Page:Jack Heaton, Wireless Operator (Collins, 1919).djvu/42

 After we were shown our staterooms by the steward I made a bee-line for the wireless room, but found it locked, the operator not yet having put in an appearance. To kill time till he came I went up on the hurricane deck, that is the upper deck, to take a look at the aerial.

It was formed of a couple of parallel wires about 200 feet long suspended between the masts and insulated from them by strain insulators of the kind that was then known as the Navy type. I was standing close to one of the funnels looking up at the aerial, which seemed to me to be a middling one—I had seen better and worse in Montclair—when all of a sudden there was a terrific noise set up and for a second I failed to cohere—that is I was nearly scared stiff. Inan instant my jigger was right again, for it was only the ship’s whistle blowing its deep throated blast to let those who had come aboard to say good-by to their friends who were sailing, know that it was time to go ashore, and to those ashore who wanted to take the boat know that they had better get a move on them if they expected to make it.

When I got back to the wireless room there was quite a collection of people crowded around