The Kings of the North they were scattered abroad--

The Rajah of Dacca he slew them all.

Hot from slaughter he stooped at the ford,

And the dove--the dove--oh, the homing dove!

She thought of her cote on the palace wall.

She opened her wings and she flew away--

Fluttered away beyond recall;

She came to the palace at break of day.

Dove--dove--oh, homing dove!

Flying so fast for a kingdom's fall.

The Queens of Dacca they slept in flame--

Slept in the flame of the palace old--

To save their honour from Moslem shame.

And the dove--the dove--oh, the homing dove!

She cooed to her young where the smoke-cloud rolled.

The Rajah of Dacca rode far and fleet,

Followed as fast as a horse could fly,

He came and the palace was black at his feet;

And the dove--the dove--the homing dove,

Circled alone in the stainless sky.

So the dove flew to the Rajah's tower--

Fled from the slaughter of Moslem kings;

So the thorns covered the city of Gaur,

And Dacca was lost for a white dove's wings.

Dove--dove--oh, homing dove,

Dacca is lost from the roll of the kings!

VII

THE SMOKE UPON YOUR ALTAR DIES

(_To whom it may concern._)

The smoke upon your Altar dies,

The flowers decay,

The Goddess of your sacrifice

Has flown away.

What profit, then, to sing or slay

The sacrifice from day to day?

"We know the Shrine is void," they said,

"The Goddess flown--

Yet wreaths are on the Altar laid--

The Altar-Stone

Is black with fumes of sacrifice,

Albeit She has fled our eyes.

"For it may be, if still we sing

And tend the Shrine,

Some Deity on wandering wing

May there incline;

And, finding all in order meet,

Stay while we worship at Her feet."

VIII

RECESSIONAL

The Recessional is one of the most popular poems of this

century. It is a warning to age and a nation drunk with

power, a rebuke to materialistic tendencies and

boastfulness, a protest against pride.

"Reverence is the master-key of knowledge."

God of our fathers, known of old--

Lord of our far-flung battle-line--

Beneath whose awful Hand we hold

Dominion over palm and pine--

Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet

Lest we forget--lest we forget!

The tumult and the shouting dies--

The captains and the kings depart--

Still stands Thine ancient Sacrifice,

An humble and a contrite heart.

Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,

Lest we forget--lest we forget!

Far-called our navies melt away--

On dune and headland sinks the fire--

Lo, all our pomp of yesterday

Is one with Nineveh and Tyre!

Judge of the Nations, spare us yet,

Lest we forget--lest we forget!

If, drunk with sight of power, we loose

Wild tongues that have not Thee in awe--

Such boasting as the Gentiles use

Or lesser breeds without the Law--

Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,

Lest we forget--lest we forget!

For heathen heart that puts her trust

In reeking tube and iron shard--

All valiant dust that builds on dust,

And guarding calls not Thee to guard--

For frantic boast and foolish word,

Thy mercy on Thy People, Lord! Amen.

IX

L'ENVOI

When Earth's last picture is painted, and the tubes are twisted and

dried,

When the oldest colours have faded, and the youngest critic has died,

We shall rest, and, faith, we shall need it--lie down for an aeon

or two,

Till the Master of All Good Workmen shall set us to work anew!

And those who were good shall be happy: they shall sit in a golden

chair;

They shall splash at a ten-league canvas with brushes of comet's hair;

They shall find real saints to draw from--Magdalene, Peter, and Paul;

They shall work for an age at a sitting and never be tired at all!

And only the Master shall praise us, and only the Master shall blame;

And no one shall work for money, and no one shall work for fame;

But each for the joy of the working, and each, in his separate star,

Shall draw the Thing as he sees It for the God of Things as They Are!

I

THE SING-SONG OF OLD MAN KANGAROO

Not always was the Kangaroo as now we do behold him, but a Different

Animal with four short legs. He was gray and he was woolly, and his

pride was inordinate: he danced on an outcrop in the middle of

Australia, and he went to the Little God Nqa at six before breakfast,

saying, "Make me different from all other animals by five this

afternoon."

Up jumped Nqa from his seat on the sandflat and shouted, "Go away!"

He was gray and he was woolly, and his pride was inordinate: he danced

on a rockledge in the middle of Australia, and he went to the Middle

God Nquing.

He went to Nquing at eight after breakfast, saying, "Make me different

from all other animals; make me, also, wonderfully popular by five

this afternoon."

Up jumped Nquing from his burrow in the spinifex and shouted, "Go

away!"

He was gray and he was woolly, and his pride was inordinate: he

danced on a sandbank in the middle of Australia, and he went to the

Big God Nqong.

He went to Nqong at ten before dinner-time, saying, "Make me different

from all other animals; make me popular and wonderfully run after by

five this afternoon."

Up jumped Nqong from his bath in the salt-pan and shouted, "Yes, I

will!"

Nqong called Dingo--Yellow-Dog Dingo--always hungry, dusty in the

sunshine, and showed him Kangaroo. Nqong said, "Dingo! Wake up, Dingo!

Do you see that gentleman dancing on an ash-pit? He wants to be

popular and very truly run after. Dingo, make him so!"

Up jumped Dingo--Yellow-Dog Dingo--and said, "What, _that_

cat-rabbit?"

Off ran Dingo--Yellow-Dog Dingo--always hungry, grinning like a

coal-scuttle--ran after Kangaroo.

Off went the proud Kangaroo on his four little legs like a bunny.

This, O Beloved of mine, ends the first part of the tale!

He ran through the desert; he ran through the mountains; he ran

through the salt-pans; he ran through the reed-beds; he ran through

the blue gums; he ran through the spinifex; he ran till his front legs

ached.

He had to!

[Illustration: This is a picture of Old Man Kangaroo when he was the

Different Animal with four short legs. I have drawn him gray and

woolly, and you can see that he is very proud because he has a wreath

of flowers in his hair. He is dancing on an outcrop (that means a

ledge of rock) in the middle of Australia at six o'clock before

breakfast. You can see that it is six o'clock, because the sun is just

getting up. The thing with the ears and the open mouth is Little God

Nqa. Nqa is very much surprised, because he has never seen a Kangaroo

dance like that before. Little God Nqa is just saying, "Go away," but

the Kangaroo is so busy dancing that he has not heard him yet.

The Kangaroo has n't any real name except Boomer. He lost it because

he was so proud.]

Still ran Dingo--Yellow-Dog Dingo--always hungry, grinning like a

rat-trap, never getting nearer, never getting farther--ran after

Kangaroo.

He had to!

Still ran Kangaroo--Old Man Kangaroo. He ran through the ti-trees; he

ran through the mulga; he ran through the long grass; he ran through

the short grass; he ran through the Tropics of Capricorn and Cancer;

he ran till his hind legs ached.

He had to!

Still ran Dingo--Yellow-Dog Dingo--hungrier and hungrier, grinning

like a horse-collar, never getting nearer, never getting farther; and

they came to the Wollgong River.

Now, there was n't any bridge, and there was n't any ferry-boat, and

Kangaroo did n't know how to get over; so he stood on his legs and

hopped.

He had to!

He hopped through the Flinders; he hopped through the Cinders; he

hopped through the deserts in the middle of Australia. He hopped like

a Kangaroo.

First he hopped one yard; then he hopped three yards; then he hopped

five yards; his legs growing stronger; his legs growing longer. He had

n't any time for rest or refreshment, and he wanted them very much.

Still ran Dingo--Yellow-Dog Dingo--very much bewildered, very much

hungry, and wondering what in the world or out of it made Old Man

Kangaroo hop.

[Illustration: This is the picture of Old Man Kangaroo at five in the

afternoon, when he had got his beautiful hind legs just as Big God

Nqong had promised. You can see that it is five o'clock, because Big

God Nqong's pet tame clock says so. That is Nqong in his bath,

sticking his feet out. Old Man Kangaroo is being rude to Yellow-Dog

Dingo. Yellow-Dog Dingo has been trying to catch Kangaroo all across

Australia. You can see the marks of Kangaroo's big new feet running

ever so far back over the bare hills. Yellow-Dog Dingo is drawn black,

because I am not allowed to paint these pictures with real colours out

of the paint-box; and besides, Yellow-Dog Dingo got dreadfully black

and dusty after running through the Flinders and the Cinders.

I don't know the names of the flowers growing round Nqong's bath. The

two little squatty things out in the desert are the other two gods

that Old Man Kangaroo spoke to early in the morning. That thing with

the letters on it is Old Man Kangaroo's pouch. He had to have a pouch

just as he had to have legs.]

For he hopped like a cricket; like a pea in a saucepan; or a new

rubber ball on a nursery floor.

He had to!

He tucked up his front legs; he hopped on his hind legs; he stuck out

his tail for a balance-weight behind him; and he hopped through the

Darling Downs.

He had to!

Still ran Dingo--Tired Dog Dingo--hungrier and hungrier, very much

bewildered, and wondering when in the world or out of it would Old Man

Kangaroo stop.

Then came Nqong from his bath in the salt-pan, and said, "It's five

o'clock."

Down sat Dingo--Poor Dog Dingo--always hungry, dusky in the sunshine;

hung out his tongue and howled.

Down sat Kangaroo--Old Man Kangaroo--stuck out his tail like a

milking-stool behind him, and said, "Thank goodness _that's_

finished!"

Then said Nqong, who is always a gentleman, "Why are n't you grateful

to Yellow-Dog Dingo? Why don't you thank him for all he has done for

you?"

