formly graded proportions of the
enemy explosive reproduces a correspondingly like extent and nature in
ship damage. Location and sea-trim may vary the fractures in proportion
to resistance but, with the vessels on the blocks together, working time
may be adjusted to these conditions and a balance be struck that will
further a simultaneous completion.

So the dockmaster ranges his pair on the centre line of the keel-blocks,
sets tight the hawsers that hold them in position, and bars the
sea-entry with a massive caisson. Presently he passes an order to the
pumpman, and the power-house echoes to the easy thrust of his giant
engine.

The keel-blocks have been set to meet the general lines of the vessels,
with only a marginal allowance for the contour of damaged plating. To
remedy any error divers, with their gear and escort, are ready on the
dockside, and they go below with first fall in the water-level. The
carpenters straggle out from sheltered corners and bear a hand. Riggers
and dockmen have placed the ships, and it remains for the 'tradesmen' to
bed them down and prop against a list by shores and blocks. They are ill
content with the vile weather and their job in the open, where the rain
lashes down pitilessly, soaking their working clothes. Doubtless they
envy the dry divers their suits of proofed rubber, when they are called
on to manhandle the heavy timber shores from the mud and litter of the
dockside and launch them out towards the steel sides of the settling
vessels. There the tide-workers on deck secure them by lanyards, and the
spars hang in even order, sighted on doublings of the plates, ready to
pin the ships on a steady keel when the water drains away.

With the timbers held in place, the carpenters split up to small parties
and stand by to set a further locking strain by prise of block and
wedge. The dockmaster blows a whistle signal at the far end of the
basin, and casts up his hand as though arresting movement; the thrust of
the main pump stills, and he swings his arm. At the sign, the carpenters
ram home . . . the thunder of their forehammers on the hardwood wedges
rings out in chorus that draws a quavering echo from the empty,
hard-pressed hulls.

Settled and bedded and pinned, the ships are left till the water drains
away and to await the coming of the shipwrights and repairing gangs. The
carpenters shoulder their long-handled top-mauls and scatter to a
shelter from the steady, continuous downpour