THE FIRST STRUGGLE The engine-room floor-plates slanted, and light and shadow played about the throbbing machinery.

It looked as if the lamps swung in a semicircle, but they did not.

All else slanted at an ever-changing angle; the swiveled lamps were still.

Overhead the dark and bulky cylinders cut against the reflected glimmer on the skylights; below, valve-gear and connecting-rod flashed across the gloom, and the twinkling cranks spun in their shallow pit.

One saw the big columns shake and strain as the crosshead shot up and down; the thrust-blocks groaned with the back push of the propeller.
A door in the bulkhead was open, and now and then a blaze from the stokehold lighted the engine-room.