The four-masted steamship here illustrated is the White Star Adriatic, which was built in 1906. This mighty vessel is of 25,000 tons, and though smaller than the two Cunarders with which we have just dealt, is superior in size and speed to the White Star Baltic, and until the advent of the Olympic and Titanic, was the biggest production which the White Star Line has conceived. Like the Baltic, the second Oceanic, and the Cedric, this Adriatic follows out the modern White Star practice of giving mammoth size, moderate speed, and considerable luxury. She steams at 17½ knots with an indicated horse-power of 16,000. Unlike the more modern ships, the Adriatic is propelled not by triple or even quadruple screws, but by twin-screws, and is employed on the Southampton-Cherbourg-Queenstown-New York route. Although not provided with turbines, the Adriatic exhibits a minimum of vibration owing to the careful regard which is now paid to ensure the balancing of the moving parts of the reciprocating engine. She has two three-bladed screws, which are made of manganese bronze, driven by twin engines, and her dimensions are: length, 725·9 feet; beam, 77·6; depth, 54 feet. It will be seen, therefore, that the old ten-beams to length rule is yet again broken in the modern White Star leviathans.

In 1905, the German Hamburg-American Line became possessed of the Amerika, which with the length of 670½ feet, beam 74·6, and a tonnage of 22,225, and a moderate speed, makes her rather a rival of the White Star Baltic and Adriatic, than of the Cunard ships or the Norddeutscher Lloyd Kaiser Wilhelm der Grosse and Kaiser Wilhelm II., and the Hamburg Company’s own fast steamship, the Deutschland. Although sailing under a foreign flag, she is to all intents and purposes a British ship, for she was built at Harland and Wolff’s famous Belfast yard, where the White Star ships have come into being. Her speed is 18 knots, so that she is rather faster than the latest White Star ships, although inferior to the fastest contemporary liners. Carrying a total of 4,000 passengers and crew, the Amerika is one of the finest vessels, not merely in the German fleet, but in the whole world.

The George Washington, which is seen steaming ahead in the illustration herewith, was the first of the Norddeutscher Lloyd steamers to make a considerable advance on the 20,000 tons (registered) limit. In length, breadth and tonnage she was launched as the biggest of all German ships, and some of her details are not without interest. Her speed of 18½ knots is obtained by two engines with an indicated horse-power of 20,000, and her gross register is 26,000 tons. She is propelled by twin-screws, and was built of steel according to the highest German standards, with five steel decks extending from end to end, a double bottom, which is divided up into twenty-six water-tight compartments, while the ship herself is divided by thirteen transverse bulkheads which reach up to the upper deck, and sometimes to the upper saloon deck, and separate the vessel into fourteen water-tight compartments. A special feature was made in the bulkheads to render them of such a strength as to be able to resist the pressure of the water in the event of collision. The three upper decks seen in the photograph show the awning, the upper promenade, and the promenade-decks; while, as in the Mauretania and her sister, and in the Adriatic, electric lifts are installed for the convenience of the passengers wishing to pass from one deck to the other. The four pole-masts are of steel, and have between them no fewer than twenty-nine derricks. The George Washington’s engines are of the quadruple-expansion type, with two sets of four cylinders, the propellers being two three-bladed, made of bronze. The difficulty with large reciprocating engines has always been to cause them to work without giving forth considerable vibration. But the careful arrangement of the cranks of the engine so as to balance each other tends to neutralise the vibration. It is easier to balance four cranks than three, and in this German ship the four-crank principle is followed. Steam is supplied by four single-ended and eight double-ended boilers, the Howden draught system being employed.

The Berlin, the other latest modern liner of the Norddeutscher Lloyd Line, will be seen in the next illustration. Unlike her sister, she has been given only two masts, and in another illustration, in a later chapter, we show this ship under construction. She was recently built at Bremen for the Mediterranean to New York service, and carries 3,630 persons, inclusive of crew. Like other modern German liners, this vessel is handsomely furnished, and the public rooms are all united in a deckhouse lighted by a large number of cupola-shaped sky-lights. She has a registered tonnage of 19,200 gross, and in the Norddeutscher fleet ranks next after the Kaiser Wilhelm II. She passed into the hands of her owners at the end of 1909.

Two interesting new ships were commissioned in 1909 by the White Star Line, for the Liverpool-Quebec service, named respectively the Laurentic and Megantic. An illustration, showing the former on the stocks at Harland and Wolff’s yard, Belfast, is given opposite page 210. The Laurentic and Megantic are, as to hulls, sister ships, and each has a tonnage of 14,900, thus being among the largest steamers in the Canadian trade. But whilst the latter is a twin-screw ship propelled by reciprocating engines, the former has three screws and a combination of reciprocating engines and a low-pressure turbine, being the first large passenger steamship to be designed with this ultra-modern method. Each of the “wing” propellers is driven by four-crank triple balanced engines, the central propeller, however, being driven by the turbine. The object aimed at by this novel hybrid method was to retain the advantages of the carefully balanced reciprocating engines, but at the same time to obtain the benefit of the further expansion of steam in a low-pressure turbine, without having to employ a turbine specially for going astern. The reciprocating engines of the Laurentic are adequate for manœuvring in and out of port, and for going astern, since they develop more than three-quarters of the total combined horse-power. This steamship, single-funnelled and two-masted, measures 565 feet in length, and 67 feet 4 inches in width, and besides having accommodation for 1,690 passengers, carries a large quantity of cargo. Like many other big steamships that we have noted in the course of our story, she has a double cellular-bottom which extends the whole length of the ship, being specially strengthened under the engines. Her nine bulkheads divide her up into ten water-tight compartments. It will be noticed that the rudder has gone back to the ordinary type common before the introduction of the balance method. Notice, too, that the blades of the propeller are each bolted to the shaft, and that the latter terminates in a conical shape now so common on screw-ships. This is called the “boss,” and was invented by Robert Griffiths in 1849. It was introduced in order to reduce the pressure of the water towards the centre. This method was first tried on a steamer in the following year at Bristol and afterwards on H.M.S. Fairy. By reason of its shape, it naturally causes less resistance through the water.

