252 BOATS AND BOATING. 



without it ; in addition to this, the boat will be stiff with a 

 moderate amount of ballast, which is a matter of consequence, 

 as the ballast has to be carried down and up on every occasion 

 you go to sea for a sail. For rowing, all beach boats are quite 

 stiff enough without ballast. 



I am now of course speaking of what I may term a single- 

 handed boat for general purposes, to row or sail, according to 

 circumstances ; but for offing fishing, when never less than two 

 should be on board, eighteen feet will be a convenient size, 

 beyond which they will be found cumbrous to amateurs. A 

 capstan should be provided for getting up a boat of the last- 

 named size, for a man's strength can be more effectually exerted 

 at a capstan bar than in any other manner which has been 

 adopted for heaving a strain. 



Various kinds of ballast are in use ; namely, lead, iron, 

 stone, and water ballast, of which lead is the most effective, but 

 very likely to take unto itself wings, when cast into weights of 

 as little as fifty-six pounds, which are quite heavy enough to be 

 thrown out on the beach, when running on shore in a surf. 

 Next comes iron, which is more in use than any other, and 

 sufficiently heavy ; but in this metal I do not recommend the 

 pig ballast with a hole in each end (for this necessitates a rope 

 handle or becket where quick handling is required), but the 

 square half-hundredweights, such as grocers and coal-merchants 

 keep, having a square sloping hole in the centre crossed by a 

 handle. This, as it does not project above the surface of the 

 iron, is not at all in the way of the feet when moving about in 

 the boat. 



Barrels or breakers of an elliptic shape take up too much 

 room in small boats, but if four tank boxes be made two feet 

 square, of three-quarter inch plank when planed, and rounded 

 in the bottom to fit the boat, and of a depth of six or seven 

 inches in the middle part, they will stow, when filled and soaked, 

 a considerable weight of water. This, with two half-hundred- 

 weights, and a stone of about forty pounds weight, used to 

 moor on rocky ground, will amount to near three hundredweight, 

 and should be sufficient, with an anchor, ropes, oars, &c., to 

 ballast a boat of this size. 



