Notwithstanding the wonderful development of railway and steamship systems, means of conveyance during the summer months often fall short of the demand. Passages by the more popular lines of steamships must be engaged months ahead; in many cases the ships are uncomfortably crowded. At such times sofas take the place of berths, and all the officers’ rooms, from the coveted Captain’s cabin to the second and third stewards’ bunks, are called into requisition and held at a round premium. On Saturday, the 8th of May, 1897, no less than 1,500 saloon passengers left New York for Liverpool on the great ocean greyhounds. The travelling season is comparatively short, the competition is keen, and the enormous expense of building, furnishing and running up-to-date steamships renders it difficult to provide the requisite accommodation on a paying basis. The up-to-date steamship must be built of steel, to combine light weight with strength. It must have triple or quadruple expansion engines to economize fuel. It must be propelled by twin or triple screws, as well for the easier handling of the vessel as for safety in case of a breakdown of machinery, and for attaining the highest possible speed. Our ideal steamship must be able to turn quite round in its own length, and to go through the water at an average speed of at least twenty knots an hour. To attain these results, ships of a very large class are called for—nothing short of from eight to ten thousand tons burthen will come up to the mark. There are many magnificent steamships in the North Atlantic trade and elsewhere but as yet few have in all respects reached the up-to-date standard, and even those that are such this year, a few years hence are certain to be regarded as quite behind the times. There is no valid reason to suppose that the process of development which has been going on during the last fifty years in this direction is to be arrested at the close of the century. The indications, so far as they can be interpreted, are all in the opposite direction. The paddle-wheel ocean steamer reached its zenith with the launch of the _Scotia_ of the Cunard Line in 1862. She was the last of the race.