Meanwhile, as the minutes wax and wane, winches chatter noisily; windlasses clink musically; capstans rattle with slacking cables; and the shrill chanty songs of the docking gang working the warps, answer the cheery "Yo-heave-oho" of the sailors on the deck. On the bridge with the silent yet impatient captain lingers a representative of the company. By and by, after the final instructions have been given, this person departs, and as he goes over the side the captain, saluting him with a wave of the hand, gives a quiet order to the first officer. The wheel is shifted, the capstan reels noisily, and link by link the chain comes home. At last, after a vicious tug or two on the cable, the ground is broken, and, dripping with cleansing water from the hose, the anchor, ring and stock, appears above the foam-streams rippling at the bow. When the catfall is hooked, the ship swings easily around the jutting pier, the engines increase their speed, the ensign dips in answer to salutes, and a long blast from the whistle claims the right of the channel. Slowly and carefully she picks her way through the shipping that crowds the harbor, drops her pilot and heads for the open. The voyage has begun. With the dropping of the pilot, sea routine is promptly taken up, and thereafter on the shoulders of the commander rests the preservation of the ship and the safety of the passengers and crew. Every captain of an Atlantic liner embodies in his person a shining example of the law of the survival of the fittest, for there is no short cut to the bridge, and none but a master seaman ever reaches it. The man who would be captain cannot crawl through the cabin window. He must fight his way over the bows, and struggle out of the ruck and smother of the forecastle, by sturdy buffeting and hard knocks, by the persistent edging of stout shoulders backed by a strong heart and an active brain. There is probably not a commander of an ocean liner who has not been around the world as a common sailor, a mate, and finally a master of a ship. In fact, it would be difficult if not impossible to get the command of a transatlantic ship without having first been the captain of a large sailing vessel. Some of the companies like the Cunard, have a rule requiring that a candidate for a captaincy shall have served as a captain somewhere; and only a few years ago a sailor on one of the largest steamships plying between New York and Liverpool, who had climbed from the bottom to the high rank of first officer, left the company with which he had made his progress solely that he might take a place as captain on a smaller and less important vessel. If he succeeds in his new berth--and his old employers will watch his course--it is more than likely that he will be called back in a few years and have a command given him.