THE ENGINEER.
These concluding chapters should be written by an engineer; for no
sailor, whatever his position may have been, is fully competent to
judge of the work performed by the handlers of marine engines. Much
less is he able to appreciate the position of those toiling helots of
civilization, the firemen and trimmers. The benefits of steam are vast
and undeniable; but it is not good to forget that the service of steam
to-day means a truly awful burden of labour and risk laid upon a large
army of civilized men. I believe I shall carry with me the assent of
every one who knows anything about the facts when I say that of all
modern occupations there is not one so terribly exhausting, so full of
peril, as that of the servants of the marine engine at work. The marvel
of marvels to me is that men can be found to undertake the task so
readily. And if this be true of the Merchant Service, as I hold it is,
plain unvarnished truth, it is doubly true of the same work, or what
answers to the same description of work, in the Royal Navy. For there
the manifold complications of ship-propelling machinery are immensely
more intricate, the conditions under which the men labour are far more
arduous, and, in addition, there is always the fighting risk superadded.
But I must not stray into the fighting line of engineering--I have
said, perhaps, more than enough on that subject recently. Nevertheless,
I honestly believe that I have only been able to put in the tamest
and most colourless way what I feel about these men. When I say that
such a chapter as this should be written by an engineer, I mean that
only an expert in the wonderful profession can fully appreciate the
difficulties and dangers thereof. Outsiders may, as I do, admire and
wonder, but we cannot fully enter into these things as an engineer can.
The country badly needs a writer on engineering matters who knows his
business thoroughly, and at the same time is able to tell the people
who don't know, what marine engineering means. No amount of sympathy
and admiration can make up for lack of expert knowledge, yet, as far
as it is possible, I feel constrained to draw the attention of my
countrymen to the work of the men who, far below the water-line, amid
the clanging chorus of their gigantic slaves, bend watchful brows to
their mighty task; who for the four hours of their watch on deck (see
how the sailor crops up), no, their watch below at work, know not
one moment's respite. Vigilance unremitting is theirs; the price of
effective manipulation must be paid, for no eastern Afrit was ever more
jealous of the power over him held by the enunciator of the master-word
than is the high-pressure marine engine of the governance of the
engineer.
The casual observer, glancing down into the engine-room of a sea-going
steamer, is apt to imagine that the men who wait upon the engines have
an easy time of it. He is inclined to think that once the engines are
started--"full speed ahead" sounded--watch after watch need only sit
and look at them doing their work. Nothing could well be more false,
while nothing is more natural. For engineers, like the best workmen
everywhere and of every sort, make no fuss about their work. Quietly,
without ostentation, they tend their engines, their trained ears noting
the faintest change of tone in the uproar which sounds so chaotic
to the ear of the outsider. Every single part of those engines, the
amount of strain that it is bearing, the need for nursing, lubricating,
watching that it has, is in the mind of that quiet, nonchalant man
who steps cat-like into the thick of the flying steel cranks, and
accommodating his movements to the swing of the thrusting shafts, feels
their temperature, the amount of lubricant they are carrying, and
regains his perforated platform with an air of indifference as if he
had merely looked over the side on deck, instead of having been on the
most intimate terms with an unspeakable form of death.
Perhaps the most noticeable feature about the marine engineer in the
Merchant Service is the high respect in which he is held by every
one. The merchant seaman instinctively recognizes in him a man whose
attainments are not merely theoretical, but eminently practical.
Every merchant seaman realizes that with the engineer has arrived a
new stamp of seafarer, whose stern stress of duty cuts him off from
those enjoyments common to all seamen. For him there is no meditative
contemplation of the glories of the tropical night, when in the midst
of the mighty solitudes of the untainted ocean man draws near to the
great heart of Nature, feels himself akin to the stars and the wind and
the waves; no heart-uplifting view of the apocalyptic splendours of the
dawn, when the grey shadow of night melts away before the palpitating
glow of the approaching sun; no speechless delight in the indescribable
panorama sweeping past when the swift ship skirts closely the wonders
of many shores.
At such times the engineer and his crew, deep in the bowels of the
ship, are shut in from all sights and sounds and perfumes save those
of the engine-room and stokehold, which are akin to those of Tartarus.
And when through the swart night the vessel plunges madly athwart
the raging seas, remorselessly driven against the combined forces of
wind and wave and current, the engineer works on, all depending upon
him. Then do his anxieties enormously increase, as at one moment the
whirling blades of the propeller are buried deep beneath the surface
and their thrust vibrates through every fibre and rivet of the ship,
and the next by a downward plunge of the vessel's head they are lifted
into the air, spinning madly with a frightful acceleration of speed on
their release from the element in which they have been toiling. Then,
see the engineer erect upon his iron platform, facing his Titanic
charges, throttle-valve in hand, and steady eye fixed upon index
glasses; every sense on the alert, muscles tense to shut off the supply
of force sooner than the "governor" can act, so that the engines shall
not be torn from their foundations by the fearful strain imposed upon
them by the sudden taking away of their work while the driving steam is
still bursting in through the main feed and slide-valves.
