[Illustration: SHEARS FOR CUTTING HOT SLABS OF STEEL. These shears, photographed at the works of the Glasgow Iron and Steel Company, are capable of cutting through solid steel slabs 4 feet wide and 12 inches thick. The slabs travel over the "live rollers" in the floor to and from the shears. The use of steel in large quantities, both for shipbuilding and for the making of rails, was rendered possible by the introduction of the "Bessemer Process" (named after its inventor, Sir Henry Bessemer) in 1860. Steel which had hitherto cost £50 or £60 a ton, now cost but £7 or £8, and rapidly superseded iron. The Bessemer "Converter" has, however, itself given place to the Siemens open-hearth furnace.] The safety of Lower Egypt being threatened by the Mahdi's continued success, the British Government undertook the defence of a frontier line drawn through Souakim. General Graham ascended the Nile with about 4,000 troops, and inflicted a severe defeat on the Arabs, under Osman Digna, at El Teb, on February 29. Again, on March 11, Graham attacked Osman Digna's camp at Tamai, captured, and gave it to the flames. [Illustration: LAUNCHING AN ATLANTIC LINER AT MESSRS. HARLAND AND WOLFF'S, BELFAST.] [Illustration: FRAMING AND PLATING SHEDS, SHOWING MACHINERY FOR DRILLING HOLES IN STEEL PLATES FOR SHIPBUILDING. The works of Messrs. Harland and Wolff, which, some forty years ago covered two or three acres, and employed a couple of hundred men, now cover nearly eighty acres, and pay wages amounting to £12,000 to £14,000 per week. The tonnage of the vessels built during 1896 amounted to 81,000 tons, considerably more than the output of all the five Government yards.] [Sidenote: Gordon Besieged.]