Then said Kangaroo--Tired Old Kangaroo--"He's chased me out of the

homes of my childhood; he's chased me out of my regular meal-times;

he's altered my shape so I'll never get it back; and he's played Old

Scratch with my legs."

Then said Nqong, "Perhaps I'm mistaken, but didn't you ask me to make

you different from all other animals, as well as to make you very

truly sought after? And now it is five o'clock."

"Yes," said Kangaroo. "I wish that I had n't. I thought you would do

it by charms and incantations, but this is a practical joke."

"Joke!" said Nqong from his bath in the blue gums. "Say that again and

I'll whistle up Dingo and run your hind legs off."

"No," said the Kangaroo. "I must apologize. Legs are legs, and you

need n't alter 'em so far as I am concerned. I only meant to explain

to Your Lordliness that I've had nothing to eat since morning, and I'm

very empty indeed."

"Yes," said Dingo--Yellow-Dog Dingo--"I am just in the same situation.

I've made him different from all other animals; but what may I have

for my tea?"

Then said Nqong from his bath in the salt-pan, "Come and ask me about

it to-morrow, because I'm going to wash."

So they were left in the middle of Australia, Old Man Kangaroo and

Yellow-Dog Dingo, and each said, "That's _your_ fault."

This is the mouth-filling song

Of the race that was run by a Boomer,

Run in a single burst--only event of its kind--

Started by Big God Nqong from Warrigaborrigarooma,

Old Man Kangaroo first: Yellow-Dog Dingo behind.

Kangaroo bounded away,

His back-legs working like pistons--

Bounded from morning till dark,

Twenty-five feet to a bound.

Yellow-Dog Dingo lay

Like a yellow cloud in the distance--

Much too busy to bark.

My! but they covered the ground!

Nobody knows where they went,

Or followed the track that they flew in,

For that Continent

Had n't been given a name.

They ran thirty degrees,

From Torres Straits to the Leeuwin

(Look at the Atlas, please),

And they ran back as they came.

S'posing you could trot

From Adelaide to the Pacific,

For an afternoon's run--

Half what these gentlemen did--

You would feel rather hot

But your legs would develop terrific--

Yes, my importunate son,

You'd be a Marvellous Kid!

II

FUZZY-WUZZY

At the School Council Fuzzy-Wuzzy was elected Vice-President

of Mr. Kipling's Poems, "because he was so brave."

(_Soudan Expeditionary Force._)

We've fought with many men acrost the seas,

An' some of 'em was brave an' some was not:

The Paythan an' the Zulu an' Burmese;

But the Fuzzy was the finest o' the lot.

We never got a ha'porth's change of 'im:

'E squatted in the scrub an' 'ocked our 'orses,

'E cut our sentries up at Suakim,

An' 'e played the cat an' banjo with our forces.

So 'ere's _to_ you, Fuzzy-Wuzzy, at your 'ome in the Sowdan;

You 're a poor benighted 'eathen, but a first-class fightin' man;

We gives you your certifikit, an' if you want it signed,

We'll come an' 'ave a romp with you whenever you're inclined.

We took our chanst among the Khyber hills,

The Boers knocked us silly at a mile,

The Burman guv us Irriwaddy chills,

An' a Zulu _impi_ dished us up in style;

But all we ever got from such as they

Was pop to what the Fuzzy made us swaller;

We 'eld our bloomin' own, the papers say,

But man for man the Fuzzy knocked us 'oller.

Then 'ere's _to_ you, Fuzzy-Wuzzy, an' the missis an' the kid,

Our orders was to break you, an' of course we went an' did.

We sloshed you with Martinis, an' it was n't 'ardly fair;

But for all the odds agin you, Fuzzy Wuz, you bruk the square.

'E 'as n't got no papers of 'is own,

'E 'as n't got no medals nor rewards,

So we must certify the skill 'e 's shown

In usin' of 'is long two-'anded swords;

When 'e 's 'oppin' in an' out among the bush

With 'is coffin-headed shield an' shovel-spear,

A 'appy day with Fuzzy on the rush

Will last a 'ealthy Tommy for a year.

So 'ere 's _to_ you, Fuzzy-Wuzzy, an' your friends which is no

more,

If we 'ad n't lost some messmates we would 'elp you to deplore;

But give an' take 's the gospel, an' we'll call the bargain fair,

For if you 'ave lost more than us, you crumpled up the square!

'E rushes at the smoke, when we let drive,

An', before we know, 'e 's 'ackin' at our 'ead;

'E 's all 'ot sand an ginger when alive,

An' 'e 's generally shammin' when 'e 's dead.

'E 's a daisy, 'e 's a duck, 'e 's a lamb!

'E 's a Injun-rubber idiot on the spree,

'E 's the on'y thing that does n't care a clam

For the Regiment o' British Infantree.

So 'ere's _to_ you, Fuzzy-Wuzzy, at your 'ome in the Sowdan;

You 're a pore benighted 'eathen but a first-class fightin' man;

An' 'ere's _to_ you, Fuzzy-Wuzzy, with your 'ayrick 'ead of 'air--

You big black boundin' beggar--for you bruk a British square.

III

THE ENGLISH FLAG

Above the portico the Union Jack remained fluttering in the

flames for some time, but ultimately when it fell the crowds

rent the air with shouts, and seemed to see significance in

the incident.--_Daily Papers._

Winds of the World, give answer? They are whimpering to and fro--

And what should they know of England who only England know?--

The poor little street-bred people that vapour and fume and brag,

They are lifting their heads in the stillness to yelp at the English

Flag!

Must we borrow a clout from the Boer--to plaster anew with dirt?

An Irish liar's bandage, or an English coward's shirt?

We may not speak of England; her Flag's to sell or share.

What is the Flag of England? Winds of the World, declare!

The North Wind blew:--"From Bergen my steel-shod vanguards go;

I chase your lazy whalers home from the Disko floe;

By the great North Lights above me I work the will of God,

That the liner splits on the ice-field or the Dogger fills with cod.

"I barred my gates with iron, I shuttered my doors with flame,

Because to force my ramparts your nutshell navies came;

I took the sun from their presence, I cut them down with my blast,

And they died, but the Flag of England blew free ere the spirit passed.

"The lean white bear hath seen it in the long, long Arctic night,

The musk-ox knows the standard that flouts the Northern Light:

What is the Flag of England? Ye have but my bergs to dare,

Ye have but my drifts to conquer. Go forth, for it is there!"

The South Wind sighed:--"From The Virgins my mid-sea course was ta'en

Over a thousand islands lost in an idle main,

Where the sea-egg flames on the coral and the long-backed breakers

croon

Their endless ocean legends to the lazy, locked lagoon.

"Strayed amid lonely islets, mazed amid outer keys,

I waked the palms to laughter--I tossed the scud in the breeze--

Never was isle so little, never was sea so lone,

But over the scud and the palm-trees an English flag was flown.

"I have wrenched it free from the halliard, to hang for a wisp on

the Horn;

I have chased it north to the Lizard--ribboned and rolled and torn;

I have spread its fold o'er the dying, adrift in a hopeless sea;

I have hurled it swift on the slaver, and seen the slave set free.

"My basking sunfish know it, and wheeling albatross,

Where the lone wave fills with fire beneath the Southern Cross.

What is the Flag of England? Ye have but my reefs to dare,

Ye have but my seas to furrow. Go forth, for it is there!"

The East Wind roared:--"From the Kuriles, the Bitter Seas, I come,

And me men call the Home-Wind, for I bring the English home.

Look--look well to your shipping! By the breath of my mad typhoon

I swept your close-packed Praya and beached your best at Kowloon!

"The reeling junks behind me and the racing seas before,

I raped your richest roadstead--I plundered Singapore!

I set my hand on the Hoogli; as a hooded snake she rose,

And I flung your stoutest steamers to roost with the startled crows.

"Never the lotos closes, never the wild-fowl wake,

But a soul goes out on the East Wind that died for England's sake--

Man or woman or suckling, mother or bride or maid--

Because on the bones of the English the English Flag is stayed.

"The desert-dust hath dimmed it, the flying wild-ass knows.

The scared white leopard winds it across the taint-less snows.

What is the Flag of England? Ye have but my sun to dare,

Ye have but my sands to travel. Go forth, for it is there!"

The West Wind called:--"In squadrons the thoughtless galleons fly

That bear the wheat and cattle lest street-bred people die.

They make my might their porter, they make my house their path,

Till I loose my neck from their rudder and whelm them all in my wrath.

"I draw the gliding fog-bank as a snake is drawn from the hole;

They bellow one to the other, the frightened ship-bells toll,

For day is a drifting terror till I raise the shroud with my breath,

And they see strange bows above them and the two go locked to death.

"But whether in calm or wrack-wreath, whether by dark or day,

I heave them whole to the conger or rip their plates away,

First of the scattered legions, under a shrieking sky,

Dipping between the rollers, the English Flag goes by.

"The dead dumb fog hath wrapped it--the frozen dews have kissed--

The naked stars have seen it, a fellow-star in the mist.

What is the Flag of England? Ye have but my breath to dare,

Ye have but my waves to conquer. Go forth, for it is there!"

IV

THE KING

"Farewell, Romance!" the Cave-men said;

"With bone well carved he went away;

Flint arms the ignoble arrowhead,

And jasper tips the spear to-day.

Changed are the Gods of Hunt and Dance,

And he with these. Farewell, Romance!"

