S72 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
[May 12, 1900. 
New Factors in Yacht Measure- 
ment. 
Mditor For^esf nnd Stream : 
I atm indebted to you for publishing my proposed simple 
length rating, combined with sail allotment per displace- 
»ine6it for the racing of small yachts. I notice that you 
invite discussion, and inasmuch as you have mentioned 
sottife assumed disadvantages, or what appears to you as 
such, I should like to discuss these points. 
In the first place, you regard the weighing of small 
yachts to be feasible only at yachting centers, such as the 
Clyde and the Solent, in Great Britain, and other localities 
■coi a like nature in America. In reply, I would point out 
that racing yachts are usually built in some such position 
and consequently close to a weighing machine specially 
erected, at no great cost, for such purpose. The weight 
of ex-racers would be known and recorded in Lloyds' 
Yachting Register, and the racing of tubs which are not 
■.built for racing is a matter about which racing men 
jhave no concern. I maintain that the actual process of 
' ■weighing a yacht tip to say ten or twelve tons would be 
quickly and accurately performed, and with far less 
.trouble than the present British measurement of her 
•girth. .. . - 
■ Yaclits which are intended to race after building at 
. 0jit stations, possessing no weighing machine could be 
■weighed as to hull and fixed ballast after building, and 
i .t)?€ir spars, sails, stores, and inside ballast could be 
■;>Weighed separately, so that any change subsequently could 
' be at once allowed: for as regards the sail area carried 
-when racing. I am therefore not at all in agreement with 
• 'your reinarks to the effect that any practical difficulties 
""-iekist connected with the weighing of racers. As for the 
. -simall yachts which occasionally want to race, let them do 
"■•«o under the length and sail area rule, or any other 
-simple rule of the kind, to be settled among themselves 
'according to their requirements. 
The next objection j-ou urge is, however, the more im- ■ 
'portant. You say: "After a designer has taken his 
'\inaximum displacement for the class, there is apparently 
'■■nothing to prevent him from disposing of his displacement 
in the worst possible form — a wine glass section of great 
beam and draft, practically a scow with a thick fin," and 
you add, "The rule would probably produce a yacht of 
large displacement and sail area, of short waterline, with 
extreme beam and draft, and very shoal middle body." 
Well, sir, I am fully convinced that the above opinion is 
^erroneous. First, there is n*o "maximum displacement 
in a class." It is a matter of choice for the designer. He 
can take as much or as little as he likes, but assuming that 
two designers for same class select the same displace- 
ment to work to, and that this selection is a generous 
vdispiacement in order to obtain a generous sail plan, then 
I say that the designer who follows your lead, as indi- 
cated ab?B"e. would be beaten by a designer who adopted 
a .shipshape ■midship;. section. The two designs would 
be'^of. the' same . length on the waterline, the maximum 
'all-ow.edi' for the class., and j^our remark re "a short water- 
rline'.'- is not uridersto.od. ■ We therefore have two designs 
■^ach of the same L.W.L., of same D. in tons, of same S. 
'but one has a .".wine- glass section" and the other the usual 
section of a -British -yacht twenty -j'ears ago, sailing under 
the so-called Thames tonnage rule. Inasinuch as . the 
jdriving- powers are. equal and. the displacements, driven 
ar-e.eqijal, it. seenas to fiie that so . far as these two designs 
Vare.eoHcerneC the one- Which offers the. smaller amount of 
■ jesistance to motion due to shape, and shape alone, will 
.Vwih. In , this connection, smaller immersed surface is 
'iqjpoftant in light winds ; and a shape which produces 
hut small wave disturbance when driven hard is important 
^ in hard winds ; in moderate winds skin friction and shape 
^wpuld combine to form the resultant of resistance. I am 
"I'therefore confident that the shipshape boat would win in 
./.light weather every time, bar accidents, and I think she 
would win every time in moderate breezes. When hard 
driven the shallower body might, if well designed, be the 
faster. Of course, the problem is not so simple as the 
above example, but I took you on your own selected 
ground — a good displacement. The real problem will be 
whether the shipshape boats of good . displacement will 
'score over the section you describe, but possessing small 
displacement. I think they would, but not in a reaching 
course with a fresh wind. Some prizes would still go 
to the present style of boat. But there cannot be two 
opinions as to the tendency of my rule — viz., to en- 
courage the building of racing yachts to a good and health- 
ftil scantling, and of a .shipshape section, as they must 
win sometimes under the conditions I pronose. 
