Speed Queen Burns

What argufies sniveling and piping your eye?

--18th Century British Sea Chanty Rightly or wrongly the Allied Powers dealt beaten Germany a blow beneath the belt in 1919, when they seized virtually the whole German merchant marine of 3,500,000 tons--third largest in the world. From President Paul von Hindenburg down, every German feels today that among the greatest triumphs of Peace must be ranked the Fatherland's astounding feat of building 3,000,000 tons of shipping in the decade since the War. The summer of 1929 was to have seen German mercantile prestige finally restored with added lustre by the completion of two new and superb liners, the Bremen and the Europa, expected to be fastest in the World (TIME, Aug. 27). There was a great swelling throb of joy in the solemn throat of Old Paul von Hindenburg as he launched the Bremen with these words: "Seventy years ago [when President Hindenburg was ten] the then young North German Lloyd launched its first vessel for trans-Atlantic service. It gave the craft the name of Bremen. . . . Now it is our wish to give this newest and largest vessel of Germany's revived fleet to its elements. . . . I hail the Bremen and the Europa as new links between Europe and America. I hail them as manifestations of the indestructible German capacity for work. ... I christen thee Bremen!" One of the two new links between Europe and America was shattered last week, at a single blow. Aboard the nearly completed Europa fire broke out simultaneously at four points, deep in the 'tween decks. Every precaution had been taken against such a conflagration. For months the great shipyard of Blohm & Voss at Hamburg, where the Bremen and Europa lay, had been guarded like a military fortress. No one--not even STIMMING himself--was allowed to enter without showing an elaborately documented pass. Certainly Herr Direktor Karl Stimming of the North German Lloyd--a man of such arresting reticence that he keeps even his first name out of the German Who's Who, and is known to most of his awed subordinates only as STIMMING--would not have decreed these iron precautions had he not feared human enemies. Clanging, screeching fire engines roared out from Hamburg to try and save the Europa. Hour after hour Fire bellowed, and water pssssssssed--from 3 a. m. to 9 p. m. Up and down, up and down until the fire was out, tirelessly paced a little man very stout and round for his small stature, with the carefully shaven and glistening head of a Prussian, and with two hard, compelling eyes. Subordinates wept, but not STIMMING. Far away in the Manhattan office of the North German Lloyd, the blow pierced a deep vein of German sentiment; and of the two principal officials one sobbed as only a man can, while the other sat for a time stunned with grief. Naturally, however, the blackest pall of German grief hung thickly over Hamburg.

Thousands of people lined the Hamburg quays all day, frankly in tears. They remembered 1919, when from these very yards the Allies towed away the largest ship in the world, the Bismarck, now Great Britain's Majestic, favorite ship of J. P. Morgan. Among the embittered Hamburg throng there were plenty who put two and two together. They know that next year, but not until next year, the British will have an even larger and possibly as fast a ship as the Europa. From the office of Direktor Stimming, however, flashed a private, circular cable to N. G. L. agents throughout the World. In substance it ran: There is no explanation of the fire. Deny any imputation of incendiarism.

Pretty Frau Stimming drives a Buick and her husband a snorting, supercharged Mercedes. Whenever he is in a hurry he flies, and he is always in a hurry, though his mannerisms and probably his thoughts are deliberate. A most annoying habit is to speak to subordinates in tones so low that only by straining can they hear. The Emperor Napoleon was at times similarly guilty. Indeed as Der Herr Direktor sits at his very big desk -- autocratically directing a fleet of 174 vessels totaling 731,688 tons -- he is not without a wholly German and quite paradoxical resemblance to the French "Little Corporal." Frugal and precise of tongue, his only recent public utterance was badgered out of him by reporters who wanted to know what the N. G. L. meant, exactly, by announcing that the Bremen and Europa would be "five-day boats."* Goaded, Herr Stimming barked: "I mean that the Bremen and the Europa will cross from America to England within five times 24 hours ! They will reach Germany within six times 24 hours after they leave New York." Only the Bremen is now left to make such a record six-day crossing to Germany in 1929--all other ships on that run now take nine days and upwards. Damage to the Europa--at first believed a total loss--was eventually found, last week, to involve only a $3,000,000 gutting of cabins, salons and gear. The hull was declared sound, and bulkheads with automatic fire doors saved the boilers, turbines and other propelling machinery. On her maiden voyage she would have carried $15,000,000 insurance placed by the N. G. L.; and in her partially completed state she was insured by her builders, Blohm & Voss, for $9,500,000 in the event of total loss. What they can now collect is a matter of "adjustment." They paid $3 per $500 coverage for an expected building period of 21 months. In London --world centre of maritime insurance-- the disaster was declared "absolutely without precedent," since no such mighty leviathan has ever burned in course of construction. Result: the prevailing London rate of 8% for a "constructive total loss" was jumped to 15%. Most of the Europa insurance was placed in Hamburg, thus adding more murk to the city's gloom. Unofficially it was said that the N. G. L. had expected an increase in revenue of 20% when the Bremen, Europa and newly re-engined and speeded Columbus should be put in service. Shares of the N. G. L. were placed on the U. S. market last November by Direktor Stimming personally at $69. Dividends of $3.42 per share were paid last week but this showing was due in part to the fact that U. S. Treasury had recently paid to the N. G. L. $2,000,000 in cash compensation for piers at Manhattan seized during the War. A positive announcement from the office of Direktor Stimming, last week, assured that the Europa will be completed for service in 1930. The Bremen is scheduled to sail from Bremen July 16 on her maiden voyage, and from Manhattan for the first time July 27. Primarily because of her speed she has been placed in a higher rating than any other ship afloat by the North Atlantic Conference of ship owners. Accordingly she will command a slightly higher minimum First Class rate than the $300 "crowded season minimum rate" of the Majestic, hitherto with the Leviathan highest in price and largest. So far as accommodations are concerned no radical innovation is planned, except that there will be absolutely no closing hour for revelers on the top-deck "Night Club"--an intimate restaurant purposely removed as far as possible from the cabins of those who prefer sleep to giggle water. As in the newest Dutch liner Statendam, the German fliers will have Tourist Third Class accommodation of a luxury not found in the First Class of many small and old eight-day boats. Today the fastest ship in the world is still the Mauretania but with the advent of the Bremen a new speed queen should reign on the Atlantic, at least until 1930. The largest German motor ship, M. S. St. Louis of the Hamburg-American Line, sailed from Hamburg on her maiden voyage to Manhattan, last week, tips the nautical scales at 16,750 tons.

*A description applied by many lines to any ship which can steam from a U. S. to a British port in one minute under six days.