"Farewell, Romance!" the Lake-folk sighed;

"We lift the weight of flatling years;

The caverns of the mountain side

Hold him who scorns our hutted piers.

Lost hills whereby we dare not dwell,

Guard ye his rest. Romance, farewell!"

"Farewell, Romance!" the Soldier spoke;

"By sleight of sword we may not win,

But scuffle 'mid uncleanly smoke

Of arquebus and culverin.

Honour is lost, and none may tell

Who paid good blows. Romance, farewell!"

"Farewell, Romance!" the Traders cried;

"Our keels ha' lain with every sea;

The dull-returning wind and tide

Heave up the wharf where we would be;

The known and noted breezes swell

Our trudging sail. Romance, farewell!"

"Good-bye, Romance!" the Skipper said;

"He vanished with the coal we burn;

Our dial marks full steam ahead.

Our speed is timed to half a turn.

Sure as the tidal trains we ply

'Twixt port and port. Romance, good-bye!"

"Romance!" the Season-tickets mourn,

"_He_ never ran to catch his train,

But passed with coach and guard and horn--

And left the local--late again!

Confound Romance!" ... And all unseen

Romance brought up the nine-fifteen.

His hand was on the lever laid,

His oil-can soothed the worrying cranks,

His whistle waked the snow-bound grade,

His fog-horn cut the reeking Banks;

In dock and deep and mine and mill

The Boy-god reckless laboured still.

Robed, crowned and throned, he wove his spell,

Where heart-blood beat or hearth-smoke curled

With unconsidered miracle,

Hedged in a backward-gazing world:

Then taught his chosen bard to say:

"The King was with us--yesterday!"

V

TO THE UNKNOWN GODDESS

Will you conquer my heart with your beauty, my soul going out from

afar?

Shall I fall to your hand as a victim of crafty and cautious _shikar_?

Have I met you and passed you already, unknowing, unthinking, and blind

Shall I meet you next session at Simla, oh, sweetest and best of your

kind?

* * * * *

Ah, Goddess! child, spinster, or widow--as of old on Mars Hill when

they raised

To the God that they knew not an altar--so I, a young Pagan, have

praised.

The Goddess I know not nor worship; yet if half that men tell me be

true,

You will come in the future, and therefore these verses are written

to you.

VI

THE GALLEY SLAVE

Oh, gallant was our galley from her carven steering-wheel

To her figurehead of silver and her beak of hammered steel;

The leg-bar chafed the ankle, and we gasped for cooler air,

But no galley on the water with our galley could compare!

Our bulkheads bulged with cotton and our masts were stepped in gold--

We ran a mighty merchandise of Negroes in the hold;

The white foam spun behind us, and the black shark swam below,

As we gripped the kicking sweep-head and we made that galley go.

It was merry in the galley, for we revelled now and then--

If they wore us down like cattle, faith, we fought and loved like men!

As we snatched her through the water, so we snatched a minute's bliss,

And the mutter of the dying never spoiled the lover's kiss.

Our women and our children toiled beside us in the dark--

They died, we filed their fetters, and we heaved them to the shark--

We heaved them to the fishes, but so fast the galley sped,

We had only time to envy, for we could not mourn our dead.

Bear witness, once my comrades, what a hard-bit gang were we--

The servants of the sweep-head, but the masters of the sea!

By the hands that drove her forward as she plunged and yawed and

sheered,

Woman, Man, or God, or Devil, was there anything we feared?

Was it storm? Our fathers faced it, and a wilder never blew;

Earth that waited for the wreckage watched the galley struggle through.

Burning noon or choking midnight, Sickness, Sorrow, Parting, Death?

Nay our very babes would mock you, had they time for idle breath.

But to-day I leave the galley, and another takes my place;

There's my name upon the deck-beam--let it stand a little space.

I am free--to watch my messmates beating out to open main,

Free of all that Life can offer--save to handle sweep again.

By the brand upon my shoulder, by the gall of clinging steel,

By the welt the whips have left me, by the scars that never heal;

By eyes grown old with staring through the sun-wash on the brine,

I am paid in full for service--would that service still were mine!

* * * * *

It may be that Fate will give me life and leave to row once more--

Set some strong man free for fighting as I take awhile his oar.

But to-day I leave the galley. Shall I curse her service then?

God be thanked--whate'er comes after, I have lived and toiled with men!

VII

THE SHIP THAT FOUND HERSELF

It was her first voyage, and though she was but a cargo-steamer of

twenty-five hundred tons, she was the very best of her kind, the

outcome of forty years of experiments and improvements in framework

and machinery; and her designers and owner thought as much of her as

though she had been the _Lucania_. Anyone can make a floating hotel

that will pay expenses, if he puts enough money into the saloon, and

charges for private baths, suites of rooms, and such like; but in

these days of competition and low freights every square inch of a

cargo-boat must be built for cheapness, great hold-capacity, and a

certain steady speed. This boat was, perhaps, two hundred and forty

feet long and thirty-two feet wide, with arrangements that enabled her

to carry cattle on her main and sheep on her upper deck if she wanted

to; but her great glory was the amount of cargo that she could store

away in her holds. Her owners--they were a very well-known Scotch

firm--came round with her from the north, where she had been launched

and christened and fitted, to Liverpool, where she was to take cargo

for New York; and the owner's daughter, Miss Frazier, went to and fro

on the clean decks, admiring the new paint and the brass work, and the

patent winches, and particularly the strong, straight bow, over which

she had cracked a bottle of champagne when she named the steamer the

_Dimbula_. It was a beautiful September afternoon, and the boat in all

her newness--she was painted lead-colour with a red funnel--looked

very fine indeed. Her house-flag was flying, and her whistle from time

to time acknowledged the salutes of friendly boats, who saw that she

was new to the High and Narrow Seas and wished to make her welcome.

"And now," said Miss Frazier, delightedly, to the captain, "she's a

real ship, is n't she? It seems only the other day father gave the

order for her, and now--and now--is n't she a beauty!" The girl was

proud of the firm, and talked as though she were the controlling

partner.

"Oh, she's no so bad," the skipper replied cautiously. "But I'm sayin'

that it takes more than christenin' to mak' a ship. In the nature o'

things, Miss Frazier, if ye follow me, she's just irons and rivets and

plates put into the form of a ship. She has to find herself yet."

"I thought father said she was exceptionally well found."

"So she is," said the skipper, with a laugh. "But it's this way wi'

ships, Miss Frazier. She's all here, but the parrts of her have not

learned to work together yet. They've had no chance."

"The engines are working beautifully. I can hear them."

"Yes, indeed. But there's more than engines to a ship. Every inch of

her, ye'll understand, has to be livened up and made to work wi' its

neighbour--sweetenin' her, we call it, technically."

"And how will you do it?" the girl asked.

"We can no more than drive and steer her, and so forth; but if we have

rough weather this trip--it's likely--she'll learn the rest by heart!

For a ship, ye'll obsairve, Miss Frazier, is in no sense a reegid body

closed at both ends. She's a highly complex structure o' various an'

conflictin' strains, wi' tissues that must give an' tak' accordin' to

her personal modulus of elasteecity." Mr. Buchanan, the chief

engineer, was coming toward them. "I'm sayin' to Miss Frazier, here,

that our little _Dimbula_ has to be sweetened yet, and nothin' but a

gale will do it. How's all wi' your engines, Buck?"

"Well enough--true by plumb an' rule, o' course; but there's no

spontaneeity yet." He turned to the girl. "Take my word, Miss Frazier,

and maybe ye'll comprehend later; even after a pretty girl's

christened a ship it does not follow that there's such a thing as a

ship under the men that work her."

"I was sayin' the very same, Mr. Buchanan," the skipper interrupted.

"That's more metaphysical than I can follow," said Miss Frazier,

laughing.

"Why so? Ye're good Scotch, an'--I knew your mother's father, he was

fra' Dumfries--ye've a vested right in metapheesics, Miss Frazier,

just as ye have in the _Dimbula_," the engineer said.

"Eh, well, we must go down to the deep watters, an' earn Miss Frazier

her deevidends. Will you not come to my cabin for tea?" said the

skipper. "We'll be in dock the night, and when you're goin' back to

Glasgie ye can think of us loadin' her down an' drivin' her forth--all

for your sake."

In the next few days they stowed some four thousand tons' dead weight

into the _Dimbula_, and took her out from Liverpool. As soon as she

met the lift of the open water, she naturally began to talk. If you

lay your ear to the side of the cabin next time you are in a steamer,

you will hear hundreds of little voices in every direction, thrilling

and buzzing, and whispering and popping, and gurgling and sobbing and

squeaking exactly like a telephone in a thunder-storm. Wooden ships

shriek and growl and grunt, but iron vessels throb and quiver through

all their hundreds of ribs and thousands of rivets. The _Dimbula_ was

very strongly built, and every piece of her had a letter or number, or

both, to describe it; and every piece had been hammered, or forged,

or rolled, or punched by man, and had lived in the roar and rattle of

the shipyard for months. Therefore, every piece had its own separate

voice in exact proportion to the amount of trouble spent upon it.

Cast-iron as a rule, says very little; but mild steel plates and

wrought-iron, and ribs and beams that have been much bent and welded

and riveted, talk continuously. Their conversation, of course, is not

half as wise as our human talk, because they are all, though they do

not know it, bound down one to the other in a black darkness, where

they cannot tell what is happening near them, nor what will overtake

them next.

