116 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
[Feb. 6, 1897. 
gaDizatioB of the Yacht EaciDsr League mentioned in the resolution 
under which they were appointed. 
All of which is respectfully subnaitted. 
Edwabd M. Brown, 
S. Nicholson Kane, 
James I>. Smith, 
E. D Morgan, 
Iioras Cass Lbdtaed, 
C. Oliver Iselin, 
Clabence a. Postley. 
Dated New York. Jan. 20. 1897. 
The Payne Bill. 
From the Marine Journal. 
If the President of the United States does not take advantage of 
his constitutional right to veto to-day (Saturday, Jan. 30) House bill 
8,088, it becomes a law, and next Blonday morning our readers can 
congratulate themselves upon the face that hereafter if the Anglo- 
American millionaire desires to build, purchase or charter a foreign 
yacht she will have to enter and clear at the Custom House, pay ton- 
nage dues, m fact, be amenable to the laws that govern all foreign 
built vessels, which is practirally prohibition, as no yacht owner 
would subject himself to tbis annoyance, to say nothing of the ex- 
pense. The bill rtferrpd to amends the revised statutes. The amend- 
ment, is in italics ard reads as follows* 
'•Section 4.216.— Yachts belonging to a regularly organized yacht 
club of any foreign nation whicQ shall extend like privileges to the 
yachts of the United States shall have the privilege of entering or 
leaving any P"rc of 'he United States without entering or clearing at 
■the Custorn House thereof or paying tonnage tax. p-ovirled that'the 
privileges of this section shall not extend to any yacht built outside 
of the United States and ovsnid. chartered or used by a citizen of 
the United States, unless such ownership or charter was acquired 
prior to the passage of this act.^' 
Thi? bill originated wiih the Marine Journal upon the earnest 
solicitation of some of the most influential of our patrons. Con- 
gressman S. E. Payne, chairman of the House committee on Marine 
and Fisheries, introduced it and championed it through the House 
the first session of the Fifty fourth Congress. Senator Wm P. 
Frje, chairman of the commerce committee, would bave got it 
through the Senate during the same session had it not been for the 
detprmmed oppo.^itioa of a member of the Senate who was at last 
through Senator Frye'8ea>-nest efforts prevailed upon to withdraw 
bis opposition, thereby enabling the latter to pass the bill last week, 
soon after which it went to the President, who, we hope, will sign it; 
if not, it is the opinion of those interested that he will allow ip to 
become a law without his sigoatTire 
This is a very imporiant bill in the line of shipbuilding, which in- ' 
eludes skilled labor in nearly 3 0 different industries, all of which 
are largely indebted 10 Senator Frye and Oongreasaian Payne, who 
never lost an opiDortunity to advance it to its final pas-age. The 
part the iWanne o/btt»-??ai took in the matter was a pleasant duty it 
owes its constituents, and is another one of tne many bills that we 
have advocated in the interest of the merchant marme, and the 
licensed officers of the United States that have become fixed on the 
statute books for all time, we hope. American designers and Ameri- 
can builders can furnish our mUltonaires with a better yacht; than 
they can get abroad; neoce this new law can do no American any 
injury; it will simply oblige the Anglo-American to pay a handsome 
revenue into the Treasury of the United States if he cannot exist out- 
side a British built craft. 
We would not rob our contemporary of a tithe of the 
credit which it assumes for this most cowardly bill. Every 
true American should lilush at the knowledge that American 
shipbuilders, after failing utterly in the attempt to compete 
in quality with their rivals of the Clyde, have gone to Con- 
grts^ with a cowardly plea for special legislation that should 
protect them from a fair and open competition on the part of 
men whom they thus acknowledge are more skillful than 
themselves. 
Thus far we have been unable to learn just what the effect 
of the new law will be, and we believe that no one yet knows; 
it will probably take several suits at law to determine some 
of the questions now in doubt. It is possible that the bill 
may act as its promoters intend: to exclude all foreign 
yachts, both sail and steam, from American waters; to pre- 
vent even such instructive and profitable experiments 
as the racing of Minerva aad Clara. On the other hand, it 
18 possible that the framers of the bill have overreached 
themselves, and that it may fail entirely in achieving its 
principal objects. 
In any case it is a sorry exhibition of the skill and spirit 
of the American shipbuilder of the end of the century. 
Society of Naval Architects. 
TJndbk date of Dec. 31, 1896, the president of the Institu 
tion of Naval Architects, 5 Adelphi Terrace, London, W. 
C., invited the Society of Naval Architects to visit England 
toward the commencement of next July, to attend an ioter- 
national congress of naval architects and marine engineers, 
in London, under the honorary presidency of His Koyal 
Highness, the Pricce of Wales, to celebrate the sixtieth year 
of the reign of Her Majesty, Queen Victoria. 
