18 



Chapter 



FORE-AND-AFT 



Th 



-HE packets and the clippers were types of vessels that had 

 a special use at a particular era. They did their jobs, earned their pay 

 and their fame and then disappeared in the spindrift of time to the 

 haven where all good ships gather. 



They provide nice and neat chapters in the story of the Atlantic. 

 Not so the fore-and-afters for "fore-and-aft" describes a method and 

 principle of hanging and using sail. This principle is closely tied up 

 with the ability of a vessel to sail into the wind. Its use is very old 

 and it may have had an independent origin in other oceans but its 

 full development is essentially an Atlantic story. The principle 

 emerges in many vessels and at many times; in early Dutch vessels, 

 large and small; in the first English yachts; in American river boats; 

 in New England schooners and Baltimore Clippers; in Banks fisher- 

 men and West Indian traders; in the great timber and cargo schoon- 

 ers of the early twentieth century; in modern ocean racers. Today 

 there are still many sailing ships afloat on the Atlantic and practically 

 all of them are fore-and-afters. 



Following their development, our chapter takes us back and for- 

 ward in time and moves freely about an ocean. 



It was a long time before mariners of any nation developed in their 

 vessels the ability to work into the wind by sail alone and without 

 assistance from oars or any other propulsive device. This ability is 



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