No other engineering in the world can for one moment compare in vital
importance with this. The conditions are so onerous, the complications
are so many, the need for watchfulness is so great, that a new race
of men has been bred to compete with them. The engineer ashore may,
and does, have all his repairs done by other people; the engineer at
sea must, in the very nature of things, be not only the prince of
engine-drivers, whose care of his charge, under the most severe tests,
not applied occasionally but continuously, is beyond all praise,
but he must be ready at any moment by day or night to undertake the
most radical repairs. With improvised adjuncts he must undertake on
the instant to do such things with masses of steel that if they were
described would sound impossible except to the large room and full
equipment of a first-class factory ashore. Not only so, but the work
must be done under conditions of heat, imperfect lighting, and cramped
space that render the duty enormously more difficult.
Yes, it _must_ be done, because if not----? Well, they have taken away
the steamship's masts, so that the sailor, even with the best ability
and good-will in the world, can hardly get steerage way on the vessel
by means of sails, and then there is a great ship, perhaps with an
immense perishable cargo and a large number of passengers, lying like
a log upon the ocean, at the mercy of currents that are most likely
to be drifting her away out of the track of ships, away into the ocean
solitudes that are to-day, owing to the method of following beaten
tracks which is so universally pursued, more solitary than they have
been for centuries.
The performance of duties like these calls for the highest qualities
of mind and muscle ever possessed by men. The forces dealt with are
so terrific, the dangers so great, that a weak man could not so much
as face them, much less perform the wonderful pieces of work that are
necessary in opposition to them. Occasionally a curt paragraph appears
in the shipping papers, conveying to underwriters and owners the
information that the steamship _So-and-so_, long overdue, has arrived,
her broken-down machinery having been repaired by the engineer. Beneath
that brief intimation lies a volume of tragic story--the dauntless
conflict of man with fire, steam, and steel, and his final triumph over
them. But these stories are never told as they ought to be. Some day,
perhaps, an engineer-writer will step forth and unfold to an admiring
world the Iliad of the engine-room. May I live to read it.
For the evolution of a marine engineer, it is first of all necessary
that he serve his apprenticeship in a "shop" where marine engines are
made. This is essential, and a moment's consideration will convince any
one that it must be so. Then, having mastered all the details of engine
construction, if the aspirant has a desire for the sea, he will, in
some way, of which I do not pretend to understand the details, obtain
a subordinate position in an engine-room of some sea-going steamship.
Here will he become conversant with the duties expected of him as an
engineer-in-charge, and will, moreover, devote all his spare time to
scientific study, in order that he may be fit to pass his examination
in theoretical engineering. And if he shows himself worthy of the
position, there will be little doubt that, having passed the required
examination before the Board of Trade officials appointed for that
purpose, and received his second engineer's certificate, he will find
little difficulty in getting a berth as junior engineer. His foot once
upon the ladder, the ascent is easy. There is only one more examination
to pass compulsorily, that of chief engineer, although there is, as in
the seafaring branch, a voluntary examination which all self-respecting
engineers will take, "Chief Engineer Extra." Now he may rise to be
chief engineer of the _Oceanic_ or the _Lucania_, with twenty or thirty
engineers under him, and a whole host of firemen and trimmers.
It would ill become a mere sailor like myself to say anything about
the polity of the engine-room, even if I had ever been in a position
to study it. No doubt there are occasional hitches, instances of petty
tyranny, of jealousies, of hindrances to getting on, since, with all
their virtues, engineers are but human. But I do not know. I know
that, except in the way of official routine, such as the control of
the engines from the bridge, the officer of the watch has nothing to
do with the engineer at all. The chief engineer is responsible to the
master, and to him alone. Only the master can punish, and all cases of
insubordination, etc., among the "black gang" must be reported to him.
The master is in supreme command, and knows quite well what is due to
the engineer. More, he seldom fails to grant him his full due. But I
should be sorry to sail in any steamships where the officers took upon
themselves to meddle with engineering matters. There would be much
unpleasantness, from which the officers would suffer most. In brief,
the engineer's importance is recognized.
They live, too, in a little world of their own. They have their
mess-room, with a steward to wait upon them, and the best food the ship
can supply. Their accommodation, too, is good, and their pay--well, it
varies much with the class of ship, but, taken all round, it is much
better than the officers'. _And they are British to a man._ I would
not give much for the peace of a foreign engineer who by any chance
found himself in a British ship's engine-room. The engineers in this
respect enjoy peculiar advantages. Some people begrudge them their
unique position in the seafaring world, and profess to see danger ahead
because of it. I do not. I confess that my feeling with regard to the
engineer is that, remembering the awful stress of his duties, the way
in which he is not only cut off from home delights, like the sailor,
but is also debarred from participation in the real joys of the sea, he
deserves every advantage in pay, position, and prospects that he can
obtain.