J. T. BUCKNILL. 
April 15, 
We are glad to hear from Col. Bucknill in reply to our 
criticism, as - the most serious difficulty connected with 
the measurement question is the lack of interest on the 
'part of practical yacht sailors and owners and the im- 
■ possibility of- maintaining a thorough discussion. The 
■ two points.:, touched on in the above letter are necessarily 
'very largely matters, of opinion that can only be decided 
' finally by practical tests. As to the actual weighing of 
■ Jr&'chts, we can only repeat our original statement, that 
: from our knowledge of the conditions on this side and of 
the building yards, there would be no small amount of 
' difficulty in weighing the racing fleet, even the smaller 
■ .division. The racing on the Solent is confined exclusively 
•'to racing boats, built and kept for the purpose, well 
"known to all racing men, and most' of them but three or 
four years old. The fleets to be handled on this side are 
' of different composition, many of them being compara- 
• tiyely old boats and not built and u.sed exclusively for 
•■■racing. Col. BtickniU disposes of . this class by the pro- 
.'■i)DsaI to let them- race- under the present Seawanhaka rule 
''or;.un.der any, rule they may select; but this would, not 
:'.=.answer= here., where such boats make up a very large part 
- of the general racing fleet. Even if it were possible to 
..obtain accurateh'- and conveniently the weight of every 
.■small yacht built for racing within the past three years, 
there would still be hundreds of small yachts throughout 
the country whose weight is not known and cannot easily 
be ascertained. The owners of these yachts and the 
I -members of the many local clubs are to-day. as a rule, de- 
■ sirous of following the lead of the principal racing clubs 
on the coast.'in matters of measurement, racing rules, etc.. 
and any rule adopted by the latter clubs should be of such 
nature as to be fitted to all American clubs. The first 
requisite in this country is a good rule of measurement 
for all cabin yachts of from 30ft. l.w.l. upward to the 90- 
footers and the big schooners, that will encourage a 
moderate type rather than the fin-keel, and that can be 
applied to all yachts with as little difficulty as possible. 
We believe, and Col. Bucknill will probably concede, that 
the displacement by actual weighing is not to be easily 
obtained in the case of the larger yachts and of the small 
yachts other than the strictly racing boats in certain 
localities, such as the 30-footers at Newport and the 
raceabouts at Boston. 
As to the type likely to develop under the proposed 
rule, we have seen so much of late years in the way of 
the evasion of L.W.L. length in the scow form and of the 
advantages of power derived from the levers alone where 
they go free, that we should look for a similar develop- 
ment even where the sail is related to the displacement 
under the rule. In our reference to a short waterline, we 
were assuming that the designer on the class limit of 
\yaterline, whatever it might be, would select a relatively 
large sail area, accompanied by large breadth and draft, 
thus making a proportionately short waterline. Of course 
he would be compelled to take too much displacement for- 
an extreme fin-keel scow, but he might distribute this 
displacement in such a way as to produce a relatively shoal 
body about the floors and garboards, so that there would 
be a lack of reasonable headroom. As to the area of 
immersed surface which Col. Bucknill relies on as a 
deterrent, while it would naturally be greater in the 
imaginary extreme type than in the normal boat, the shoal 
body of the former would admit of a liberal cutting away 
of the deadwoods, as in all of the fin or semi-fin type ; 
■while the deeper and fuller section would of necesity carry 
with it a generous area of deadwood at each end, so that 
the difference in area would be much less than might be 
supposed at first sight. 
We quite agree with the proposition that the moderate 
type would win sometimes ; it may even be that it would 
win in the majority of races; but we have little doubt 
that a keen designer looking only to the one point of 
winning races under the rule would turn out such a 
machine as we have tried to indicate in a general way, and 
that she would win often enough to raise many doubts as 
to the expediency of building a better type of yacht for 
racing. _ . . , 
Our position in the me.asiirement question is a radical 
one ; we favor a rule that will discriminate positively and 
strongly on the side of the moderate type of yacht, both 
keel and centerboard, in vogue ten years ago, this to be 
the principal rule for all clubs. If there are still yachts- 
men who wish to build machines of extreme dimensions 
and dangerously light construction, like Defender and 
many of the smaller fin-keels, a separate racing division 
should be established for them. The interests of the 
majority to-day demand yachts of durable and permanent, 
construction, and of a form such as will_ make them 
available for other uses after they are outbuilt as racers; 
in other words, the man who builds a yacht must get 
more for his money through the ability to sell her for a 
reasonable sum when he has done with her as a racer. 
