Page:Robert William Cole - The Struggle for Empire; A Story of the Year 2236 (1900).djvu/83

Rh time, while Alec minutely inspected everything that was being done. Then a bell rang.

'Time for the third meal!' shouted a voice. 'All hands except those on duty can cease work.'

The men came crowding along the deck to an open space at the end, where tables were spread out amidst the deadly weapons that glittered on all sides, and soon nothing was heard but the clatter of knives and forks. Alec remained on duty some two hours longer, when he was relieved by another officer and summoned to the captain's spherical metal box.

'Here, my lad, come and take a turn here while I go and have a spell off,' said the latter, as he gave Alec a sheet of paper. 'This will show you the course you must follow. You have to take orders from the Magnificent, just in front of you.'

Alec seized a lever which Captain Mainton relinquished to him, and fixed his eyes on some dozen dials which were