Dripping wet as they were, the boys did not forget their carefully instilled training, and each came to attention and saluted as they faced the officer of the deck. "Who are you men?" demanded that dignitary, red tape not allowing him to comment on the accident. "Recruits, s-s-sir, from Newport T-T-T-Training School," answered Ned respectfully, his teeth chattering. "Get on dry clothes and report to the master-at-arms. Messenger!" A messenger slid to the officer's side with a hand raised in salute. "Show these recruits to their quarters. Let them get on dry clothes and then conduct them to the master-at-arms." As the boys' suitcases had by this time been hoisted on board, they soon changed into dry uniforms in the men's quarters forward, and their conductor then beckoned them to follow him. The two boys, their eyes round with astonishment at the sights and scenes about them, followed without a word, and were led through labyrinths of steel-walled passages, down steel ladders with glistening steel hand rails, up more ladders, and through bulkhead doors made to open and close with ponderous machinery. The lower decks of the ship were lighted with hundreds of incandescent bulbs, as, in a modern man-of-war, there are no portholes on the sides, owing to the thickness of the armorplate. The officers' cabins are lighted by lozenges of glass let into the deck. "It's like living in a fire-proof safe," whispered Herc. The boys noticed that, although they seemed to be in a steel-walled maze, that the air was fresh and cool, and they discovered afterward that large quantities of fresh ozone were distributed into every part of the ship by electric blowers. For the present, however, they followed their guide in a sort of semi-stupefaction at the novelty of their surroundings. "Say, we must have walked a mile," gasped Herc, as their guide finally emerged into a narrow passage seemingly in the stern of the vessel. He paused before a door hung with heavy curtains and knocked. "What is it?" demanded a voice from inside. "A voice as pleasant as an explosion of dynamite," Herc described it afterward. "Two recruits, sir," was the reply. "Send them in." The boys found themselves in the presence of the master-at-arms, a dignified and business-like officer. "Your papers?" he demanded, without further parley. "Here, sir," answered both boys, producing their precious certificates from the training school. The master-at-arms glanced over them. "You seem to have good records," he remarked, "but don't presume on them. You have a lot to learn. Messenger!" The messenger sprang to attention and saluted, and the boys, not to be outdone in politeness, did likewise. "Sir!" "Take these two recruits to the ship's writer, and have him enter them in the ship's records."