e; 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