25 JULY 1908, Page 24

Below and Above the Wafer - Line. By Seafarer. (Whitcombe and Tombs.

2s. 6d.)—" Seafarer" in these "up-to-date sketches of steamship life" gives us descriptions, illustrated by snapshas,

of the various persons who work the steamship, are concerned with the mechanism and the control of its locomotion, and organise its life. He divides the sketches into two parts : (1) "Below the Water-Line," in which we hear about the chief engineer and his subordinates, the firemen, &c.; and (2) "Above the Water-Line," in which the captain (of various kinds), his lieutenants, the sailors with their "non-corns" as they may be called, the cooks and the stewards, are described. All this is the work of an expert, and we shall not attempt to criticise. Let it suffice to say that any one meditating an ocean voyage may study this little volume with profit.