talked with them at length; and he held many conferences with Parker and Cutler. But he issued no orders of any kind. "I'll be glad if you'll keep things running till I get my hand on the throttle," he said to the old man.

And Parker was fair enough to admit to his man Friday, that, for a mere boy of thirty, and a champion tennis player at that, "Billy" Maginn was a decent enough chap.

"But won't he think he's struck a nest of snakes when he tackles the foundry, Cut?" the old fellow concluded. He was beginning to feel a little sorry for "Billy" Maginn.

Meanwhile, out in the milling-room and all through the shops, the men were talking more and more sullenly about their new boss. Stories went from machine to machine and from bench to bench, with covert sniffs and sneers, that the new "supe" was a dude, that he had his hands manicured, that he smoked cigarettes and wore ice-cream pants on Saturday afternoons. A really beautiful mess was brewing for Mr. William Devereaux Maginn, which

Parker's grim answer. "Now the show's ready to start."

The raising of the curtain certainly. wasn't long delayed. Maginn called Mike Nagle, the foreman, to his desk the first morning he went to the foundry,

was the name somebody had seen on one of his engraved cards.

At the end of the second week, his assistants in the little laboratory brought the results of several tests in to the Superintendent. And promptly on Monday morning Mr. Maginn had a little desk installed in the foundry, and started to spend a couple of hours a day there.

"By Jim Blaine! The boy's out looking for trouble, ain't he?" Cutler said to his old chief when he heard the news.

"He's picked out the sorest place in the whole works-that's dead certain," was

and as the man came up handed him a little slip of paper.

"There's a new formula I'd like you to have your mixer try," he said. "I want to get castings of a little higher tensile strength."

Nagle "Red Mike," the boys called him-made a bow that was a studied insult, and answered, "I'll give it to him;" and "Billy" Maginn turned back to his desk without another word.

Chris Metzger, a huge young German, was the head mixer. Nagle took the slip of paper to him, and said: "Say, Chris,

His Cigarettes wants you to work by this dope.

"The hell he does!" Metzger answered, and thrust the crumbled paper into his overalls.

Word went to Parker that the crisis was at hand, and he took occasion to remonstrate with both Nagle and Chris Metzger.

"Give the young fellow a fair chance, boys," he urged. But he got no encouragement. They both grinned and told im not to worry about things.

Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday went by, and "Billy" Maginn made no sign. Meanwhile Metzger went on making the old mixture, and everybody on the pay-roll knew that the new Superintendent was being openly defied.

"I ought to go and warn him, Cut," old Parker said several times to his pal. "This ain't your funeral, Parker," came the invariable answer.

"He don't want no advice from us old has-beens, anyhow."

On Saturday morning, Cutler called Parker to the window in a hurry.

"By the great jumping Jehoshaphat! Look at that!" he gasped.

Strolling across the shipping platform, about which stood all the buildings of the great plant, was Mr. William Devereaux Maginn, attired in a complete suit of spotlessly white tennis flannels. Andto add the last touch to the amazing picture-he nonchalantly swung a tennis racket in one hand.

Parker and Cutler, leaning against the wall for support, watched him in utter fascination, pop-eyed and speechless, until he vanished into the open door of the foundry. Then they looked at each other, and both collapsed into the nearest. chairs. Cutler burst into a roar of halfhysterical laughter.

"Billy" Maginn laid his tennis racket on the top of his desk, took off his white flannel coat, and hung it on the nail. All over the foundry the men were going into contortions of mirth.

"Nagle!" the voice of the new Superintendent sounded sharply.

The foreman, his face in a broad grin he was at no pains to conceal, stepped to the side of the desk.

"How's the new formula working?" asked Maginn.

"Haven't mixed any of it, yet," Nagle answered, with equal sharpness. "Did'nt you give it to the mixer?" "Yes."

"Metzger!"

The voice of "Billy" Maginn rang through the foundry. The head mixer, his face twisted in a leer, walked slowly over from his corner.

"Metzger," demanded the new Superintendent, "why haven't you mixed that new formula I gave you?"

The mixer's heavy eyebrows dropped low over his little rat-eyes, and his wide mouth flattened to a straight line. He held out the crumpled slip of paper in one grimy paw.

"Say," he began, in a tone that was heard all over the foundry, "why don't you talk United States? I can't understand these here hen-tracks."

"Metzger," answered "Billy" Maginn, in a calm, almost caressing voice, "for about fifteen minutes we'll forget that I'm your Superintendent. If you'll step out there on the shipping platform, I'll try to hammer my meaning into your thick Dutch head!"

