“Tell them, if they do, you lose your contract and they lose their work.”  So the splendid little steamer grew apace; she was composite, and Cassall took care that she should be strong.  The most celebrated living designer of yachts had offered to make the drawings for nothing, out of mere fondness for Cassall, but the old gentleman paid his heavy fee.  If any one can design a good and safe vessel it is the yacht-builder, whose little thirty tonners are expected to run quite securely across the Bay in the wild autumn.  The Robert Cassall had not a nail or bolt in her that was not scrutinized by a stern critic.  “Never mind fancy work or fancy speed.  Give me perfect collision bulk-heads; perfect watertight compartments; make her unsinkable, and I don’t care if you only make her travel ten knots—­that’s good enough for the North Sea.”

Powys asked and obtained an assistant to take a turn on the day or night shifts, and the British workmen were held hard in hand by two acute and most critical mariners.

Robert Cassall had value for every penny of his money, but he certainly did not spare the place.  His friend the yacht-builder twice came to see how the work was going on, and he said, “You’ll be able to run her round the Horn if you like.  You see I took care that she shouldn’t kick like those steam-carriers.  You’ll find her as stiff as they make them.”

Sir John Rooby resolved that the peerless engines which he provided should be fitted under cover, so, as soon as the hull was completed, the engineers began their work; and as it turned out, the experiment of launching a boat with all engines complete was an entire success.  Sir James Eoche came and watched the fitting of all the appliances designed by him, and it seemed that he was as exquisite in mechanical skill as he was sagacious in treatment of disease.  Ferrier was afraid that the vehement old man would wear him out, but he bottled his impatience, and sought repose in the gentle society of Sir James.  The two medicos pottered on with pulleys and wheels and inclined planes with much contentment, and they satisfied themselves at last that a man might be picked up in any sea, and swiftly placed under cover, without sustaining a jar severe enough to hurt even a gouty subject.

Cassall did not like the workmen to be discontented over his incessantly vigilant superintendents, so, with his inexhaustible good-humour and resolution, he hit on a mode of conciliation.  He met both shifts on a Friday, and said, “Now, men, I’m not a bad sort even if I am determined not to have a scamped nail in my vessel.  Now you’re working hard, and we’ll show the prettiest vessel in England presently, so to-morrow we’ll have two brakes here at eleven o’clock, all who like will drive to a certain little place that I know of, and we’ll have a rare good dinner together, and come home in the evening.  We’ll have no spirits, and no shaky hands for Monday.  Plenty of good, pure spring water with orange champagne for those who like it.”