ase of the complicated calling of the
modern navy man.

And there were days when the great fleet put to sea for target practice
and for battle manoeuvres, the turrets and broadsides belching forth
their tons upon tons of steel and the observers aloft sending down their
messages of commendation for shots well aimed. It is the statement of
those in a position to know that never were jackies so quick to learn as
those of our war-time personnel. Whether the fact of war is an incentive
or whether American boys are adapted, through a life of competitive
sport, quickly to grasp the sailorman's trade, the truth remains that in
a very short space the boy who has never seen a ship develops swiftly
into a bluejacket, rolling, swaggering, but none the less deft, precise,
and indomitable.

"They come into the navy to fight," said one of the officers of the
fleet, "and they want to get into the thick of it. We turn out qualified
gun crews in three months--and that is going some." A large majority of
the new men of the fleet come from farms, especially from the Middle
West. More than 90 per cent of the seamen are native-born, and on any
ship may be heard the Southern drawl, the picturesque vernacular of the
lower East or West side of New York City, the twang of New England, the
rising intonation of the Western Pennsylvanian, and that indescribable
vocal cadence that comes only from west of Chicago.

Not only gunners were developed, but engineers, electricians, cooks,
bakers--what-not? They are still being developed on our home ships, but
in the meantime the fruits of what was done in the time dating from our
entrance into the war to the present summer are to be noted chiefly in
the North Sea, where our vessels lie waiting with their sisters of the
British Fleet for the appearance of the German armada.

Let us transfer ourselves for the time being from the general to the
particular: in other words, to the deck of a great American dreadnought,
which, together with others of her type, has been detached from the
Atlantic Fleet and assigned to duty with Admiral Beatty's great company
of battleships and battle-cruisers. This battleship has entered the war
zone, en route to a certain rendezvous, whence all the American units
will proceed to their ultimate destination in company.

It is night. It is a black night. The stars are viewless and the ocean
through which the great steel hull is rushing, with only a slight hiss
where the sharp c