As soon as she had cleared the Irish coast a sullen gray-headed old

wave of the Atlantic climbed leisurely over her straight bows, and sat

down on her steam-capstan used for hauling up the anchor. Now the

capstan and the engine that drove it had been newly painted red and

green; besides which, nobody likes being ducked.

"Don't you do that again," the capstan sputtered through the teeth of

his cogs. "Hi! Where's the fellow gone?"

The wave had slouched overside with a plop and a chuckle; but "Plenty

more where he came from," said a brother-wave, and went through and

over the capstan, who was bolted firmly to an iron plate on the iron

deck-beams below.

"Can't you keep still up there?" said the deck-beams. "What's the

matter with you? One minute you weigh twice as much as you ought to,

and the next you don't!"

"It is n't my fault," said the capstan. "There's a green brute outside

that comes and hits me on the head."

"Tell that to the shipwrights. You've been in position for months and

you've never wriggled like this before. If you are n't careful you'll

strain _us_."

"Talking of strain," said a low, rasping, unpleasant voice, "are any

of you fellows--you deck-beams, we mean--aware that those exceedingly

ugly knees of yours happen to be riveted into our structure--_ours_?"

"Who might you be?" the deck-beams inquired.

"Oh, nobody in particular," was the answer. "We're only the port and

starboard upper-deck stringers; and if you persist in heaving and

hiking like this, we shall be reluctantly compelled to take steps."

Now the stringers of the ship are long iron girders, so to speak, that

run lengthways from stern to bow. They keep the iron frames (what are

called ribs in a wooden ship) in place, and also help to hold the ends

of the deck-beams, which go from side to side of the ship. Stringers

always consider themselves most important, because they are so long.

"You will take steps--will you?" This was a long echoing rumble. It

came from the frames--scores and scores of them, each one about

eighteen inches distant from the next, and each riveted to the

stringers in four places. "We think you will have a certain amount of

trouble in _that_;" and thousands and thousands of the little rivets

that held everything together whispered: "You will. You will! Stop

quivering and be quiet. Hold on, brethren! Hold on! Hot Punches!

What's that?"

Rivets have no teeth, so they cannot chatter with fright; but they did

their best as a fluttering jar swept along the ship from stern to bow,

and she shook like a rat in a terrier's mouth.

An unusually severe pitch, for the sea was rising, had lifted the big

throbbing screw nearly to the surface, and it was spinning round in a

kind of soda-water--half sea and half air--going much faster than was

proper, because there was no deep water for it to work in. As it sank

again, the engines--and they were triple expansion, three cylinders in

a row--snorted through all their three pistons, "Was that a joke, you

fellow outside? It's an uncommonly poor one. How are we to do our work

if you fly off the handle that way?"

"I did n't fly off the handle," said the screw, twirling huskily at

the end of the screw-shaft. "If I had, you'd have been scrap-iron by

this time. The sea dropped away from under me, and I had nothing to

catch on to. That's all."

"That's all, d'you call it?" said the thrust-block whose business it

is to take the push of the screw; for if a screw had nothing to hold

it back it would crawl right into the engine-room. (It is the holding

back of the screwing action that gives the drive to a ship.) "I know I

do my work deep down and out of sight, but I warn you I expect

justice. All I ask for is bare justice. Why can't you push steadily

and evenly instead of whizzing like a whirligig, and making me hot

under all my collars." The thrust-block had six collars, each faced

with brass, and he did not wish to get them heated.

All the bearings that supported the fifty feet of screw-shaft as it

ran to the stern whispered: "Justice--give us justice."

"I can only give you what I can get," the screw answered. "Look out!

It's coming again!"

He rose with a roar as the _Dimbula_ plunged, and

"whack--flack--whack--whack" went the engines, furiously, for they had

little to check them.

"I'm the noblest outcome of human ingenuity--Mr. Buchanan says so,"

squealed the high-pressure cylinder. "This is simply ridiculous!" The

piston went up savagely, and choked, for half the steam behind it was

mixed with dirty water. "Help! Oiler! Fitter! Stoker! Help! I'm

choking," it gasped. "Never in the history of maritime invention has

such a calamity overtaken one so young and strong. And if I go, who's

to drive the ship?"

"Hush! oh, hush!" whispered the Steam, who, of course, had been to sea

many times before. He used to spend his leisure ashore in a cloud, or

a gutter, or a flower-pot, or a thunder-storm, or anywhere else where

water was needed. "That's only a little priming, a little

carrying-over, as they call it. It'll happen all night, on and off. I

don't say it's nice, but it's the best we can do under the

circumstances."

"What difference can circumstances make? I'm here to do my work--on

clean, dry steam. Blow circumstances!" the cylinder roared.

"The circumstances will attend to the blowing. I've worked on the

North Atlantic run a good many times--it's going to be rough before

morning."

"It is n't distressingly calm now," said the extra-strong frames--they

were called web-frames--in the engine-room. "There's an upward thrust

that we don't understand, and there's a twist that is very bad for our

brackets and diamond-plates, and there's a sort of west-north-westerly

pull that follows the twist, which seriously annoys us. We mention

this because we happened to cost a good deal of money, and we feel

sure that the owner would not approve of our being treated in this

frivolous way."

"I'm afraid the matter is out of owner's hand, for the present," said

the Steam, slipping into the condenser. "You're left to your own

devices till the weather betters."

"I would n't mind the weather," said a flat bass voice below; "it's

this confounded cargo that's breaking my heart. I'm the

garboard-strake, and I'm twice as thick as most of the others, and I

ought to know something."

The garboard-strake is the lowest plate in the bottom of a ship, and

the _Dimbula's_ garboard-strake was nearly three-quarters of an inch

mild steel.

"The sea pushes me up in a way I should never have expected," the

strake grunted, "and the cargo pushes me down, and, between the two, I

don't know what I'm supposed to do."

"When in doubt, hold on," rumbled the Steam, making head in the

boilers.

"Yes; but there's only dark, and cold, and hurry, down here; and how

do I know whether the other plates are doing their duty? Those

bulwark-plates up above, I've heard, ain't more than five-sixteenths

of an inch thick--scandalous, I call it."

"I agree with you," said a huge web-frame by the main cargo-hatch. He

was deeper and thicker than all the others, and curved half-way across

the ship in the shape of half an arch, to support the deck where deck

beams would have been in the way of cargo coming up and down. "I work

entirely unsupported, and I observe that I am the sole strength of

this vessel, so far as my vision extends. The responsibility, I assure

you, is enormous. I believe the money-value of the cargo is over one

hundred and fifty thousand pounds. Think of that!"

"And every pound of it is dependent on my personal exertions." Here

spoke a sea-valve that communicated directly with the water outside,

and was seated not very far from the garboard-strake. "I rejoice to

think that I am a Prince-Hyde Valve, with best Para rubber facings.

Five patents cover me--I mention this without pride--five separate and

several patents, each one finer than the other. At present I am

screwed fast. Should I open, you would immediately be swamped. This is

incontrovertible!"

Patent things always use the longest words they can. It is a trick

that they pick up from their inventors.

"That's news," said a big centrifugal bilge-pump. "I had an idea that

you were employed to clean decks and things with. At least, I've used

you for that more than once. I forget the precise number, in

thousands, of gallons which I am guaranteed to throw per hour; but I

assure you, my complaining friends, that there is not the least

danger. I alone am capable of clearing any water that may find its way

here. By my Biggest Deliveries, we pitched then!"

The sea was getting up in workmanlike style. It was a dead westerly

gale, blown from under a ragged opening of green sky, narrowed on all

sides by fat, gray clouds; and the wind bit like pincers as it fretted

the spray into lacework on the flanks of the waves.

"I tell you what it is," the foremast telephoned down its wire-stays.

"I'm up here, and I can take a dispassionate view of things. There's

an organized conspiracy against us. I'm sure of it, because every

single one of these waves is heading directly for our bows. The whole

sea is concerned in it--and so's the wind. It's awful!"

"What's awful?" said a wave, drowning the capstan for the hundredth

time.

"This organized conspiracy on your part," the capstan gurgled, taking

his cue from the mast.

"Organized bubbles and spindrift! There has been a depression in the

Gulf of Mexico. Excuse me!" He leaped overside; but his friends took

up the tale one after another.

"Which has advanced----" That wave hove green water over the funnel.

"As far as Cape Hatteras----" He drenched the bridge.

"And is now going out to sea--to sea--to sea!" The third went free in

three surges, making a clean sweep of a boat, which turned bottom up

and sank in the darkening troughs alongside, while the broken falls

whipped the davits.

"That's all there is to it," seethed the white water roaring through

the scuppers. "There's no animus in our proceedings. We're only

meteorological corollaries."

"Is it going to get any worse?" said the bow-anchor, chained down to

the deck, where he could only breathe once in five minutes.

"Not knowing, can't say. Wind may blow a bit by midnight. Thanks

awfully. Good-bye."

The wave that spoke so politely had travelled some distance aft, and

found itself all mixed up on the deck amidships, which was a well-deck

sunk between high bulwarks. One of the bulwark plates, which was hung

on hinges to open outward, had swung out, and passed the bulk of the

water back to the sea again with a clean smack.

"Evidently that's what I'm made for," said the plate, closing again

with a sputter of pride. "Oh, no, you don't my friend!"

The top of a wave was trying to get in from the outside, but as the

plate did not open in that direction, the defeated water spurted back.

"Not bad for five-sixteenths of an inch," said the bulwark-plate. "My

work, I see, is laid down for the night"; and it began opening and

shutting, as it was designed to do, with the motion of the ship.

