always upon the horizon and not a sail breaks its line. All day long the birds wheel but they rarely scream, as if they were afraid of breaking the gripping silence. A shipwrecked mariner would not be worth saving after two weeks of this. Underway at 2:00.
July 21, 1927.
Nothing doing today except a fight over the Dempsey-Sharkey bout. Very dead and nearly everyone has lost the old gift of gab pro tem.
July 22, 1927.
Today is Friday. This morning I got up early to study. Tomorrow will also be today.
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