It is easier to balance four cranks than three, and in this German ship the four-crank principle is followed. Steam is supplied by four single-ended and eight double-ended boilers, the Howden draught system being employed. The _Berlin_, the other latest modern liner of the Norddeutscher Lloyd Line, will be seen in the next illustration. Unlike her sister, she has been given only two masts, and in another illustration, in a later chapter, we show this ship under construction. She was recently built at Bremen for the Mediterranean to New York service, and carries 3,630 persons, inclusive of crew. Like other modern German liners, this vessel is handsomely furnished, and the public rooms are all united in a deckhouse lighted by a large number of cupola-shaped sky-lights. She has a registered tonnage of 19,200 gross, and in the Norddeutscher fleet ranks next after the _Kaiser Wilhelm II._ She passed into the hands of her owners at the end of 1909. [Illustration: THE “LAURENTIC” ON THE STOCKS. _From a Photograph. By permission of Messrs. Harland & Wolff._] Two interesting new ships were commissioned in 1909 by the White Star Line, for the Liverpool-Quebec service, named respectively the _Laurentic_ and _Megantic_. An illustration, showing the former on the stocks at Harland and Wolff’s yard, Belfast, is given opposite page 210. The _Laurentic_ and _Megantic_ are, as to hulls, sister ships, and each has a tonnage of 14,900, thus being among the largest steamers in the Canadian trade. But whilst the latter is a twin-screw ship propelled by reciprocating engines, the former has three screws and a combination of reciprocating engines and a low-pressure turbine, being the first large passenger steamship to be designed with this ultra-modern method. Each of the “wing” propellers is driven by four-crank triple balanced engines, the central propeller, however, being driven by the turbine. The object aimed at by this novel hybrid method was to retain the advantages of the carefully balanced reciprocating engines, but at the same time to obtain the benefit of the further expansion of steam in a low-pressure turbine, without having to employ a turbine specially for going astern. The reciprocating engines of the _Laurentic_ are adequate for manœuvring in and out of port, and for going astern, since they develop more than three-quarters of the total combined horse-power. This steamship, single-funnelled and two-masted, measures 565 feet in length, and 67 feet 4 inches in width, and besides having accommodation for 1,690 passengers, carries a large quantity of cargo. Like many other big steamships that we have noted in the course of our story, she has a double cellular-bottom which extends the whole length of the ship, being specially strengthened under the engines. Her nine bulkheads divide her up into ten water-tight compartments. It will be noticed that the rudder has gone back to the ordinary type common before the introduction of the balance method.