"We are not what you might call idle," groaned all the frames

together, as the _Dimbula_ climbed a big wave, lay on her side at the

top, and shot into the next hollow, twisting in the descent. A huge

swell pushed up exactly under her middle, and her bow and stern hung

free with nothing to support them. Then one joking wave caught her up

at the bow, and another at the stern, while the rest of the water

slunk away from under her just to see how she would like it; so she

was held up at her two ends only, and the weight of the cargo and the

machinery fell on the groaning iron keels and bilge-stringers.

"Ease off! Ease off, there!" roared the garboard-strake. "I want

one-eighth of an inch fair play. D' you hear me, you rivets!"

"Ease off! Ease off!" cried the bilge-stringers. "Don't hold us so

tight to the frames!"

"Ease off!" grunted the deck-beams, as the _Dimbula_ rolled fearfully.

"You've cramped our knees into the stringers, and we can't move. Ease

off, you flat-headed little nuisances."

Then two converging seas hit the bows, one on each side, and fell away

in torrents of streaming thunder.

"Ease off!" shouted the forward collision-bulkhead. "I want to crumple

up, but I'm stiffened in every direction. Ease off, you dirty little

forge-filings. Let me breathe!"

All the hundreds of plates that are riveted to the frames, and make

the outside skin of every steamer, echoed the call, for each plate

wanted to shift and creep a little, and each plate, according to its

position, complained against the rivets.

"We can't help it! _We_ can't help it!" they murmured in reply. "We're

put here to hold you, and we're going to do it; you never pull us

twice in the same direction. If you'd say what you were going to do

next, we'd try to meet your views."

"As far as I could feel," said the upper-deck planking, and that was

four inches thick, "every single iron near me was pushing or pulling

in opposite directions. Now, what's the sense of that? My friends, let

us all pull together."

"Pull any way you please," roared the funnel, "so long as you don't

try your experiments on _me_. I need fourteen wire ropes, all pulling

in different directions, to hold me steady. Is n't that so?"

"We believe you, my boy!" whistled the funnel-stays through their

clinched teeth, as they twanged in the wind from the top of the funnel

to the deck.

"Nonsense! We must all pull together," the decks repeated. "Pull

lengthways."

"Very good," said the stringers; "then stop pushing sideways when you

get wet. Be content to run gracefully fore and aft, and curve in at

the ends as we do."

"No--no curves at the end! A very slight workmanlike curve from side

to side, with a good grip at each knee, and little pieces welded on,"

said the deck-beams.

"Fiddle!" cried the iron pillars of the deep, dark hold. "Who ever

heard of curves? Stand up straight; be a perfectly round column, and

carry tons of good solid weight--like that! There!" A big sea smashed

on the deck above, and the pillars stiffened themselves to the load.

"Straight up and down is not bad," said the frames, who ran that way

in the sides of the ship, "but you must also expand yourselves

sideways. Expansion is the law of life, children. Open out! open out!"

"Come back!" said the deck-beams, savagely, as the upward heave of the

sea made the frames try to open. "Come back to your bearings, you

slack-jawed irons!"

"Rigidity! Rigidity! Rigidity!" thumped the engines. "Absolute,

unvarying rigidity--rigidity!"

"You see!" whined the rivets, in chorus. "No two of you will ever pull

alike, and--and you blame it all on us. We only know how to go through

a plate and bite down on both sides so that it can't, and must n't,

and shan't move."

"I've got one-fraction of an inch play, at any rate," said the

garboard-strake, triumphantly. So he had, and all the bottom of the

ship felt the easier for it.

"Then we're no good," sobbed the bottom rivets. "We were ordered--we

were ordered--never to give; and we've given, and the sea will come

in, and we'll all go to the bottom together! First we're blamed for

everything unpleasant, and now we have n't the consolation of having

done our work."

"Don't say I told you," whispered the Steam, consolingly; "but,

between you and me and the last cloud I came from, it was bound to

happen sooner or later. You _had_ to give a fraction, and you've given

without knowing it. Now, hold on, as before."

"What's the use?" a few hundred rivets chattered. "We've given--we've

given; and the sooner we confess that we can't keep the ship together,

and go off our little heads, the easier it will be. No rivet forged

can stand this strain."

"No one rivet was ever meant to. Share it among you," the Steam

answered.

"The others can have my share. I'm going to pull out," said a rivet in

one of the forward plates.

"If you go, others will follow," hissed the Steam. "There's nothing so

contagious in a boat as rivets going. Why, I knew a little chap like

you--he was an eighth of an inch fatter, though--on a steamer--to be

sure, she was only twelve hundred tons, now I come to think of it--in

exactly the same place as you are. He pulled out in a bit of a bobble

of a sea, not half as bad as this, and he started all his friends on

the same butt-strap, and the plates opened like a furnace door, and I

had to climb into the nearest fog-bank, while the boat went down."

"Now that's peculiarly disgraceful," said the rivet. "Fatter than me,

was he, and in a steamer not half our tonnage? Reedy little peg! I

blush for the family, sir." He settled himself more firmly than ever

in his place, and the Steam chuckled.

"You see," he went on, quite gravely, "a rivet, and especially a rivet

in your position, is really the one indispensable part of the ship."

The Steam did not say that he had whispered the very same thing to

every single piece of iron aboard. There is no sense in telling too

much truth.

And all that while the little _Dimbula_ pitched and chopped, and swung

and slewed, and lay down as though she were going to die, and got up

as though she had been stung, and threw her nose round and round in

circles half a dozen times as she dipped; for the gale was at its

worst. It was inky black, in spite of the tearing white froth on the

waves, and, to top everything, the rain began to fall in sheets, so

that you could not see your hand before your face. This did not make

much difference to the ironwork below, but it troubled the foremast a

good deal.

"Now it's all finished," he said dismally. "The conspiracy is too

strong for us. There is nothing left but to----"

"_Hurraar! Brrrraaah! Brrrrrrp!_" roared the Steam through the

fog-horn, till the decks quivered. "Don't be frightened, below. It's

only me, just throwing out a few words, in case any one happens to be

rolling round to-night."

"You don't mean to say there's any one except us on the sea in such

weather?" said the funnel in a husky snuffle.

"Scores of 'em," said the Steam, clearing its throat; "_Rrrrrraaa!

Brraaaaa! Prrrrp!_ It's a trifle windy up here; and, Great Boilers!

how it rains!"

"We're drowning," said the scuppers. They had been doing nothing else

all night, but this steady thrash of rain above them seemed to be the

end of the world.

"That's all right. We'll be easier in an hour or two. First the wind

and then the rain: Soon you may make sail again! _Grrraaaaaah!

Drrrraaaa! Drrrp!_ I have a notion that the sea is going down already.

If it does you'll learn something about rolling. We've only pitched

till now. By the way, are n't you chaps in the hold a little easier

than you were?"

There was just as much groaning and straining as ever, but it was not

so loud or squeaky in tone; and when the ship quivered she did not jar

stiffly, like a poker hit on the floor, but gave with a supple little

waggle, like a perfectly balanced golf-club.

"We have made a most amazing discovery," said the stringers, one after

another. "A discovery that entirely changes the situation. We have

found, for the first time in the history of ship-building, that the

inward pull of the deck-beams and the outward thrust of the frames

locks us, as it were, more closely in our places, and enables us to

endure a strain which is entirely without parallel in the records of

marine architecture."

The Steam turned a laugh quickly into a roar up the fog-horn. "What

massive intellects you great stringers have," he said softly, when he

had finished.

"We also," began the deck-beams, "are discoverers and geniuses. We are

of opinion that the support of the hold-pillars materially helps us.

We find that we lock up on them when we are subjected to a heavy and

singular weight of sea above."

Here the _Dimbula_ shot down a hollow, lying almost on her

side--righting at the bottom with a wrench and a spasm.

"In these cases--are you aware of this, Steam?--the plating at the

bows, and particularly at the stern--we would also mention the floors

beneath us--help _us_ to resist any tendency to spring." The frames

spoke, in the solemn, awed voice which people use when they have just

come across something entirely new for the very first time.

"I'm only a poor puffy little flutterer," said the Steam, "but I have

to stand a good deal of pressure in my business. It's all tremendously

interesting. Tell us some more. You fellows are so strong."

"Watch us and you'll see," said the bow-plates, proudly. "Ready,

behind there! Here's the Father and Mother of Waves coming! Sit tight,

rivets all!" A great sluicing comber thundered by, but through the

scuffle and confusion the Steam could hear the low, quick cries of the

ironwork as the various strains took them--cries like these: "Easy,

now--easy! _Now_ push for all your strength! Hold out! Give a

fraction! Holdup! Pull in! Shove crossways! Mind the strain at the

ends! Grip, now! Bite tight! Let the water get away from under--and

there she goes!"

The wave raced off into the darkness, shouting, "Not bad, that, if

it's your first run!" and the drenched and ducked ship throbbed to the

beat of the engines inside her. All three cylinders were white with

the salt spray that had come down through the engine-room hatch; there

was white fur on the canvas-bound steam-pipes, and even the

bright-work deep below was speckled and soiled; but the cylinders had

learned to make the most of steam that was half water, and were

pounding along cheerfully.

"How's the noblest outcome of human ingenuity hitting it?" said the

Steam, as he whirled through the engine-room.

"Nothing for nothing in this world of woe," the cylinders answered, as

though they had been working for centuries, "and precious little for

seventy-five pounds' head. We've made two knots this last hour and a

quarter! Rather humiliating for eight hundred horse-power, is n't it?"

