It will no doubt surprise some people to know that the largest steamship line in the world is the Hamburg-American Company. That is, its vessels, which number one hundred and twenty-four, aggregate the greatest number of tons. The new freight steamers “Pennsylvania” and “Pretoria” of this line are mammoth vessels, and two more of the same class are now building by the Vulcan Works at Stettin. Their gross tonnage is about twelve thousand five hundred, with a displacement of twenty-three thousand tons, and a carrying capacity of twenty thousand tons. It is marvellous that a vessel should be able to carry, safely, twenty-twenty-thirds of her own weight. The new White Star freighter “Cymric” slightly exceeds these vessels in carrying capacity, and it requires six hundred and twenty-five carloads of freight to fill her enormous hull. Below will be found a list of the five largest steamship lines, with the aggregate tonnage of each. Tons Hamburg American 341,000 British India 295,000 North German Lloyd 266,000 Peninsular and Oriental 251,000 Messageries Maritimes 279,000 The Cunard Line is simply swallowed up in these figures, and even the White Star Line, with all its freighters, falls below them; while the Japanese Nippon Yusen Kabushiki, with one hundred and sixty-two thousand tons, exceeds the Cunard, which the average citizen would perhaps place first on the list. Latitude 5° 16′ north; longitude, 30° 30′ west. +June 1+ Three weeks at sea this day, and we are involved in the vortex, so to speak, of the Doldrums, with all which the name implies: intense heat, sultry, humid atmosphere, a baking sun which glares down between heavy showers and an almost total absence of wind. We were congratulating ourselves last night, for at 8.30 we took a northeasterly wind, which sent us along at seven knots through a sea spangled with phosphoric jewels and leaving a wake of silvery light astern, like the trail of a meteor. “About, about, in reel and route, The death-fires danced at night.” But on issuing from the companion-way this morning, lo! a great calm was lying upon the waters; while the sun, like a globe of incandescent gold, sent down terrible rays of heat, trebly intensified by the brassy glare from the ocean. Perspiration dripped from the faces of the weather-hardened seamen upon the least exertion, the pigs breathed in short gasps and the poultry stalked about the deck with open bills. [Illustration: The companion-way] “Down dropt the breeze, the sails dropt down, ’Twas sad as sad could be, And we did speak only to break The silence of the sea. “All in a hot and copper sky The bloody sun at noon Right up above the masts did stand, No bigger than the moon.”