154 ALL AFLOAT 



Instead of a length equal at most to five beams 

 there are lengths of more than ten beams now. 

 This means a radical change in framing. 

 The old wooden vessel, as we have seen, 

 had a frame looking like the skeleton of a 

 man's body, with the keel for a backbone and 

 multitudinous ribs at right angles to it. But 

 the new steel vessel, especially if built on the 

 excellent Isherwood principle, looks entirely 

 different. The transverse ribs are there, of 

 course, but in a modified form. They do not 

 catch the eye, which now, instead of being 

 drawn from side to side, is led along from end 

 to end by what looks like, and really is, a com- 

 plete ribbing of internal keels. The whole 

 system has, in fact, been changed from the 

 transverse to the longitudinal. 



The subject is well worth pursuing for its 

 own sake. But the modern developments of 

 naval architecture and waterborne trade which 

 Canada shares with the rest of the world do not 

 concern us any further here. 



