The wave had slouched overside with a plop and a chuckle; but "Plenty
more where he came from," said a brother wave, and went through and
over the capstan, who was bolted firmly to an iron plate on the iron
deck beams below.

[Illustration: THE "DIMBULA" TAKING CARGO FOR HER FIRST VOYAGE.]

"Can't you keep still up there," said the deck beams. "What's the
matter with you? One minute you weigh twice as much as you ought to,
and the next you don't."

"It isn't my fault," said the capstan. "There's a green brute from
outside that comes and hits me on the head."

"Tell that to the shipwrights. You've been in position up there for
months, and you've never wriggled like this before. If you aren't
careful you'll strain _us_."

"Talking of strain," said a low, rasping, unpleasant voice, "are any
of you fellows--you deck beams, we mean--aware that those exceedingly
ugly knees of yours happen to be riveted into our structure--_ours_?"

"Who might you be?" the deck beams inquired.

"Oh, nobody in particular," was the answer. "We're only the port and
starboard upper-deck stringers; and, if you persist in heaving and
hiking like this, we shall be reluctantly compelled to take steps."

Now, the stringers of the ship are long iron girders, so to speak,
that run lengthways from stern to bow. They keep the iron frames (what
are called ribs in a wooden ship) in place, and also help to hold
the ends of the deck beams which go from side to side of the ship.
Stringers always consider themselves most important, because they are
so long. In the "Dimbula" there were four stringers on each side--one
far down by the bottom of the hold, called the bilge stringer; one a
little higher up, called the side stringer; one on the floor of the
lower deck; and the upper-deck stringers that have been heard from
already.

"You will take steps, will you?" This was a long, echoing rumble.
It came from the frames; scores and scores of them, each one about
eighteen inches distant from the next, and each riveted to the
stringers in four places. "We think you will have a certain amount of
trouble in _that_;" and thousands and thousands of the little rivets
that held everything together whispered: "You will! You will! Stop
quivering and be quiet. Hold on, brethren! Hold on! Hot punches!
What's that?"

Rivets have no teeth, so they can't chatter with fright; but they did
their best as a fluttering jar swept along the ship from stern to bow,
and she s