Then the business of clearing, filling, and lowering the boats was begun—a business quickly described, but occupying a good deal of time in the transaction. Mr. Murdoch, the Chief Officer, ordered the crews to the boats; and with some confusion different parties of stewards and sailors disentangled themselves from the throng and stood in their positions by each of the sixteen boats. Every member of the crew, when he signs on for a voyage in a big passenger ship, is given a number denoting which boat’s crew he belongs to. If there has been boat drill, every man knows and remembers his number; if, as in the case of the _Titanic_, there has been no boat drill, some of the men remember their numbers and some do not, the result being a certain amount of confusion. But at last a certain number of men were allotted to each boat, and began the business of hoisting them out. First of all the covers had to be taken off and the heavy masts and sails lifted out of them. Ship’s boats appear very small things when one sees a line of them swinging high up on deck; but, as a matter of fact, they are extremely heavy, each of them the size of a small sailing yacht. Everything on the _Titanic_ having been newly painted, everything was stiff and difficult to move. The lashings of the heavy canvas covers were like wire, and the covers themselves like great boards; the new ropes ran stiffly in the new gear. At last a boat was cleared and the order given, “Women and children first.” The officers had revolvers in their hands ready to prevent a rush; but there was no rush. There was a certain amount of laughter. No one wanted to be the first to get into the boat and leave the ship. “Come on,” cried the officers. There was a pause, followed by the brief command, “Put them in.” The crew seized the nearest women and pushed or lifted them over the rail into the first boat, which was now hanging over the side level with the deck. But they were very unwilling to go. The boat, which looked big and solid on the deck, now hung dizzily seventy-five feet over the dark water; it seemed a far from attractive prospect to get into it and go out on to the cold sea, especially as everyone was convinced that it was a merely formal precaution which was being taken, and that the people in the boats would merely be rowed off a little way and kept shivering on the cold sea for a time and then brought back to the ship when it was found that the danger was past. For, walking about the deck, people remembered all the things that they had been thinking and saying since first they had seen the _Titanic_; and what was the use of travelling by an unsinkable ship if, at the first alarm of danger, one had to leave her and row out on the icy water? Obviously it was only the old habit of the sea asserting itself, and Captain Smith, who had hitherto been such a favourite, was beginning to be regarded as something of a nuisance with his ridiculous precautions.