There were thirty-six moulders within hearing of that low-voiced speech. To the begrimed and grinning face of each of them came a sudden and almost incredulous look of pleased anticipation. In the reckless, blue eyes of Mike Nagle, the foreman, shone the light with which the fighting Irishman hails the presence of a kindred spirit. Only Metzger, startled out of all self-possession, hung back, heavy and silent.

The men on either side pushed him. forward. "Go an,' one of them whispered. "Don't let the lady bluff ye." "Billy" Maginn threw open the door leading to the shipping platform. "After you, Metzger," he said.

In that mysterious and incomprehensible way by which news spreads through a great plant, it became known, almost instantly, all over the building, that "something was doing" on the shipping platform.

A thousand blank windows were as quickly filled with eager faces. Even the girl trimmers, up on the fourth floor of the main building, had left their piece

work and were staring down breathless. "Billy" Maginn calmly rolled up the sleeves of his white shirt. Then he held out his right hand. "We'll begin by shaking hands, Metzger," he said.

The head mixer drew back, swearing and doubling his arm for a blow. Maginn sent in a quick short-arm jolt, and a little jet of blood leaped from Metzger's nose, where the fist struck. With a bellow, the big moulder charged forward. Maginn side-stepped and landed a swing on the side of the jaw as his man went by. Metzger fell, but was on his feet in an instant and rushing for a clinch. The

Superintendent met him with a couple of upper-cuts, each of which staggered the man, strong and heavy as he was. He threw up both hands to protect his face, and "Billy" Maginn instantly sent home a hard left-hander over the heart that toppled Metzger to the floor with a crash.

Two of the moulders helped him up again, and he leaned back against the power house, gasping, and spitting blood.

"Metzger," said the even voice of the new Superintendent, close at his ear, "do you think you can make out that formula now?"

For answer the mixer aimed a heavy

kick at his tormentor, but it was stopped by the big boot of Mike Nagle, the foreman, whose red head was bristling with the joy of a fair fight.

"Be gob!" said Nagle, with profane emphasis, "if he can't, afther this, I'll find a lad that kin."

"Billy" Maginn had rolled down his white shirt-sleeves, and was turning to go back into the foundry. Nagle glanced at him, then waved a hairy, freckled hand up at the excited faces looking down. from the windows.

"What's the matter wid the new supe?" he yelled.

"He's all right!" Parker and Cutler found themselves cheering with the rest of the three thousand.

When the noon whistle blew, Superintendent Maginn came up to the office in the main building. Old man Parker jumped up to shake hands with him.

"You are all right from now, too," he said. "But I tell you, things did look pretty nasty."

"Yes," said "Billy" Maginn. "It seemed to be up to me to demonstrate the value of a technical education."

ernment, is in service.

The main ship channel now being used by most vessels at the great gateway of America, is so narrow and tortuous that with varying currents it is a difficult task for even the most expert pilots to guide their floating charges through in safety, particularly at night; and the many complaints, coupled with persistent demands of the shipping interest, for better facilities, were the despair of the Lighthouse Board. One official of the Board declared, "Nothing short of a picket fence. with a lantern hanging on every stick, would satisfy the grumblers."

The passage of the Omnibus Lighthouse bill by Congress in July, to cover lighting expense, was hastened by the prospect of embarrassment when the great express steamers Mauretania and Lusitania, now building at Wallsend-onTyne and Clydebank, will be in commission next fall. As these ships will draw 371⁄2 feet, when fully loaded, the comparatively shallow depth of thirty feet in the present waterway will preclude the passage through this entrance of vessels approaching the mammoth size of the new liners. Even now, the danger of grounding is a continuous menace to large craft, some of which dare not load to their full capacity and are obliged to regulate their trips with the flood tide to lessen the chance of such accident.

The official title "Ambrose Channel" has been given the new waterway, which will be 8 miles long, 2,000 feet wide, and

40 feet deep at ebb tide. This gigantic undertaking has been in progress nearly six years, requiring the use of powerful dredges and suction pumps; and all that remains to complete the plans is the erection of bases and structures for lanterns and the installation of lighting apparatus. Contracts are now being closed for a system for illumination that promises to eclipse in brilliance any port-entrance in the world, on account of which the pilots already call it "Ambrose Boulevard"-a name that will probably become more popular as its fame spreads among the mariners.

This marine boulevard will be the most serviceable of its kind, having practically but one deviation from a straight line, and sufficient capacity in width and depth to accommodate the largest ships planned or likely to be planned for many years. Moreover, it will greatly improve facilities for vast and steadily increasing ocean traffic by bringing the docks of New York five miles nearer to the sea. These ad