The schooner Iroquois, of only Soft, l.w.l., launched in 
t886, sold the other day for •$20,000. How much will 
'some of the newer yachts of much gr.eater first cost be 
worth when they are half her age? Yachtsmen as a 
class .are willing' to-day to pay high prices for craft of 
.good' design, but in spite of all that is said about_.speed, it 
is plain that they one and all Avant more for their money 
in the shape of a reasonable sale value than they can get 
with the up-to-date fin-keel racing basket. 
Limit of Size in Single-Hand Craft, 
The wonderful voyage of Capt. Slocum in the sloop 
Spray around the world single-handed has among other 
things demonstrated how much can be done by a bold 
and skillful sailor. Such work, however, is by no means 
a criterion of what may reasonably and properly be 
attempted by the average skillful amateur, and it by no 
nteans settles the important question of the most de- 
sirable size of craft for single-hand cruising on the sea. 
The two fathers of the sport, the late Capt. John Mac- 
Gregor and the late R. T. McMuUen, believed in com- 
paratively small boats, of four to five tons, and most men 
would probably accept the latter figure as a fair limit. 
This standard is, however, by no means acceptable to 
one of the leading single-hand cruisers of the time, Mr. 
Frank Cowper, who writes as follows to The Yachts- 
man : - _ . 
Undine, which I have just sold, and which I designed 
expressly for a thoroughly comfortable, all-round, whole- 
some single-handed cruiser, is registered at 14.30 tons 
and appears in Lloyds as 18 tons. I consider that this size 
can be handled by any one who knows anything of a 
boat quite as easily as a 5-tonner, if she is ketch-rigged. 
In Undine I have' sailed in all the waters into which I 
took the Ladv Harvey, except the Scotch and Irish. She 
has been, however, into even more dangerous regions, 
for I consider the Channel Islands, the Bay of St. Malo, 
the Ranee to Dinan, and from Cap Frehel to the Sept- 
Isles, including the Bale de St. Brieue, with all its sunken 
dangers, far more risky than even the Orkneys or Scarba 
Sound. In fact, I think that one could not find a more 
dangerous cruising ground than that little rock-strewn 
patch of sea bounded by a line from the Casquets to 
Cap la Hougue on the north, and from the same rocks 
to Brehat Island on the west; yet, absolutely alone, and 
with the greatest pleasure and comfort, I took Undine in 
and out of these rocks. The Pass Percee. Sark, Al- 
derney Race, whele I had to anchor, the Miniquiers, and 
'many'other stony grounds, were all explored by her; and 
I -never had any accident or even contretemps, while she 
would eiTter .such crowded and for a single-handed man 
rather difficult harbors as Dover, Torquay, Dartmouth, 
Weymouth, Portsmouth, with the greatest ease and 
confidence. I do not think that either risk or arduous- 
ness is necessarily increased with size, of course up to a 
certain limit, while there is no comparison between the 
comfort enjoyed by the skipper of such a boat as 
Undine, and the possessor of a S-tonner. iln st^ph a. boat 
a man can practically go anywhere, and face a good deal 
of bad weather — in fact, I think almost any bad weather- 
provided he has plenty of sea room and sound gear. 
Why should one limit one's comfort to one small 
cabin, with not sufficient head room, when two cabins 
with 6ft. head room and ample accommodation can as 
readily be owned? In Undine, nearly 50ft. over all and 
10ft. breadth, I possessed every comfort I had on board 
the Lady Harvey (30 tons), with the added convenience 
that she drew only 5ft. 3in. The comfort which such a 
boat gives is far and away out of all proportion to the 
slight strain of stowing away an anchor sometimes 
causes. 
As regards risk, there is certainly far more in attempt- 
ing such cruises in a small boat than there is in a large 
one, and for arduousness, I know that I have panted 
much more and been much more put to it when getting 
under way in a small boat than I have with a large, 
simply because she was much more lively and things 
had to be done in a small space and with less certainty 
that the boat would give one time to finish. ' 
No; I say get as big a boat as you can, and that will 
give yoit all the comfort possible, and you will never 
repent it. Only she must be ketch-rigged to be easily 
handled. 
Most men would consider Undine — ^3Sft. l.w.l. and toft. 