By directioQ of the council, given at a special meeting 
held OB Jan. 31, President Griscom has accepted this invita- 
tion for the society. 
Members viho propose to attend the congress are requested 
to notify the secretary, Francis T. Bowles, at their earliest 
coijvenience. 
The executive committee, charged by tbe council with 
such detailed arrangements as may be necessary, will further 
communicate through the secretary with members who sig- 
nify their wish to accept the invitation. 
ST. LAWRENCE RIVER "SKIEF." 
The Compartment System in Early Vessels. 
Editor Forest and Stream: 
In looking over some old books lately I have come across 
descriptions of early compartment vessels, which may be of 
Interest to readers of the Porest and Stream. 
Marco Polo, writing early in the fourteenth century, is 
said to credit the Chinese with this system of construction 
in their river junks. We know that Le Compt> the Jesuit, 
writing in 1690, says of these same vessels and their build- 
ers: "They divide them into five or six apartments, sepa- 
rated by good partitions, so that when they touch at any 
place upon a point of rock only one part of the boat is 
full, while the others remain dry and give time to stop the 
bole." 
The most curious description of this compartment system 
is that given by Dampier in describing a trading junk, 
Writing under date of May 31, 1687, then being in the Bay 
of Siam, the captain records that they fell in with "a great 
junk that came from Palimbar, a town on the island of 
Sumatra. This vessel was of the Chinese make, full of 
little rooms or partitions like our well-boats." 
On June 35 of this same year Dampier anchored off the 
northeast end of St. John's Island. This island lies "on the 
south coast of the province of Quantung or Canton in 
China." Here Dampier boards another junk and gives a 
full account of her: 
"She was built with a square, flat head as well as stern, 
only the head or fore part wab net so broad as the stern. On 
her deck she had little thacht houses like hovels, covered 
with palmeto leaves and raised about 3ft. high, for the 
seamen to creep into. She had a pretty large cabin wherein 
there was an altar and. a lamp burning. I did but just look 
in and saw not the idol. The hold was divided in many 
small partitions, all of them made so tight that if a leak 
should spring up in any one of them it could go no farther, 
and so could do but little damage, but only to the good-3 in 
the bottom of that room where the leak springs up. Each 
of these rooms belongs to one or two merchants, or more, 
and every man freights his goods in his own room, and prob- 
ably lodges there if he be oo board himself." 
Knowing John Chinaman's large care for his person and 
goods, it is a question whether the bulkhead was first intro- 
duced to protect the ship or the merchant and his venture. 
A. C. Stott. 
Stottville, N. Y., Jan. 26. 
YACHTING NEWS NOTES. 
W. B. Stearns, of Marblehead, yacht designer and builder, is the 
promoter of a class of iti-foot racing fln-keels of moderate cost, de- 
signed for racing and afternoon sailing ,n Marblehead Harbor. The 
boats will be asft. over all, IBft. waterline, about oft. ein. beam, and 
about 4ft. draft. They will carry SSOsq. ft. of sail in jib and mainsail 
rig. Tne promise of quite a number of orders in the class is a good 
one, and the racing of the boats would make interesting sport. Par- 
ker H. Kemble has agreed to offer a special cup for the boats if five 
are built, and C. F. Lyman will offer a second cup If ten are built. — 
Boston Globe 
C. H. Oiling & Rro., of Fall Kiver, are building for their own use 
from designs by F. T Wood, of that city, an open racing cat of S3ft. 
over all, 2 ft waterline with crew on board, 10ft. extreme beam and 
8ft 5in. beam at waterline. The hull draws hut bin. The eenterboard 
is of wood, weighted with about 751bs. of lead, and is 8ft. 6iD. long, 
with a drop of 5ft 61n. The boat's least freeboard is 16in. She will 
have no outside keel or deadwood, and will steer with a balanced 
metal rudder. Her model is on the same principle as the J^-raters 
Paprika and Question. She will have a sail area of 73Ssq. ft., ihe sail 
dimensions being as follows: Foot 32ft. lin.. head 20ft. 9in., hoist 21ft. 
The spars wUl be light and the mast wiU have a headstay, backstays 
and shrouds with spreaders. In construction the boat will be very 
light. The keel is of spruce, 9in. wide and l^^in. thick, strengthened 
vertically by sills ifc aeep and 1%ui. thick. I'he frames are of oak, 
sided lin. and moulded %m , and spaced 9in. on centers. The plank- 
ing is i^isin cedar and the deck is of ''ijin pine, covered with canvas. 
The boat will be raced in the Fall Rivfer Y. C.'s 18' to 21ft. calboat 
cl&ss.— Boston Globe. 
The Brief's" Illustrations. 
