"Everything-she was no more'n in dock and poomped dry than the Commandant sinds for the foreman of shipfitters, which is me, sayin', 'Come to me office at wanct.' I wint, shakin' it up, too, pasth the orderly who sthands like a statue-I tell ye, Em, I'm an active old bhoy yet whin I thry."

"Were you fired?" mocks Mr. Knott.

"I was not," replied Mr. Weems with heat, "but I finds a grand colliction av talent there already, consistin' av the Admiral himself, the Naval Consthructhor, the Engineer av the Yard and wan av the Admiral's holders on-aids, they call 'em, Em.

Well, the Admiral rumbles his voice, it sounds like a mop batin' a tatoo on a pla-ate av steel, and that frightens the orderly out av the room and he shuts the door as he goes. Thin the Admiral starts rumblin' agin.

"Fwhat I wanted to say,' says he, "is that I've a tiligram here from the city av Washington, fwich it indicates that this country's likely to be suddenly heaved into a sta-ate of vioylent wa-ar-and that in a few days, too.'

"Well, I was thrown into a sta-ate of frinzy, Em-'war's me ilement. And 'tis Michael Weems comes into his own,' sez I to mesilf.

"Thin he goes on, hastenin' himsilf to talk fast, and 'twas like hastenin' a camel, Em This tiligram is not explicit, but the purport is plain, and they say the Penobscot must be ready f'r sea in twilve days.' After that he asks Misther McKinnon, the Consthructhor, how much work there is on the ship, and Misther McKinnon looks beyant the windy for a minute at the caisson and says twinty days, workin' three shifts-and he's a good judge av work, too, Em.

"Well, I was breathin' like a frish-caught fish, but Misther McKinnon was as calm as a bhillet of stheel-there's no excitin' that mon under hivin, his feet must be rivited to bed rock.

"Say no more,' says I, breakin' in, 'we'll do it in tin days if it's war that's comin' on-or ilse I'll have twinty-sivin dead fitters piled up in me shed, to say nawthin' of bhoys, helpers and riveters!' 'Tis extravagant I talk, Em, but there was no offinse given or taken.

"Can ye do it in tin days?' asks the Admiral, lookin' pleased.

VOL. L.-34

"'I can,' sez I, 'if you'll let me tell the min what'll be doin'. If I whisper war to 'em nothin'll stop 'em at all at all.'

"But we niver can hang diplimatic secrits on bulletin boards,' says the Admiral, and this is a secrit.'

"Av course it is,' says I, addressin' both Misther McKinnon and him, and the bearin's of me mind runnin' hot with the speed of me thoughts. 'We'll get the min we want and put 'em down in the dock, and there we'll isylate 'em entoirely, tellin' 'em fwhy, av course; and we'll feed an' sleep 'em right there on the floor under the bow, and they'll have no chanct to tell any one what's doin'-and in twilve hours I'll have 'em so tired they wont want to talk, anyhow. But, anyhow, an iron worker can kape a secrit as well as any man.' Oh, I tell ye I talked to 'em, Em."

"Did they do what you told 'em?" asked Em.

"Well, partly; only partly; but the min did slape on the floor under the bow. But you get me ahead av the work. They sint me out, thin they called me back.

"Go ahead, McKinnon,' says the Admiral, 'I give you cart blank '—or some such thing as that. Misther McKinnon turns to me and says, 'Heave around, Misther Weems; I hope you do fwhat ye say ye will, though I believe 'tis impossible.'

"Was the Penobscot very bad?" breathed Mr. Knott.

"Was she bad! Fwhy ye've no conciption av it. Her nose was like yours'd be if I flung a sledge onto it. She was crumpled at the cut water for twinty-wan foot, plates twisthed and warped like they were beeswax, frames stritched and deformed till ye'd have cried. And clear to the water-line 'twas no betther.

"I put me gang to it at wanct, whisperin' the word war to 'em as I did so. And, Em, 'twas like feedin' 'em brandy. You know how the work goes-or rather, ye would know if ye hadn't been fired so soon from the heatin' rivet job in Frisco; not that ye lost anything by your loss-the fitters make a mark here and there and thin the chippers start their air hammers bawlin' and bellerin' like-like God knows fwhat; there's nothin' that's like it. The fitters thin go on makin' marks till the bottom looks like an almanac, only the inf'rmation is reliable. Thin they lift timplates and help back out

some rivets, rig tackles and chain-blocksthe big travellin' crane gives a hand, too, and she's a fine, handy tool. And all this time the air tools are bawlin' and min are sweatin' like prize-fighters."

"I don't see any trouble for you," volunteers Mr. Knott.

"I s'pose not, but I'll tell ye av it. Misther McKinnon has a new Assistant who'd arrived only three days before from that tichnical school in Bosthon. He's a large chisted bhoy with a backbone as strong as an 'I' beam, and he wears socks as white as new snow. Oh, he's the iligant lad, though he'll make a man yet, his only fault bein' that he's no conciption av how iron workers feel concernin' the job they're workin' on. And that's important to any man that's goin' to spind his life at the bossin' av people loike me. Misther Munn was the bhoy's name. McKinnon gave him charge av the job. I forgive him f'r that, but 'twas a misthake.

"When McKinnon told me av it, I says, ‘Aye, aye, sir,' thinkin' we could sthand that much handicap.

"Well, for three days it did not matter much, for the bhoy was off tiliphonin' and tiligraphin' f'r plates to iviry yard on the coast because those in our racks wouldn't do, bein' too thin and too small. And moind, he did a fhine job. Oh, he's a lively bhoy and I like him not less'n sixtyfour per cint av the time."