7in. breadth, and 18 tons measurement — entirely too large 
for single-hand work, but Mr. Cowper has sailed her 
alone for three years about the English Channel and the 
French coast, and is certainly qualified to speak from 
experience. Only a little smaller is the single-hander 
Christopher Columbus, owned by Capt. Isaac L. Church, 
of Tiverton, R. I., and used off shore outside Martha's 
Vineyard and Nantucket. She is about 40ft, over all, 
gft. breadth and has a cabin house 15ft. long, with full 
head room. In rig she is between a ketch and a schooner, 
the mainsail and foresail being practically of the same 
size, the latter having a lug foot. She carries double 
headsails. One important point about her rig is the 
absence of shrouds, there being onlj'' the headstays. The 
masts are long, but the gaffs are very short. 
The fact seems to be that a man of average strength 
and skill can safely and comfortably handle zJone a ves- 
sel of upward of 20 tons, provided that the model is right, 
being specially designed for the purpose, and that she is 
properly rigged. The best rig seei-ns to be the ketch or 
schooner, with double head rig, no topsails, light spars 
and as simple gear as can be worked effectively. The 
average single-hander will, for various reasons, restrict 
himself to something of the canoe-yawl and canoe-yacht 
type, tmder rather than over 5 tons, but there is good 
reason to believe that if he can afford a larger boat 
giving a far greater araout of comfort, he can handle her 
to as good advantage as the smaller one. 
Canoeing for Yachtsmen. 
The modern sailing canoe, such as the one illustrated 
last week, has much to reconnnend it to those other than 
canoeists who desire a small and handy craft for occa- 
sional sailing. With many of the advantages of the rater 
or half-rater, the canoe possesses the additional charm of 
being strictly a one-man craft, to be handled by the 
owner alone, without the aid of a paid hand. The follow- 
ing, from the Field, is written by an old yachtsman, Mr. 
W, Baden- PoweU, who is at the same time a canoeist. 
The canoe is easily carried at the davits and may be 
made a source of pleasure at all times when it is not 
desired to get under way in the larger craft. 
Comparatively few yachting men are aware of the 
sport which is going forward in sailing canoes; the 
majority have never seen a sailing canoe, while others 
draw on their memory of the sailing of the old type of 
"main and mizzen" craft with crew lying down below, 
or of the crank hike-out plank-balanced racing machine. 
As a matter of fact, round about Easter is just the time 
in which the yacht owners could thoroughly enjoy canoe 
sailing. Salmon fishing is by no means every man's 
game at this season of the year; most rivers hold a fair 
share of snow water, and only those who wade deep all 
day know how the cold strains the system, to say nothing 
of the annoying frequency of contests with worthless 
kelts, and the shivering sleet squalls which in Scotland 
do duty as April showers. The yachts are not yet fitted 
out, and few owners, except the amateur single-handers, 
do more than pay a flying visit to the yacht yard while 
fitting out is going on. ^ ... 
We cannot doubt that if yachtsmen were to visit Ted- 
dington Reach on the Thames, a mere twelve miles from 
London, at the time of any of the above named fixtures of 
the Royal Canoe Club, they would return to town with a 
vastly changed notion of the sport of canoe sailing. Not 
only, perhaps, as to canoe sailing in itself, but of the sport 
of sailing. We have on more than one occasion asserted, 
and perhaps assertion is a dangerous and improper thing, 
but we have asserted, and still do so, that for pure sailing 
there is none better to be got than in a really up-to-date 
sailing canoe. We have sailed in and sailed and owned 
pretty nearly, all classes of yachts, but in none of them 
can one enjoy fully unfettered sailing. Even in a half- 
rater or i8-linear-footer the owner is to a large extent 
dependent on his amateur or professional crew for suc- 
cess in racing, and for needful aid in cruising.. ■ If 'he 
goes in for regular racing, such as on the Solent, he is 
barely allowed to be his own master; his "crew" will 
insinuate a lot. it may even amount to open mutiny: 
whereas in heavy tonnage racing the owner is really only 
a paymaster, allowed by his crew to be on board for a 
limited time, except in a very few cases where the owner 
is actually master. The art of sailing and the handling 
of the vessel and the maneuvers in the race will be just 
the same in the canoe as in the class rater, with, per- 
haps, two additions, that everything will have to be done 
in quicker time, whether it be thought, decision or action, 
in the canoe, and without any prompting suggestions from 
a 'orize-aspiring paid hand. 
The up-to-date cruising class canOe is, in every way 
necessary to sailing, an absolute little rater; her rig is the 
same, only far more refined and perfect; her hull is as 
carefully modeled, designed and built ; her ballasting and 
other equipment is more elaborate, and her powers of 
endurance, her handiness and her soeed are compara- 
tively far ahead of the raters. That is to say, it is well 