Whilst these lines are being written, there are building at Harland and Wolff’s yard still another couple of ships for the White Star flag, which, if not in speed, will be the most wonderful, and certainly the largest ships in the world. After the Baltics and Mauretanias one feels inclined to ask in amazement: “What next, indeed?” They will measure 850 feet long, 90 feet broad, and be fitted with such luxuries as roller-skating rinks and other novelties. They will each possess a gross register of 45,000 tons. (By way of comparison we might remind the reader that the Mauretania has a gross register of 33,000 tons.) Named respectively the Olympic and Titanic, they will be propelled by three screws, and have a speed of 21 knots, so that besides being leviathans, they will also be greyhounds, and are destined for the Southampton-New York route. The first of these, the Olympic, will take the water in October, 1910, and some idea of her appearance may be gathered from the illustration which forms our frontispiece. Like the Laurentic, these ships will be fitted with a combination of the turbine and reciprocating engines, and will thus be the first ships running on the New York route to have this system. Their builders estimate that the displacement of each of these mighty creatures will be about 60,000 tons, which is about half as much again as that of the Baltic. Each ship will cost at least a million and a half of money, and it will be necessary for each of those harbours which they are to visit to be dredged to a depth of 35 feet. It is a complaint put forward by both ship-builders and owners of modern leviathans that the governing bodies of ports have not shown the same spirit of enterprise which the former have exhibited. To handicap the progress of shipping by hesitating to give the harbours a required depth, they say, is neither fair nor conducive to the advance of the prosperity of the ports in question, and on the face of it, it would seem to be but reasonable that if the honour of receiving a mammoth liner means anything at all, it should be appreciated by responding in a practical manner. In New York Harbour this fact is already recognised, for dredging is being undertaken so as to provide a depth of 40 feet.

At the present moment the Cunard Company are also engaged in replenishing their fleet, consequent on the removal from service of the Lucania, the Umbria, the Etruria, and the Slavonia. An 18,000 ton steamship, to be called the Franconia, is being built by Messrs. Swan, Hunter and Wigham Richardson, Ltd., the firm which turned out the Mauretania, and will be ready some time in 1911. This latest addition will not, it is understood, be a “flyer,” for her speed is believed to be less than 20 knots, and it is therefore probable that she is intended to replace the Slavonia. But it is supposed that another vessel is to be built presently to relieve the Mauretania and Lusitania, or to co-operate with them, and that her speed will be 23 knots, though it must not be forgotten that this ship will not be built with the help of Government money, but will be purely and solely a commercial transaction.

In the meantime German enterprise shows but little signs of lagging. The Hamburg-American Line are understood to have ordered from the Vulcan Yards at Hamburg a new passenger liner of more than 800 feet in length and a displacement of between 45,000 and 50,000 tons. Her speed is to be 21 knots. Herr Ballin a couple of years ago had a similar project in view, and entered into a contract with Harland and Wolff for building the largest ship in the world, to be called the Europa. But the condition of the Atlantic passenger trade became unfavourable for the enterprise, and the contract was annulled. The contract now goes, not to Belfast, but to Hamburg, for the Belfast yard has no slip vacant for several months to come. It will mean, therefore, that this Europa, which is destined to excel the big Cunarders in size though not in speed, will be the largest undertaking that German ship-building yards have yet had to face, for the biggest merchant ship which up till now they have turned out is the George Washington, of 26,000 tons. Since the Deutschland lost the honour of holding the “blue ribbon,” the Hamburg-American Line have not worried much about recapturing the first position in speed. Economy plus a first-class service would seem to be the modern combination of influence that is dominating the great steamship lines. Speed is a great deal, but it is not everything in a passenger steamship, and whether the limits have not already been surpassed, and the Mauretania and Lusitania with their high speeds and enormous cost of running will presently be regarded rather as belonging to the category of white elephants than of practical commercial steamships, time alone can show.

After all, the Atlantic and the other oceans were made by the Great Designer as barriers between separate continents, and although we speak of them casually as rather of the nature of a herring-pond, and build our big ships to act as ferries, yet are we not flying in the face of Nature, and asking for trouble? In the fight between Man and Nature, it is fairly plain on which side victory will eventually come, in spite of a series of clever dodges which throughout history man has conceived and put into practice for outwitting her. You can fool her very well in many ways for part of the time; but you cannot do this for ever in every sphere. When we read of fine, handsome, well-found modern liners going astray in the broad ocean, or of excellent, capable little cross-channel steamships foundering between port and port, without any living witnesses to tell how it all happened, we have a reminder that the ways of man are clever beyond all words, but that Nature is cleverer still. What the future of the steamship will be no one can tell. Already ship-builders profess themselves capable of turning out a monster up to 1,000 feet in length. But whether this will come about depends on the courage of the great steamship lines, the state of the financial barometer, and any improvements and inventions which the marine engineer may introduce in the meantime. Perhaps the future rests not with the steam, but the gas engine: we cannot say. It is sufficient that we have endeavoured to show what a century and but little longer has done in that short time for the steamship. Sufficient for the century is the progress thereof.