"Well, it's better than drifting astern, at any rate. You seem rather

less--how shall I put it?--stiff in the back than you were."

"If you'd been hammered as we've been this night, you would n't be

stiff--iff--iff, either. Theoreti--retti--retti--cally, of course,

rigidity is the thing. Purrr--purr--practically, there has to be a

little give and take. _We_ found that out by working on our sides for

five minutes at a stretch--chch--chh. How's the weather?"

"Sea's going down fast," said the Steam.

"Good business," said the high-pressure cylinder. "Whack her up, boys.

They've given us five pounds more steam"; and he began humming the

first bars of "Said the Young Obadiah to the Old Obadiah," which, as

you may have noticed, is a pet tune among engines not built for high

speed. Racing-liners with twin-screws sing "The Turkish Patrol" and

the overture to the "Bronze Horse," and "Madame Angot," till something

goes wrong, and then they render Gounod's "Funeral March of a

Marionette" with variations.

"You'll learn a song of your own some fine day," said the Steam, as he

flew up the fog-horn for one last bellow.

Next day the sky cleared and the sea dropped a little, and the

_Dimbula_ began to roll from side to side till every inch of iron in

her was sick and giddy. But luckily they did not all feel ill at the

same time: otherwise she would have opened out like a wet paper box.

The Steam whistled warnings as he went about his business: it is in

this short, quick roll and tumble that follows a heavy sea that most

of the accidents happen, for then everything thinks that the worst is

over and goes off guard. So he orated and chattered till the beams and

frames and floors and stringers and things had learned how to lock

down and lock up on one another, and endure this new kind of strain.

They found ample time to practise, for they were sixteen days at sea,

and it was foul weather till within a hundred miles of New York. The

_Dimbula_ picked up her pilot and came in covered with salt and red

rust. Her funnel was dirty gray from top to bottom; two boats had been

carried away; three copper ventilators looked like hats after a fight

with the police; the bridge had a dimple in the middle of it; the

house that covered the steam steering-gear was split as with hatchets;

there was a bill for small repairs in the engine-room almost as long

as the screw-shaft; the forward cargo-hatch fell into bucket-staves

when they raised the iron cross-bars; and the steam-capstan had been

badly wrenched on its bed. Altogether, as the skipper said, it was "a

pretty general average."

"But she's soupled," he said to Mr. Buchanan. "For all her dead weight

she rode like a yacht. Ye mind that last blow off the Banks? I am

proud of her, Buck."

"It's vera good," said the chief engineer, looking along the

dishevelled decks. "Now, a man judgin' superfeecially would say we

were a wreck, but we know otherwise--by experience."

Naturally everything in the _Dimbula_ fairly stiffened with pride, and

the foremast and the forward collision-bulkhead who are pushing

creatures, begged the Steam to warn the Port of New York of their

arrival. "Tell those big boats all about us," they said. "They seem to

take us quite as a matter of course."

It was a glorious, clear, dead calm morning, and in single file, with

less than half a mile between each, their bands playing and their

tug-boats shouting and waving handkerchiefs, were the _Majestic_, the

_Paris_, the _Touraine_, the _Servia_, the _Kaiser Wilhelm II._, and

the _Werkendam_, all statelily going out to sea. As the _Dimbula_

shifted her helm to give the great boats clear way, the Steam (who

knows far too much to mind making an exhibition of himself now and

then) shouted:

"Oyez! Oyez! Oyez! Princes, Dukes, and Barons of the High Seas! Know

ye by these presents, we are the _Dimbula_, fifteen days nine hours

from Liverpool, having crossed the Atlantic with four thousand ton of

cargo for the first time in our career! We have not foundered. We are

here, _'Eer! 'Eer!_ We are not disabled. But we have had a time wholly

unparalleled in the annals of ship-building! Our decks were swept! We

pitched; we rolled! We thought we were going to die! _Hi! Hi!_ But we

did n't. We wish to give notice that we have come to New York all the

way across the Atlantic through the worst weather in the world; and we

are the _Dimbula_! We are--arr--ha--ha--ha-r-r-r!"

The beautiful line of boats swept by as steadily as the procession of

the Seasons. The _Dimbula_ heard the _Majestic_ say, "Hmph!" and the

_Paris_ grunted, "How!" and the _Touraine_ said, "Oui!" with a little

coquettish flicker of steam; and the _Servia_ said "Haw!" and the

_Kaiser_ and the _Werkendam_ said, "Hoch!" Dutch fashion--and that was

absolutely all.

"I did my best," said the Steam, gravely, "but I don't think they were

much impressed with us, somehow. Do you?"

"It's simply disgusting," said the bow-plates. "They might have seen

what we've been through. There is n't a ship on the sea that has

suffered as we have--is there, now?"

"Well, I would n't go so far as that," said the Steam, "because I've

worked on some of those boats, and sent them through weather quite as

bad as the fortnight that we've had, in six days; and some of them are

a little over ten thousand tons, I believe. Now I've seen the

_Majestic_, for instance, ducked from her bows to her funnel; and I've

helped the _Arizona_, I think she was, to back off an iceberg she met

with one dark night; and I had to run out of the _Paris's_

engine-room, one day, because there was thirty foot of water in it. Of

course, I don't deny----" The Steam shut off suddenly, as a tug-boat,

loaded with a political club and a brass band, that had been to see a

New York Senator off to Europe, crossed their bows, going to Hoboken.

There was a long silence that reached, without a break, from the

cut-water to the propeller-blades of the _Dimbula_.

Then a new, big voice said slowly and thickly, as though the owner had

just waked up: "It's my conviction that I have made a fool of myself."

The Steam knew what had happened at once; for when a ship finds

herself all the talking of the separate pieces ceases and melts into

one voice, which is the soul of the ship.

"Who are you?" he said, with a laugh.

"I am the _Dimbula_, of course. I've never been anything else except

that--and a fool!"

The tug-boat, which was doing its very best to be run down, got away

just in time, its band playing clashily and brassily a popular but

impolite air:

In the days of old Rameses--are you on?

In the days of old Rameses--are you on?

In the days of old Rameses,

That story had paresis,

Are you on--are you on--are you on?

"Well, I'm glad you've found yourself," said the Steam. "To tell the

truth I was a little tired of talking to all those ribs and stringers.

Here's Quarantine. After that we'll go to our wharf and clean up a

little, and--next month we'll do it all over again."

I

A TRIP ACROSS A CONTINENT[1]

Harvey N. Cheyne, a spoiled darling, "perhaps fifteen years

old," "an American--first, last, and all the time," had

"staggered over the wet decks to the nearest rail," after

trying to smoke a "Wheeling stogie." "He was fainting from

seasickness, and a roll of the ship tilted him over the

rail," where a "gray mother-wave tucked him under one arm."

He was picked up by the fishing schooner _We're Here_, and

after many marvellous experiences among the sailors arrived

in port, a happier and wiser fellow. His telegram to his

father brings the following result.

Cheyne was flying to meet the only son, so miraculously restored to

him. The bear was seeking his cub, not the bulls. Hard men who had

their knives drawn to fight for their financial lives put away the

weapons and wished him God-speed, while half a dozen panic-smitten

tin-pot roads perked up their heads and spoke of the wonderful things

they would have done had not Cheyne buried the hatchet.

[Footnote 1: A selection from "Captains Courageous," copyrighted by

The Century Company.]

It was a busy week-end among the wires; for, now that their anxiety

was removed, men and cities hastened to accommodate. Los Angeles

called to San Diego and Barstow that the Southern California engineers

might know and be ready in their lonely roundhouses; Barstow passed

the word to the Atlantic and Pacific; and Albuquerque flung it the

whole length of the Atchison, Topeka, and Santa Fe management, even

into Chicago. An engine, combination-car with crew, and the great and

gilded "Constance" private car were to be "expedited" over those two

thousand three hundred and fifty miles. The train would take

precedence of one hundred and seventy-seven others meeting and

passing; despatchers and crews of every one of those said trains must

be notified. Sixteen locomotives; sixteen engineers, and sixteen

firemen would be needed--each and every one the best available. Two

and one-half minutes would be allowed for changing engines, three for

watering, and two for coaling. "Warn the men, and arrange tanks and

chutes accordingly; for Harvey Cheyne is in a hurry, a hurry--hurry,"

sang the wires. "Forty miles an hour will be expected, and division

superintendents will accompany this special over their respective

divisions. From San Diego to Sixteenth Street, Chicago, let the magic

carpet be laid down. Hurry! oh, hurry!"

"It will be hot," said Cheyne, as they rolled out of San Diego in the

dawn of Sunday. "We're going to hurry, mamma, just as fast as ever we

can; but I really don't think there's any good of your putting on your

bonnet and gloves yet. You'd much better lie down and take your

medicine. I'd play you a game o' dominoes, but it's Sunday."

"I'll be good. Oh, I _will_ be good. Only--taking off my bonnet makes

me feel as if we'd never get there."

"Try to sleep a little, mamma, and we'll be in Chicago before you

know."

"But it's Boston, father. Tell them to hurry."

