YACHTING Otf THE ST. JOHNS. 175 



of revisal, and beyond doubt, boats that do not carry 

 for hire will be set free from all needless restrictions. * 



The trip described in these notes \vas made in a small 

 yacht chartered by the day. She was about 48 feet long, 

 and carried captain, pilot, engineer, and fireman, yet the 

 cost for a party of four was only about the same as the 

 daily hotel board and passage tickets over the route ; 

 while the ability to visit many points without remaining 

 until another boat should permit moving on, was a very 

 great economy of time and money. Of course much was 

 seen and enjoyed that the tourist is usually hurried past, 

 or only seen in company with a crowd that does away 

 with all the romance and characteristic quiet of the 

 wilderness. The captain was a useless party, and did no 

 service. The pilot was needful. The fireman was a 

 luxury, a mere attendant upon a lazy engineer ; one man 



* The attention of owners of steam yachts is called to the importance of 

 embodying in the new steamboat inspection laws some exemptions in favor of 

 steam yachts and launches. As the law now stands, they are liable to severe 

 penalties for not complying with requirements that neither their size nor 

 character render proper, and in the Southern States a number of small explor 

 ing and pleasure boats have been abandoned because of the oppressions of a 

 law designed for large vessels, carrying for hire. An immediate effort will 

 undoubtedly secure such amendments as will encourage the use of steam 

 launches, and enable explorers and sportsmen to use them with a reasonable 

 economy, and free them from needless legal red tape and embarrassment. For 

 instance, the requirement that a boat, however small, must carry an engineer, 

 captain, and pilot no one man to hold two licenses, and these licenses cost 

 ing $10 each, and a good deal of trouble is one that is unreasonable when 

 applied to a small boat, where one man is competent to do all about the engine, 

 and the owner can steer, taking his own risk now and then of getting on a 

 sand bar. There is no real reason why a boat carrying no persons for hire 

 should be under any more restrictions than a sail boat, in which people are 

 permitted to drown themselves with the main sheet tied, and no licensed 

 sailor on board. Sportsmen cannot carry BO many men on small yachts and 

 launches. There is neither need nor room for them, and it may be presumed 

 that any person owning a craft of the kind will, for his own comfort and 

 safety, exercise the same high degree of care and skill that distinguish 

 sportsmen, yachtmen, and horsemen, in their guns, boats, and equipage. 