The unique position he holds among seafarers of which I speak is,
that he is in close touch with powerful Trade Unions ashore. Since
every engineer must learn his business ashore before going to sea, he
becomes a member of the hierarchy of mechanical workers. Let him go
to sea for never so many years, he must remember the workshop where
he received his training; he has numbers of associates and relatives
who are still working ashore, and who, in safeguarding their own
interests in parliamentary ways, are all unlikely to forget him. They
are his proxies, can speak for him, can use their votes on his behalf.
Presently we shall find this great organization having something to
say about the prototype of the Mercantile Marine engineer in the Navy,
the engine-room artificer. The Admiralty, in their wisdom, have chosen
to train up the naval engineer officer themselves, so that he shall be
free from the influence of the workshop, shall become a class apart
from and above the mechanical engineer. But in the doing of this they
have been compelled to build up another corps to do the work. They are
known in the Navy as E.R.A.'s (Engine Room Artificers), and it may
be said, without any fear of contradiction, that they are, as far as
ability and experience go, always the equals, and often the superiors,
of the merchant engineer. Indeed, their period of service and the
knowledge required of them before they can become Chief E.R.A.'s in the
Navy is much greater than the Board of Trade require for the granting
of engineers' certificates for the Mercantile Marine.
Then comes the great anomaly--the immense gulf that divides the two
classes of men. As I have said, the merchant-ship engineer knows no
superior on board the ship except the master. He deserves the best
treatment, the best pay, and the greatest respect; and he gets them.
His work cannot be made lighter, it must always be full of danger and
toil, but all that can be done by way of mitigation of these onerous
conditions is done. On the other hand, the E.R.A. in the Navy is a
nobody. His pay is trivial compared with his congener in a merchant
ship, he gets no respect from anybody, the youngest officer in the
ship is his despot, whom to answer back means degradation and loss
of pension, and he is berthed and fed much as a fireman is on board
a merchant steamer; so that he continually smarts under a sense of
injustice, and looks with longing and envious eyes upon his chums who,
wiser than he, have gone into the Merchant Service. More than that, he
knows full well that there are no reserves of E.R.A.'s, there are not
nearly enough of them to man properly the ships that are now afloat; in
case of an outbreak of war with a European Power, huge bribes would be
offered to merchant-ship engineers to come and help in the Navy; knows,
too, that not one of them would come without being rated as an officer,
and receiving all the deference due to an officer in her Majesty's
service. And so he may find himself, after years of the most arduous
experience, ruled by a nephew who was a babe in arms when he served his
time, who has all his life been engaged in one steady occupation on the
same kind of engines, never hurried, never bullied, and probably with a
sea experience of one-third of his uncle's, the E.R.A.
Therefore, because of these reflections and this knowledge, the E.R.A.
is continually warning youngsters from the home shops not to enter the
Navy by any means. The Merchant Service is the place for them if they
want to be treated properly; the Navy is a place where they will never
be anything else but a "dirty Tiffy," looked down upon by the youngest
blue-jacket, and liable to be docked of many years' hard-earned pension
for pointing out a mistake to an officer who, instead of accepting
expert information gratefully, reports them for insolence.
I trust that these remarks about the E.R.A.'s may not be considered
malapropos, remembering the great importance of the subject;
remembering, too, that in the engineer of to-day we have not a mere
mechanic, a man with no thought beyond his day's work and the receipt
of his wages. I am afraid that the importance of the engineer,
especially at sea, is insufficiently recognized by non-engineers. Every
class of the community is benefited by the work of the engineer, and in
modern sea-traffic he is, as Kipling has finely said, the kingpin of
the ship. He cheerfully takes upon himself a burden of toil and danger
such as the ancient world never knew--takes it, too, with the full
consciousness of what he is doing; holds himself ready at any time to
sacrifice his body for the safety of those whom he is serving,--and the
least we who are thus served can do, is to recognize his value to the
full.
For my part, I look upon the modern marine engineer as the true
nineteenth-century hero. Some day I hope that a roll of honour will be
drawn up, giving a list of heroic deeds performed by engineers out of
sight, unostentatiously, just as a part of their duty. It would be
an inspiring record; and from no source would more details be drawn
than from the engine-rooms in the Navy, where, as has been abundantly
proved, the engineer is thought but little of; so little, indeed, that
all his efforts to obtain some meed of official recognition are at
present in vain. Good for us that this does not obtain in the Merchant
Service. There the engineer is estimated by his shipmates at his proper
worth.