The six-foot drivers were hammering their way to San Bernardino and

the Mohave wastes, but this was no grade for speed. That would come

later. The heat of the desert followed the heat of the hills as they

turned east to the Needles and the Colorado River. The car cracked in

the utter drought and glare, and they put crushed ice to Mrs. Cheyne's

neck, and toiled up the long, long grades, past Ash Fork, toward

Flagstaff, where the forests and quarries are, under the dry, remote

skies. The needle of the speed-indicator flicked and wagged to and

fro, the cinders rattled on the roof, and a whirl of dust sucked after

the whirling wheels. The crew of the combination sat on their bunks,

panting in their shirt-sleeves, and Cheyne found himself among them

shouting old, old stories of the railroad that every trainman knows,

above the roar of the car. He told them about his son, and how the sea

had given up its dead, and they nodded and spat and rejoiced with him;

asked after "her, back there," and whether she could stand it if the

engineer "let her out a piece," and Cheyne thought she could.

Accordingly the great fire-horse was "let out" from Flagstaff to

Winslow, till a division superintendent protested.

But Mrs. Cheyne, in the boudoir stateroom, where the French maid,

sallow-white with fear, clung to the silver door-handle, only moaned a

little and begged her husband to bid them "hurry." And so they dropped

the dry sands and moon-struck rocks of Arizona behind them, and

grilled on till the crash of the couplings and the wheeze of the

brake-hose told them they were at Coolidge by the Continental Divide.

Three bold and experienced men--cool, confident, and dry when they

began; white, quivering, and wet when they finished their trick at

those terrible wheels--swung her over the great lift from Albuquerque

to Glorietta and beyond Springer, up and up to the Raton Tunnel on the

State line, whence they dropped rocking into La Junta, had sight of

the Arkansaw, and tore down the long slope to Dodge City, where Cheyne

took comfort once again from setting his watch an hour ahead.

There was very little talk in the car. The secretary and typewriter

sat together on the stamped Spanish-leather cushions by the

plate-glass observation-window at the rear end, watching the surge and

ripple of the ties crowded back behind them, and, it is believed,

making notes of the scenery. Cheyne moved nervously between his own

extravagant gorgeousness and the naked necessity of the combination,

an unlit cigar in his teeth, till the pitying crews forgot that he was

their tribal enemy, and did their best to entertain him.

At night the bunched electrics lit up that distressful palace of all

the luxuries, and they fared sumptuously, swinging on through the

emptiness of abject desolation. Now they heard the swish of a

water-tank, and the guttural voice of a Chinaman, the clink-clink of

hammers that tested the Krupp steel wheels, and the oath of a tramp

chased off the rear-platform; now the solid crash of coal shot into

the tender; and now a beating back of noises as they flew past a

waiting train. Now they looked out into great abysses, a trestle

purring beneath their tread, or up to rocks that barred out half the

stars. Now scaur and ravine changed and rolled back to jagged

mountains on the horizon's edge, and now broke into hills lower and

lower, till at last came the true plains.

At Dodge City an unknown hand threw in a copy of a Kansas paper

containing some sort of an interview with Harvey, who had evidently

fallen in with an enterprising reporter, telegraphed on from Boston.

The joyful journalese revealed that it was beyond question their boy,

and it soothed Mrs. Cheyne for a while. Her one word "hurry" was

conveyed by the crews to the engineers at Nickerson, Topeka, and

Marceline, where the grades are easy, and they brushed the Continent

behind them. Towns and villages were close together now, and a man

could feel here that he moved among people.

"I can't see the dial, and my eyes ache so. What are we doing?"

"The very best we can, mamma. There's no sense in getting in before

the Limited. We'd only have to wait."

"I don't care. I want to feel we're moving. Sit down and tell me the

miles."

Cheyne sat down and read the dial for her (there were some miles which

stand for records to this day), but the seventy-foot car never changed

its long steamer-like roll, moving through the heat with the hum of a

giant bee. Yet the speed was not enough for Mrs. Cheyne; and the heat,

the remorseless August heat, was making her giddy; the clock-hands

would not move, and when, oh, when would they be in Chicago?

It is not true that, as they changed engines at Fort Madison, Cheyne

passed over to the Amalgamated Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers an

endowment sufficient to enable them to fight him and his fellows on

equal terms for evermore. He paid his obligations to engineers and

firemen as he believed they deserved, and only his bank knows what he

gave the crews who had sympathized with him. It is on record that the

last crew took entire charge of switching operations at Sixteenth

Street, because "she" was in a doze at last, and Heaven was to help

any one who bumped her.

Now the highly paid specialist who conveys the Lake Shore and

Michigan Southern Limited from Chicago to Elkhart is something of an

autocrat, and he does not approve of being told how to back up to a

car. None the less he handled the "Constance" as if she might have

been a load of dynamite, and when the crew rebuked him they did it in

whispers and dumb show.

"Pshaw!" said the Atchison, Topeka, and Santa Fe men, discussing life

later, "we were n't runnin' for a record. Harvey Cheyne's wife, she

was sick back, an' we did n't want to jounce her. Come to think of it,

our runnin' time from San Diego to Chicago was 57.54. You can tell

that to them Eastern way-trains. When we're tryin' for a record, we

'll let you know."

To the Western man (though this would not please either city) Chicago

and Boston are cheek by jowl, and some railroads encourage the

delusion. The Limited whirled the "Constance" into Buffalo and the

arms of the New York Central and Hudson River (illustrious magnates

with white whiskers and gold charms on their watch-chains boarded her

here to talk a little business to Cheyne), who slid her gracefully

into Albany, where the Boston and Albany completed the run from

tide-water to tide-water--total time, eighty-seven hours and

thirty-five minutes or three days, fifteen hours and one half. Harvey

was waiting for them.

II

THE CHILDREN OF THE ZODIAC[2]

"It's too hard," said the Big Boy. "I don't know what

'Zodiac' means." "I will hunt up the words for you in the

dictionary," said the Little Girl. And when they came to the

next story the Boy took pleasure in doing his own hunting in

the dictionary.

Though thou love her as thyself,

As a self of purer clay,

Though her parting dim the day,

Stealing grace from all alive,

Heartily know

When half Gods go

The gods arrive.--_Emerson._

Thousands of years ago, when men were greater than they are to-day,

the Children of the Zodiac lived in the world. There were six Children

of the Zodiac--the Ram, the Bull, the Lion, the Twins, and the Girl;

and they were afraid of the Six Houses which belonged to the Scorpion,

the Balance, the Crab, the Fishes, the Goat, and the Waterman. Even

when they first stepped down upon the earth and knew that they were

immortal Gods, they carried this fear with them; and the fear grew as

they became better acquainted with mankind and heard stories of the

Six Houses. Men treated the Children as Gods and came to them with

prayers and long stories of wrong, while the Children of the Zodiac

listened and could not understand.

[Footnote 2: Copyrighted, 1891, by Harper & Brothers.]

A mother would fling herself before the feet of the Twins, or the

Bull, crying: "My husband was at work in the fields and the Archer

shot him and he died; and my son will also be killed by the Archer.

Help me!" The Bull would lower his huge head and answer: "What is that

to me?" Or the Twins would smile and continue their play, for they

could not understand why the water ran out of people's eyes. At other

times a man and a woman would come to Leo or the Girl crying: "We two

are newly married and we are very happy. Take these flowers." As they

threw the flowers they would make mysterious sounds to show that they

were happy, and Leo and the Girl wondered even more than the Twins why

people shouted "Ha! ha! ha!" for no cause.

This continued for thousands of years by human reckoning, till on a

day, Leo met the Girl walking across the hills and saw that she had

changed entirely since he had last seen her. The Girl, looking at Leo,

saw that he too had changed altogether. Then they decided that it

would be well never to separate again, in case even more startling

changes should occur when the one was not at hand to help the other.

Leo kissed the Girl and all Earth felt that kiss, and the Girl sat

down on a hill and the water ran out of her eyes; and this had never

happened before in the memory of the Children of the Zodiac.

As they sat together a man and a woman came by, and the man said to

the woman:

"What is the use of wasting flowers on those dull Gods. They will

never understand, darling."

The Girl jumped up and put her arms around the woman, crying, "I

understand. Give me the flowers and I will give you a kiss."

Leo said beneath his breath to the man: "What was the new name that I

heard you give to your woman just now?"

The man answered, "Darling, of course."

"Why, of course," said Leo; "and if of course, what does it mean?"

"It means 'very dear,' and you have only to look at your wife to see

why."

"I see," said Leo; "you are quite right;" and when the man and the

woman had gone on he called the Girl "darling wife"; and the Girl wept

again from sheer happiness.

"I think," she said at last, wiping her eyes, "I think that we two

have neglected men and women too much. What did you do with the

sacrifices they made to you, Leo?"

"I let them burn," said Leo. "I could not eat them. What did you do

with the flowers?"

"I let them wither. I could not wear them, I had so many of my own,"

said the Girl, "and now I am sorry."

"There is nothing to grieve for," said Leo; "we belong to each other."

As they were talking the years of men's life slipped by unnoticed, and

presently the man and the woman came back, both white-headed, the man

carrying the woman.

"We have come to the end of things," said the man quietly. "This that

was my wife----"

"As I am Leo's wife," said the Girl quickly, her eyes staring.

"---- was my wife, has been killed by one of your Houses." The man set

down his burden, and laughed.

"Which House?" said Leo angrily, for he hated all the Houses equally.

"You are Gods, you should know," said the man. "We have lived together

and loved one another, and I have left a good farm for my son: what

have I to complain of except that I still live?"

As he was bending over his wife's body there came a whistling through

the air, and he started and tried to run away, crying, "It is the

arrow of the Archer. Let me live a little longer--only a little

longer!" The arrow struck him and he died. Leo looked at the Girl, and

she looked at him, and both were puzzled.

