buildings than things meant to go afloat; others, half loaded, far
on the way to recover the true sea-physiognomy of a ship brought
down to her load-line, looked more accessible. Their less steeply
slanting gangways seemed to invite the strolling sailors in search
of a berth to walk on board and try "for a chance" with the chief
mate, the guardian of a ship's efficiency. As if anxious to remain
unperceived amongst their overtopping sisters, two or three
"finished" ships floated low, with an air of straining at the leash
of their level headfasts, exposing to view their cleared decks and
covered hatches, prepared to drop stern first out of the labouring
ranks, displaying the true comeliness of form which only her proper
sea-trim gives to a ship. And for a good quarter of a mile, from
the dockyard gate to the farthest corner, where the old housed-in
hulk, the President (drill-ship, then, of the Naval Reserve), used
to lie with her frigate side rubbing against the stone of the quay,
above all these hulls, ready and unready, a hundred and fifty lofty
masts, more or less, held out the web of their rigging like an
immense net, in whose close mesh, black against the sky, the heavy
yards seemed to be entangled and suspended.

It was a sight. The humblest craft that floats makes its appeal to
a seaman by the faithfulness of her life; and this was the place
where one beheld the aristocracy of ships. It was a noble
gathering of the fairest and the swiftest, each bearing at the bow
the carved emblem of her name, as in a gallery of plaster-casts,
figures of women with mural crowns, women with flowing robes, with
gold fillets on their hair or blue scarves round their waists,
stretching out rounded arms as if to point the way; heads of men
helmeted or bare; full lengths of warriors, of kings, of statesmen,
of lords and princesses, all white from top to toe; with here and