I HAVE just been comparing the subjects of field illustration in the 
Game Laivs in Brief with the Frost outiug water colors which 
have recently been canvassed about the country, and was struck 
with their typical characteristics. Of course the Frost collection Is 
exclusively tleld pictures; but if a stranger from the planet Mars 
should desire a typical album illustrative of American sport, lie 
would hardly find so many phases of it in so small a compass as the 
thirteen photos at the end of your compendium. 
CHABLBS HAliliOCK. 
THE ORIGINAL ST. LAWRENCE SKIFF. 
There is, or was at one time, a good deal of dispute as to 
what was, or is, the St. Lawrence River skiff, "only" or 
otherwise; but I think that no one who knows that river 
from the Long Sault to the Gulf — and that is no small dis- 
tance — has the slightest doiibt as to what Was tlje oflginil 
"St. Lawrence River skiff," or ihdeed As to what is the typi- 
cal rowing craft of this ^reat water. They have canoes and 
half-ratets and other abnormal creations of degeneracy on 
the St. Lawrence about Montreal; and pilot boats, yawls 
and most villainous dingeys about Quebec; but aside from 
those exotic colonies of modernity the craft in almost uni- 
versal use on the "river" is the "skief." In my opinion the. 
"skief" was not invented for use on the river, nor indeed bas 
the river gi-eatly affected the form of the "skief," for the 
Prench-Canadian is not an inventive person. He is prone to 
believe that what was good enough for his father is good 
enough for him, and his great great-great-grandfather prob- 
ably brought the idea of the "skief" from the Breton river 
sides when as a forced or free colonist he came to I4ew 
Piance in the long ago picturesque time of Louis XIV. 
Be that as it may, the "skief" is a mighty good boat, and to 
this day wben it comes down to business, When big stretches 
of the river have to be crossed among the drifting floe ice of 
spring or the "Fraseal" of winter, when a November gale on 
Lac St. Peter has to be faced, it is almost always the despised 
green-painted "skief" with the pin oars that is selected for 
the work — not the varnished, lapstreaked skiff from "up the 
river," with her fancy woods, spoon oars, and general piano 
finish. 
The "skief," as the accompanying sketch shows, is the 
river's sister of the ocean's dory, but as used on the St. Law- 
rence she is always flat-bottomed, without other frames than 
a few stiffening battens nailed to her sides, and fitted with 
short ash pin oars The sides are generally one single piece 
of clear white pine, and in the actual boats, while the stetn 
is nearly perpendicular, the stem has a strong rake. The 
bottom is always planked athwartship without caulking, 
and is never painted, so that the swelling of the wood may 
keep the boat tight. 
The "pingeys" of the raftsmen are big skiffs, the sides 
being built up to H and 4ft in height, generally lapstreak of 
rough fashion. There are but few of these most picturesque 
craft in existence now. The Caughnawaga Indians still use 
them, and Big John still takes his "big boat" through the 
steamer channel upon occasions ; but apart from this they 
are numbered with the Durham boats and ".Northwest" 
canoes. 
Not so the "skief." All along both sides of the river, 
from the Long Sault to Quebec, every farmer with a river 
frontage, every other villager, and every fisherman and 
riverman has his "skief." Every "pin flat" (and there are 
still lots of these almost prehistoric craft afloat), every barge 
and schooner has her "skief," and nearly all the fishing and 
shooting on the river is done from these boats. 
Mr. Wickstead's drawing is of a "skief," but a modern- 
ized and symmetrical "skief," such a skiff as we would 
all like to own; and still I doubt whether in essentials she 
would be one whit better than one of the Varannes boats, 
that can be bought for $1 a foot, paint included. 
When the Preoch-Canadian riverside man uses a sail in 
his "skief he uses a little rag of a sprit sail, a rough, oblong, 
blanket-shaped thing, and the mast is generally steppetl 
amidships. I never saw one of them attempt to ply to wind- 
ward in these craft, and in fact the "Chambly canoe" is the 
only French-Canadian craft that has any pretensions to 
weatherliness. The "pin flat" and the "barge" are only in- 
tended to run before the wind, although the "barge" now 
carries a gaff sail. I think it was originally a lateen or set- 
tee. 
That is all I know about cows, "skiefs" I mean, but their 
color, which is variegated, but generally green. In this 
they fall far behind the "pingeys," which were red, or the 
"pin flats," which are frequently blue, with fine big black 
eyes to see out of. When the drawings of the "pin flats," 
"pingeys," "Durham boats," "Chambly canoes," "north 
shore canoes" and "barks" that Mr. Wickstead has promised 
for this series are completed, 1 will have something more to 
say about these cattle; but, like little Tommy, "1 now saya 
no more; compositions is done for this week." Rbtaw. 
The FoBEST Axj) Btbeam is put to preas each week on TuescUty 
Oorreapondenee inttnd^d for publication ahmiid retteh u» as (Ac 
laUtt.by Mondtti/, and a»,timA •artier a« praoMoaMCi ^ r « , 