"He wished to die," said Leo. "He said that he wished to die, and

when Death came he tried to run away. He is a coward."

"No, he is not," said the Girl; "I think I feel what he felt. Leo, we

must learn more about this for their sakes."

"For _their_ sakes," said Leo, very loudly.

"Because _we_ are never going to die," said the Girl and Leo together,

still more loudly.

"Now sit you still here, darling wife," said Leo, "while I go to the

Houses whom we hate, and learn how to make these men and women live as

we do."

"And love as we do?" said the Girl.

"I do not think they need to be taught that," said Leo, and he strode

away very angry, with his lion-skin swinging from his shoulder, till

he came to the House where the Scorpion lives in the darkness,

brandishing his tail over his back.

"Why do you trouble the children of men?" said Leo, with his heart

between his teeth.

"Are you so sure that I trouble the children of men alone?" said the

Scorpion. "Speak to your brother the Bull, and see what he says."

"I come on behalf of the children of men," said Leo. "I have learned

to love as they do, and I wish them to live as I--as we--do."

"Your wish was granted long ago. Speak to the Bull. He is under my

special care," said the Scorpion.

Leo dropped back to the earth again, and saw the great star

Aldebaran, that is set in the forehead of the Bull, blazing very near

to the earth. When he came up to it he saw that his brother, the Bull,

yoked to a countryman's plough, was toiling through a wet rice-field

with his head bent down, and the sweat streaming from his flanks. The

countryman was urging him forward with a goad.

"Gore that insolent to death," cried Leo, "and for the sake of our

family honour come out of the mire."

"I cannot," said the Bull, "the Scorpion has told me that some day, of

which I cannot be sure, he will sting me where my neck is set on my

shoulders, and that I shall die bellowing."

"What has that to do with this disgraceful exhibition?" said Leo,

standing on the dyke that bounded the wet field.

"Everything. This man could not plough without my help. He thinks that

I am a stray bullock."

"But he is a mud-crusted cottar with matted hair," insisted Leo. "We

are not meant for his use."

"You may not be; I am. I cannot tell when the Scorpion may choose to

sting me to death--perhaps before I have turned this furrow." The Bull

flung his bulk into the yoke, and the plough tore through the wet

ground behind him, and the countryman goaded him till his flanks were

red.

"Do you like this?" Leo called down the dripping furrows.

"No," said the Bull over his shoulder as he lifted his hind legs from

the clinging mud and cleared his nostrils.

Leo left him scornfully and passed to another country, where he found

his brother the Ram in the centre of a crowd of country people who

were hanging wreaths round his neck and feeding him on freshly plucked

green corn.

"This is terrible," said Leo. "Break up that crowd and come away, my

brother. Their hands are spoiling your fleece."

"I cannot," said the Ram. "The Archer told me that on some day of

which I had no knowledge, he would send a dart through me, and that I

should die in very great pain."

"What has that to do with this?" said Leo, but he did not speak as

confidently as before.

"Everything in the world," said the Ram. "These people never saw a

perfect sheep before. They think that I am a stray, and they will

carry me from place to place as a model to all their flocks."

"But they are greasy shepherds, we are not intended to amuse them,"

said Leo.

"You may not be; I am," said the Ram. "I cannot tell when the Archer

may choose to send his arrow at me--perhaps before the people a mile

down the road have seen me." The Ram lowered his head that a yokel

newly arrived might throw a wreath of wild garlic-leaves over it, and

waited patiently while the farmers tugged his fleece.

"Do you like this?" cried Leo over the shoulders of the crowd.

"No," said the Ram, as the dust of the trampling feet made him sneeze,

and he snuffed at the fodder piled before him.

Leo turned back, intending to retrace his steps to the Houses, but as

he was passing down a street he saw two small children, very dusty,

rolling outside a cottage door, and playing with a cat. They were the

Twins.

"What are you doing here?" said Leo, indignant.

"Playing," said the Twins calmly.

"Cannot you play on the banks of the Milky Way?" said Leo.

"We did," said they, "till the Fishes swam down and told us that some

day they would come for us and not hurt us at all and carry us away.

So now we are playing at being babies down here. The people like it."

"Do you like it?" said Leo.

"No," said the Twins, "but there are no cats in the Milky Way," and

they pulled the cat's tail thoughtfully. A woman came out of the

doorway and stood behind them, and Leo saw in her face a look that he

had sometimes seen in the Girl's.

"She thinks that we are foundlings," said the Twins, and they trotted

indoors to the evening meal.

Then Leo hurried as swiftly as possible to all the Houses one after

another; for he could not understand the new trouble that had come to

his brethren. He spoke to the Archer, and the Archer assured him that

so far as that House was concerned Leo had nothing to fear. The

Waterman, the Fishes, and the Goat, gave the same answer. They knew

nothing of Leo, and cared less. They were the Houses, and they were

busied in killing men.

At last he came to that very dark House where Cancer the Crab lies so

still that you might think he was asleep if you did not see the

ceaseless play and winnowing motion of the feathery branches round his

mouth. That movement never ceases. It is like the eating of a

smothered fire into rotten timber in that it is noiseless and without

haste.

Leo stood in front of the Crab, and the half darkness allowed him a

glimpse of that vast blue-black back, and the motionless eyes. Now and

again he thought that he heard some one sobbing, but the noise was

very faint.

"Why do you trouble the children of men?" said Leo. There was no

answer, and against his will Leo cried, "Why do you trouble us? What

have we done that you should trouble us?"

This time Cancer replied, "What do I know or care? You were born into

my House, and at the appointed time I shall come for you."

"When is the appointed time?" said Leo, stepping back from the

restless movement of the mouth.

"When the full moon fails to call the full tide," said the Crab, "I

shall come for the one. When the other has taken the earth by the

shoulders, I shall take that other by the throat."

Leo lifted his hand to the apple of his throat, moistened his lips,

and recovering himself, said:

"Must I be afraid for two, then?"

"For two," said the Crab, "and as many more as may come after."

"My brother, the Bull, had a better fate," said Leo, sullenly. "He is

alone."

A hand covered his mouth before he could finish the sentence, and he

found the Girl in his arms. Woman-like, she had not stayed where Leo

had left her, but had hastened off at once to know the worst, and

passing all the other Houses, had come straight to Cancer.

"That is foolish," said the Girl whispering. "I have been waiting in

the dark for long and long before you came. _Then_ I was afraid. But

now----" She put her head down on his shoulder and sighed a sigh of

contentment.

"I am afraid now," said Leo.

"That is on my account," said the Girl. "I know it is, because I am

afraid for your sake. Let us go, husband."

They went out of the darkness together and came back to the Earth,

Leo very silent, and the Girl striving to cheer him. "My brother's

fate is the better one," Leo would repeat from time to time, and at

last he said: "Let us each go our own way and live alone till we die.

We were born into the House of Cancer, and he will come for us."

"I know; I know. But where shall I go? And where will you sleep in the

evening? But let us try. I will stay here. Do you go on."

Leo took six steps forward very slowly, and three long steps backward

very quickly, and the third step set him again at the Girl's side.

This time it was she who was begging him to go away and leave her, and

he was forced to comfort her all through the night. That night decided

them both never to leave each other for an instant, and when they had

come to this decision they looked back at the darkness of the House of

Cancer high above their heads, and with their arms round each other's

necks laughed, "Ha! ha! ha!" exactly as the children of men laughed.

And that was the first time in their lives that they had ever laughed.

Next morning they returned to their proper home and saw the flowers

and the sacrifices that had been laid before their doors by the

villagers of the hills. Leo stamped down the fire with his heel and

the Girl flung the flower-wreaths out of sight, shuddering as she did

so. When the villagers re-returned, as of custom, to see what had

become of their offerings, they found neither roses nor burned flesh

on the altars, but only a man and a woman, with frightened white faces

sitting hand in hand on the altar-steps.

"Are you not Virgo?" said a woman to the Girl. "I sent you flowers

yesterday."

"Little sister," said the Girl, flushing to her forehead, "do not send

any more flowers, for I am only a woman like yourself." The man and

the woman went away doubtfully.

"Now, what shall we do?" said Leo.

"We must try to be cheerful, I think," said the Girl. "We know the

very worst that can happen to us, but we do not know the best that

love can bring us. We have a great deal to be glad of."

"The certainty of death?" said Leo.

"All the children of men have that certainty also; yet they laughed

long before we ever knew how to laugh. We must learn to laugh, Leo. We

have laughed once, already."

People who consider themselves Gods, as the Children of the Zodiac

did, find it hard to laugh, because the Immortals know nothing worth

laughter or tears. Leo rose up with a very heavy heart, and he and the

girl together went to and fro among men; their new fear of death

behind them. First they laughed at a naked baby attempting to thrust

its fat toes into its foolish pink mouth; next they laughed at a

kitten chasing her own tail; and then they laughed at a boy trying to

steal a kiss from a girl, and getting his ears boxed. Lastly, they

laughed because the wind blew in their faces as they ran down a

hill-side together, and broke panting and breathless into a knot of

villagers at the bottom. The villagers laughed, too, at their flying

clothes and wind-reddened faces; and in the evening gave them food and

invited them to a dance on the grass, where everybody laughed through

the mere joy of being able to dance.

That night Leo jumped up from the Girl's side crying: "Every one of

those people we met just now will die----"

"So shall we," said the Girl sleepily. "Lie down again, dear." Leo

could not see that her face was wet with tears.