begged him to find me a passport for a neutral.  He set off in search and I waited all day at his house, consumed with impatience and anxiety.  At last, toward evening, my friend returned, but the news he brought was not cheering.  He had found a passport, indeed, but his report of the rigors of the inspection at the wharf was such as to make it clear that the chances of my getting through on a false passport were exceedingly slim, since I was well known in Jaffa.  If I were caught in such an undertaking, it might mean death for me and punishment for the friends who had helped me.

Evidently this plan was not feasible.  All that night I racked my brain for a solution.  Finally I decided to stake everything on what appeared to be my only chance.  The Tennessee was due on the next day but one, early in the morning.  I gave my friend the name of a boatman who was under obligations to me and had sworn to be my friend for life or death.  Even under the circumstances I hesitated to trust a Mohammedan, but it seemed the only thing to do; I had no choice left.  My friend brought the boatman, and I put my plan before him, appealing to his daring and his sense of honor.  I wanted him to take me at midnight in his fishing-boat from an isolated part of the coast and wait for the appearance of the Tennessee; then, on her arrival, amid the scramble of boats full of refugees, I was to jump aboard, while he would return with the other boats.  The poor fellow tried to remonstrate, pointing out the dangers and what he called—­rightly enough, doubtless—­the folly of the plan.  I stuck to it, however, making it clear that his part would be well paid for, and at last he consented and we arranged a meeting-place behind the sand-dunes by the shore.

I put a few personal belongings into a little suit-case and had my friend give it to one of the refugees who was to sail on the Tennessee.  If I succeeded, I was to recover it when we reached Egypt.  The only thing I took with me was the paper which declared my “intention of becoming an American citizen,” the “first paper.”  From this document I was determined not to part.  I shall not tell how I kept it on me, as the means I used may still be used by others in concealing such papers and a disclosure of the secret might bring disaster to them.  Suffice it to say that I had the paper with me and that no search would have brought it to light.

Arrived next morning at the appointed place, I gave the signal agreed upon, the whine of a jackal, and, after repeating it again and again, I heard a very low and muffled answer.  My boatman was there!  I had some fear that he might have betrayed me and that I should presently see a soldier or policeman leap out of the little boat, but my fears proved groundless, the man was faithful.

[ILLUSTRATION:  STORMY SEA BREAKING OVER ROCKS OFF JAFFA]