no swagger of huge crank and piston, disappointing little things that
developed as much as one-third of the horse-power required for all the
electricity of New York.

And then, lastly, when I had supposed myself to be at the rock-bottom
of the steamer, I had been instructed to descend in earnest, and I went
down and down steel ladders, and emerged into an enormous, an incredible
cavern, where a hundred and ninety gigantic furnaces were being fed
every ten minutes by hundreds of tiny black dolls called firemen. I,
too, was a doll as I looked up at the high white-hot mouth of a furnace
and along the endless vista of mouths.... Imagine hell with the addition
of electric light, and you have it!... And up-stairs, far above on the
surface of the water, confectioners were making fancy cakes, and the
elevator-boy was doing his work!... Yes, the inferno was the most
thrilling part of the ship; and no other part of the ship could hold a
candle to it. And I remained of this conviction even when I sat in the
captain's own room, smoking his august cigars and turning over his
books. I no longer thought, "Every revolution of the propellers brings
me nearer to that shore." I thought, "Every shovelful flung into those
white-hot mouths brings me nearer."

* * * * *

It is an absolute fact that, four hours before we could hope to
disembark, ladies in mantles and shore hats (seeming fantastic and
enormous after the sobriety of ship attire), and gentlemen in shore hats
and dark overcoats, were standing in attitudes of expectancy in the
saloon-hall, holding wraps and small bags: some of their faces had never
been seen till then in the public resorts of the ship. Excitement will
indeed take strange forms. For myself, although I was on the threshold
of the greatest adventure of my life, I was unaware of being excited--I
had not even "smelled" land, to say nothing of having seen it--until,
when it was quite dark, I descried a queerly arranged group of
different-colored lights in the distance--yellow, red, green, and what
not. My thoughts ran instantly to Coney Island. I knew that Coney was an
island, and that it was a place where people had to be attracted and
distracted somehow, and I decided that these illuminations were a device
of the pleasure-mongers of Coney. And when the ship began to salute
these illuminations with answering flares I thought the captain was a
rather good-natured man to consent thus to am