"Mike, I've not spoiled a plate in sivinteen years.'

"Then, 'tis time ye spoiled wan,' says I; and he did it, just as I'd showed him.

"Av course the bhoy cussed Dan tremindous. "Twas overeagerness,' I explained to him, but Dan said niver a word, and Mr. Munn went away agin and tiliphoned and tiligraphed for more plate for two days. Thin I had Dan find a plate that would do, he found it in the Sthore Keeper's shed. I'd had it hidden there all the toime, and be the time the bhoy was back on the job we were rivetin' up.

"Dad Harper, he's boss of riveters now, was handlin' the gang, and he's a great man, Em-no wan can swing riveters like him. Mr. Munn came down on him and sat all day on the job, and at night ivery man jack wanted to kill him, which feelin' was due mostly to havin' no sleep. 'Tis strange how it affects a man, Em.

"That night was the last night av the job. War wasn't started yet, and the newspapers had divil a word av it. 'But,' says I, "twill come any minute now.' And the ship's people belaved so too, f'r the Captain was comin' and watchin' the work at all hours, and they'd loaded thimselves to the guards with ammunition and sthores, and the officers were watchin' for tiligrams like detectives.

"Do!-why nawthin', av course; foremin and officers niver do anything. He just sat on the job, and 'twas enough. The first day the min sthood it patiently, the sicond 'twas as though they had carbuncles all over 'em, and on the third day I saw we must do somethin' or the min would go off in a band and get drunk. Ye see, Em, ye can treat a man any way ye like for eight hours av the day, but ye've need for tact whin ye eliminate sleep. And our gang's sleep was just the ghost av sleep.

the date had been set f'r more'n three weeks and there was no backin' out without reason

and the reason was secrit. So they had it, and the Admiral ordered Mr. Munn to attend-and God's mercy be on him f'r that. Ah, the Admiral's the wan that's the deep wan, Em.

"But sthill 'twas the divil's own night. The wind twisthed and whirled us, and the rain bate us till we could hardly keep the rivet forges goin' even under a canviss, The last thing 't came down was the shoe. which, as ye know, Em, proticts the turn av

binding it with his hydraulic press for fortytwo hours, ind on, and there's no wan else on this coast could have handled the jobthat's right, I mean fwhat I say. 'Twas made av forty-pound plate, and weighed as

says:

min swear when they handle such weights.

"We got it in place, though, and the air machines wint to buzzin' like wasps. And while the reamers still were buzzin' out the long holes-some was eight inches longwe had rivets hot in the forges and ready to drive, with bull fitters workin' the cranks, for the rivet bhoys were sleepin' exhausted on the floor av the dock. We were rivetin' by hand, the machines bein' no good for those damn monsther rivets, and Dad Harper had a hammer himsilf. It made a fine show, and ye couldn't hear yersilf think.

"And so things wint on and about midnight the Consthructor himsilf comes to the copin' and sthands there in his evenin' clothes talkin' to me, not seemin' to know that the rain is washin' his shirt front and crumplin' his vest. He was in no hurry.

"Tek it out,' sez he.

"And thin we sthands in the rain and talks, and I can hear the band in the sail loft fwhich was playin' twostips, or fwhatever substitute for jigs and strathspeys thim officers uses these days. And in the dock the rivet hammers roared, the reamers whirred, and the rivet forges spouted fire like little volcanoes, while, reglar-like as a clock, a rivet would spout up in an arc like a rocket-some one had thrown it with his tongs-thin a man twinty feet away wad catch it in a pail and slap it into a hole so Dad Harper and the riveters could lape onto it, and whang the stars out av it, and head it over in workmanlike style.

"It made a good show, the shadows of min dodgin' under the ram, rain, wind and band music, roarin' hammers and squealin' drills and the loike.

"I'll be back lather,' says McKinnon,

they blinked out the lights in the sail loft

and blanked off the music, but down in the dock we kept on hammerin' and sweathin' and cursin', every man av us feelin' like a sore toe from weariness, sleepiness, and sthrain.

"And thin Misther Munn came down in the dock in his slick, shiny oil-skins; and, 'fore God, McKinnon should have chloroformed or tied him up to a wall.

"That's too long a rivet,' says he, the first thing.

"Do ye think so?' says I, diggin' me toes into the planks and niver movin' to sthop it off or change it-and, Em, it was too long, the bhoy knows siviral things; but we were in a hurry, a hell av a hurry.

"Tek it out,' sez he.

"Aw, to hell with ye,' sez I, and I was goin' to hit him with a rivet hammers' help me, 'twas so, and me with twintyeight years av Navy Yard service. I don't know how the thing came into me mind,

but it did, and I drew back me hammerand had I hit him 'twould have killed him. God saved me fr'm that. He stepped forward to look at the rivet, and he sthumbled and fell to the floor av the dock, twilve feet below, and he hit on his head and wint sinseless.

""Twas I mesilf that picked him up-I really like the bhoy, Em-and Jimmy Jones and I brought him to and dragged him up to the surgeon. Thin I came back to the job and took a hammer and hammered at rivets like a crazy man, tryin' to work mesilf away from me thoughts. At six minutes past two we drove the last rivet, and the caulkers were so close behind that they finished nine minutes later, be the watch. And I tell ye, Em, the last clank of caulking tool was music."

"Did McKinnon come down?" asked Mr. Knott.

"He did.