The manifest success of the Cunard Company could not long continue without exciting competition, and this followed in due course from a variety of quarters; nor was it to be expected that they should easily hold the supremacy of the sea against all new-comers. They had, in fact, to contend vigorously for their laurels, and at successive intervals had to retire into the second rank, but their determination to regain and hold, at whatever cost, the championship has been well illustrated in the newer ships of the line. The _Umbria_ and _Etruria_, steel ships launched in 1884, having cost nearly two millions of dollars each, were a decided advance upon any steamers then afloat. They are 500 feet long, 57 feet 3 inches wide, and 40 feet in depth; they are of 8,127 tons, 14,500 horse-power and are equal to a speed of 19½ knots an hour. They have ample accommodation for 550 first-class passengers and 800 steerage. Each of them has made the run from Queenstown to New York (2,782 knots) in less than six days. In nine consecutive voyages the _Etruria_ (in 1885) maintained an average speed of 18 knots. Her fastest voyage, however, from Queenstown to New York, was made in August, 1897, when she was thirteen years old—namely, 5 days, 21 hours and 10 minutes actual time, the average speed during the voyage being about 20 knots. [Illustration: THE “CAMPANIA,” AT LIVERPOOL LANDING-STAGE.] It helps one to understand the enormous cost of such vessels when it is stated that the single screw-propeller weighs about thirty-nine tons and costs $25,000! Splendid as was the record of these crack Cunarders, they were surpassed by ships of the White Star and Inman Lines. Something had to be done. An order was given to the Fairfield Ship-building and Engineering Company on the Clyde to build two steel twin-screw express steamships that should surpass all previous efforts. The result was the _Campania_ and _Lucania_, launched at Govan in September, 1892, and February, 1893, respectively. These sister ships are splendid specimens of marine architecture. They are each 620 feet long, 65¼ feet beam, and 43 feet in depth. Their gross tonnage is 12,950 tons; their twin screws are driven by triple expansion engines of 30,000 indicated horse-power. Each engine has five cylinders and three cranks. The low-pressure cylinders have the enormous diameter of 8 feet 2 inches; the two high-pressure cylinders are 37 inches in diameter, and the intermediate are 79 inches, with a stroke of 5 feet 9 inches. They are arranged tandem fashion, with a high-pressure cylinder over a low-pressure cylinder, one at each end, and the intermediate in the centre. At eighty revolutions (their normal speed) this enormous weight is moved about 2,000 feet per minute. The crank shaft is twenty-six inches in diameter, and each of the three interchangeable parts weighs twenty-seven tons. The propeller shaft is twenty-four inches in diameter, fitted in lengths of twenty-four feet, each length